Themes: tell me if I'm wrong... (I'm not!)

So... I haven't written anything for a while. I always had a few ideas on the tip of my brain, to write about... but with having moved recently to a 160 year-old house with a lot of land that hadn't been landscaped in any shape or form for God-knows-how-many years, I've been otherwise busy.

So, today, I thought I'd introduce "themes" to this blog. Themes is intended to be about 'observations; trends' as you'd see them every day on the roads. It's not really about my opinion, more just observations of how certain cars attract certain drivers and how they all share the same behaviour.

The first theme: Cars that you will never see going fast... or even as fast as the posted speed limit. You know these cars. You're always stuck behind them, doing 10-under the limit when you're actually in a hurry to get to work or when you're stuck behind them because of a double yellow-line.

1: Toyota Corollla: It seems with the Corolla, there's an obligation to be a terrified, middle-aged Asian woman who clearly doesn't know where the hell she's going. The one who is always in the turning lane, who then merges back into the faster lane of traffic but while doing something like 40-less than all of us while her turn-signal still blinks for that never-happened right-turn!

2: Almost every Buick, (except the Enclave): Ever notice how that Gold-tinted Buick "land-yacht" is almost always being driven by a 90 year-old, Fedora-wearing gentleman who can barely see over the steering wheel?! It's always someone who is too old to not only see over the sterring wheel, but has no concept of the size of their vehicle; no understanding that 40kph is NOTHING like 40mph; and they're always oblivious to that left-turn signal blinking away for the last 25 minutes!

3: Toyota Camry: Always driven by a middle-aged Caucasian woman who thinks her car's the size of Noah's Arc and that equates to start braking 100 meters before the Stop sign. They also always use their turn signal and move over into your lane without EVER looking in the mirror! And then when you use your horn to advise her that she's about to force you into attempting to defy the law of physics that dictates that 'no two objects can occupy the same space at the same time', she terrifyingly over-reacts and almost drives into the ditch and almost taking the next three cars behind with her!

4: Toyota Prius: WHO CARES?!!

5: Electric scooters: WHY THE HELL ARE THESE THINGS ALLOWED ON THE ROAD?!?!?

6: Cop cars on patrol: I AM sure that these guys just love driving at a ridiculously-below-the-limit speed just to see if anyone will dare pass them, even if it's well-below the allowed limit.

7: Honda Accord 4-cylinder, 4-door: They're always green or beige and are incapable to go as much as the posted limit for reasons I cannot honestly imagine.

8: An empty schoolbus: why are they going so slow when they're empty?!

Demographics: they're almost always wrong

Demographics: the science behind marketing a car, ie: who will this car appeal to? A Buick LeSabre: retirees. A Chevy Cobalt: a teenager. A Mercedes C-Class: a well-to-do 20-something. Any Subaru: tree-huggers.

The above notations stand true. But for the most part, they're wrong too. Take for example, the Chrysler 300C. Aimed at the 65 year-old and over. Instead, every big-city pimp bought one and now it's the most popular vehicle among the gangland-crowd.

It's actually no longer about the skin-tone, age, or employment group that suggests who will buy what car. It's all about the attitude or more specifically, the ineptitude.

So here's how I see them:

Any 1-series BMWs; Well-to-do 20-somethings who want to be hip without realizing they could have bought an Audi A4 and not kill themselves in the first fast corner they try in winter.

Subarus: For those who can't afford Volvos.

Volvos: For those who can't afford a BMW 5-series.

Volkswagens: For people who used to own a Subaru.

Audis: For those who know they can't drive and depend on the car to make up for their short-comings in driver-experience.

Mercedes: For those who can afford them but don't know how to drive 10 km/h above the speed limit.

Toyotas: For the most boring people on the planet.

Hondas: For those who can't think for themselves and look beyond the marketing.

BMW 3-series: As Jeremy Clarkson of Top Gear would say: "Coqs!" People who think they know how to drive until they unleash all that horsepower and end up in the ass-end of a minivan!

Nissans: For those who want to be jussssssst a lil' different.

