Dan Roth  0:04  
This is wheel bearings. I'm Dan Roth from 

Rebecca Lindland  0:08  
I'm Rebecca Lindland from Rebecca drives I guess

Sam Abuelsamid  0:12  
I'm Sam Abuelsamid from guidehouse insights

Dan Roth  0:15  
well let's let's jump into it and Rebecca you driving the Infinity q50.

Rebecca Lindland  0:20  
The q 50 red sport 400 all wheel drive that does have a $800 exclusive paint job that is red. It's so so what happened I had planned on going on vacation with my friend Lorraine, her husband Gary and their four kids, four of my favorite humans. They're eight to 14 years old. And so naturally I asked for a minivan, which at the last minute the manufacturer pulled for reasons that I'm not clear on. And so I got delivered this infinity q 50. Instead, which actually, you know, it's I mean, it's definitely a plan B so The kids and I kind of talked about it because they were originally supposed to go with me on this two day drive down to Virginia and we ended up doing going with three kids the oldest in the front and then to the little ones in the back. It's it's a five seater There are five there are seatbelts for five people.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:19  
Mostly most cars have seat belts for three people in the back but cannot actually accommodate three. This is not as human beings

Rebecca Lindland  1:26  
This is not happening. I yeah, this is happening so so you know with so I had the three girls and so the eight and 10 year old were in the back with all their stuff. I did not

Dan Roth  1:37  
realize this is the only sedan Infiniti makes right now.

Unknown Speaker  1:43  
Well, you know, the 270 it's not

Dan Roth  1:45  
showing up on their site wouldn't surprise me. No, you're

Rebecca Lindland  1:47  
right. It's not Yeah, I remember well, when infinity changed to from the G to the Q and Q lineup and rename rebranded and I remember I was working at Kelley Blue Book at the time. And what ended up happening was people would search for the GE. And then when it wouldn't come up or only used, they just would shop us, they didn't even know that this car existed. And we could tell by the traffic that nobody was shopping the Q 50. Because they wanted the G. And so it was this bit, you know, they really kind of fumbled on that whole branding thing, which is unfortunate, but because this car was great, it was it was a lot of fun to drive. One of the things that I made note of both in my review and my experience with it, is it has an absolutely enormous gas tank. I mean, when I got in it was you know, the gas was filled, and I had like 480 miles of range.

Dan Roth  2:48  
So that's insane. What engine did I have to have the

Rebecca Lindland  2:54  
it's got the 3.0 liter V six, turbo, seven speed, all wheel drive. You know, it's 400 horsepower, 350 foot pounds of torque. There was there was plenty of power there. It was not great in Eco mode, which plays into the size of that of that fuel tank. So I actually ended up only getting 21.8 miles per gallon over the course of 1000 miles, of which a lot of it was highway. That's not good.

Dan Roth  3:23  
It's not good. It's not good.

Rebecca Lindland  3:25  
I was, you know, so so my friend was driving his 10 year old Toyota Sienna minivan. And he was getting about the same in that minivan. And, you know, we were just really struck by it because obviously, we were shopping to get gas for driving together. And we were probably averaging. We weren't entirely on the highway because we really were trying we had a couple of stops that we wanted to make along the way and we were trying desperately to avoid 95 which is really the only Highway Route down there. But it was still we were still On some pretty good, very empty back roads, and I was conscious of the speed we were going, I would say 55 to 60. Most of the time and very steady. You know, there weren't a lot of traffic lights, we weren't stopping. And it just that 21.8 the thing that struck me too is that so on the way back, I drove by myself because they were staying in Virginia and I had to get the car back. So I did go, I went over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge, route 13, which is a two lane divided highway. There was commercial. There were times when I was in a commercial area. But I can for the most part, this was a lot of highway and I and the mileage didn't change. I tried to put it in eco. But eco was so restrained that when I went to merge onto the highway, I had nothing there

Dan Roth  4:48  
you feel so

Rebecca Lindland  4:51  
yeah, I was like, I gotta get out of that. Exactly. I've been this red sports dad and it's not going any better. So Ico was just not fun. I mean, it wasn't fun. In some ways. It wasn't practical. It was so restrained. I did try to put it in that for when I was going through some of these commercial things to basically just try and get any kind of improvement in my fuel economy. And I just didn't get it. I mean, it was it started at 21.6. When I put it in Eco mode, on the way down, it went up to 21.8. And it pretty much stayed there. It never went above or below, which was again over 1000 miles. It's rare that we get to drive these cars that far and have that experience. So you know, that was edits actually rated. I mean looking at the Mulroney it's rated at 19 City 26 Highway 22 combined and that is 21.8 which

Dan Roth  5:46  
is exactly what I got, you know, doing a lot of highway because my my Volvo 60 was kind of like that abysmal mileage in in town. A car that should Get better mileage for its size and a big tank I think that car had a 23 gallon tank I think this one has a 20 gallon tank so you could do quite a bit of range. right but on the highway that car would actually edge up towards 28 or 30 so I'm surprised it just it like you didn't get anywhere closer to the 26 that

Rebecca Lindland  6:21  
I didn't get anywhere close to 20 seconds I just didn't and again you know I didn't reset it for the for the drive back because I really and it didn't have I couldn't get it said that trip a but I could never find trip. Yeah, it's actually more

Dan Roth  6:34  
accurate when you leave the average alone, because it's sort of like it's still compiling that average yes everybody who drives it before you will affect that average but you get a truer sort of picture.

Rebecca Lindland  6:47  
I actually reset it so this was my that thousand miles was my was so I it was it came with euro so they handed

Dan Roth  6:54  
back the credit course after I get it.

Sam Abuelsamid  6:57  
So just shows us your login

Rebecca Lindland  7:00  
But that's the thing is I was following my friend and her mating ban I was not allowed. I mean, she's not allowed but either so you know, I couldn't really I mean there were times when we hit 70 but not very often it was pretty much 60 most you

Dan Roth  7:13  
like even between the Sienna and the q? q 50. Right I see this Yes, they screwed up their numbers because we can't even get it right and then he went over to Cadillac into the same thing anyway. Exactly. But I think I would much rather be in the Infinity it's got the Infinity interiors, especially in the press cars are really nice. I'm assuming it had like light colored leather and all the fancy wood it did.

Rebecca Lindland  7:37  
It had white, closest other beautiful, absolutely beautiful not want to own it. The kids were banned from eating anything and no magic marker, a new pair of blue letters actually surprisingly family friendly because you can wipe it off. It just depends on what you're wiping off, you know. On the other.

Sam Abuelsamid  7:59  
Yes. Good. I was just gonna ask you what you thought of the infotainment system, that dual dual touchscreen system they have.

Rebecca Lindland  8:06  
I know they're really proud of it. I mean, there was, you know, all right, you know,

Sam Abuelsamid  8:13  
I could ever design

Rebecca Lindland  8:16  
so so there was two things. The first is there was no place for my phone, which Nowadays most, you know, there was a slot that was the old style coin, you know, had the felt liner that you could put a couple coins in and there was a cigarette lighter, that would have been a good spot for a phone. Instead, we ended up using one of the cupholders, which was a pain. I was using Android Auto it connected very well, and it showed up very well. However, the sound, for the most part was not through the Bluetooth. I figured out that if I turned off the sound and turned it back on. Well, while it was connected that then it came through the Bluetooth huh So that so that was one thing. The other was playing sound from from your phone speakers, you were controlling it on the screen, but it was playing out through your Bluetooth or your phone speaker

Dan Roth  9:07  
to my phone. Well, that's dumb,

Rebecca Lindland  9:09  
right? We're okay. And in order to get it to play through Bluetooth, I just turned the volume off, like in ways I had to turn the waves sound off, and then turn it back on again. And this happened repeatedly. This wasn't just one time, the whole way down and never played through. And then when I was fiddling around with how I was going to get home, I had turned the volume off. When I got in the car, I turned it back on and I jumped about a foot when she came through this is super hard. You're there okay. So and then I had stopped, you know, a couple times along the way. It was about a about seven and a half hours home. And so I would have to do that every single time. So every time I disconnected it, I'd have to turn the volume off, turn it back on again. So the other thing that I ran into issues with was that The phone to the voice control, the voice activated phone would not work. When Android Auto was attached, it literally would say to me, so if I pressed the voice activation on the steering wheel, it would say this function is not available in in your current mode or whatever. And when I pulled up the menu, it would, the phone would be grayed out. So I would have to then press the phone thing and go through my previous calls, which was clearly unsafe, like it was it so so

Dan Roth  10:40  
it was definitely if I actually wonder if you had connected straight via Bluetooth versus using Android Auto if that would have given you some of those functions back there's the new system like yeah, like you say, like, it seems. They're they're touting it and it's an improvement in some ways, but it seems like It's still got some issues to work through

Rebecca Lindland  11:03  
all the issues I'm describing, we're using Android Auto with it. The infotainment system itself was actually very, very good. So, and I would use both because again, I drove it a long time. So, you know, the directions were very good. It accounted for traffic, the, you know, the the audio was very good. So all of these issues were directly related to Android Auto was it was using an Android Auto, it again, it's, you know, I use ways for traffic and cops, let's face it, right. So, buddy, right. So you know, so from that standpoint, it works well. It's just that there was a couple of things that there were wrinkles which is very typical for my experience with Android Auto in all of these on all of these cars. So the the screen itself was fine. I did like the dual screen. One of the things I liked about it was things like you can see the weather which is very convenient. So there were there were things you know again especially right now we're waiting for a hurricane to come in the next few days driving up that coast in that area in Virginia and Delaware, Maryland. You know this time of year you can get really bad weather and we had some spectacular thunderstorms unfortunately we weren't on the road for but this this area you know as many of us is prone to really dangerous thunderstorms, lightning, things like that. So having the weather there was great. So there was benefits to having that dual screen. But again, my you know, I I would have loved to have been able to slot my phone underneath there or have a wireless charging pad, you know, things like that. The other thing so this vehicle, so the base, q 50 starts at 36 four and then of course you add destination which is like 1000 bucks or something. This the Reds Port 400 all wheel drive started at 56,000 to six but

Dan Roth  13:05  
I'm assuming the typical like infinity way is it has all the packages.

Rebecca Lindland  13:10  
It does not as I discovered, fortunately not the hard way that doesn't have adaptive cruise control. Oh really? She's

Sam Abuelsamid  13:18  
a 20 that's that's actually surprisingly common, you know, on premium cars that they don't include stuff like ACC as standard equipment. You can you get to the standard equipment now on a Corolla, or Camry, but not on a Lexus.

