The Crossover fad appears to be in full swing, and it seems that every Mom wants one, or something even larger? They sit higher, some have the 4WD option, and many are sold in areas where it will never snow. Many people who buy them will never leave the pavement, so what is driving the Crossover popularity? according to a few reports, crossovers give up mileage due to their higher stance, and higher drag coefficient numbers, some say about 41mpg for a more streamlined car like the Prius, VS 32 mpg for a crossover.
In the news during the last few weeks are stories of discontinued cars that seem to be more efficient than the pickups and crossovers that people want. That person who told you that you had no business driving a pickup around? Will she buy one for herself this coming year? I do keep hearing people say both the pickup and the crossovers are easier to get into and out of, maybe that’s the draw?
Where did all those people go who were insisting we all drive tiny efficient cars? With all the table pounding and endless testaments for the EVs and Hybrids, there aren’t enough real buyers to keep the well engineered Chevrolet Volt in production? Does it make you wonder about the sales potential of the Teslas? Yes, they may be a great car, but will large numbers of people shell out the money with their range limitations?
A car to keep your eye on is the Mazda crossovers, people want them, and the 2019 model promises great mileage and even lower emissions. If you’re in the business of selling cars, it’s always nice to know the difference between what people say they want, and what they’ll actually buy. Mazda may actually know that.
G
I can see the appeal of easier entering and exiting a vehicle POSSIBLY being a factor. I’ve been finding getting in and out of my Buick Century getting a bit more difficult over the years.
Pickups, crossovers, SUVs. Seems like that’s what I see most on the roads now-a-days. The thing that makes me shake my head is pickups being driven by people that probably don’t utilize it to it’s full potential. Oh well. They have the freedom to buy and drive what they want.
I have a couple of pickups and use them for hauling, pulling trailers, snow plowing etc. I don’t drive them every day but have ’em if i need ’em.
The vehicle I truly enjoy driving when it’s warm-ish (due to me needing to address possible heater blend door gaskets) is my 1993 Ford Festiva. Longer doors to make access and egress easy, GREAT MPG, can park in the smallest areas, manual everything (except brakes) and simply fun to drive. As an added bonus it’s pretty easy to work on also.
i don’t see myself EVER owning a new vehicle in my lifetime. Waaaaay more money than I’m willing to spend and unless I’m willing to pony up a few thousand for diagnostic equipment, waaaay too expensive to keep on the road for an extended period (decades).
It does seem the crossovers are appealing to all age groups.
A note on the pickups, I’m retired, my crew cab is seldom driven now, and when I do take a trip over the mountains, it gets 20mpg. There are cars that do worse. I’ve heard that the Festivas are good cars. We have the same goals, no new cars 🙂
My Mazda 626 crossed over from 1989 has 2.2 liter multi port fuel injection, advanced air fuel mixture computer controls of the day. Three dealers could not properly diagnose why electron shift transmission would shake between 1st & 2nd gear changes, in warranty. I told mechanics several lifers were ticking in AM trips to office. 18 years later personally replaced 16 hydraulic lifters/seals discovered loss of HP during shit points partially to blame. Years earlier transmission rebuilt by AMCO, electronic shift was very harsh 1st-2nd, they messed with MAS body plug wires cutting factory sealed boot away. Mazda’s require engine parts replacements, considered typical maintenance after 8-10 years no matter the millage.
2017 discovered tapping aluminum body MAS with socket wrench engine would start to die, after wife reported trouble driving to work. A cold solder joint to connector inside factory sealed MAS cover sits a ceramic PCB wiper fingers on arm swings to velocity air flow changes resistance on wiper fingers when/if it gets to computer as expected.
The 2002 Town County on Obama’s Clunkers list is even worse for electronic failures, still making payments. Let alone the head liner falling $32K vehicle when Mazda $15k head liner remains in tact 28 years later is pathetic. It ain’t no easy feat to change a head liner, harder than down links front struts twice replaced in less than 10 years. EVIC computer on T&C shows 11-14 EPA city, better on highway 29MPG when the wind is blowing same direction. Agree crossovers have easier entry to seating yet still have to step up to get AIS and they don’t swivel even a little to accommodate ones adult size body parts.