Buicks: For those people who are waiting to die and hopefully, take you with them when they drive through those red lights.

Nissan Cubes: Weirdos.

Corvettes: There's no way around it, they ARE trying to make up for something... but just what that is, I don't know.

Chevy Cobalts: For those who think they look cool driving fast while laying practically in the backseat. (You know who they are).

F*rds: Who cares!

Dodge Rams or F*rd F150 pickup trucks: For those who think they can drive a pickup like a car.... until it flips over.

Minivans: Suckers!

Any Supercars: Remember, just because you can afford it, DOESN'T mean you know how to drive it!

Toyota Prius' or Honda Insights: Go back to British Columbia or Seattle!! Leonardo's hosting a Sushi Bar tonight!

Lexus': For people with money but no real aspirations to drive.

Infinitis: For people who wish they could buy a BMW.

Hummers: For those pimps who have too much money and not enough brains to know where best to spend it.

Honda Fits: For people with no identity and no desire to have one either.

Mustangs: For people who should have been born in Quebec.

Pontiacs: For people who should have been born in Quebec.

Honda Civics: The second most boring people in the world.

Hyundais: For people who don't want to be suckered into buying Japanese.

Land Rovers: For people who can buy an extremely-capable SUV but are too terrified to ever drive it off-road.

Saturns: For those people who actually believed they weren't buying GM.

Mazdas: For those people who don't know they're buying a F*rd.

Jaguars: For those people who don't know they're buying a F*rd.

Kias: For those people who can't afford a Hyundai.

Toyota Echos: For those people who don't really need a car.

Mini Coopers: For those people who will never have children.

Smart cars: For those people who should never have children.

What's what...

Ever notice how one car looks ka-pow in one color but another model looks completely alien in the same color? Some colors ate just made for those vehicles. Let me explain: not EVERY Ferrari looks good in the infamous Ferrari Red. Here's a few examples:

Ferrari F430: Metallic Blue
Ferrari Testarossa: White
Buick Enclave: Brown
New Camaro: "Bumble-Bee" Yellow
Chrysler 300C: Teal Green
Jeep Wrangler: Sahara Green & Tan
Dodge Magnum SRT8: Red
New F*rd Mustang: Brilliant Blue
New Mazda3 Sport: Brilliant Metallic Blue
Toyota Venza: Brown
Dode Ram pickup: Red
Toyota Camry: White
Second-generation Audi A4: Deep Blue
Audi A6: Silver
Honda Civic: Silver

Simple isn't it?! Try adding some vehicles of your own choosing.

The Truth about Toyota.. and maybe the rest.

Ok, so the truth is out about Toyota. how long will it be before we hear the truth about Honda? Nissan? And the others?

I've said it repeatedly that the Japanese automakers are just not as good as they want you to believe they are. And here's this massive recall of eight models of Toyotas, that kill. The Japanese brands have been very good at two different things. Hiding their faults, product-deficiencies; poor service; etc. The only reason everyone now knows about the sticking gas pedal is, sadly, because of the deaths of four people, one of whom was a police officer, with his family, in the midst of making a 911 call because his wife's car was accelerating out of control and they crashed in broad daylight in a very public manner.

Sadly, this is always how the truth comes out, isn't it? What if this hadn't been in daylight? What if it hadn't happened to a cop and his family? What if it had happened only to some slightly-drunk teen... it would have just been dismissed as drunk-driving and inexperience. As a matter of fact, as I write this, I wonder if it ever HAS happened? It probably has. But no one would have looked further into it, right?

And now that Toyota is recalling MILLIONS of vehicles, how are they going about this? Not too damn well it would seem. The dealerships have either had no guidance from Toyota-HQ or they just don't care. I have read numerous stories about dealerships threatening customers with process the repair of the vehicle as a repossession, thereby ruining the credit of the owner.

Here in Ottawa, some Toyota owners have become quite public about the shitty treatment they've received from local Toyota dealerships either not responding to phone calls; emails; not even responding to the local media's inquiries. They of course, are only looking out for their 'bottom-line'. So much for the highly-vaunted Toyota service. Vaporized like the sands of New Mexico in the 40s!