Rebecca Lindland  13:34  
That's the weirdest thing. It did not have adaptive cruise, which, you know, I go back and forth on adaptive cruise control. Sometimes it's useful sometimes it's not. But believe me on a trip like this, it would have been incredibly useful, especially because I'm following somebody right? So you know, the rains driving, she doesn't have you know, all the bells and whistles she doesn't have adaptive cruise control. And so her speed would would vary Just buy a couple of miles per gallon of miles per hour. But, but it was enough so that you know, I was constantly coming off a little bit and, and playing with that pedal. And adaptive cruise control would have been absolutely ideal. So I reached out to infinity because they were like, hey, how's the drive going? And I was like, wow, actually, and it's a 20 $700

Dan Roth  14:22  
package. What else is it

Unknown Speaker  14:25  
offered?

Rebecca Lindland  14:27  
Uh, let me look in. I'll look at I'll look it up and see. But yeah, they were like, Oh, yeah, that requires this package. So that but the crazy thing is that so this vehicle, so I had exclusive paint, as I mentioned, this cargo package, the carbon fiber package for 1500 and $20,

Dan Roth  14:45  
whatever carbon fiber look nice, like

Rebecca Lindland  14:49  
is 60,004 75 without adaptive cruise. I mean, and then of course, you don't have all the safety features either the lane departure warning that I mean, you have If I had a lane departure warning, it had this this weird, tiny little light

Dan Roth  15:04  
lights by the mirrors and it'll beep at you too. Right?

Rebecca Lindland  15:07  
Well, it was down it was down by the by the side mirrors. Yes, it was. Yeah. So

Sam Abuelsamid  15:14  
I pulled up the the Q 50. Building price. Okay, the proactive package is 20 $700 Yeah, that's got the direct adaptive steering ACC lane departure warning blind spot so it's all it's all it's basically all the A das features that you get standard on mainstream,

Dan Roth  15:34  
quite honestly. Like if it's got the

Sam Abuelsamid  15:37  
adaptive front lighting

Dan Roth  15:38  
and see that's a lot of crap. You don't need it. The one thing that ruins it and I'd be interested to see so your your cue 50 didn't have it was the direct adaptive searing that's the steer by wire. I don't feel nonsense. That's it did not have that. So it's probably better for it.

Rebecca Lindland  15:58  
Maybe, but yeah, it was Again, you know, looking at this, so this vehicle specs out, it's 60,004 75 that's what that thousand 25 destination, but it doesn't have these things. It doesn't have those features, as Sam says, you're going to get on far less expensive vehicles. So you know, I, and I meant to look this up and I forgot. I I don't know when this came out what year this debuted, it was about

Sam Abuelsamid  16:25  
2015 or 16. Yeah, it 250

Rebecca Lindland  16:30  
you know, the interior is showing its age a little bit from the fact that it doesn't have a wireless charging pad, it doesn't have that place to put a phone and I know that we sort of went through this time where it was like, Oh, no, no, you have to put your phone away. You know and never look at it again. But that's just not our reality. And people you know, do want their phone there. And you know, I could have put it in tucked away in the in the center console compartment. But you know, needing to do these changes. needing to make this go back and forth, and you know, unplug it, plug it back in. It was just more convenient, frankly. So I never looked at it beyond that. But it was showing its age a little bit.

Dan Roth  17:11  
But this is our great like, you know, I will get the comment back to us that you you guys don't like technology or your your cranky old men. It's no I actually I really, I like it. But you have to understand from a user perspective, if you're going to make it so that you've got to put the phone away, then you have to make the phone projection system actually work. Yes. And seamless. And it's it's not there yet. It's not there with Apple CarPlay either. It's it they've gotten better. But there are times where I still have to pick up the phone and fiddle with it to get what I want. Yeah. And that's, you know, if you're gonna do it, you have to commit and make it really good. And I know there's a lot of reasons why we're not quite there yet. But I think you know, the two screen system here is Didn't bug me when I tried it in the I think I had the Qx 50. Which it has the same kind of layout. It didn't bug me that much. But, you know, the rest of the car also didn't really make up for like, some of that frustration, either. You know, it was expensive. And it sounds like the same thing. You know, it's expensive. So if at that point, it does, how does it drive? I mean, you know, the engines nice. I'm assuming that it probably rides and handles, okay. But you start to look at the money and you go, I could have just had a BMW with I drive.

Rebecca Lindland  18:33  
Well, and that's the problem is that you start to get it right, or G 70. And, you know, and that's the problem is that, you know, the sticker price you look at that and you say what else can I buy? Yeah, for that, you know, and I mean, it was it was a super fun car to drive home. You know, I you know, I saw a brand new seven series. I was like that the end it's it blast Yeah, no doubt doing triple digits. I, you know, I was like, should I try it? But you know, it was it was fun to drive. So, it's a great, it's a great sport sedan, it was a lot of fun. I love the fact that it has all wheel drive standard. It's got those five or six different drive modes, you know, so it was nice, you know, I would have preferred in the A of the Mercedes GLC 43. I had it actually had slippery mode, as opposed to specific to snow. So you know, this had a snow mode. It's 100 degrees down in Virginia. So I didn't need that. But it's slippery mode would come in handy. Because there was times when we were in torrential downpours.

Sam Abuelsamid  19:42  
And so quickly, you know, slippery modes and slow snow modes actually behave quite differently because slippery mode, you know, tightens up the slip thresholds for activating stability control and stuff so activate sooner. Snow mode actually does the opposite. It actually loosens it up so that when you're in a deformable surface like snow or something And it'll actually allow more slip so you can get going because otherwise you tend to get stuck. Yeah, you just that

Rebecca Lindland  20:05  
makes sense, right? Yeah, that's I yeah. So they're not

Dan Roth  20:07  
interchangeable. I usually when I'm shooting traction control off when I've got to do something in snow, like, you know, climbing a hill and unplowed driveway or something, because it just grinds to a halt otherwise, so, yeah, that's interesting.

Rebecca Lindland  20:21  
Yeah. So, you know, again, the, I think if you're looking if you're in the market for that sport sedan for something that is fun to drive, it handles great on the twisties You know, it was, it was a good, I mean, the suspension was lovely. So, you know, we're going on over all different types of road surfaces, it was quiet. I mean, it was especially quiet on traditional pavement. Concrete always, you know, draws up more road noise, but it was it was still very, very good. I mean, that, you know, the kids and I, we had no problem, you know, hearing each other conversation we had the radio on and, you know, so overall it was very, very comfortable. I think So I think it's a good small family sedan, if that's what you're going for the trunk was actually pretty good. And it had that slip that the long thing through the backseat, so you can put like long skis and stuff. So, you know, there was a lot of good things about it. I didn't hate it. I, you know, when it went away, I was like, Okay, that was fun. You know, I'm glad I had that car for this drive. But I do think that it was just showing its age a little bit. They've tried to keep it up as much as they can. And again, for 60 grand. Just a lot of money.

Dan Roth  21:32  
Yeah, I think to the, the fact that this is the only sedan and their lineup right now is sort of indicative of the way the wind blows for infinity. And I'm sure that their sales are really quite down

Rebecca Lindland  21:44  
right now. Well, the other indication is that this car actually had not been in nobody had had it in the Presley in New York since about I think they said December Wow.

Dan Roth  21:56  
Yeah. So I

Sam Abuelsamid  21:57  
yeah, I've been just sitting idle.

Rebecca Lindland  21:59  
It had been sitting Don't they had to give it to me because they pulled the minivan at the last minute and I needed something. And so you're and and they were like nobody wanted in the winter. I'm like it has all wheel drive and snow mode. And they were like yeah, well, so for

Dan Roth  22:14  
snobby guys out there in Mannheim, right?

Sam Abuelsamid  22:18  
Maybe Nissan didn't want to put the money into getting a set of snow tires.

Rebecca Lindland  22:22  
Yeah, maybe it had 6000 miles on

Dan Roth  22:26  
it. So now it has 7000 miles that's I mean, I know the other fleets it was always boggles my mind when the guys Detroit fleet are like yeah, it's got 20 miles and I'm like yeah, out here in New England. Driven stuff with like 20,000 and it's fine actually. Like I actually like when they have some wear on them because everything's great when it's brand new, you know, so right getting getting it worn and a little bit is actually getting, getting those rattles and

Sam Abuelsamid  22:52  
everything that that show up after you've only after you've driven a car for a year or two. Yeah, you get a little more of the experience of what it's going to be like, for the average user. Yeah,

Rebecca Lindland  23:00  
absolutely. No. And from that standpoint, this was very, very good.

Dan Roth  23:04  
Well, that's that's good to know. I mean, I have always liked the the infinities sedans, I do I lament the g 35 g 37. I think that was their high point. They were not as refined as this, but they were more visceral. And they that that car was just marvelous. And so yeah, q 50. makes me a little sad.

Unknown Speaker  23:25  
Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid  23:26  
I know. And it turns out, they did discontinue the Q 70 for the 2020 model year. So there are apparently still some I was looking at the Infinity website. There. There are still some q 70 sitting around on dealer lots. So if you really want you know, this car but a little bit longer. They're out there, but I think I get them. I

Dan Roth  23:45  
mean, I think Rebecca points out pretty accurately though, like, why it's hard to sell them because they're, they're not cutting edge. They have some interesting tech in them. But overall, they just they haven't kept up in the ways that You're gonna feel every day, you know that whole, like, Where am I gonna put my phone? And I, me, I usually toss it in the cup holder. But that becomes an issue when you've got other things that need to go in there especially if

Rebecca Lindland  24:11  
that's right. I mean, there's two of us I had a front passenger, you know and that and then we're so we're, you know, we're kind of juggling things around, you know,

Dan Roth  24:19  
on a test drive, it's just gonna annoy you and you're not gonna buy it. Right. But on the other the other thing you were driving, maybe was a little less annoying on a test drive.

Rebecca Lindland  24:31  
It was nice. I don't want to dominate. I don't I know I've taken up a lot of time. I'll tell you what, so quickly. The 2020 AMG GLC 43 s UB otherwise known as the Mercedes, compact SUV, and this would have been amazing on that road. But I actually did I had to go pick up something that I purchased and in New Jersey, New

Dan Roth  24:57  
Jersey.

Rebecca Lindland  24:58  
Well, I think I refer Yeah there's a

Sam Abuelsamid  25:00  
lot of there's a lot of stuff for sale there that falls off a trust

Dan Roth  25:04  
you know where you are in Greenwich it's actually probably easier to get into jersey because you just like zip across.

Rebecca Lindland  25:09  
It's right across town. So I collect as some of our listeners know and certainly you guys know I have a mid century modern house. So I actually edits up then take like, I bought it from the original owners and builders, and I collect this false craft mid century modern I it's called brown gourmet brown drip.

Dan Roth  25:30  
Oh, dish. Wow. Okay.

Rebecca Lindland  25:31  
And so it did fortunately, it didn't fall off the tree. But But what happens is people you know, they go through their parents houses or they go through an estate sale or something and they find this step. And it's, I absolutely love it. It's all every piece is different.

