Sam Abuelsamid 0:00 Coming up on episode 220 of wheel bearings, we've got rivian r1 t the Mercedes Benz e Qs 450 plus the Nissan Pathfinder NetFlow Ford Maverick XL T, Fords eliminator crate motor rivian goes IPO and much more all coming up next. This is episode 220 wheel bearings. I'm Sam Abuelsamid for guidehouse insights. Nicole Wakelin 0:31 I am Nicole Wakelin. And let's go with an outlet I just started writing for let's say moto one. Roberto Baldwin 0:37 And then Roberto Baldwin, and this week I'll be TechCrunch the crunchiness of text Nicole Wakelin 0:44 the crunchiest of tech no smooth tech just crunch dough just Roberto Baldwin 0:47 crunch attack like a delicious granola technology. Sam Abuelsamid 0:55 Alright, Nicole, what do you got? Nicole Wakelin 0:58 I actually the vehicle I was driving yesterday. I can't talk about yet Womp womp womp I can I mean you guys know it exists. We'll Sam Abuelsamid 1:06 talk about that one next talk Nicole Wakelin 1:08 about the Jeep Grand Cherokee next week because that's I was out driving mode but Moab but what I the vehicle I have this week, I've only just gotten today, which makes it a little hard to talk about my full drive experience in it. They parked a Nissan Pathfinder in my driveway this afternoon, which I actually drove on the launch program a little while back. So I've already had some time to drive it. You know it's neat, it's it's a nice it's like it's weird having just been in another big SUV going from that one to this one. This is definitely more affordable. It has some offer chops, but it's not something you're gonna go rock crawling it, you know, this is like a family hauler. I am pleased with it. I mean this it's a solid upgrade from what it was in the previous generation. So I think they made good moves forward. One of the things I love about it is the center row. The second row if you have the captain's chairs, the center console, it completely like lifts out you kind of just reach back and you can do it because they're like well you can just reach back from the front seat I'm like well sure you can six foot engineering dude. But can I reach it so I reached back okay, yeah, it's not like you have to like dislocate a shoulder to reach it you really can reach back there and just pull it right out. So it's it's a good choice for that. You know, the family that wants the extra seating that wants a little bit more in an SUV but doesn't necessarily want to bake break the bank by spending an absolute fortune to get a car. I'm but you know what, I'm a fan of Nissan's. I think a lot of people aren't a fan of Nissan's like they think they're sort of are you guys fans of Nissan I feel like sometimes people just sort of harp on that, that the quality isn't good enough. And I like I think they're good for the price that you're paying for Nissan I think you're getting a good deal. Sam Abuelsamid 2:53 I'm a fan of a lot of value there. Nicole Wakelin 2:55 Yeah, you're a fan of what the kicks Roberto Baldwin 2:57 kicks is the best Nissan so far still. I think it's a further price like what you're getting it's a good little car it's a great little first car it's a great second car. It's a nice car if you need like something small to get around town and still has that little you know, I think I think the with the kicks and as they're sort of the rebirth I think of Nissan because I think for a long time everything's super old and super boring and super not great and super in all the all the rental fleets. I think they're they're good, they're getting up there. Nicole Wakelin 3:28 Maybe they stopped. I think they stopped with the rental fleet thing, though. But this I think the thing with these is that they're really good. They're good value proposition like this one, there are four trims, you got that you can do four wheel drive, the base trim starts at 35 310 That's not a bad price. You know, that's, that's reasonably affordable, it's not going to require you to take out a second mortgage. When you get up to the top trim. Even with that you're only at I believe it's like $48,000 Which again, it's getting up there but it's that's you know less than you'll pay for the base model of many a three row vehicle you know, it's it's, it's still pretty affordable. That's kind Sam Abuelsamid 4:06 of like the same price spread is a you know, a Hyundai palisade or Kia Telluride, right. So Nicole Wakelin 4:12 it's you know, so it comes in under affordable thing. Power. It's got a 3.5 liter V six 284 horsepower, 259 pound feet of torque, and it gets a new transmission this year. It has a nine speed automatic, which, you know, it's so funny. I remember when I first started doing this many years ago in the dark ages, I was like, I don't get it. Who cares whether it's a five speed or a six speed or a seven speed or 150 speed. I don't care. Like now I'd be driven by like, oh, like it you don't you don't realize how much of a difference the transmission makes and how a car drives until you've actually had the chance to say oh, here's an old one. Here's something with only a five speed and here's your nine speed and that's it. It makes for a very smooth, even power delivery. So you get rid of those sort of like, you don't feel the shifts as hard as you would. In other cars. This one's really good. It's actually very smooth, which is sort of what you want in a vehicle. That's just basically this is a family car or family SUV, you're going to be taking your family around, you're not, you know, it's not a race car, it's not going to be climbing over mountains. It's something you want to be comfortable with for kids for you driving around and it nails it on that it really does. So I'm, I am a fan of the Pathfinder. I think it's good. It's got good room for cargo. You know, it has a good range of standard safety features. So yeah, I give an A plus to the new 2022 Nissan Pathfinder. Sam Abuelsamid 5:39 Okay, I have an assignment for you for the for the next time we gather together, okay. And I want I want you to go into that center console, that second row center console. Oh, god, yeah. sewn up with all the sort of typical detritus that you would find in a family hauler after a few months of use. Nicole Wakelin 5:58 So I need to find a couple and then like chocolate bars or something, some tissues, some random hair ties. Okay, go ahead. Yeah. Sam Abuelsamid 6:07 Oh, all the usual stuff. And then get back in the driver's seat, and then pull up that center console and see what happens. See if stuff falls out all over