And now, here in Canada, there's talking of two massive class-action lawsuits for the inevitable loss of value that owners will incur because of this. Although that's a bit like putting the cart before the horse, I would never have bought a Toyota before this happened but you can bet your local beer-tab that 7/8s of these Toyota owners will NOT buy a Toyota again. And how are they going to sell these vehicles off, even long after they're repaired? This won't be quickly forgotten. hell, I still remember when there was a rampant rumor of Audis doing the same in the 80s. If true, I've never seen evidence that it was nothing more than the media's then-white-whale. But if true, back then you could just shift the tranny out of gear into neutral and that would do. Just how bad is this current defect that you can't shift your car into neutral and coast to a stop? You can bet anything that that police officer tried it for sure and it evidently didn't work, sadly.

Driving home from work today, I couldn't help but notice every Toyota around me and I can't help but wonder if that car isn't suddenly going to suddenly take off and plow into the nearest light standard. Seriously, if you think about it, you can't not wonder if you and some poor single-mom or some senior aren't going to become a statistic, another anecdote on page 3 of your local newspaper.

We all believe in the vehicles we drive, to the point that we don't even think about it. I mean, really, c'mon, you get in your car every morning, you go to work, you come home... it's usually that easy... but now.... not so much anymore. There could be a Corolla or a Camry waiting around the bend... there has to be stricter quality controls in place. There is no way in today's modern and extensive testing of prototypes, that this never came up as a design flaw somewhere in the development stages! They would have us believe that they build these cars to the highest standards, with exacting controls and continuous development in place.

Well perhaps it's time to raise those standards ever higher! Toyota isn't alone in fault. Governments are too. Federal; provincial; state; municipal.. they all have automotive standards that the manufacturers need to meet. Perhaps those standards need to be revised, too.

Before someone else dies.

A sad truth... that made me happy!

So here's a sad truth I recently discovered: I can buy a Chrysler from F*rd and be treated better at the F*rd shop than any Chrysler dealership! How backwards is that?!

If you know me, (and if you don`t, you`ll find out if I haven`t already said so), I hate F*rd. And there's MANY reasons to do so. I love Chrysler. And I'm on my second one to prove it. But the bizarre thing is I've F*rd to thank for it!

It's like this: ever since April 1, I was driving my BMW M540i and loving every moment of it. But in the back of my mind I knew that when Autumn turned into winter, that I'd have to put it away and rely on my Caddy CTS for winter duties. Sometime during June, I went to remove the winter tires on the CTS only to find the nuts had 'frozen' to the bolts and I couldn't get the wheels off. Ok, so I brought the car home from my buddy's place and was terrified the entire drive back. The steering wheel was doing anything it wanted; the brakes were nearly non-existent, and so on.

It was a horrible drive home and then I took it to Canadian Tire to have the bolts drilled out and replaced. While it was there, I was informed of over $3000-worth of repairs it needed. This car was a nightmare from the beginning and had cost us well over $2500-worth of repairs prior to this. We decided it needed to go. So began the search for a newer vehicle to replace it.

Among the vehicular choices were the Audi A4/A6; Hummer H2; Infiniti FX 35/45 and G35x; Chrysler 300C AWD; and a variety of other models. After an exhaustive search and some useless guidance and time-wasting by our bank, we had narrowed it down to the Infinitis and Chrysler 300s. I posted my car for sale on Autocatch and Kijiji and also a few ads looking for an Infiniti FX and Chrysler 300C.

One day, someone sent me a response via Kijiji that there was an Infinity FX45 at Kanata F*rd. Ok, so why not, I thought, and went to see the FX. When I got there, I came across the gorgeous red 300C you see in the pic above this story. Well, I was there primarily for the FX but I decided to try this 300C. Listed at $22,000 for a 2007, that was a damn good price and with only 50,000kms, the mileage was even better. I took it out, discovered an unknown feature of automated high-beams and found the car drove like it just came off the showroom floor.