Dan Roth  25:45  
So, yeah, it's got the glaze with the eye.

Rebecca Lindland  25:52  
And so I just I absolutely love this stuff, and I try really hard not to buy all of it. I frequently fail. So this great professor had a set that they bought at an estate sale and they had a ton of it. And I actually posted on on my Instagram, because he had a, he had a Prius with, I think he's I think it's 300,000 miles on a wall in pristine condition. He's replaced the battery once. I mean, it's just, it's insane. So he said, that was really fascinating. So I drove this thing out, and I drive this this AMG tuned Mercedes out. And it turns out that he was a retired professor of environmental studies, of course, you know, so he eyeballs is saying, and it's got, you know, Georgia ladies like, why are you you know, just give

Dan Roth  26:46  
me the plates. Don't ask any questions.

Rebecca Lindland  26:51  
I mean, it was funny, but so you know, the GLC I mean, overall, it's, you know, this thing. drew a lot of looks even here in Greenwich. The jlc has this beautiful huge stately grille on it definitely draws a lot of attention people want to see what this thing is the color of it it was this beautiful, the cardinal red on it. So it was just it was really a beautiful vehicle. A couple things that I really liked about it 21 inch tires, but very very minimal road noise. It's got this hundred and $50 option for heat and noise insulating glass, which actually worked pretty well

Dan Roth  27:31  
totally worth 50 bucks.

Rebecca Lindland  27:33  
Right for 150 bucks. Yes please. So that would definitely be something really easy adjustable drive modes I there was I did run into some get a lot of rain. And so I threw it into a into slippery mode. And it was great you know all wheel drive traction. So you know it was it was very, very good. One thing that was interesting is that so in comfort mode which is the default mode. The accelerator was really grabby. And it was funny because my sister drove with me for a bit and I was like, see, I'm like, and I

Sam Abuelsamid  28:07  
like, it's like the pedal itself.

Rebecca Lindland  28:09  
The pedal itself, like, it was, it was very early, like I couldn't get a smooth acceleration from it. And then when I put it in Sport and Sport Plus mode, I didn't have any of those problems at all. I usually find on these kind

Dan Roth  28:25  
of cars I if I put an eco, it's actually better, you know, because it gives you a less like, it's not trying to show off how powerful it is. It's just sort of a bit more linear, a little more gradual.

Sam Abuelsamid  28:38  
Okay, was was this one, the the, the 43 or the 5043. Okay, so this, the 43 has the new three liter in line six, and it's also a mild hybrid. It's a 48 volt mild hybrid. So there's there's actually an integrated Motor generator on the back end of the crank shaft. So maybe it's something with the control of that, you know, that was kind of surging a little bit when you're you know when you're in Eco mode you know kind of trying to trying to get smooth control or trying to keep it keep the power to a minimum.

Rebecca Lindland  29:19  
So, the Eco stop start kind of thing with

Sam Abuelsamid  29:22  
a little bit you think that could be what we mean stop start but just just trying to blend the the output from the electric motor and the engine smoothly,

Rebecca Lindland  29:32  
okay, it happened repeatedly. And it was I was sort of stopped I was embarrassed because like what is happening? It was bad driving, you know, so, but then it was noticeably noticeably absent in Sport and Sport Plus. Okay. So that was kind of an interesting you know, again, like just, it was a very minor wrinkle, but something that was you know, so I ended up struggling for plus. If you May

Dan Roth  30:00  
I had a GLC last year and I, I adored it. I just thought and I'm sure the AMC is just even better but it's just it's one of those I think it's one of those cars that I drove that just sort of paved the way for for me deciding that like a Mercedes is something that I might like to own some.

Sam Abuelsamid  30:20  
Yes,

Rebecca Lindland  30:21  
absolutely. So you know and true to form of course, I I had some issues with tech. So, overall, I mean, I really liked the enhanced navigation there was real time live video, which was super cool. So you know, you you can switch on and you can actually see like, when you're when you have your indicators on, it turns it into the front camera turned into live video, which was really, really cool. So I love that part. I would have loved to have had heads up display with it. I was surprised that it didn't especially because the x three has a very very good heads up display. It doesn't have live video, but a direct competitor like The BMW X three does have a heads up display. But what happened to me is and shameless plug this is in my review on the site, which is actually my reviews actually live. So it's Rebecca drives. Thank you, it sounds better coming from you. So when I, so when when I'm in navigation, if I did not want voice commands, I would have to highlight the icon for voice commands. And it would, it would show the icon in regular like you could see the icon. If active voice activation was on it would cross out the icon. I sent this to Mercedes and they were like, you're right, that doesn't make any sense. So I have I took screenshots of it sure it

Sam Abuelsamid  31:55  
made sense to some German engineer somewhere along the line.

Rebecca Lindland  31:58  
So I'm in a small group of guys, other journalists here in New York. So I asked them like, Did anybody else have this vehicle yet? And did you run into the same thing, and none of them had had it yet in my in my little small, small cohort, but it was very, very bizarre. So the icons were quite confusing and strange. And I actually meant to go down to a Mercedes dealer to see if this is just, you know, what are the odds that I get this car though? Like, like, seriously, between the CRV and that loud, weird noise and then this? Well, it's certainly

Sam Abuelsamid  32:33  
possible. You know, a lot of times, you know, the press vehicles, the vehicles that go into the press fleet, especially the early ones are pre production or pilot production vehicles. And sometimes they don't always have the final production intent software. And they may or may not have gotten updated by the time that it gets to you.

Rebecca Lindland  32:54  
Right. Now. Fair enough. So yeah, so that was the only thing otherwise I mean, the interior is gorgeous. This carbon fiber I know Dan, you said something about this actually looks gorgeous. There was a nice spot for my phone. You know, it just it just it was beautiful. It was a beautiful driving experience. I really loved it. I probably, frankly, I probably prefer the X ray a little bit more. I because I'm very partial to BMW, I guess it was a little less, you know, there. There weren't as many looks with the x three. I think I talked about this before, you know, it's a little bit less dramatic. And but you know, you can't go wrong with either vehicle. So this one starts at 60,000 and change. As tested. It was 79,007 I was actually able to build one on the site for 82 seven and up because there's so many targeted twice

Dan Roth  33:49  
the price. That's

Rebecca Lindland  33:53  
it. But you know, I mean, it's just it was it was nice. It was nice. It was fun.

Sam Abuelsamid  33:59  
Oh, just just Quick correction. I was wrong. The GLC 43 still has the old twin turbo V six. It's not the new inline six yet.

Rebecca Lindland  34:10  
Oh, it's my turbo.

Sam Abuelsamid  34:12  
Yeah. So it's a twin turbo V six. But it's it's not the, not the new inline six that they have. And some of the other Mercedes AMG models, which has the mild hybrid system. This one does not have that. So it's just bad tuning when it's an eco mode.

Rebecca Lindland  34:26  
Okay, well, so this is the AMG tuned one,

Sam Abuelsamid  34:29  
right? Yeah, but it's still it's just, you know, it's just poorly tuned in Eco mode.

Rebecca Lindland  34:33  
Well, and it's probably trying to compensate. And, you know, I, you know, coincidentally this actually gets 21 miles per gallon, like the Q 50. But you're in an SUV and you've got a

Dan Roth  34:44  
lot more real so in a Mercedes. I mean, come on. Who cares what kind of fuel economy gets,

Sam Abuelsamid  34:54  
especially in AMG? Yes, you don't buy an AMG for the fuel of car.

Dan Roth  34:59  
It's more of Do not want to point speed at that point, right? That's that's the way I look at it. It's like efficiency is less of a matter. It's more about how fast can I, you know, get between those dots on the map?

Rebecca Lindland  35:11  
Yeah, yeah. No. And this was this was a lot of fun.

Dan Roth  35:14  
Yeah, it was great. I do like me some Mercedes AMG s have that. That character.

Rebecca Lindland  35:20  
Yeah. But now I'm in a Kia seltos this week. So it's

Unknown Speaker  35:25  
a model that

Sam Abuelsamid  35:27  
we have to stay grounded.

Rebecca Lindland  35:29  
Yeah, exactly. It does. It has it doesn't have keyless entry. I'm going out of finding those keys. Yes.

Dan Roth  35:36  
Well, hang on. Hold it for next week. Sam, we can talk about the Hyundai Sonata Hybrid now that we've we've all had this car I think and Yes, me and Rebecca both seem pretty impressed with it. What's your take?

Sam Abuelsamid  35:52  
It's fantastic. You know, I mean, I'm not going to go into a whole lot of depth because, you know, we talked about it and also the regular Sonata and most Most of what we said about the Sonata before, as well as the snow hybrid certainly applies to this really nice interior really nicely executed, especially for this segment and this price point. Yeah. Again, I would say, for me, you know, this interior is second only to the Mazda six, in terms of the material quality and the look and feel of it. And very close second to that. So I you know, I think it's, it's excellent. The hybrid, outstanding fuel economy, you know, I got 51 miles per gallon with this. Yeah, I got ridiculous fuel economy two,

Rebecca Lindland  36:33  
that's amazing.

Sam Abuelsamid  36:34  
You know, which, you know, for a midsize family sedan with a very roomy backseat, a big trunk. You know, that's, that's amazing. You know, it's, you can't complain about that

Rebecca Lindland  36:44  
as a feat of engineering for sure.

Sam Abuelsamid  36:46  
One thing that was interesting, I don't know. When you guys you both had the hybrid before, right. Yes. Did the ones that you have have the the solar roof

Dan Roth  36:57  
Yes, I don't have the solar roof.

Sam Abuelsamid  37:00  
So the the solar roof is an interesting thing. You know, a lot of people have asked repeatedly over the years, you know what, when we get these electric and hybrid vehicles, why don't we put solar roofs on them to charge the battery?

Dan Roth  37:12  
You don't get much out of it? That's like a perpetual motion machine. It doesn't exist. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid  37:15  
Well, that's Yeah, that's the issue is, you know, solar panels are great in stationary applications where you can point them directly at the sun. Because when you get off angle from the solar panel, the power generating efficiency drops off pretty dramatically. And, you know, in the the specs, you know, Hyundai says that, you know, the solar roof on this thing, can charge the battery, you know, fully in about six hours, which I suppose would be true if you were sitting under noonday sun directly

Rebecca Lindland  37:51  
in California,

Sam Abuelsamid  37:52  
or, you know, maybe even in Michigan, you know, in the summertime,

Rebecca Lindland  37:55  
but I mean, that's the California sun.