Tesla is a farce of a company when you get away from the Fanboi hyperbole and look at them critically. The cars -might- be good but a look on the Tesla forums run and frequented by the fanbois show so many problems with even purchasing, delivery, servicing, getting parts and repairs and so many other aspects of ownership. For a premium priced product in an ultra competitive market like Vehicles, that’s just not going to be tolerated by the average Buyer that does not know tesla from Cheese and a good percentage buy the vehicle on the looks and color options.
The extreme big brother interference of the company that can basically decide if your car will work or if they want to switch it off and the constant interface with the car to the company to me is scary and leads to a lot of problems again well documented in Tesla forums and other places.
Nothing about the company really adds up. The flag wavers make all sorts of excuse’s but putting the fanfare aside, as a company it’s a financial disaster. Yes, they made a profit q3 of ’18 but there was a lot of slight of hand in that and to do it again in q4 and Q1 this year and then on I cannot see happening at all. Rather than the hype about them being over run with orders, the actions of what the company does actually suggests they are trying to find customers and the growing stock piles around various sites also is not indicative of a company with more orders than it can fill at all.
There are a whole plethora of EV’s about to rain down on the market and when a car co can’t get it right when they have the market virtually to themselves, The chances of them surviving against huge competition from established brands that have the customer service and marketing Might Tesla does not is going to make Tesla a very life limited company.
Today Nissan announced an upgrade to the leaf to give it a range of 265 Miles. It will have a starting price of $30K, a number Tesla has been lying about as the cost of a model 3 for years but so far not one single car has been offered let alone sold for that price. I notice that a lot of the EV sites which champion the Tesla’s and write endless useless articles about irrelevant information on the things daily have not made any mention of the New Nissan yet. How predictable. They will and will have to but very evident who’s the favourite with them.
The whole transition from traditional fuels to electric has a Myriad of problems to over come and I have severe doubts if things will ever go all electric. It’s going to be a good 20 years before electrics even look like becoming the majority of new car sales but the problems of the move to EV is going to be nothing like the problems tesla is going to face in the next few years.
Of course when they do go down, the Fanbois will blame everything and everyone bar the erratic behaviour of the CEO, the Terrible customer service and general running of the company, the huge amounts of money squandered, the misleading of the markets and breaking the law and everything else that was seen just in the last 12 Months alone.
There is a reason that executives were leaving the company at such a rate and it was not because they thought the place was doing well or the right thing.
I have many times tried to make legitimate bets with a number of fanbois that Tesla will be gone in 5 years or less. Despite the rebukes and virtual screaming, no one is prepared to put the $1000 in an escrow account to back up their belief in their favorite cult which by definition, is exactly what Tesla has become to maybe as many as millions of believers.
Sounds like you have a beef with Elon Musk. Ideally the S model EPG was written 350 miles on single charge. How can the Leaf compete @265 even with it’s recent advances motor design & latest PM’s. All the HEV have the same 0-60 hyper rhetoric selling points, internal combustion engines easily deliver. Either way even GM has lost it’s mind spreading false narratives that HEV’s reduce carbon foot print left behind by typical combustion engines.
HEV supporters will argue spending billions converting coal power plants to natural gas somehow justifies spreading such non-sense they don’t pollute. EPA, DOE, Energy general, Trump must immediately fire for being lobbied idiots of the top 2%. The hypocrisy is the banking investment arms under Obama fundamentally restricted fair & equal technology investments & interest rates as the top %’ers have the US vested in perpetual undeclared middle east wars spending billions of tax dollars my children have to repay on top of BS student loan/ds. Otherwise the DC swamp is so deep it strangles US industrial engine momentum for NAFTA trade agreements to remain mostly one way routes for China back door’ing their products into the US markets. The Tesla is least thing to frat about!
Brett, Elon is burning up the road! I figured the stock would be around $200 today, how could I have been more wrong? Soon the EV fans will expect all of us to rebuild the grid, and build all the charging infrastructure at no cost to them? We’ll see how it goes, but the early adopters (right now) get the free ride?
It’s questionable if I should be posting stuff I’ve ignored for so long? I still think the hard part is ahead for EVs, but time tells all.