the Nicole Wakelin 6:16 place that, okay, so for if you're someone who just like tosses all the random in there, but I think you know what, though, I think if you're someone who's going to be removing that center console, it's not something like, Oh, I'm removing it today. But like, you're probably doing that, like, you're probably like you, you would know that you're going to do that. It's not just like an on the fly thing. So you have to have a little bit more careful with what you store in there. Sam Abuelsamid 6:39 Well, except from the driver's seat. You could, Nicole Wakelin 6:42 but don't be so sloppy Sam. Be nice and neat and tidy. Sam Abuelsamid 6:47 Well, not anymore because my kids are grown and out of the house. I mean, I remember what it was like to have young kids. Yeah. Nicole Wakelin 6:55 Yeah, that's true. That's true. But yeah, it's good. If you Sam Abuelsamid 7:00 if you put a couple of kids in that second row and those captains chairs, that thing is inevitably going to get filled up with all kinds of stuff. Nicole Wakelin 7:08 Okay, see, but I'm not I am well, my kids are older now to they're not at the age have to worry about all that stuff. But I was still the mom who had everything so tidy and neat in her car, unless except for the McDonald's toys that always littered the floor. But like the console and stuff like everything was nice and neat and organized. A little Ziploc baggie with napkins little baggie with extra straw. I was I was that. Sam Abuelsamid 7:31 I didn't show you the the interior of Julie's car when you were here. Nicole Wakelin 7:35 Oh, what I've been horrified. Yeah, you had a lot of stuff in it. And I you know, and even with the one hand thing, if you decide to put an anvil in there or something, I mean, you're not going to be able to lift it if you pack it full of stuff. But if you're just you know, using it for light stuff, and you're more organized than Sam is, it's gonna be just fine. Sam Abuelsamid 7:59 Well, my car is organized because it's so small, there's nowhere to put Nicole Wakelin 8:03 storage. Yeah, you can't store anything in it. So it's all good. That's right. Now we know why you bought it, the truth comes out. Roberto Baldwin 8:12 Exactly. It's like if you buy small, okay, if you buy smaller plates, you eat less food. It's that sort of thing. Like if you buy a big play like why gotta fill this with food? If you buy a smaller car a smaller plate you put less Nicole Wakelin 8:25 food in it. So yeah. I like that theory applied to cars that works. Roberto Baldwin 8:31 Yeah, if you have less room you can put less crap and you're Nicole Wakelin 8:37 automatically keep a tidy card. Just Roberto Baldwin 8:39 don't get anything with storage. Don't get any storage because you're just gonna you're just gonna put Nicole Wakelin 8:43 stuff in there it's gonna be a mess when you lift up that console. Get me out of it actually, as is everyone the answer to everything is me. There you go Sam Abuelsamid 8:55 alright, Robbie, what have you been driving Roberto Baldwin 8:59 you know stuff. So the okay moving stuff. So I finally got a chance this is I got a very small window of time. And this vehicle by I finally got a chance to drive the rivian r1 t their electric pickup truck. They're having like a drive First Mile program here in the Bay Area where potential buyers or current I guess deposit terror deposit holders I know people who have buy in the thing they can go out and they can drive it for about 30 minutes on sort of like an off road course you know there's some just regular dirt roads but I'll see go up a steep hill down a steep hill it was really muddy because it's been raining. And I'm gonna say as a whenever you get into a vehicle from a new automaker, there's always something that's not quite you know, it's a little off because it's new. They don't have decades upon decades upon upon decades of experience building vehicles. This is the first time you know, it's so the first time you do anything, you know, there's probably going to be some issues, I was really impressed with how well put together the vehicle was, I was impressed how well it drove, again only had like 30 minutes in it, I was impressed, you know, has that those four, it's all wheel drive, and every wheel has its own little motor. And the torque vectoring was great. It has, you know, it has the, like one pedal driving, and they had it on a steep hill with some mud. And if there was just enough of a rut, I could get it to just sort of stop without using the brake, which is nice. So if you've ever done any off roading, and you're going down a steep hill, you know that you can't stop on the brake cuz then you'll slide down. And once you start sliding, like Well, there you go. All bets are off. So you're always sort of feathering the clutch trying to like keep it in first try to slow down and kind of back and forth between the brake in the clutch brake and clutch brake, you know, braking the accelerator, just sort of to adjust your your speeds, more and more vehicles now have a descent feature that actually slows the vehicle down using the engine. But you know, it was it was it was it drove really nice. It was comfortable. There's room in the front and the back. They had like that tent setup thing. So I got inside the tent for a little while in case I ever want to go over landing and then they had the big stove, you know, the the pullout stove. And those are so cool. It's very cool. But Nicole Wakelin 11:28 it's also like a need for it like Yeah, did you ever need that? But I'm like, That is so cool. It's a very Roberto Baldwin 11:33 expensive, I think it what is the price? Hold on? I found it out. It's like five grand. Yeah, it's like $5,000 Was it? Yeah, it is. It's $5,000 for the camp. And for the little camp kitchen. Nicole Wakelin 11:46 Yeah, Roberto Baldwin 11:47 I guess if you're going camping all the time. Are you going to use it all the time? May I guess it's worth it. It's very expensive. I mean, it's impressive. It's like a little, a little like a tub. And we'll see can you get water and you have to come. I mean, it's all very nice and impressive. But $5,000 That's more than like a stove in your home. That I know you can take it places unfortunately, you can actually take it out. Nicole Wakelin 12:12 So if your home is not portable, I can't just like wheel that into my truck. So that's Roberto Baldwin 12:17 just like, plop it on top. Plug it in, get an electric stove Sam Abuelsamid 12:24 just get a dolly, you