Sam Abuelsamid  37:56  
You know, the sun you know, the sun doesn't stay directly over A roof of the car pointing straight down directly into those cells for any six hour period continuously. So, one of the things I noticed on the instrument cluster on this, you know, where you've got the normal power flow meter on a hybrid that shows you if you're getting power from the engine or the battery, or whether it's regenerating. There's also an extra little icon in there for the solar panels. And it's like a, it's like a bar graph. And it actually lights up depending on how much power you're getting from the solar cells. And, you know, as I drove around, you know, and I was at different angles to the sun, you know, it would go from being full, so it's getting full power out of the solar cells, you know, down to, you know, it's like five bars, you know, go down would sometimes go down to one bar, and if you went under a tree, or under a bridge, it goes

Dan Roth  38:48  
down to zero. I made a very, very sophisticated light meter.

Sam Abuelsamid  38:52  
That's great. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So it does put some power back into the into the the The battery

Unknown Speaker  39:01  
it literally says

Sam Abuelsamid  39:02  
two miles. Yeah, well, I mean, that's that's about what you get from, you know, from a battery in a typical hybrid, you know, is about two miles of very light driving. So, you know, this is not going to have a huge impact one way or the other on you, it does come standard and the limited trim, I'm not sure about the the other trim levels, you know, what, what they charge for it, or if it's even available, but it does come standard on the limited trim, you know, which the, the car I had was priced at 36,004 30, including the destination charge, which, you know, I think, for what you get in this car, you know, is really generally a great value and, you know, you're getting outstanding fuel, fuel efficiency, you know, without without even really having to try very hard. You know, a lot of the times certainly, you know, drop most almost all the time driving through my neighborhood at 25 miles an hour, you know, 20 to 25 miles an hour, you know, it would be on pure electric mode, you know, until I got out onto the main road, and even then, you know, surprising amount of time, you know, the engine would shut off, it would be coasting, you know, so Hyundai has done a great job on both the blending of the engine and the hybrid, so that it's really seamless, you know, and also, you know, really getting the engine shut down as much as possible, you know, when you're coasting or sailing, and certainly when you're decelerating that you know, so that they're, they're really extracting the maximum on this thing, and I think they've really done an outstanding job. It's it's, the system has come a long way since the first generation. It's not a hybrid 10 years ago. And you know, the battery the lithium ion battery Hyundai was the first manufacturer to use a lithium ion battery on a regular production hybrid with the launch of the original Sonata 10 years ago, and they've continued to do that and you know, so there's you're not giving up any trunk space for this. Just it's just really well executed across the board. And so if you're looking for a family sedan that drives really well, it's outstanding fuel economy looks great. You know, you, you'd be hard pressed to do much better than than the Sonata Hybrid.

Rebecca Lindland  41:17  
It looks like that solar roof is only available on the limited.

Sam Abuelsamid  41:21  
Okay, that that makes sense.

Rebecca Lindland  41:24  
Yeah, I couldn't find it. It couldn't add it to the others when I was trying to build it.

Sam Abuelsamid  41:30  
Okay. And what's, what's the the base price on this and not a hybrid? I think it's like 2627 777. Okay.

Rebecca Lindland  41:38  
Yeah. 27 750 for the blue. Okay, um, but that get, you know, like we talked about before, like, so that still comes with for collision avoidance, blind spot collision, eight inch touchscreen. So it's a nice, you know, for that price. It's not bad.

Sam Abuelsamid  41:52  
Yeah. And you know, the one thing you do give up going with the limited with the solar panel is you can't get a sunroof. So Right, you know, if you want a sunroof, which, you know, on the on the regular Sonata drove a couple of months ago, you know, that was, you know, personally I like I like having you know, you know, opening up the roof, you know, whether it's a convertible or sunroof, I liked seeing I was just gonna say,

Dan Roth  42:15  
of all the cars you've actually owned the sunroof, how often do you use the sunroof, but I guess you do so. Yeah, you

Sam Abuelsamid  42:21  
know, I know my wife does. I mean, you know, the last three cars we've had all had sunroof, and you know, she drives with the sunroof open all the time.

Rebecca Lindland  42:29  
I don't think that you can get a sunroof anyway. I'm

Sam Abuelsamid  42:33  
I'm pretty sure what I'm building when the hybrid or the regular hybrid. Okay, yeah, that may be true that may be the hybrid sunroof is not offered. It is on the regular Sonata. But even the regular Sonata, you know, is an outstanding cars well,

Rebecca Lindland  42:48  
so did they just continue than the plug in hybrid because that only has

Sam Abuelsamid  42:52  
2019. They they haven't reintroduced the new one yet. So it's coming so that they typically staggered the interest And they've done this for the last couple of generations, you know, so the launch the standard one, and bring out the hybrid. And then, you know, usually six to nine months after that they'll bring out the plug in hybrid. So I do believe they're bringing out a plug in hybrid version of the new Sonata. We'll probably see it by the end of this year.

Rebecca Lindland  43:18  
Okay. But yeah, it doesn't look like you can get a you can't get a sunroof in in them, which makes sense from a build standpoint.

Sam Abuelsamid  43:25  
Yeah, I mean, they're probably trying to contain constrain the the number of buildable combinations,

Rebecca Lindland  43:30  
right. So you know, so they just keep that but, I mean, I think, you know, the, the, the limited, there's a big jump between the STL and the limited so there's three trims, the blue STL. Unlimited, and the STL. Seems like a pretty good combination, a pretty good compromise. You know, you get a lot of the accoutrements that you would get in limited now you can't get Park, parking, collision avoidance assistance. There's a couple of things sensors, you know, there's a few things that you're not going to get, but there's a 6000 thousand dollar jump between those two So, but what Hyundai does

Sam Abuelsamid  44:03  
do is they do include a lot of Driver Assist options, you know, as standard equipment across the board,

Rebecca Lindland  44:08  
right you can get you can get a really nice vehicle I think in that mid trim line. That's

Dan Roth  44:13  
product planning. Alright. Um,

Sam Abuelsamid  44:19  
all right, well, let's the Sonata has hit its crescendo unless there's anything else again, you want one more the Toyota Highlander at 2020 Highlander, which we talked a little bit about back in February when they introduced the march Yeah, when they Yeah, they did some some local media drives around here. And I had a chance to drive it briefly out of just to spend a week with it. Here. My wife hated the way it looks really.

Dan Roth  44:46  
So I'm out on this internet hated it. Car Twitter hated it. And I didn't think it was terrible, but it's definitely like they're trying for something.

Sam Abuelsamid  44:56  
Yeah, you know, I don't mind the way it looks. But You know, personally, you know, for a big SUV crossover, I actually prefer the previous generation, which was a little more truck ish looking. Yeah, this one you know, I don't mind it but I'm not crazy about it, you know, it's got a more curvy, voluptuous look to it is almost like the, you know, especially like the the fenders, the rear fenders that have this, you know, big curving arch over the fenders almost looks like they tried to apply some super styling cues to it, which I'm not entirely sure works on this thing. But, you know, driving it was fine.

Dan Roth  45:39  
With a new model, that's what you

Rebecca Lindland  45:40  
aim for. It's fine. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid  45:44  
It's not exceptional. But you know, it's really good. The, you know, the third row seat, you know, the third row is very cramped, you know, it's definitely for the little one even

Dan Roth  45:54  
now cuz that was one of the things that they talked about was they improved the third row and access to it. It's it's

Sam Abuelsamid  45:59  
still It's still tight. Yeah, it's still very tight back there, I would not want to sit in the third row of this thing. You know, the one I had had the second row captain's chair, so you do have access through the, through the middle as well as being able to fold the seats forward. But it's still very snug in that third row for adults. And it's, it's probably it probably is a little better than the old one, but not by a huge amount. The front, did Java come comment?

Rebecca Lindland  46:27  
Well, I mean, thank you, please continue. I'll make it after you're done.

Sam Abuelsamid  46:32  
Okay, so the, you know, the front, you know, I think that it's really nicely executed the materials and the fit and finish you know, in the in the front is really good. The new touchscreen, you know, is larger, I think it's 10 inches now and a half inches. And, you know, it looks good. It the Toyota infotainment system we've complained about in the past, you know,

Rebecca Lindland  46:54  
Android Auto and Apple CarPlay.

Sam Abuelsamid  46:55  
Yes. And this one did to it had Android Auto and CarPlay,

Dan Roth  46:58  
which is a new add on For like, a decade,

Sam Abuelsamid  47:02  
yeah, it was the last. And they started, they brought up CarPlay first and First they were going to go CarPlay only. And then they relented when they got all the complaints. And so they said, Okay, we'll add Android Auto. And they've been gradually adding that to models as they've gone along over the last year and a half. And actually, to their credit on a bunch of the 2018 and 2019 models that had CarPlay support, they are offering a retrofit kit, you can take it to the dealer and get you know, get a free retrofit to add Android Auto support. So that's a toy that absolutely deserves credit. The only other company I know that's doing that is Mazda, they just charges like 100 bucks for a

Dan Roth  47:40  
stick of Rosetta Stone in the trunk so it can translate but

Rebecca Lindland  47:44  
but my 2015 Buick, which definitely didn't have Apple CarPlay or Android Auto at the time, I was very pleasantly surprised it supports that. Now when I plug in, yeah, I can get ways up. I can get ways up there. So maybe a full suite

Sam Abuelsamid  48:01  
I think products

Rebecca Lindland  48:02  
by it was still great to be able to get ways up there.

Sam Abuelsamid  48:06  
Yeah. So the the system that GM used on that vehicle had support for certain specific apps. It's not full blown Android Auto. But you it had ways built in there so that when you connected your phone, it would use that connection to use ways. But what one of the things that really particularly annoyed me about the the Highlander was actually the adaptive cruise control. jerky not smooth. Well, yeah, you know, first of all the gaps You know, when you set it at a given gap, it was like twice as far as on most other cars. You know, so it left to left even even at the very shortest gap setting it was still longer than most of what would you get in most other vehicles. So you know, makes it easier for people to cut in. But the other thing is even With that big gap, you know, the, you know, when it decided to slow down the car ahead of you slow down, it slowed down it, you know, I wouldn't call it jerky, but it the braking was significantly more aggressive is it it really wanted to maintain that gap, it did not want to get any closer. So it didn't take any chances. So it was not the smoothest system I've driven in a while, you know, by any stretch. So that was that was not great. And then the other thing that was the probably the biggest disappointment of this thing was the fuel economy. So, you know, this year for the new Highlander, you know, they have the 3.5 liter V six is the base engine, and then you can get the hybrid. But on the previous generation Highlander, the hybrid was matched with the V six as it is in the Lexus RX, but on the new one, they switched to the force of the 2.5 liter four cylinder. So it's basically the same combination you get in the rav4 and the Camry, and that really bumped up fuel economy. So like The EPA combined fuel economy for the hybrid is like 34 miles per gallon, which is way beyond what any other three row crossover gets. The V six, not so much. You know, the, the V six is EPA rated at at 20 City 27 Highway 23 combined. I only got 19

Rebecca Lindland  50:22  
I was just looking at my pictures, I got 19.1 we

Dan Roth  50:24  
can get 19 without the animal care what the numbers say if you just if that's just what that's what a vehicle that size with three rows, that's all it gets. That's what

Sam Abuelsamid  50:33  
Yeah, and you know, I mean, I was, you know, not driving me I was driving it the way I normally drive, you know, which I typically get, you know, pretty close to the you know, to the EPA combined number and, you know, so I was not beating this thing up or anything and it just it didn't do very well, you know, so they actually a lot of times, you know, city driving, you know, it was closer to 17 most of the time.