So I went back home and discussed it with our revised post-bank BS (take that TD Bank!), budget and then I noticed there was a White 300C AWD at Capital Dodge. I had been there at the beginning of the summer and had tried to purchase it only to find out that the final tally after factoring-in the balance owed on the CTS, that it would be too expensive. However, before coming to that conclusion, the guy I was dealing with was a bit of a jackass, jerking us around, playing up the purchase, the car's many attributes, (and it WAS WELL-EQUIPPED: Nav; 6-cd; AWD; Bluetooth and low mileage), I advised him I'd come back in the afternoon with a down-payment. Well, I returned later and he was gone, nowhere to be found. No one knew where he was. I had to out to the in-laws that evening so when Monday came around, I called him, wondering why he didn't call me on the Saturday after leaving my mobile number with the receptionist. Anyway, when I did get a hold of him, he just flat-out said it would be too expensive for our budget. So the idea here was that we weren't worth the time to call back or to continue discussing it.

So, this happened after I had a horrible experience with this dealership in the Spring in which the MANAGER insultingly said out loud, "..and here is where the sales process comes to an end", when I told him the CTS had 200,000+ kilometers on it. I was so insulted, that I wrote to Chrysler Canada a letter of complaint.

Anyway, I'm getting off-track here. So, unintentionally, we ended up dealing with the same salesman for the same car, because IT DIDN'T SELL DURING THE ENTIRE SUMMER! I went to look at it, drive it and though it was a bit rougher in the driving, (the tranny was slamming into its gears), I was ready to buy it. Of course, this jerk had to argue that the car was fine, "nothing wrong when I drove it earlier", yeah right, do you KNOW WHO YOU'RE dealing with?!!

So, we were to go see our bank to get an idea of what they could do for us per-month-wise and on that day, I get an email from this guy saying the car was sold. Well I watch Autocatch thoroughly through the day to see what has been uploaded, what has sold; etc. I went immediately to see if it had been identified as sold and there it was, plain as day, STILL for sale! And so it remained for a week. So he lied. Didn't even have the balls to call... he'd rather lose a sale than deal with someone who knows cars!

And so, back to the web I went and onto Kanata F*rd's website and lo, they dropped their red 300C to $18,000! Bam, I was on it! I went to see it again and there on the mirror was a tag for $27,000!! HUH?!! Anyway, when I talked to the salesman again, (Blair), he said someone had put it there because they couldn't find the other one. So, again I went back to the bank and within LESS-than-10 minutes, I walked out of the meeting having had enough of TD Bank's crap. I went back to Kanata F*rd, met with the finance manager; we did the figures and put down $500. Within 10 minutes, we were approved! All through this, the salesman answered ALL my questions, never treated me like some dork who thinks he knows something about cars. The finance manager gave us the low-down on what to expect from the bank; what they could do; what the bank wouldn't do; etc.

All through the summer, I went to multiple Chrysler dealerships; surprisingly three times to Capital Dodge despite their shitty and personally-offensive attitudes! I only went for the cars, not for the personnel. Southbank made a few half-hearted attempts at finding me the car I wanted, but never really met my criteria. Dilawri was NEVER on my radar, their prices were always way too high. And their service department are just jackasses not prepared to help a potential customer when I went to them with the VIN in order to find out what warranty-based work had been done on the car and how much warranty remained. They said it was due to privacy laws in regards to the previous owner. Give me a damn break, I don't care who owned it, I just wanted to know what had been done and what was left! BMW gave me that info OVER THE PHONE when I researched the 540! Kanata F*rd answered ALL my questions, even explaining the $4000 drop in price from one day to the next. I even asked them to find out about the warranty, hoping that perhaps professional courtesy between dealerships would help them get the info. And they did... AFTER WE BOUGHT THE CAR!!! At that point, they could have stopped 'working for us', the car was sold. But no, they DID find out and gave me the info requested.

