https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1958-ford-f-850-super-duty/ 
Posted on 06/07/2024 11:36:29 AM PDT by karpov
It’s not just the political class. America’s fleet of cars and trucks is also getting long in the tooth. Last month a study by S&P Global Mobility reported the average age of vehicles in the U.S. was 12.6 years, up more than 14 months since 2014. Singling out passenger cars, the number jumps to a geriatric 14 years.
In the past, the average-age statistic was taken as a sign of transportation’s burden on household budgets. Those burdens remain near all-time highs. The average transaction price of a new vehicle is currently hovering around $47,000. While inflation and interest rates are backing away from recent highs, insurance premiums have soared by double digits in the past year.
Many buyers are now surfing on waves of vehicle depreciation, picking up used and off-lease cars and trucks still under warranty for thousands less than new. That’s smart. Your Dutch uncle approves. But lately another, stranger element is showing up in the numbers: a motivated belief among consumers that automakers’ latest and greatest offerings—whether powered by gasoline, batteries or a hybrid system—are inferior to the products they are replacing.
That’s different. Americans have been trained from a young age that the New is better than Old, especially coming from the car industry, the people who brought you tail fins, planned obsolescence and generous trade-in allowances. Who are these wild-eyed dissidents?
In fact, new-car deniers form a broad coalition of the unpersuaded. Some fear that new, digitally connected vehicles could expose their personal information to the Chinese—or worse, to their insurance agencies. Other modern marvels people seem eager to avoid include stop/start cycling systems, which shut off engines to save fuel when vehicles are stationary, now all but mandatory in new vehicles; continuously variable transmissions (CVTs), commonly found in compact vehicles with small-displacement engines
(Excerpt) Read more at wsj.com ...
Is that the goofy electric thing?
All that electronic crap the new cars come loaded with is a farce. Much of it fails fairly fast.
I was given a Jaguar F coupe as a rentla (not what i wanted) and the damn thing took me ten minutes to figure out how to drive with all the gismos. Reven the side mirrors had to deply, the center dash rise up, etc.
All thos little motors responding to some computer when to do their thing. Recipe for failures.
I see brand new BMWs being taken back to the dealer on flatbeds all the time here.
Easy bet it was an electrical failure.
“I see brand new BMWs being taken back to the dealer on flatbeds all the time here.”
I just saw that the other day. M4 I think.
No One Wants a New Car Now. Here’s Why.
UGLY and proof you have no taste in style.
Pre 1971 restored cars is better built has style it’s cheaper retains it’s value.
My brother told me of the nightmares his GM big diesel gave him. I thought gas engines were bad with the smog stuff.
Told me about some little tank of nystery floud that needs filling and other sensors that left him stranded.
Diesels used to be the Terminators of the road vehicles.....
There is another big problem with new cars: modules. These things which replaced all the mechanical and electrical bits in a car and can be EXTREMELY expensive to replace can also brick the vehicle when they fail or miscommunicate with the computer and in many cases no one knows why.
Go to YouTube and search “the 5700.00 taillight.”
Modules have also made assembling the car cheaper and easier with the result that very cheap but important parts are buried in, say, the dash and to get at, say, a twenty dollar plastic “air director”. (the part a h shifts air flow to the defroster or vents etc) you have to disassemble the entire dash and the airbags etc. you’re looking here at up to 3 grand in labor for something that might have been less than a hundred bucks in an earlier car. Plus the computer in many cases must be updated to any module changes or to get those airbags back on line.
We hear of junkyards (YouTube)that are starting to look like parking lots due to the still viable looking vehicles being junked because they have module problems too pricy to replace . Stay tuned. Someone predicted the new thing very soon might be kits to turn these module cars into mor analog vehicles.
“Sounds like I wouldn’t be able to warm up my car on a winter morning without it shutting off, or keep my dog cool in the summer when I make a 5 minute stop, and I might even have to keep restarting it while stuck in a traffic jam. No thanks.”
Sounds like you don’t know how it operates ...
“by having a disable switch”
There is one.
https://bringatrailer.com/listing/1958-ford-f-850-super-duty/
“All that electronic crap the new cars come loaded with is a farce. Much of it fails fairly fast.”
How fast?
“Many of them are much smaller
than cars of 15 or so years ago. “
Most of the vehicles on the road today are larger. SUV’s and PU’s.
I agree with all the objections to new cars. Too expensive and too many “improvements” that detract from the driving experience, increase costs of ownership and maintenance well beyond the value of gas saved, and reduce the useful life of the car.
The average age of my cars is 23 years. My family’s newest vehicle is an almost 16-year-old Toyota minivan. It was the last new car we bought. The next oldest vehicle is 19 years old and now my oldest, who is the same age, drives it. My own daily driver is a 2003 Lincoln Towncar with only 105k on the odometer, drives like a dream, has all the options I really want in a car and I bought it used for 90% off the original sticker. Other vehicles include a 1999 Ford truck for use as a beater/hauler, a giant 2000 Chevy Express for family trips and a 1992 Miata for fun drives on nice days. I can get into any one of them right now and have no worries taking it on a long trip but to buy all of them together today would be less than the cost of the average new car and the maintenance cost of those 6 vehicles together is easily less than half of the loan payment for the new car. Why buy new?
Last year I bought a 2018 Toyota Sequoia. It took me 8 months to find one that was the right milage and price. Spent a lot of time on line looking. I found one that had 50K miles and the dealer was asking $47K. I got them down to $45.5K. Paid cash. I am 62 and plan to make this my last vehicle. It is a Toyota truck, so I expect it to outlast me.
Unless you’re a politician...I don’t know how regular folk make it work these days.
My 2008 toyota yaris was 10 500 base new.
At the time was cheapest US car.
Yep. I remember those. We were blessed by buying our brand new 2020 Chevrolet Spark on December 31st from folks that were trying to make end of year quotas. Cost $9,400 brand new. (Well, before sales taxes anyway.) I think that the cheapest new car now may be a Nissan Versa at around $19,000.
EVs have a useful niche in the automotive market. For people with short to moderate commutes, a garage or parking place they can charge at home and another vehicle to take on long trips, an electric car is a viable option. If you have a long commute, live in a city or apartment that you can’t charge at, live in a climate with extremely cold winters or only have one vehicle the usage case is not so great. The problem is that governments are trying to shove them down our throats.
So many aspects of the market are not ready for the mass migration to electrics either. Oh well. 1970s redux.
So everyone will get a hybrid unless you're buying a corvette or a Lamborghini
Last car I saw on ads that looked cool to me was a Volvo SUV. When I went to the Volvo website the entire lineup is now electric or hybrid. I immediately and completely lost interest.
I won’t buy a non ICE in my lifetime if I have the choice.
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