Rebecca Lindland  50:55  
So I mean the fact that we got the exact same is saying something

Sam Abuelsamid  50:59  
Yeah, so You know, if it fuel efficiencies important to you? Absolutely. You know, and you want to get the get the the Highlander. Yeah, absolutely make sure you check out the hybrid, because the V six is nowhere near what you're going to get with the hybrid.

Rebecca Lindland  51:19  
I mean, my feeling on the on the Highlander because I had it a few months ago, is that there's so much competition in this space that has greatly improved. And that's the thing is that I didn't feel like I was driving the future with this vehicle. And you do feel like that when you get into ones like, like that, you know, say

Sam Abuelsamid  51:43  
there's

Rebecca Lindland  51:44  
no Sade, exactly, you know, in the telluride and so that's what I just I felt like, you know, there's there's so much competition, I mean, this is a stalwart vehicle, you're never going to go wrong with a Toyota, but there's some really, really good old alternatives out there. The Subaru ascent is another one that I named, you know, that just I mean, I like the styling. So it didn't bother me at all, but and on the interior was really, really nice. They had some really nice features in there. But I just feel like there's so much competition for this price point. Well, the 150 thousand dollars.

Sam Abuelsamid  52:20  
This one was 5051 654, including delivery. Which, you know, more. Yeah, this is a platinum. Yeah, so it's low. Yeah. But, you know, you can you can get a palisade or a telluride for significantly less than that for many thousands of dollars less. And I think that they're better vehicles to drive.

Rebecca Lindland  52:40  
Yeah, I think so.

Dan Roth  52:41  
Better bat better third row seat, better access, better tech, better dynamics, that they're really well thought out. And like that. That's,

Sam Abuelsamid  52:50  
yeah, and arguably better looking much better. I mean, you know, I mean, design design is always, you know, a very personal subjective thing. So I'm sure you know, There are people that are going to look at the Highlander and look at the palisade or telluride or a set, or even the VW Atlas, and they're going to, they're going to prefer one over the others. And there will be those that prefer the Highlander. And that's fine. You know, that's, that's great. You know, and especially if what you want is a three row utility, that gets fantastic fuel economy, you absolutely need to look at the Highlander hybrid, because that, that, that hybrid that, you know, 34 miles per gallon it gets is way beyond anything else in this segment.

Rebecca Lindland  53:33  
I know nobody does hybrids as me. You know, Toyota has been known for their hybrid technology. It's absolutely fantastic. Yeah, I agree. And, you know, for

Sam Abuelsamid  53:43  
for hybrid, which, you know, is really great, but it's not, you know, they did not necessarily tune it as much for maximum fuel economy. Yeah. So there's, like 27 or 28, I think. And, you know, but but it also you know, it's with a V six. And, you know, it's got, you know, 5000 pounds of towing capability, you know, with the hybrid, or 5300 I think actually, you know, so, you know, it's, they've, they've gone, you know, they've biased it in a different way, which is fine. You know, that's, that's, you know, that was their choice. But

Rebecca Lindland  54:19  
I just find with with Toyota overall, you know, they've been this is an entirely fair, but they have been resting on their laurels. And in some ways they've been so dependent upon that baby boomer demographic for so long. And and but you know, when you think about like the Toyota Prius, like the competition has really surpassed them. And that's what I think of the Highlander that there's so much competition out there that it's not a no brainer to go buy a Toyota anymore, because you there's other competition out there that's just as good if not better, and again, we think about resale value and stuff. Maybe Overall ownership experience may not be exactly the same, but there's still a lot of really good vehicles out there.

Sam Abuelsamid  55:07  
Now. Yeah, Dan, it's your turn.

Dan Roth  55:10  
Okay, so let's circle back to Nissan and how you were talking about the Infinity q 50. Not having adaptive cruise I had a versa and it had adaptive curse. That's that's a versa is for 2020 they've redone it inside. Now style wise the underpinnings are still pretty much the same, which is fine. There wasn't really a ton wrong with that car. Pretty simple underneath, you know, beam rear axle so you had a pretty big 14 and a half cubic foot trunk rides and handles decently. It's not as squishy as the last one that I drove that just felt like a modern day. It was terrible. It was

Unknown Speaker  55:56  
the last one it was a bad car.

Dan Roth  55:59  
It's funny. The Versa has really matured it's first generation everybody loved it, but we especially loved the hatch, more so than the the sedan and then the second generation they made it long had they they were crowing about the backseat leg room that's bigger than a Mercedes E Class which is all well and good but the rest of the car looked like I don't

Sam Abuelsamid  56:24  
like this tall lobby, little wheels it looked like it was good hip over all the time.

Dan Roth  56:31  
And it's like it aggressively went for the crown of lowest priced car in the United States and it achieved it and you could tell it just it was a cheap car built cheaply. And this time around, they've taken what was good about it and changed what needed to change. really sharp Look, it looks so good. From especially the exterior styling. It makes you wonder like this is the same car like this is the same platform and it is But they've done enough to it. They've done a lot to it to make it look like a Nissan and not like some blobby thing. So,

Sam Abuelsamid  57:08  
yeah, it fits in the lineup, Rebecca and I drove it last summer in YesI. And Tansy, you know, was fantastic. You know, I've driven it earlier this year and actually just had the Sentra, which we'll talk about next. Yeah. Yeah, same same thing. everything you just said equally applies to the Sentra. It's so much better than the previous Yeah, he

Dan Roth  57:26  
starts making pretty good cars while everybody else is fleeing the segment. Um, the interior was nice, including infinity. I had I had an SSR so it has a little sportier bent to it. You know, outside it has a lip spoiler on the trunk lid and just get gets larger wheels and I think the front facia might get fog lamps or something. It's not really it's not a sports car. It's definitely not sporty when you push it Interior in the SRS is nice it has it's a nice looking upholstery that has a orange stitching and the there's some stitching on the dash and stuff so they've done what they can to make this small inexpensive car feel like a folk and not not like you settled, you know, it's like yeah, it's small in it. This one topped out I think this was like 21,000 and change which didn't strike me as a bad deal actually struck me as a pretty good deal because there's not really any options or anything I wanted for and had you know, the the eight s we did had adaptive cruise. It didn't I don't think it had nav but it had Apple CarPlay so that was not much of an issue. And the screen is nicely integrated into the dash in a way that I find aesthetically pleasing. It looks like it looks like it was meant to be there. materials and stuff inside are you can tell that it's a initiative Have car there's there's some hard plastic that is not hard to find, but it's not egregious, like it was in the last Versa where it things just like you could tell like this is a one piece molding because it's cheap as hell to make it though.

Sam Abuelsamid  59:14  
Well, you know, the thing is, you know, on lower priced cars like that, you know, there's nothing wrong with having hard plants down. Yeah, as long as it's reasonably well executed, you know, you have some, some decent texturing on it, you know, so it doesn't look too it's not, you know, shiny, no texture to it, you know, long as it looks halfway decent. I'm I'm not opposed to hard plastics in a car, you know, a $20,000 car. Yeah. a $40,000 vehicle is something entirely

Dan Roth  59:43  
different. Yeah. And so the the versus that like versus Sentra crossover point has happens right around $18,000. And so I was like, Well, why would you buy this instead of a Sentra. And the argument basically comes down to equipment because the the verse is a little tighter in the center it's not actually that much smaller, it's narrower so there's less hip room front headroom the little less rear leg room they have given up their their giant rear seat it's still a good size in the backseat but it's it's still right on top of the center so when you start to get at that point you go well do you want the features or do you want the slightly larger car I mean the truck in the center is only like half a cubic feet larger so and i but i think there's more that you can get in the center like the they'll they'll give you more features more options and there's certainly more to climb I'm assuming you can get a center over 30 so I don't think so actually get close you know, like there's there's more features and things to be had. The vs is kind of a tightly tightly optioned and planned car and that's fine. It's it's good for what it is the competition in the market. is also those that aren't fleeing are still pretty formidable though and they do a better job than the Versa where the verse loses it is its weak engine. It's got 122 horsepower from its its 1.6 liter engine, which is, again, it's one of those things like it's fine. But it's it's not as powerful as some of the others in this segment and its power curve like a Chevy Sonic, Chevy Sonic is a standard turbo engine. So it's going to have a lot more torque right off the line. And there's a CVT here, which is pretty well behaved but when you need it, it does the CVT thing, you know where just the engine revs up and so it gives you that sensation of not being all that that quick and it's not all that quick and that's that's fine. It doesn't have to be a quick car. You just need to adjust to that and plan a little bit and if you're driving other things in the class, you may find that they feel a little bit more satisfying power wise, the Hyundai Accent and Kia Rio also probably feel a little more sporty, they probably have a slightly more comprehensive tech suite. And they're they're just as competitive. I remember the last Rio I was in I was also pretty impressed with So is this a tight competition? This class, the ride of the Versa is also a little stiff. I don't know what what kind of experience it was when you folks drove it, but it it handles Okay, it, it rides, okay most of the time, but on rough pavement, it'll, it'll skitter around a little bit like it's just got, you know, it's it's a little too stiff. And so that'll interrupt you and in you know, corners and stuff, it'll it'll bounce a little bit sideways in the BMX doesn't help there. Because it has that's a solid x, a little bit of like, if the rear comes up, it'll move kind of thing. But it's it's fine. You know, it's it's a car I put a bunch of miles on I had to go into the office and so I did a bunch of high With it, it's a little loud on the highway. But it's, it's, you know, comfortable. It does everything you asked if it has just about every feature you could want. So it's a great starter car. It's great downsizer car. It again looks really good. And it gets pretty good economy to the point where when it was swapped a I tried to fill it up. I you know, you set the pump and you do another stuff and it clicks off like, no, there's no way that thing's full. Something's wrong here and I kept trying to put more gas into it even went to another station as the guys nozzle must be wrong. I went to the station, I couldn't get any more fuel into it. And I'm like, idiot. It's full. So they're gauge their gauges, a gray bar, and there's a red area for the quarter tank. That's always there. And so I was looking at the red like, no, it hasn't moved. It's still I need to put gas in it still. Oh, yeah. No, it's fine. I just I couldn't get any fuel. I've texted the fleet guy was like, Hey, I can't get any more fuel in this like please make sure our driver has enough to make it back. It's like yeah, it's fallen to stupid. But it's it's a good car in the class that that others have left. I mean that sort of best. The best cars in the class, you know the Honda Fit is going away and the fit is a hatch too. So that's not a direct comparison. If you want to hatch, Nissan wants you to buy the kicks or the rogue sport and or the room, you know, like to get into the crossovers. And because they'll they'll charge you more.