All this is to say, the irony of buying my favorite domestic vehicle from my most-hated of brands is not lost on me! I hate F*rd, always have, always will. But the people made the difference! And in today's world, why is it we have to be struck-dumbfounded when we encounter excellent service?! Whatever the case may be, F*rd gpt my money, they have my endorsement! I told them twice, that I would never buy a F*rd but I WILL buy another car from them any day! I love my Chrysler 300C but damnit Chrysler, you need to review who you hire or send them to some sort of Disney-based customer service seminars because with one exception, we were treated like we were wasting their time! And right now, Chrysler doesn't need that rep.

I have the car I've wanted for the last 5 years but I had to buy it from the company I hate the most. Ironic you say?!! F*rd obviously knows how to treat customers, NO MATTER WHAT BRAND OF VEHICLE THEY ARE THERE TO BUY!! They even gave us free lifetime oil-changes!

Kudos to you, Kanata F*rd, you have my vote. And Chrysler: take note!

A V8 more economical than a 4-cylinder? Believe it!

Stay tuned, an interesting article that PROVES my theory on power-to-weight ratios are REALLY where a car's fuel economy is decided, long before you turn the key!!

So here it is: due to a mechanical repair that I didn't have time to invest in, I had to rent a car to go to Montreal to get my son. To keep costs low with a rental, i rented the second-lowest class of car available: a Pontiac G5; basic 4-door; 4-cylinder; bare-bones vehicle. I as lucky to have Cruise Control, (as I later found out).

So here I am, cruise at 120/kph towards Montreal, the usual round-trip comes out to about 6 hours on a good day. This vehicle has a fuel-tank of about 65 liters, about two less than my 2002 BMW M540i; running with a 2.2 liter 4-cylinder. The logic and the common social belief is that the smaller the engine, the better the fuel economy. Well not really.

Ottawa-Montreal-Ottawa consumed one FULL tank with the G5. With my BMW's 4.4 liter V8: 1/2 tank. Why is that, then? Heavier car; bigger engine! Physics. Power-to-weight ratio. In simpler terms, each cylinder had less weight to move per-cylinder unlike the 4-cylinder. And this is with the same number of gears in both transmissions.

Just goes to prove, just because it`s common belief or `popular belief`, that doesn`t make it so, nor right. As an example, building a Prius does more harm to the environment BEFORE it is even on the road than if I spent a year driving my BMW, (which I don`t, I only use it 5 months out of the year and then it goes into winter-storage).

So, again as I`ve said so many times, don`t be a sheep, don`t follow the crowd, rad up on topics of interest, learn the truth, don`t believe everything without learning more about it.

And to those detractors who still want to bash V8s; why don`t you go for a ride on your diesel-chugging GreenPeace Rainbow Warriors and protest against the disinformation Toyota and other `sayers-of-nay` have spread and turned fiction to fact. Look beyond the social-programming! Make up your own mind with facts, not belief, not fiction.

Times are 'a changin'

Once there were three mighty automotive giants in North America... and then these little companies from across the two great oceans eyed us and said, "hmm, maybe we could do something with that market over there."

The Italians, the French, the Brits, the Germans, the Russians and the Swedes; they all say this huge market and expressed a thought: "we can sell some cars over there." And so it was with the arrival of Alfa Romeo; Ferrari; Fiat; Citroen, Renault, Peugeot; Jaguar, Morgan, Triumph, Aston Martin; Land Rover; Mercedes, BMW, Volkswagen; Skoda, Lada; Volvo, Saab, etc.

And they came at the right time. Back then, (in the 50s/60s), North American cars were built well but they were huge and gas guzzlers and no attention to the environment or the passengers' safety. Volvo was the first to change that by adding this unheard-of device called the seat belt. Then crumple-zones, allowing the car to absorb the energies of the impact, instead of conveying it directly to the passengers.

And these new 'immigrant vehicles' did everything so differently. In the 50s, who would want to buy a tiny little Triumph when your neighbor had a 25-foot-long Buick Roadmaster that weighed in at about three tons and took a week to come to a stop. But prevail they did. Hindsight is 20/20 but isn't it always those who choose to do the one thing differently than others who usually trump the norm?!