know, haul it out of the kitchen. Yeah, all in. Nicole Wakelin 12:29 Easy, totally. Roberto Baldwin 12:30 I just saved you $4,100. Yeah, no, but it's nice that I found out like, can you just take that thing off and didn't just have the sliding gear shuttle? Can you just have this gear shuttle? They're like, Oh, yeah, yeah, you can take this. So if you know, the months at a time, you actually don't need to be hauling around a kitchen, you can take it off and just have the gear shuttle you put things in and slides into. Yeah, overall, I think you know, it's a, I'll have a better idea of how much I like it or don't like it. And once I get more than 30 minutes of time, behind the wheel, but I was impressed. It felt nice. Again, with the especially with these events, especially when you're trying to get people to buy it, you're gonna bring the best one you have, you know what I mean here, but we have 10 of them. And eight of them are the best ones we have. So let's bring those over there when it comes down to actually building and manufacturing. And this is the issue that Tesla always seems to run into is like once you have to make a bunch of them. That's when you know, panel gaps and issues with things falling off and whatnot. And, again, new company, we'll see how it sort of shakes out but overall Yeah, I was impressed. And then I am currently driving the Mercedes EQ s 450. Plus, plus plus. Better I drove this vehicle and the fi fy 2530. July right at Yeah, I drove this vehicle and the 580 version, the the all wheel drive version in Switzerland. A while back in July sounds about right. So this is the the last powerful, I guess you want to say ruble drive version of the q s. So the starting price is $102,000, which isn't cheap, but still cheaper than an S class, which is sort of insane. The version I was driving $122,000 Anything. Mercedes, BMW once you start adding things onto it, it gets very expensive very quickly. 350 miles of range, which is nice. It supports plug and play. I went to the Electrify America thing. I plugged it in. It just started charging. Yeah, I didn't have to do anything and I have to use my Electrify America account. And so that was really nice. It's, it is a I think it drives better than the S class because as an Eevee powertrain and so that means you reduce vibration Get rid of any sort of extra sound, it's all gone. Because you just have this nice, smooth Evie powertrain. It's the rear wheel drive version. It's not that I don't think most people need all wheel drive and an S class unless you live somewhere cold, maybe it's going to snow. And this one has does have the gigantic hiper screen, which is the most expensive option for this vehicle. And it is $7,230. How Wait $7,230 Now, within the screen, there are three displays. There's your there's your dash cluster display. There's the infotainment touchscreen display and your passenger way over on the other side gets a 12.3 inch display as well. These are OLED display, they look beautiful. It has all the fun lights that Mercedes Benz has now all the sort of LEDs and stuff inside the car. So at night, it feels like you're in a rave. And it was what is funny is that that passenger screen so me and my wife are driving to do whatever. And she's like pushing buttons in the like, oh, there's a browser, so she tries to use the browser. You can't use the browser unless the car is in park. Nicole Wakelin 16:18 Even on the passengers even on the passenger screen is the passenger screen like like like a privacy thing? Like can the driver seat or just the past? Roberto Baldwin 16:25 If I look way over there, I could see it. Like my watch. Have you Nicole Wakelin 16:29 driven? It has that screen like you can't unless you're like in the lap of the passenger? You can't see it in a grant. Roberto Baldwin 16:36 Because it has the sort of Yeah, yeah, like you have to be like, they don't have the sort of tenting they don't have the Nicole Wakelin 16:43 because you could be distracted, I guess. But it's terribly distracting. So Roberto Baldwin 16:48 what catered to the internet, she can like adjust the you know, you can do the media, you can do navigation, you can do all these things that you can kind of do if you just look left to you know, a few inch center. Nicole Wakelin 17:02 Look straight ahead and move your eyes to the left. That's a lot of work. Like I feel like Roberto Baldwin 17:07 especially when, especially when you're in the passenger and you have so many other things you should be doing so many Nicole Wakelin 17:11 things you have to focus on. It's like now I have to move my eyes left. Roberto Baldwin 17:15 So we're driving to we're going to go buy records because we're where are those people now? We're gonna go buy some records. And my wife's like trying to get it she's like, well, this is just dumb. She's all because I can just get online with my phone. Why? She's like, it was just a bigger screen and that were part I'm getting out of the car. I'm not hanging out in the car. I'm like, yeah, yeah, so there you go. That's what the passenger screen. So they there's Nicole Wakelin 17:41 Hey, well, you're selling that $1,000 option, it's gonna be hard to say no, Roberto Baldwin 17:47 it's, it's sort of a weird thing. I'm going to test out some more. I think those screens in the back are cool, because then you can adjust the navigation and the media and all that stuff. Because you can't reach the front that makes a lot more sense when the screens are in the back. When it's the passenger screen in almost mirrors what's happening in the screen that's just a few inches to the to the left of it. And then you can't use the one thing that you can do on it that you can't do on a regular screen when you're driving. There's like Ah, okay, it doesn't have a giant all the time. When it when there's no one there like the default is just a giant compass so you can see which way you're going. So I end up looking over my goal I'm going southwest at 12 degrees or some so Nicole Wakelin 18:30 I'm gonna make it easier when your GPS does stupid things that saying like head north on Main Street and I always think to myself if I knew which direction north was here, I probably wouldn't need to be using you right now. Sam Abuelsamid 18:41 Exactly. So So I assume that means that the passenger also can't watch a video on that screen while the cars in motion right Roberto Baldwin 18:49 probably now we haven't I haven't gotten to that point yet in my in my testing, but I'm pretty sure you cannot if