The Toyota jaros I think the hatches still available, which is Okay, enough car feels cheaper. The Yaris sedan, I think that might actually be dropping the RS for 2020 all of the hours. Okay. I think so as I know, they're dropping the sedan, the the, the Mazda two, which is like that's a great little car. It's fun. I hatch i thought was like Toyota, Toyota and I couldn't figure

Sam Abuelsamid  1:04:53  
out that the RS hatches also the motto is it I thought they were used it used to be they switched over.

Dan Roth  1:05:00  
Two or three years I see DAN DAN did not pay attention to merit. But like the hat, the IRS was another sort of fun small car to drive. Neither of those though, neither the the the, the IRS doesn't feel as rich as the verse it does at this price point. I haven't been in a fit in quite a while. So I can't really say there, but

Rebecca Lindland  1:05:27  
I think the sun has done that that vehicle really, really well. Yeah, I mean, again, for that price point, 18 grand, you've got great safety features in it. I mean, you've got some creature comforts in there that I think are you know, typically found in more expensive cars are not found at all.

Dan Roth  1:05:44  
This is a big thing, especially if you're in this this end of the market where this could be your first car or the car that no parent is buying for that that's actually really important to have and the other Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:05:54  
I mean, you'd get you're getting stuff like automatic emergency braking. Yeah, you know, standard equipment. Yeah,

Dan Roth  1:05:59  
yeah. You know and do Subaru with their eyesight is another manufacturer that does that well. So it's good to see that that stuff has made it down to this market because for so long the small cars were always just cheap. And it's this isn't it's inexpensive, you know, for the price, it's very full, fully equipped. But it's also you don't need to miss out on stuff and you shouldn't and because sometimes you just want that size and you don't, you don't need a bigger car and this does everything that you would need. So it's a it's a really comprehensive refresh it's a it's a well done car I mean I my my quibbles with it but yeah, they did give up their their cheapest car in the US title so they the pricing shenanigans are the cheapest one starts I think right about 15,000 maybe 14 something

Sam Abuelsamid  1:06:51  
i think i think it's it's I think it's 15 roughly with delivery. It's 414 right

Rebecca Lindland  1:06:56  
14 830 Yeah, then with tiller it goes like that.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:07:00  
As a manual transmission,

Dan Roth  1:07:01  
only one and I bet you it's a crappy manual and that's only the Astrium. So if you want anything in it, you have to move up to the higher trims in the CVT and that immediately makes it an $18,000 car. Which is so it's a pretty good

Sam Abuelsamid  1:07:19  
bike by today's standards, you know, aside from the Mitsubishi Mirage, it's still you know, that's that's basically the starting price now for any decent small car

Dan Roth  1:07:29  
except for when I was looking because I was I dug into this a little the sonic standard with an automatic and a turbo for 1414 and

Sam Abuelsamid  1:07:37  
a half, but that's gone away too. Yeah. So So

Rebecca Lindland  1:07:40  
yeah, but the first set is still has automatic emergency braking SM urgent lane departure warning, you know, so it's a high beam assist. So it does still have some of those features for 16. By

Dan Roth  1:07:53  
I know it's standard. Those things are standard and I'm impressed that they put them in because I think they're important in this class. So

Rebecca Lindland  1:07:59  
yeah, I think so too you know so i think that again they've I think they've done a nice job and keeping that price point you know impressive so maybe nice on their strategies to be a cockroach while everybody else leaves we're gonna hang out and

Dan Roth  1:08:15  
and we're gonna build this carcass I'm assuming too that this this car oh my goodness in other markets quite well oh yeah so yeah i don't i don't think it's it's any trouble like the sonic Chevy doesn't sell cars does really well I guess the sonic guys is a global car that's Korean right like that's that's it yeah so I'm gonna stop talking about him as Korea, Korea and China let's uh let's move to topics before I say something else stupid this there was a lot of whining about the Mustang Maki Maki 1400 I think

Rebecca Lindland  1:08:53  
he went about my drinking, because you're right, I did. I was on a

Dan Roth  1:08:58  
crusade all day.

Unknown Speaker  1:09:00  
Hay was

Dan Roth  1:09:01  
the the Mustang Mach e 1400. There actually was whining about this there's a video of literal and fake like, so the car itself whines but then everybody was complaining that it whines like What's that sound? It needs to sound like a Venus like I don't care in the video It looks pretty impressive to me

Sam Abuelsamid  1:09:21  
yeah I mean it's it sounds like a Formula E car yeah that's Joe cuz you know I think they've basically done you know it's got straight cut gears you know which is where most of that whining comes from? Yeah hot you know hot high strength differentials and that's basically it and then what they've done is they you know they gave this thing to Vaughn get fun getting jr and crew at his shop and you know they worked with for performance and they took you know they basically they've got seven electric motors in this thing they stacked up three driving the front axle for driving the rear axle and And, you know, the way the controls are set up, you can run any number of them on either end. So you can do anything from a single motor front wheel drive to seven motor all wheel drive, you know, with torque vectoring How

Dan Roth  1:10:11  
does this How does that work though? The seven motors, like, why do you need four motors on the rear axle? Like,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:10:18  
well, what part of the purpose of building this thing, you know, aside from, you know, showing, yeah, we can build, you know, a high performance, you know, electric drift Mustang, you know, that makes a lot of smoke. Yeah, is also you know, to experiment with to experiment with this platform to, you know, figure out, Okay, how much power do we need, so, you know, by being able to run any number of motors on the back there, you know, depending on which ones you send juice to, or on the front for that matter, you can try out different combinations of you know, front and rear torque balancing, you know, so if you want, you know, two front motors for rear motors, you know, so you've got a more rear biased or more evenly balanced. So you can you can play with it in different ways, you know, really easily much more so than you could do with an internal combustion car. And, you know, try out a lot of different combinations. And I'm sure that things that they learned from playing with this vehicle are going to transpire in future limited production, higher performance versions of the Maki and and other upcoming electric vehicles.

Dan Roth  1:11:26  
I wonder if they're also going for like industry or military contracts. It was really interesting to hear gms folks on auto line talk about how racing translates over to to military as well. And that that just got me thinking with the electric Mustang to say like, well, what are the other applications for that that would need high performance durability and and just, you know, having that that platform figured out for it, so I don't know.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:11:58  
I mean, you know, Maybe you know, things they learned from this will get translated into a future electric f150. Raptor. That'd be right.

Dan Roth  1:12:06  
Yeah. That's exactly yeah, nobody would. Nobody. Yeah, so what do you think? Like, do you think that it needs needs VH sound or anything? Are you Sam, you sound pretty fine with it.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:12:18  
I mean, I love the sound of a big v eight. But, you know, I know that this thing is not a VA, you know, it's electric. And, you know, the sound should be authentic to what it is, you know, just the same way. You know, I love the sound of a big v eight. I also love the sound, you know, of, you know, a flat six turbo Porsche, you know, and a V 12 Ferrari, you know that and they all have distinct sounds, you know, so there's no reason why an electric vehicle should sound like a like a GT 500 and I you know, I kind of like the the sound you know, that wine, you know, when I when I first heard that last summer at the Formula E race in New York, and I thought, wow, this is actually really Cool. So

Rebecca Lindland  1:13:01  
I was just gonna say that was a really quick we were there together. Yeah. And what I found was that the being at that formula he, it, I described it as a very micro event, you could suddenly hear the squealing of the tires, the shifting of the brakes, the, you know, the shifting of the gears, the squeal of the brakes, instead of just the macro of that engine. Normally, that's all you hear is the engine. And this time it was so quiet but the absence of noise but allowed you to then hear all these other things that were going on right

Sam Abuelsamid  1:13:38  
and even when you do you know hear it coming, you know that that sound you know more that wine is more like a Thai fighter in Star Wars, you know, yeah. And again, it's authentic to what it is which is good. I have no issue with it. I will miss the sound of VHS you know, fortunately I'm old enough that probably within my within the rest of my life. And we'll still have them around. But, you know, and, you know, future generations may not

Rebecca Lindland  1:14:07  
have the baby Dan here,

Dan Roth  1:14:08  
look, I mean, they're still Victrola and wire recorders. So all that stuff is still around for you. You can still hear the clip

Sam Abuelsamid  1:14:17  
clop of a horse every once in a while

Dan Roth  1:14:19  
for for new generations to discover. Yeah, I mean, there's there's not a whole lot that's that's as thrilling as a stationary engine. Big one cylinder turn of the century stationary diesel that just shakes the ground runs. So I'm sure that that younger folks will appreciate things that we appreciate as well. And I yeah, I mean, the sound of a dog cut gearbox just whining like that, with all the power going through it. It's got its own sort of impressiveness to it. That you don't you don't appreciate I think until you see it in person. It's easy to to see the video be like yeah, doesn't sound like whatever but no it sounds like it's something yeah it's the next on our list was a GM and Evie go so there's a charger shortage if you're not a Tesla driver

Sam Abuelsamid  1:15:20  
I'm there's there's an arguably even Tesla drivers experience experience shortages. You know when there's a lot of people trying to travel at once. I mean, you can look around online and find lots of people you know every time there's a holiday weekend or you know busy period, you know, you can find you know, Tesla drivers posting their pictures of the long lineups at the supercharger stations. I have to wait three hours to charge up my car. Yeah,

Dan Roth  1:15:45  
yeah. And well, those people around you

Sam Abuelsamid  1:15:50  
they're insufferable. So, you

Dan Roth  1:15:54  
know the dead malls too. There's not even anything to go do

Sam Abuelsamid  1:15:59  
you The shortage of chargers is is really a universal thing. Because, you know, the reality is, you know, even with, you know, fast charging, you know, 350 kilowatt fast charging, you know, it still is going to take you 20 minutes or more to get, you know, a full charge on a long range eg. And, you know, I was I did several interviews yesterday, media interviews, and one of the things, there's 168,000 gas stations in the United States. There are currently about 16,000 dc fast chargers at about nine out about a little over 8000 locations more than I thought they were Yeah, you know, so, you know, the 8000 stations, you know, they average you know, anywhere from in some cases, you know, one DC fast charger up to like 12 or 18 at some of the supercharger stations but mostly somewhere in the four to six range. So, you know, our projection at guidehouse is that by 2025 will Have 66,000 dc fast chargers in North America and 144 by 2030. But, you know, this, this deal between GM and Evie goes, you know, just one incremental step in that direction. You know, and what, what's interesting about this gmms, you know, paying for part of the cost of installing another 2700. Fast chargers, unlike what Tesla did with the superchargers, you know, are Tesla built out, you know, sort of relatively evenly distributed network of chargers across the country, because, you know, they had cars that already had fairly long range, but they wanted to make it accessible for their owners to drive anywhere they wanted to go and use these chargers. What GM is trying to do here, you know, because there's other networks, including Vigo, that are starting to build out similar styles of networks. What GM wanted to do was to expand the addressable market. It for EBS is one of the challenges you've got with EBS. Yeah, so they're building these in urban and suburban areas, close to like grocery stores and things like that. One of the challenges is that people live there. A lot of times if you live in an apartment, or if you even if you have a house where maybe you don't have a driveway in a garage, and you rely on street parking, which is often the case in many cities, you know, you don't have somewhere to plug in and charge and if you don't have workplace charging, owning an Eevee can be a real pain, you know, and if you have to rely on a 240 volt, you know, level two charger somewhere you know, that's still going to take you three or four hours to charge up. But you know, by putting these DC fast chargers in now you can you know, top off your your battery in 20 or 30 minutes while you go do your grocery shopping and then be on your way again. So that's what they're trying to target is a market that is interested in owning an Eevee but It's not viable right now for them to do it because they they're not able to charge at home.

