Posted on 12/23/2022 6:14:39 AM PST by Carriage Hill
It is the end of the road for mainstream rear-wheel-drive, four-door internal combustion engine cars. Kia has announced it will end production of the Stinger next year and is sending it out with a run of 1,000 Tribute Edition cars, with 400 earmarked for the U.S. It will be joined in the history books with the Dodge Charger, which is being replaced in 2024 by the all-electric Daytona Charger SRT coupe. Ford, Chevrolet and the non-luxury Japanese brands all stopped selling this type of car years ago as they transitioned to front-wheel-drive and SUV-focused lineups.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
Amazes me that Stellantis would think killing the Hemi V8 is a good idea for a brand that exists solely to sell muscle, in order to turn their product line into golf carts.
Anybody who wants to keep theirs running, I highly recommend WoolWax undercoating. It’s basically lanolin, smells good, and really prevents rust. I wish they had it when I lived back in Cleveland.
The best cars, gone.
I always thought it was strange that the Toyota Prius was nearly universally scorned by FReepers when it has some of the best automotive engineering ever.
Be sure to stock up on whips before they are outlawed.
In the same boat here but 20 miles away from town, aside from an overpriced Dollar General 7 miles away. There is a such thing as DYI electric cars these days. If diesel is still available, I could go modern Amish and take the tractor to town once a month. One town is 13 miles of gravel plus 5 of pavement. Don't have enough land to support a horse so horse and buggy are out. I think rural people will end up ride-sharing which is also something the Amish do with those 15 passenger vans.
Yes, they do want to force people into the cities where they can control them. They talk of Smart Cities but the only Smart part of it will be lots of facial recognition cameras and a requirement to carry your cell phone with you at all times and scan a QR code to enter/exit every building, to pay for things, to prove you're up to date on jabs to do any of the above etc.
It is interesting that Ford went back to rear-wheel drive on the 2020 Explorer. It would appear that FWD is not suitable for anything larger than a mid-size sedan. Also there are very few super-cars on the planet that are FWD.
In particular, those DC critters that retired over the last 6 years in order to derail Trump’s agenda and return the GOP to minority status. I would be a very awkward neighbor.
The problem with the Prius is not the engineering, it is the appearance (they are butt ugly) and the majority of the people buying them are liberals who break their arms patting themselves on their backs to congratulate themselves for saving the planet.
Really.
The new INEOS Grenadier (not sure if they are in the USA) is a spectacular body-on-frame basic SUV or pickup designed to be a work truck at a (relatively) cheap price. It’s AWD or RWD with diesel.
I see those kinds of super simple basic designs as lasting forever in some form.
My six vehicle fleet of four wheel vehicles, are classified thusly: five are rear wheel drive V-8 engine driven vehicles one of which is four wheel drive if activated.
Only one is all wheel drive four cylinder SUV. It is not clear if the SUV has better winter abilities than the much older Ford Crown Vic former police car. The Crown Vic certainly warms up in winter much faster, and is extremely stable on snow and ice.
Three are stick shift, two five speed one four speed.
Hopefully I can live with the vow of NO electric vehicles in any stable of mine. Consider how many times you would have been stranded if your vehicle behaved like the power company. Surely there isn’t anyone here who has not suffered multiple power outages summer and winter in your location?
All the smug those Piouses put out is choking.
Huge clouds of smug.
They are going to make EVs a thing by getting rid of the alternatives.
The demise of the ICE-powered sedan can be traced to the combination of three factors:
- EPA fuel efficiency standards
- vehicle safety standards
- UAW labor costs
Here's how it worked ...
1. The EPA fuel efficiency standards required auto manufacturers to sell a large number of compact cars in order to offset the lower fuel efficiency of large cars and SUVs.
2. However, the mandatory safety features made vehicles heavier, and it was more difficult to build small cars economically.
3. The combination of these factors, plus the UAW labor costs, made compact cars so expensive that the price differential between a compact and midsized sedan became very small.
4. Customers who saw a $25,000-$30,000 price tag on a compact car decided they'd rather pay $30,000-$35,000 on a midsized car from the same manufacturer.
5. The auto manufacturers were basically forced to outsource their compact car production to Third World countries and/or sell these cars at a loss in order to keep the prices low enough to make them attractive to U.S. buyers.
6. They finally gave up.
Living in the northeast I had a rear-wheel drive decades ago and will never get another; any front-wheel drive is better because the weight of the engine is over the drive wheels. Our weather is just too crappy for rear-wheel drive vehicles and motorcycles.
I’m kind of shocked to find out there was still somebody making rear-wheel-drive. I didn’t think they’d made it into the 21st century. Nobody even says a car is front wheel anymore, we just assume if it ain’t 4 it’s front.
The Toyota Pious...
All the great sports cars have always been RWD; some are now AWD, like my Jeep.
It’s really about the tires.
You can put a set of Bridgestone Blizzaks on just about anything and run like a sled dog.
Those tires are truly impressive.
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