you can't if you can't just surf the web on there. Yeah, I don't think you're gonna let you watch like you know, a video of what you know cats cat videos, Nicole Wakelin 19:04 I guess cats. Oh, you mean like random cats. I'm like who watches cats? I'm thinking the musical. I'm like really? Roberto Baldwin 19:10 The movie cats. That's all that's available in the new Mercedes Benz e Qs. These are watching cats. You're watching nothing. That's it. That's all you get. And Nicole Wakelin 19:18 that's it. Roberto Baldwin 19:19 Cats and that is it. Ah, yeah, no, I like the car. I liked it in Switzerland. I like it now. We'll Yeah, I'll have a review of it on and gadget like a week or two? I don't know. This depends on how long it takes him to edit the video. Sam Abuelsamid 19:38 Inbox. Yep. All right. I had the 22 Ford Maverick XL T hybrid in cyber orange. I had it for a whole week and quite a few of my neighbors were surprisingly interested in this in fact My next door neighbor on one side already has one ordered, scheduled to be built next week, they got an XL, the base model. So it's the absolute stripped down version of it, which means they don't get any cruise control on it. The one I had was the XL T. And in general, this is the one that this is, I mean, typically, you know, the mid level trim is usually the sweet spot anyway, for pretty much any vehicle. If you're going to buy something, because it's got it's usually got all the equipment you you really want on there. And it's you know, it's usually still a pretty reasonable price in the case of the maverick. That means that the the XL T starts at where to go here. It starts at 22,280 as the MSRP plus the $1,495 delivery charge, which is absolutely ridiculous. Wait, wait, wait, how much it's 1500 bucks for delivery. Roberto Baldwin 21:10 I mean, $100 and you live like down the street from Nicole Wakelin 21:15 you should get a discount? Sam Abuelsamid 21:16 Well, no, actually the the the metal fabric is built in Herman seal. Seal Mexico with the Bronco sport. Alright. But it doesn't matter if you live in San Diego. That's ridiculous. I mean, these we've talked about this before, the delivery charges are just Nicole Wakelin 21:31 a charge we've come up with since we've been obsessing about delivery charges, Sam Abuelsamid 21:35 the wagoneer $2,000. Nicole Wakelin 21:39 Grand Cherokee is 1795. So I figured that had to be pretty up there to Roberto Baldwin 21:47 fly to Mexico and drive home and save money. And they Nicole Wakelin 21:51 still mess Sam Abuelsamid 21:52 on airfare and God and all except they still charge you the delivery charge. Even if you get it from the factory. Roberto Baldwin 21:58 What's the point? Sam Abuelsamid 21:59 So So you know, this is this is something they need to change. They need to, you know, force automakers to include the delivery charge in the MSRP. If it's not optional, don't break don't bother Nicole Wakelin 22:11 anyone ever taught. I mean, I honestly have never asked this question. Why? Or is it just a way of getting extra cash? Or is there a stated reason for why delivery charges? Has anyone ever asked an OEM why they're getting? So I haven't. I'm gonna now. But if you guys ever Sam Abuelsamid 22:26 have I mean? Yeah, I mean, you know, they will tell you, you know that. It used to be the back in the day long, long ago, that they the delivery charge actually was it did vary depending on how far you were from the factory. So really, you know, for example, yeah, I mean, this is back in the up until the early 90s. For me, you know, if I was getting a truck from the Ford Rouge plant, you know, the delivery charge might be $300. But as that same truck was being delivered to California, it might be $1,500 or $1,000, whatever. But somewhere in the mid 90s, I think they changed it and just basically figured out okay, here's what the average charges across the board, we're just gonna charge everybody the same. But what they should have just done is when they did that, just roll it right into the MSRP. Because if you can't, if you can't opt out of it, then just put it on the price of the car. Roberto Baldwin 23:26 That's how much it costs. There's no like, yeah, it's like, right. Hey, I'm not playing this delivery charge at the dealership, and they're like, Yeah, you are. Nicole Wakelin 23:34 Yeah. You want a car? Yeah. Sam Abuelsamid 23:36 So so the, the the truck I had had the the cyber orange paid, which is 444 100. Sorry. Yeah. $495 option. And I think it's definitely worth it. Well, well worth it. I'm on the fence if it's wherever Mr. Cardin. I like that panel. That color in the parking lot. You'll always find it in the parking lot. It'll always stand out among the sea of silver and gray cars. Nicole Wakelin 24:05 Yeah, like the like 50 I had a few weeks ago, once a year you are so seasonally appropriate driving around in a pumpkin? Roberto Baldwin 24:13 Yeah, you can always find your car. Sam Abuelsamid 24:17 Yeah, this also had the floormats the copilot 360 package, which is $540 and the $500 spray in bedliner. All told, including that delivery charge, it came to $25,440 which I think is still quite a reasonable price. This, you know, this is a much more reasonable sized truck. For the vast majority of people if you're not towing a big camper trailer or a boat. You know, this is probably all the truck you really need. And this one would have the hybrid powertrain. It's front wheel drive. I took it out On a mileage run, I averaged 41 and a half miles per gallon with this thing. So, yeah, 25 grand 40 miles per gallon. You can't you can't beat this. It's actually a really good bargain. And if you get the XL t you do get cruise control. Nicole Wakelin 25:18 Have you driven Santa Cruz? Sam Abuelsamid 25:22 I did drive to Santa Cruz during the mama rally a few couple of weeks ago, Santa Clara and Roberto Baldwin 25:28 don don. Yeah. Sam Abuelsamid 25:34 I, I think I would personally probably go with the maverick. Yeah, especially at the base price point. You know, the the Santa Cruz has some extra features. You know, I mean, it started the Santa Cruz starts at 25,000 and goes up from there. You know, at but it doesn't have they don't have a hybrid version right now. So, you know, the the base version, the base, you know, front wheel drive 2.5 liter, I think it's rated about 26 miles per gallon. So you know, if you're concerned about you know, fuel costs, the the Maverick is a lot more fuel efficient. The, you know, the Santa Cruz is certainly more