Rebecca Lindland  1:19:06  
Yeah, I think there was a couple things that were interesting about the announcement yesterday that 2700 new fast chargers, the disappointing part to me was that it was the next five years.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:19:14  
Yeah, but they're gonna have the rounds deployed by the beginning of 2021.

Rebecca Lindland  1:19:18  
Yeah, but that's a lot, you know, like, I would have liked them to say, three years or ideally even two years. The other thing that really struck me though, is Kathy Zoya, who is the chief executive of ego. She lives in an apartment. Mm hmm. And so she was very vocal about the fact that this, you know, they need to have a multi housing solution, because she herself faces challenges like that, which I thought was a really interesting personal note, you know, and, again, I've done a lot of work in this space of looking at like charging infrastructure and multifamily housing and things like that. And so, you know, the other the other part that's fascinating is that, you know, with People potentially not needing to go into the office anymore. That workplace charging takes on a different relevance. Yeah. And our emphasis on workplace charging may not have been the right approach. Obviously, it was at the time

Sam Abuelsamid  1:20:18  
doing that, that they're also deploying 3500 workplace chargers at their facilities over the next two years,

Rebecca Lindland  1:20:23  
right. So we have to pivot a little bit from what goes in first. And when I was talking to the guys from ego offline, you know, using a software like Tableau to understand the layers of where you're going to put these things can be much more effective. But you've got to overlay this idea that commuting has changed. You know, how people are using their vehicles. You've got to factor in the impact of pandemic or the pandemic, on people's behavior globally, as well, not just in the US, but so it'll it'll be very, very interesting. To see what happens.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:21:02  
Yeah, the

Dan Roth  1:21:05  
the thing that I think they're doing smartly, though is they're they're adding the infrastructure because the commitment to EBS is sort of fallen down for, for manufacturers on that, that side of it, how do you charge it? I think they've recognized this, like, it's one thing to get people to buy the cars and always have the home charging options. But then when you're out and when you're going places that infrastructure needs to get built up before the cars are truly going to be successful. And the tech is there with fast charging to make it relatively quick. It's still not like the five minutes it takes to fill the tank, but it's

Sam Abuelsamid  1:21:40  
getting bad if you combine it with those other activities like getting your groceries. I mean, you know, you go to the grocery store. It's gonna take you 2030 minutes. Yeah, yeah, typical. Yeah. Your week's grocery shopping range and 2030

Dan Roth  1:21:52  
Yeah, yeah, like range honestly isn't that big of a deal. You're never using the full range or not. I'm not saying never never, but you're generally not using the full range of your Eevee in a single day. So,

Rebecca Lindland  1:22:08  
right. And you've got to the thing that we've talked about before, when we've had ease, is, you've got to make it convenient. Yeah, consumers gravitate towards convenience. And so, you know, even yesterday, we talked a little bit about the length of the of the, of the court, you know, it's got to have a longer cord, you've got to be able to have that kind of adaptation. And then what does that do for the vehicle itself, you know, retractable systems, opportunities for retractable systems, things like that. And the bigo I think they are doing chademo and CCS as well. So you know, they've got some they've got a good strategy here, but you got to keep in mind that consumers just gravitate towards convenience and so you've got to give them a reason that this is a better solution than an internal combustion engine then then all those gas stations, you know, that can chart that can feel up 10 1520 cars at a time in five minutes. That's right. Yeah, that's your right. Let me that's

Sam Abuelsamid  1:23:02  
your metric. That's that's the key is to, you know, to overcome that, that friction. Yeah, make it make it as seamless as possible. And that's why, you know, we're also seeing manufacturers, you know, not just invest directly in the infrastructure like what GM is doing here, but also doing the aggregation and enabling, roaming, you know, providing a single interface, you know, for doing it with Ford pass for their ease, you know, where you're going to have access to multiple networks through a single interface. You just plug in your car charges, your Ford pass account, whatever card you have tied your Ford pass account, you you know, VW last week announced their recharge system, same basic idea, you, you buy a new VW Group, Evie, you'll get this recharge card, and you can tie the different accounts to that and you don't have to manage all these different accounts. They all get charged through one interface. GM is doing the same thing through OnStar. So you know, those sorts of things. solutions will help to minimize the friction.

Dan Roth  1:24:04  
So you know, as you're talking to him strikes me that we're still leaving out a lot of people here. Well, yeah, because you need to be able to afford it. First, you need to have a device smartphone, you need to be able to tie it to a credit card. And you need to be able to afford it. All right. So there's that whole bottom third of the market that you know, if you're unbanked you still need a car right? So you you have a cheap beat.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:24:39  
Well, the truth is, if you're unbanked I know you're not a probably not buying a new car. I'm

Rebecca Lindland  1:24:44  
only talking about 5% of the population that buys a new car every year.

Dan Roth  1:24:48  
And I know I know, but it's just like it strikes me like we're still talking about the sort of play things for the wealthy. Right and and you know,

Rebecca Lindland  1:24:56  
5%

Sam Abuelsamid  1:24:59  
you know, they are They are thinking about these these challenges. So, like, How do you do? We have we have these conversations with them all the time. They're, they're trying to figure that out. And, you know, but that's, you know, that's like Step three, four or five. Yeah, they need to get to the the first they need to get to the people that actually are buying new cars, so

Dan Roth  1:25:19  
we know it's gonna keep going, but think about it.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:25:21  
Yeah. No, and they are to their credit, they are thinking about, you know, how do we handle that? And I think, you know, part of the solution there's, you know, like for the unbanked as an example, you know, you're gonna, you're probably gonna sell, you know, cards, you know, like, like, you go into a Walgreens today and you've got this wall of all the gift cards, all the different retailers, you know, you'll go in and, you know, you can go buy a PlayStation Network card, you know, for 20 bucks, you know, and so, you know, if you're unbanked, you know, you're going to go in and buy, you know, an ego card or you know, electrify America. apart for 20 bucks, and you'll have that you'll it'll charge to that, you know, at some point down the road when you're driving a used Evie. Right?

Rebecca Lindland  1:26:08  
Yeah, they're even talking about about making Uber and Lyft vehicles electric. So you don't even need to buy a car.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:26:15  
Yeah. So that's a lot more of a challenge because Uber and Lyft don't own their vehicles,

Rebecca Lindland  1:26:20  
even it is but in terms of recharging, and in terms of making transportation accessible, so

Dan Roth  1:26:27  
that like, that's still a product for somebody who is at least wealthy enough to have a smartphone and a credit card. Like,

Rebecca Lindland  1:26:35  
yeah, but I can't but I mean, you can't solve No, I know.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:26:41  
At least at least smartphones have become pretty ubiquitous. Yeah,

Rebecca Lindland  1:26:46  
there's a lot of homeless people.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:26:51  
Yeah, yeah, you get a prepaid smartphone, you know, I mean, they're, they're fairly cheap and you can get pretty cheap smartphones, not an apple, not an iPhone minute, right. But you can use You can get a lot of really cheap smartphones. And you know, you prepay, you know, you buy the prepaid cards. So again, there's there are solutions to that. It's not easy. And you know, we'll have to figure out ways to make that more seamless. But you know, we'll get I'm a man of the people.

Dan Roth  1:27:15  
And I think about those those things.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:27:19  
No, that's good. And, you know, we need to do that we need to think about that stuff.

Dan Roth  1:27:24  
Especially with TVs, like once they start to get into the US market, then, then you got to think about, okay, okay, it's great when it's brand new, and you have access to all the features and all the network and all that, but then when it's 10 year old car, how does that work? And yeah, and no, because it's still going to be viable. And, you know, how does how does somebody get the use out of that? Because in 20 years, there's gonna be a lot of us TVs on the road. I hope.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:27:52  
Why don't we jump to the listener mails? First up from Chuck Davis. Chuck listens. He hears me Leo's Leo Laporte, the tech guy show. He grew up in Bay City, Michigan, which by the way is where my wife is from. But it's been out west for many, many years. We do get back every other year to Detroit area to visit family and he has a comparison question. presently have a 2014 Acura RDX, which I love. I'm getting ready to change and I'm not crazy about the trim level and the four cylinder engine on the 2021 2020 21 RDX the new one. I really like the styling of the Cadillac XT four and five. But I'm having a real problem deciding I think the RDX may be a better engineered car. If you had a choice had to make a choice between your those cars which would you choose? Hmm, so RDX new RDX Cadillac 64 or 65.

Dan Roth  1:28:50  
I know what I would choose. I want to see what you guys Rebecca.

Rebecca Lindland  1:28:54  
I know I want to I want to hear Dan.

Dan Roth  1:28:56  
Okay, RDX. The Tech is not as good the SEC For has has better tech, but I think the Z four went a little too much toward sport and not comfort and function and utility. And it's got that engine. I like driving because I did really like driving the Z four it drove really well. But it makes sacrifices for that that I think the average buyer might want more of what the RDX does than what the XT four does.

Unknown Speaker  1:29:31  
Rebecca So

Rebecca Lindland  1:29:34  
thinking about him in the 2014 Acura RDX and then jumping to a 2020 or 2021 that's a that's gonna be a big difference from a technology standpoint. So that's a big difference. I I really do struggle with that the RDX technology and that can be very frustrating because the vehicle itself is great. But that technology is difficult for me. I have not been driven the x t five it is I am on the schedule. And I only spent a short time in the X g4. I remember seeing the XT four at the at an auto show and being pleasantly surprised when it actually came out. Because Sam to your point A while ago about the cars that we get the pre production XC four was not nearly as good as the new, the interior, the quality of the interior as the new z four, but the one that actually came out but again, I haven't spent enough time in it to really comment. So my concern just with the RDX. First of all, I think two addresses is direct question of a better engineer car. I think that they're probably pretty comparable because there's very few poorly engineered cars these days. But I can't really say enough about it. I would absolutely encourage Chuck to spend time with both of those cars. On the test drive, set up your phone, make phone calls, you Test Drive is your time don't feel pressured by the dealer to hurry that process up spend time especially when you're going from a 2014 yeah

Dan Roth  1:31:11  
yeah. So he let me see so he's so unclear he's considering

Sam Abuelsamid  1:31:17  
he's got a 14 RDX. Now I'm considering the new RDX, the XT for the XT five.