Here we are, 60 years later give-or-take a few, and some of those foreign cars are gone from North American shores. Some of the American brands are gone too. Packard; Dusenberg, AMC (American Motors Corp.); Plymouth. And now, Pontiac and Oldsmobile are gone. Mercury is dying a slow but assured death.

Was it that the North American cars weren't as good as the foreign ones? Was it that the foreign ones were less costly to run? Maybe a yes to all of the above and more. But here we are and now some of these companies have asked and received money from the respective governments to stay in business. (Must be like Christmas in Detroit).

But now, the 'foreign is better' belief has taken a down turn too. When you look at statistics, really look at them, you see the truth. Honda and Toyota, not as good as they once were. NOT BAD, but NOT as good! Nissan and Suzuki are the quirky Japanese brands that still manage to stay alive despite having some oddball products out there.

And then someone had a thought in a boardroom somewhere in Yokohama or Tokyo and it went something like this: "let's take our existing products, make them larger, more efficient, swimming in leather, better than the regularly-branded products, re-name them and target the upper-middle-class." And there you have the emergence of Lexus, cars that were FAR better than the Toyotas they were based on. Acura and Infiniti belonging to Honda and Nissan. Mazda, Suzuki and Subaru just didn't have the capital to start their own luxury brands.

So here's a question: why didn't you just make your Camry AS good as you made the Lexus LS400?! 17 years on and these original Lexus' are still on the road in very good shape! Acura never succeeded in establishing their luxury marquees as well as Toyota and Nissan did. They're not bad products but they weren't successful in establishing Acuras as not being reworked Accords and Civics.

So where am I going with all this? I don't really know. I can say this: since I was a teen, I often wondered, is there the perfect car? It would be foolish to say yes. There is no perfect car. There are as many cars to choose from in what they deliver to the customer as there are customers who buy them. Let's look at it this way: take a two-million dollar Bugatti Veyron as a starting example. 1001 horsepower, Quad-turbocharged V16, fastest production car in the world and it's an automatic. Anyone could drive it. It also has All-wheel-drive, so it's good for traction. But it IS $2,000,000 and it does have 1001 horsepower which means you could kill yourself just backing out of your own driveway.

Porsche's Cayenne Turbo S is another example. Extremely expensive, incredible power from that engine and fantastic traction with the advantage of it being an AWD SUV. But it's considered to be one of the ugliest vehicles on the road. And that engine is incredibly expensive to repair. Take ANY Ferrari and it has three main things going against them: They're expensive to buy; most of their owners don't know how to drive them; and EVERY speed-bump on the planet is their enemy.

Without going way overboard on naming every products' downfall, the truth is that EVERY CAR IN THE WORLD has a shortcoming. I like the BMW M5. The current model has amazing statistics working in its favor but the body's styling has proven itself to be its negative point. Someone else might like a Ferrari F430... but it only seats 2 and again, watch out for speed bumps! Another person likes a Hummer but the current models aren't even actually Hummers, they're a Chevy Tahoe and the S10 pickup trucks in disguise.

But IS THERE A PERFECT CAR?? Ask 100 people and you'll get 100 different answers. What matters is what it brings to YOU! I currently drive a 2002 BMW M 540i. It looks fantastic, it bloody well moves like nobody's business and there are so many well thought-out features aboard. But it has a few niggles too: the back seat won't fold flat, so that restricts the cargo capacity of the car. The engine only takes Premium fuel. And when something goes wrong with the engine, it's costly. Would I trade it for something else? Maybe. But whatever I'd choose, it too would have shortcomings.

So it's like this: Do you like American cars? Do you like sports-sedans? Do you like only Italian cars? Trucks? SUVs? So on and so forth. Do you like only European vehicles? Classic from the 50s and the 60s? Would I drive one of those 1960s Volvos, tiny and tin-like? YUP! And I know it'd be a hoot!

Today's posting wasn't a rant. I was just trying to put into words some of the thoughts that have been with me for years. Conclusion: there is no perfect car, there is only the perfect car FOR YOU!

Now, get out there and go for a ride, summer's almost over!