stylish. Yeah, it's a little less Truckee looking and it's basically a Tucson with a bed, you know, at the back end cut off of bed. But, you know, they're both really good, I think it basically comes down to, you know, kind of what you're looking for in terms of design, if you want something more stylish looking, you know, I think the Santa the Santa Cruz is definitely an excellent choice, you're not going to go, you're not going to go far wrong with either one of them. But, you know, the, the Maverick is so much more fuel efficient. And it's got some neat touches, a lot of nice little touches, like, the way the door handles are cut away the arm, the door, armrests are cut away a lot. So you can put in tall water bottles in the doors, the the notches in the bed, you know, so you can install stuff, you know, either, you know, buying accessories, or making your own accessories, you know, and Ford gives you all the instructions to build your own bike racks and things like that. So there's just a lot of nice little touches, and also the storage inside under the the rear seat. You know, you can flip up the rear seat and there's a big storage, you know, hidden storage bay under there. So you can put all kinds of stuff in there too. So just, you know, it's really well thought out. It's the ride quality is, you know, it's not plush. I wouldn't, I wouldn't call it plush. You know, it's not, it's not bad. But it's it's a little bit stiff over some bumps, but it's fine, it's acceptable, I've driven a lot worse. So, you know, I think if you're looking for you know, something that's a really good value, and you want that you want extra utility, you know, I used it, I had done some tree trimming, and I had a whole bunch of brush sitting in my yard, that I was just waiting to get a truck to haul it out to the township compost site, you know, I was able to stuff all that stuff into the bed there and take it out there. You know, it's great for things like that, you know, those kinds of jobs. You know, another another nice detail is the tailgate, you know, because it's a smaller truck. So it's not, it's not wide enough to put a four by eight sheet of plywood in between the wheel wells, but it will fit in the bed above the wheel wells. But what you don't want to do is stick, you know, a sheet of plywood or drywall in there, you know, that's on top of the wheel wells and leaning down towards the back, you know, with the tailgate out. So they have, you can take the cords for the tailgate, you can take them off the regular pens and put them on to higher pins. So the tailgate basically sits up, you know, is angled at like about a 40 degree angle, so that when you put something across the wheel wells and the tailgate, it sits flat, so it's not going to slide out the back. So just you know a lot of really nice thoughtful touches. And you can also step up to the Lariat, too, get that price, that price point, that low end price point, though, you know, the the thing is, you know, hard plastics everywhere. It's really well well done plastics, you know, they're nice, nicely textured, and you know, the colors are good, it looks good. But it's you know, it's not luxurious. So you can take a Maverick and max it out to I think almost $37,000 If you get the two liter EcoBoost and the towing package and all wheel drive and all the other options. But you know, really I think in this mid $20,000 range is is the sweet spot, you know, if you want if you want something more yeah, there's I think there's other options at the higher end of the price range. Roberto Baldwin 29:58 Oh, I thought you're putting your hand up for a question. Nicole Wakelin 30:02 Question. My dog fell asleep in my left arm and now my left arm is asleep so I shuffled him to the right arm and now I'm stretching the left arm so continue Sam Abuelsamid 30:13 okay all right. Well, that's all I got on the map. Nicole Wakelin 30:18 I like to be with you I think that between that I feel like the Santa Cruz is a little bit more car ish you know it feels a little but that the the maverick if you want to truck but you don't want to have to do the the great big truck and you want to be affordable. I love the ability to be able to do things like like you said, you want to create true life stories in there by fours and a piece of plywood. You have two levels and you can purchase it off. And yeah, I thought that was pretty cool. So I agree with you. Roberto Baldwin 30:43 I'm I'm very excited. Probably Sam Abuelsamid 30:45 about 20 bags of mulch. Oh, Nicole Wakelin 30:48 we need to do mulch test. We didn't just show this spring, we need to all get big cars mulch and count how many goes into whatever we're carry. Roberto Baldwin 30:57 Like that baseline will be the X Tiger, the PAL. Sam Abuelsamid 31:00 Get a pallet. I'll get a pallet of mulch sitting in my driveway. Nicole Wakelin 31:07 Just bring it back out, reload it. It'll be your workout for the week, load the bolts and load the mulch out. You're all done. Roberto Baldwin 31:13 Yeah, perfect. Sam Abuelsamid 31:16 All right. And some of the news items of the week. Last week, as we record was the annual SEMA show it was back live in Las Vegas again, that is the Specialty Equipment Manufacturers Association. That's where they have all kinds of interesting aftermarket stuff. And one of the last couple of years, GM has shown off a couple of concepts where they took old GM vehicles I think last year they did an old early 70s K five Chevy Blazer. And they put what they call their E crate and package in there. So the E crate package which they promised to put on sale, but I don't think are actually put on sale yet is essentially taking Chevy Bolt, electric motor, battery pack and power electronics and a wiring harness and selling that as part of their aftermarket, you know, manufacturers most manufacturers sell crate engines and this was intended as an electric crate motor powertrain for doing resto mods for converting older vehicles to electric. And this year, Ford did one they took a 1978 I think F 100 pickup truck and they put part of the powertrain and put the essentially put the powertrain from a Maki GT in there. So it had the it was four wheel drive at the the two motors from the maki GT. And they put together a battery pack with a few of the modules from the Maki, it's using the same modules. So 480 horsepower, 634 foot pounds of torque. And I think the the truck had it here, I think it was about 100 140 miles of range or so. And they also announced that they were