Dan Roth  1:31:22  
Okay, yeah I haven't also I also haven't driven the XT five I feel like the XC five is a closer analogue to his current RDX.

Rebecca Lindland  1:31:29  
I agree. Yes.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:31:32  
The the XT four is actually closer in size to the RDF le four ft five,

Rebecca Lindland  1:31:38  
dancy forest Ah, it didn't feel that

Sam Abuelsamid  1:31:41  
big and RDX is not that big.

Dan Roth  1:31:43  
Okay? No, it's not You're right. Oh, um, you could also if you're going to spend RDX money or XT for money consider the passport which is another option near already in the Honda family.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:32:00  
Yeah, but and you and you might like the infotainment better in the passport

Dan Roth  1:32:04  
Yeah. I really liked the XT four I did but I think it's got some some compromises that you need to go and try it out.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:32:13  
Yeah, but my main complaint about the XT four was just the the NVH Yeah, you know both the engine noise and road noise on certain roads. Yeah, it drives really well. Looks great. It's fantastic. Looks great. You know it's it's fairly roomy, you know for the size class it's in, which is about the same CR dx dx d fives a little bigger in a couple of years. The XT five you know, but they're both two row utilities. You know, the I love driving the RDX I am one of the few that is not as turned off by the touchpad system they haven't they're

Rebecca Lindland  1:32:51  
just not right.

Dan Roth  1:32:54  
You might you probably get used to it.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:32:57  
I agree with that. Both of you, you know, absolutely take some time, go drive it, go drive all three of them, you know, take your phone, you know, set it up for, you know, Android Auto or CarPlay, whatever you whatever you use, you know, play with it while you're driving. And, you know, and particularly the SD for, you know, try to take it around on a variety of different road surfaces and see how you feel about the way it sounds. Because it dynamically It feels really good, the ride quality is fine, you know, it handles well, does look great. But, you know, whether that road noise turns you off, or not, you know, is a very subjective thing. So, you know, make sure you try that out if you can,

Dan Roth  1:33:41  
you can also I don't know that you can get the RDX with adaptive suspension, but you can get the Z for with it if you want to pay a lot.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:33:48  
So yeah, well, and that's the other thing with the RDX and the and the Z for for the same level of equipment. A Cadillac is actually quite a bit more at least sticker price is quite But a bit more expensive. It's several thousand dollars more. Because Yeah, but I like like nickel and dime, but you can probably haggle that price down closer to the best of the RDX.

Rebecca Lindland  1:34:11  
Yeah, I think so too.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:34:14  
All right, next one from Mike Karen's really enjoy the show and look forward to it. We're looking for an SUV to be able to tow a bass boat that weighs about 3500 pounds with search brakes. Also utility trailer that has maximum weight of 3000 pounds when researching the Kia telluride and Hyundai palisade and by the way, Mike it's palisade singular not Palisades. But minor quibble. We ran into what I think is some odd specifications. It states that it has a 5000 pound towing capacity but the tongue weight is 351 pounds. If you tell a 5000 pound trailer with 10% tongue weight, it would be 500 pounds. So it basically the tongue weight is the the weight that's actually pushing down on the The hitch so you're not getting the full weight of the trailer being supported on the hitch they generally recommend no more than 10% of the total weight being on the on the hitch. So continuing along, also the maximum towing capacity of trailer without brakes is 1600 50 pounds. We called Hyundai and they said we have to ask the dealer they were not able to help Would you be able to clarify this and also what SUV would you recommend? So I reached out to both Hyundai and Kia this past week and it turned to your right you know 351 pound tongue weight would translate to a 3500 pound trailer not a 5000 pound trailer. And it turns out that that was a mistake in the owner's manual for both of those vehicles. It was corrected back in January in the telluride owner's manual, it now says 500 pounds, same for the or it was done a little later for the palisade. So the maximum tongue weight for both of those vehicles is $5 In pounds, so if you have 100 500 pounds if you have Yes, it's not it's not a, you know, a Ford F 450

Dan Roth  1:36:10  
front wheels off the car.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:36:13  
So, if you you know if you if you have a trailer with trailer brakes on it, which sounds like at least your boat trailer does. It's not clear if your utility trailer has trailer brakes but you know, and this is typical for, you know, pretty much any vehicle you're towing. If you're you know, you that typically the maximum tow rating is based on a vehicle on a trailer that has its own brakes, as opposed to a trailer that's unbraked it's always going to be lower for an unbreak trailer. So if you have a trailer with brakes on it, you get 5000 pounds and a 500 pound tongue weight. If it's an unbraked trailer, it's going to be 1600 and 50 pounds that's it. Wow. Yeah, well, I mean that's that's for safe key reasons, you know, when you're telling that much extra weight, you know, behind you, if you don't have brakes on the trailer that are controlled from the vehicle, then you're you're going to have much lower trailer towing capacity. That's that's the way it is for everybody. And, you know, as far as what other vehicles what other SUVs we'd recommend as alternatives, you know, certainly, you know, for your boat, they, you know, both of these can can handle what you've got. You have you guys have any other suggestions for good three row utilities that foretelling Durango? Yeah, it's not that's rangos an excellent choice.

Dan Roth  1:37:43  
Explorer. Yeah. explorers.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:37:45  
Yes, explorer explorer with the three five EcoBoost will do 5600 pounds 5000 with the four cylinder and 53 with the with the hybrid. Yeah.

Rebecca Lindland  1:37:55  
I mean, basically, we're talking about a truck. Well,

Dan Roth  1:37:57  
yeah, those

Rebecca Lindland  1:38:00  
Well yeah, what

Sam Abuelsamid  1:38:03  
are the are the yeah they are they're both Yoona bodies

Rebecca Lindland  1:38:07  
what is what is the traverse to the Chevy Traverse? traverse? I

Dan Roth  1:38:13  
used to be like 15 he

Sam Abuelsamid  1:38:14  
used to be used to be 4500 I'm not 45 minutes

Dan Roth  1:38:18  
I'm impressed with that usually because yeah those are the two the the Durango and the Explorer are the ones that stick out as being better towing SUVs that aren't truck based. Because otherwise if you if you're towing a lot like Yeah, probably looking at maybe something like a four runner I don't know what the four runner tow rating is, but since that's also truck based, it's probably decent ish. The Durango I think with the VA can do like 7200 pounds. So yeah,

Rebecca Lindland  1:38:45  
yeah, cuz

Sam Abuelsamid  1:38:48  
Yeah, the Grand Cherokee Cherokee Cherokee Trailhawk will tow 7200 pounds, right? Well, the Hellcat, my choice.

Dan Roth  1:38:56  
So yeah, none of those are that efficient though. Like that. Nothing

Sam Abuelsamid  1:39:00  
if you're looking for efficiency the the probably the next best bet would be the Explorer hybrid. Yeah. Yeah. You know it's got good towing capability and you know it's also pretty efficient in normal driving. Alright, one more last one real quick. My, this is from lane Sykes. My wife and I are in our 70s living in South Lake Tahoe. We have the four by four snow cup requirement covered with our low mileage 2004 BMW X three. We live in Baja during the winter and only see snow on cameras. We would really like a four door sedan that is comfortable to drive and has all the latest safety and tech features. I'm a geek and love all the extras budget around the mid $35,000 Mark Mazda six Hyundai Sonata or

Unknown Speaker  1:39:43  
Hmm

Unknown Speaker  1:39:45  
I'm gonna go with the Sonata

Dan Roth  1:39:46  
Really? Um, let's see. 30 5000s

Rebecca Lindland  1:39:53  
are the cord

Sam Abuelsamid  1:39:56  
Yeah, cords good choice. Okay. Memories cameras, good two

Dan Roth  1:40:01  
cameras. Tech noses sort of.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:40:04  
Yeah, that's true. The court the court or the Mazda or the Sonata? The Sonata is probably the most modern of those. And then the courts good too.

Rebecca Lindland  1:40:17  
I just feel like the Sonata, you know, because when we think about tech, also, it's not just the infotainment system. It's all the safety features also. Hmm,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:40:24  
you know, if that's the thing about this segment, you know, the myth is these sedans. Pretty much all of them now have all those safety features of standard equipment, even on the face. Yeah, but some

Rebecca Lindland  1:40:35  
have more or at least available.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:40:38  
And I feel like that's pretty, you know, it's pretty common across all of them that you're going to get Lane Keeping Assist, adaptive cruise control, blind spot monitor, you know, auto headlight auto high beams, you know,

Rebecca Lindland  1:40:52  
I just I felt like this Sonata was a really good package. Well,

Dan Roth  1:40:56  
you know, here's here's one thing I don't disagree. I think this is not is fine. You can also get yourself a Kia stinger.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:41:06  
That's actually an outstanding choice and you can get one, you know, bass thinner in that price range. Yeah. You could probably get a better than bass Stinger and haggle the price down because they don't sell all that well.

Dan Roth  1:41:18  
Yeah. And it's a hatchback. I mean, come on. Yeah. It's a good time. And it's rebels. Yeah. Okay.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:41:24  
Yeah. Excellent. Dan wins. Yes, dinner.

Dan Roth  1:41:29  
Otherwise, fun to

Rebecca Lindland  1:41:30  
watch to watch them get in and out of it.

Dan Roth  1:41:32  
What? Six would be my other choice. I like the six. But the key thing here is a little more esoteric choice. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid  1:41:40  
All right. Nice.

Dan Roth  1:41:42  
Let's do it. We've done it. We've done another podcast. I'm gonna go turn the air conditioner on again. Now so. So Stevie, and

Rebecca Lindland  1:41:49  
I do you turn it off? Oh, cuz it makes loud. Yeah.

Dan Roth  1:41:51  
Not all of us live in, you know,

Sam Abuelsamid  1:41:55  
climate Central. Yeah, yeah.

Dan Roth  1:41:59  
Getting there. But you're a man of the People's right? I mean, the people need to suffer for my heart. So all right in between now and the next time, send us your thoughts and questions and we'll, we'll answer them otherwise, we'll see everybody on the next episode.

Rebecca Lindland  1:42:15  
Thanks, everybody. Thanks, everyone. Bye

Transcribed by https://otter.ai