I think of this every time I see one of the local 30-somethings at the grocery store walk away from her minivan and press a button on her keyfob that makes the rear door close itself. Aren’t you clever! Wait ‘till it breaks.
Deer, that’s why - they’re everywhere!
Yup, get your hands on solid made, basic, good reliable model, older cars now. They can have issues but if you avoid bad designs (known as bad overall, bad engines, bad transmissions, rusting issues, or bad electrical issues), you may fare better.
So much of new cars, under the hood, is plastic now. That stuff doesn’t do well over time, and components that used to be metal are plastic, and not lasting as long. Sometimes they break trying to get around them or removing them to fix another area/part.
Why?
Computer Complexity.
Give me a pre-‘75 American vehicle any day. No catalytic converter to be stolen, no computers, no air bags, easy to work on yourself, real chrome bumpers, and cheap repairs (if the parts are available).
Saw a u tube on this. The fly by wire nature of the new cars is a factor. There is a little plastic dingus deep inside the dash of these cars that redirects the fan flow to where the driver wants it. Being plastic it fails. The tell is a clicking sound when you set, say, the defroster, you know, so you can see. The cost of getting at this thing is somewhere near three grand. The part itself is cheap.
I bought a new Audi A4 in 2017. It has every electronic feature one could imagine. It has been rock solid for $120k miles.
And that is why I'm sticking with my 2000 Civic. Simple. And works reliably getting me from A to B (isn't that what a transportation vehicle supposed to do?)
BS
They pack those cars with propriety plastic parts made in China and worth $15 but which they charge $350 for a weird shaped headlight.
Long gone are the times of square or round sealed beam from Walmart. Now every car company MAKES you buy their junk. Some are so nasty you can even buy an after market radio anymore because many of the vehicles features are incorporated into the proprietary head unit.
Disposable cars (not made to be overhauled) with designed obsolescence (part availability over time), proprietary parts, where maintenance by the end user was an after thought in design and is discouraged, lots and lots of plastic (plastic gets brittle over time), more use of adhesives which also give out over time (example headliner). These cars are made to be expensive when they break and people have been “trained” to get a new car every 3, 5, or 6 years while they talk about saving the environment.
The modern car has become a disposable product.
It’s not the car. Tech pay has pretty much stayed flat while requiring more from the tech
Insurance and building costs are eating shops alive.
Have a 2001 beater with a heater for dump runs and other messy stuff, have kept it going with duct tape & bubble gum.
It now needs a $1,500 catalytic converter job.
That’s just parts.
Never again.
We can have cars 25+ years old that don’t need any emissions tests.
Lease depreciating stuff (new cars), buy appreciating stuff (real estate). Getting a ‘98 K1500 for just a few sheckels. No more Cat Crapola ever again.
tune up 1k
4 cyl Nissan
one plug - wire / diagnostic
350 ( the easy plug )
2 wks later
other 3 plugs - wire
650 ( remove the manifold )
runs good
My brother had a Toyota Taco pickup, maybe 8 years old. Superb truck, though it’s not in rough service. One day he fired it up and literally every dashboard warning lamp lit up. He took it in, turns out rats had munched the wiring harness. His ins wanted to total the truck! The dealer wantedk $8k to fix it, he found a better deal @ $5k which ins paid. But the good thing w/Toyota is he traded the truck with $6k for a brand new one.
Car repairs are expensive because of the pool of money created by “warranty policies”.
College costs are expensive because of the plethora of government “student loans”.
Health care costs are expensive because of the gigantic pool of money created by “health insurance”.
Auto prices are more expensive due to the reality of banks loaning money to idiots.
Later, rinse, repeat...
The cars are basically unrepairable after even a minor, low-speed accident, unless you willing to pay to essentially replace everything connected to the windshield wipers.
I loved learning how to tune up and maintain my first 2 cars. Timing, dwell, distributor cap, points, valve adjustments. Once you get good at something like this, you can tune up a car for more power, better mileage, etc.
A friend in Kalifornia has a 1970s pickup truck. He replaced the original 2 barrel carburetor with a 4 barrel. When he went to get it smogged, the creeps would not sign off since it was not original equipment. It passed all the actual tailpipe emissions tests. He put the original back, received the smog certificate, and then put the better, more effective, efficient 4 barrel carburetor back on.
This is why I’m spending so much time rehabbing my ‘95 Ford truck.
It’s currently getting a new exhaust system (headers and a larger cat for more flow).
Part of the problem is that our auto manufacturers are not really manufacturing ICE vehicles anymore. You want a new vehicle? You have to buy an EV.
I have looked at Scotty Kilmer videos and he thinks they are too complex for simple things. He was locked out of a Honda Accord because the car had only 1 key lock and it was electronic. The key lock did not have connecting rods so he could not get the key to work. He could not pop the hood or get in the trunk.
AAA had to come out and use a slim jim and then he replaced the car battery and now the key worked....
I saw another video from another youtuber and he needed to change the spark plugs. The things he had to remove off the top of the engine just to get to the spark plugs!
Scotty’s videos.
https://www.youtube.com/@scottykilmer/videos