going to put the, their illuminator electric crate motor on sale through Ford performance. So you can order one. And I guess they had a limited number of them to sell in this first batch. And they sold out within a couple of days. Here How many 900 they did not say how many. They have 3900 Yeah, $3,900 for the motor. Which you know, when you if you compare that to, you know, buying something like a coyote V eight, motor, crate motor. You know, I think those go for about eight grand. So, it's not not a bad price. And, you know, this is a you know, it's got a lot of torque. You know, and if you want to do something like what they did with this f 100 You'd need to have those to get that 480 horsepower, but you know, what, what do you think about, you know, doing these electric resto mods, Roberto Baldwin 34:18 I love electric resto mods. For a lot of reasons a I want to do one, B, I you know, I own my first car was a 69 a car from 1969 which meant that it broke down constantly. All the time, just like things were just break. I was always able to duel carbs, I was always adjusting the carburetors, which is fun and I look at me I'm a cool car guy. But then you're just like, I just want to go somewhere. I don't want to go. I just wanted to do things. You know, I had more. I was more excited about going places then. Than then working on In the car. And so the idea of being able to take an old car and put an EV powertrain battery, the whole shebang drive train in there means that you don't have a lot of that sort of work that you have to do. Um, you're still going to have to tweak it because you know, there's probably going to be some suspension tweaks you got to be working on for four months. And then if you're using the transmission which most people are still using the transmission because it's easier just to hook up the electric motor to the existing transmission and stop trying to come up with a transaxle and blah blah blah you know, you're still going to have to You do still have to deal with that and make sure you don't destroy it by you know, taking off in first gear all the time. Typically you take off in second with these but yeah, no, I think and you know, I think it's it's a it's a fun way to take you know, the desirability and design and sort of the fun of an old vehicle and making it a bit more of just sort of drag it into the future and make it so it doesn't break down quite as much and most of the time you know, when you have these older cards you don't drive them you know, you don't a lot of people don't really drive on long road trips and you don't you know you don't do all these like super long that's that's what your Honda Civic is for and your your cord and your rav4 and that's that's what that is for. These are for cruising around town and showing it off and you know, it's cool Nicole Wakelin 36:29 and going a little car show at the park or the parking lot at Target or something. Roberto Baldwin 36:34 Yeah, yeah. Every once in a while doing burnouts and then wrecking your car at cars and coffee, don't do burnouts of cars and coffee. That's my other members doing fate, you're going to wreck you do. You're going to wreck your car, and you're going to put a lot of people in danger, including yourself. But that all said I think I really liked the rest of them on EVs. I'm a big fan. If you don't like them, that's cool. I went you know, it's your car, do what you want. Nicole Wakelin 36:58 Whatever makes you happy. Sam Abuelsamid 37:01 Yeah, I found I found the GM project that they did this year for SEMA. They, it was a 1957 Chevy. It was one that was originally done. It was bought by Hot Rod Magazine back in the mid 1960s. For 250 bucks, it was called Project X. And so Hot Rod had done a bunch of stuff with it. And so this year, Chevy performance and Motor Trend collaborated on electric taking that same car, the Project X car, and electrifying it, and they put a 340 horsepower motor in there. And the original one had a supercharged VAT in there. And so they put a 340 horsepower electric motor in there and about 30 kilowatt hours of battery. So that 340 horsepower motor is one of the new Altium motors. So this is one of the three motors you'll get in the Hummer EV so if you get a Hummer, it'll have three of these in it. And they they put one of them in this 57 Chevy, which is probably more power than it ever had originally, by quite a large margin, and certainly more torque. And this would make a pretty cool weekend cruiser. Oh, Roberto Baldwin 38:22 yeah. It's not gonna have that big loud V eight sound. I mean, that's, that's, that's what you're losing. And that's kind of it. Yeah. No worries, bro. I mean, we can buy a stereo system and just make us make that noise Nicole Wakelin 38:39 of speakers and the sound in the cabin to make it sound like your car has a better engine than it does to give you fake exhaust and air and all that stuff. Do the same thing. Sam Abuelsamid 38:48 Bla bla bla bla bla bla you know, a lot of the cars you see cruising these days, you know, have giant stereos in them pumping out, you know, 1000s of watts of bass, you know, so you can't hear the engine anyway. Roberto Baldwin 39:02 Everyone knows that. It doesn't matter. Everyone's done an LS swap. That's like the answer to every problem is like, well, what? LS swap? Okay, which sort of like defeats the whole like, Well, you got to keep it you know, you got to keep it like it was when you when you're throwing LS swaps and old cars, you're not keeping it like it was you're, you know, you're doing something insane and fun, which is kind of the whole point of the car of old car culture is you're doing just this weird, insane thing. That is part of who you are, like, none of these cars came out in purple or teal that didn't have chopped top. So they have all these like weird things that people have done to to hot rods over the last forever. And so, you know, just this is just another element of that. Sam Abuelsamid 39:47 Blah, blah, blah. All right. Let's stick with electric for a moment. You mentioned driving the ravine earlier. Earlier today, as we record Rivia and did their IPO. We don't usually talk about financial stuff, but they, they they sold their shares at evaluated the initial IPO valuation was $78 billion, which was just shy of what Ford was worth today. And they've barely delivered a handful of cars, a handful of trucks so far. They also raised $11.9 billion from selling those shares. Yes. So they've got an extra 12 billion in the bank now, on top of whatever they had leftover from their previous fundraising rounds, that what they thought was gonna be okay for a while. Nicole Wakelin 40:43 Was that what they expected for their IPO? Do you know what the the expectation was? Sam Abuelsamid 40:47 Actually, it was more it was more they were originally projecting 60 billion as the valuation and they went over a little over 11.9 was what they would their that was their takeaway. That's what they take away from the table after selling the shares. The market cap, they were projecting was going to be 60 billion. It turned out to be 78 billion instead of Nicole Wakelin 41:09 eight. So they beat it good for them. So much money Sam Abuelsamid 41:13 for 12 car, and then it went up. What went up from there? I think last time I checked, yeah. So it closed up. 29%. So Nicole Wakelin 41:24 if you had a tiny little chunk of change today. Sam Abuelsamid 41:29 Yeah. What it bounced up $22.73 from its opening price, so yeah, it's it's doing okay. They'll, they'll be alright. Roberto Baldwin 41:40 We'll be okay. Well, we'll see. I mean, hopefully there'll be okay. Nicole Wakelin 41:44 You want to say there but you never know like, I think they're gonna be okay. Yeah, it sounds like they're in great trouble. Or their product isn't going to be what it should be. But you it's the weird thing is like you watch companies sometimes burn through obscene amounts of money due to mission like obscene amounts of money. Like, how could they possibly Oh, wait, the money is God. Okay. Oh, Roberto Baldwin 42:03 God, they did some crazy thing. It's always easy, stupid thing. People who are running the place are like, we got all this money. Let's just buy lots of No, no, no, no, no, Nicole Wakelin 42:13 don't do this stuff. Hold on to the money. You're gonna need that money. You don't Roberto Baldwin 42:17 need $15,000 chairs. You don't need a, you know, a gold or diamond encrusted foosball table. You need but you need you need factories to build cars and need to pay people a living wage. That's what you need. Nicole Wakelin 42:32 Diamonds on any everything and sapphires and gold plating, gold plated desks, gold plated office chairs, gold plated Koenig, in the coffee room, all of it, Roberto Baldwin 42:44 buy the things you need to build the thing and pay the people who are building it a good wage, and you'll be fine. Nicole Wakelin 42:50 Oh, he's looking at you being all reasonable. Roberto Baldwin 42:52 I know. I know. That's why I'm not in charge of any companies. Well, no, if Nicole Wakelin 42:55 you had $11.9 billion in the IPO, that we will be confident that you would survive, because you're not boy buying curry. Roberto Baldwin 43:04 Not yet. Sam Abuelsamid 43:08 Many billions of dollars. There's a story in automotive news. Actually, this is from Reuters. They added up the total amount that's been committed in investments from automakers for EVs. Three years ago, when they did this, their analysis showed that automakers were planning on spending $300 billion. This is you know, all the all the automakers globally, spending about $300 billion to develop EVs, retool factories, built battery plants, and so on. That number since 2019, or 2018, has climbed to $515 billion. So they plan to spend this decade which, you know, given all the announcements, we've heard about new battery plants, and everything else, is not the least bit surprising. guys have any thoughts on this? Nicole Wakelin 44:06 No. I mean, it's it's surprising only that man, that's a big number. But the fact that it's a big number, not surprising, like you know, that's where everything's going, you know, that that's where the investments going to be. And you know, that whether you want to deny the future, and you know, have these super powerful AI, indices, your car forever, that eventually you're gonna have to say goodbye. So making that investment makes a heck a lot of sense. It's just to show how much is involved in it like that. It's $515 billion. Is is shocking, but to know they're doing it doesn't surprise me at all. Roberto Baldwin 44:39 Yeah, there's a billion reasons why they should be doing it. And $550 billion to make it happen. Nicole Wakelin 44:46 But yeah, yep. That's a lot, right. Oh, Sam Abuelsamid 44:50 and last one here is about Cadillac. I think earlier this year, maybe was last year, talked about Cadillac had told her dealers after they announced the lyric that they were going to have to spend a bunch of money to equip their dealerships to handle EVs for parts for training, and equipment and tools. And they told their dealers look, you know, we know that this is going to be a significant investment, it's probably going to be on the order of about $250,000 or more for every dealership to get ready for Evie sales. And so they they offered their dealers their all their dealers deal, basically said the deal if you don't want it, if you don't want to make this investment, no problem. You know, we'll buy back your franchise from you. Yeah, and you can go sell something else or close up shop or whatever. And they offered him I think, on average about about $500,000 for their franchises. And earlier this year, they announced that about 20% of Cadillac dealers, and this was, you know, they started at 875 dealerships across the United States, they announced that about 20% of them, were taking the deal and, and walking away. That number has now climbed to 1/3 of their dealers as they go into 2022 Cadillac expects to have 560 dealerships instead of 875. So about about 315 dealers are going away. But it's not actually probably going to make that much difference to Cadillac sales, because those remaining 560 dealers account for about 90% of Cadillac sales. So most of the ones that are selling back their franchises are probably dual dealerships with other brands, and they're just not selling very many Cadillacs anyway. So it's, it's going to be interesting, even with 560. Dealers, they still have, I think, quite a bit more than Lexus, I think Lexus has about 400 stores across the US. So it's at least those dealers that are left will be ready to take on the lyric and other EVs starting next year. Roberto Baldwin 47:27 Imagine you're the guy who owns a dealership who's decided he's gonna retire. And then one day like, like, right before you unnaturally retire Cadillacs. Like we'll give you $500,000 For your dealership, he's like, oh, Nicole Wakelin 47:39 right, you're like, and I'm done. Is this? Is this something where our dealerships still able, I know, they said the numbers, they gave them what they expected at the end of the year, I guess, but our dealership still able to continue to take advantage of that and say, hey, you know what, we've been thinking about it we're out? Or is that like, the bleed has stopped? Sort of, like whoever's in is? Whoever's out is out now. Sam Abuelsamid 48:02 I don't know. I suspect, you know that if there's still some that haven't made, I think most of them have probably made up their mind at this point. Because, yeah, the lyrics just a few months away, so you have to? Yeah, yeah, I think. I mean, if there's some that still want to get out, you know, I suspect that GM will probably say, Fine, you know, we'll buy out. Nicole Wakelin 48:27 I'm curious if in the end, even though like you said, it's the higher volume dealers are the ones that are staying in the lower volume guys are out. But you wonder if it's gonna end up being net net, truly better for Cadillac, because if you're getting rid of dealers that are smaller, that maybe aren't selling very much that aren't great dealers, it might not necessarily mean creating the best customer experience for people who walked in, who didn't end up buying a Cadillac at all, and went somewhere else. And now, if they do walk into a Cadillac dealership, it's the better ones that are left. So they're more likely to get a better more premium experience and more likely to walk out with a Cadillac. Roberto Baldwin 49:03 Cuz there's four ships in your area. And one of them just is really bad. So in Cadillacs, and you go to that Cadillac dealer, right, and they're also like a Ford dealer, or they're also like a Hyundai dealer or whatever. They're just like, Well, I'm just gonna go over there, as opposed to now there's only three dealerships in your area, and all three of them know how to sell a Cadillac, and you show up and they're like, hey, and you walk out with them. Nicole Wakelin 49:25 They have they have less dealerships, but the ones that are they're left with are actually more capable of selling the vehicles more vested in selling the vehicles and you know, fewer dealerships but you know, our sales, you know, are not going to take the hit at all. You know, I wonder how that'll shake out. We'll have to see. Sam Abuelsamid 49:40 Very interesting. Yeah. All right. Let's answer some questions from the listener says hello, let's let's start off with Andrew Pappas. Hello, Andrew. How do I time buying my last manual transmission car currently have a focus se looking at a GTI and or civic as the last two reasonable options. I expect to be forced to go electric or hybrid, which will likely be auto only at some point. So when, when, when should Andrew time? When should he get his last manual transmission car? I feel like a new manual transmission car. Nicole Wakelin 50:20 I feel like you got some time, Andrew, there's still a lot of manual transmissions. I mean, a dwindling number. But they're still out there. We still have a lot of gas vehicles out there. They're not. I don't, I feel like you could like, Okay, what the average age of a car is something like 1112 years old. I feel like for the next 12 years, we're still gonna have cars with manual transmissions. And it'll be the good ones like a GTI. To civic not like something that's not fun and sporty. I feel like you've got yours. You could buy one today. And they may be like one more. I don't know how long you keep your cars for? Roberto Baldwin 50:50 Yeah, I think I mean, I was talking, I talked to somebody once about manual transmissions and the take rates and we're the only sort of area where manual transmissions are likely to stick around for long term are the like the mid level performance? You know, the the GTI is the Miata is the BRGs the Civic I think is probably going to lose this manual transmission outside of the bar. You know, quicker, sooner rather than later. Just because at some point, the take rate on those isn't just, yeah, it's gonna be too low. So if as long as you're fine, you know, if you're a fan of fun little hot hatches or fun little convertibles or something like that. I think the Management Admission is going to be around for for quite a while. Was I think if you're looking at like anything else, though. I mean, even the, you know, the two series is lost its manual transmission. And that, that's that's a tough one right there. That one was like, ah, Nicole Wakelin 51:50 if it's if it's a hot hatch, you've got plenty of time. Yeah, nothing else. I wouldn't, it could be it. Roberto Baldwin 51:57 It's gonna Yeah, they're gonna for this world, maybe maybe a few more years for those people aren't I mean, it's, it's, I mean, it's people just aren't buying them. That's all. Nicole Wakelin 52:05 They can't keep them if no one's buying them. And no one's buying, you know, 5% of Roberto Baldwin 52:09 the people are buying them. And they're like, Well, why are we making all these cars? Why do we have these? Yeah, yeah, it's mostly the enthusiast vehicles. Sam Abuelsamid 52:20 You know, Honda was the last one to offer a manual in a midsize sedan. And they dropped that from the Accord last year, or 2019. And they've reduced the availability of manuals in the civic in the current generation. So there'll be around for a few more years, I think, you know, like you said, you know, sporty cars like the Miata BRC Jr, 86 Mustang will probably continue to offer manual for probably, you know, at least through most of this decade, yeah. Or at least as long as those cars are in production. But you know, something like the Corvette, you can't get a manual on a Corvette anymore. It's true. Most of the high end sports cars, you can't get manuals or they're all DCTS or something Nicole Wakelin 53:13 like you still have a hot hatch you can get a nice little manual transmission but if you want a manual in a super fancy expensive car Roberto Baldwin 53:19 you can Good luck with that. Nicole Wakelin 53:21 Well I mean that that group has said kick like kicked to the curb and God was you know the dual clutch situation a lot more quickly than little hot hatch guys have Roberto Baldwin 53:29 I think the hot hatch people are actually better drivers though. You're probably right but that's the that's that's what it comes down to. Sam Abuelsamid 53:37 Who can actually afford yeah by the supercars. It's Roberto Baldwin 53:42 someone in their their teens and 20s You know those those those kids are you know, they still want to like yeah brand brand brand brand. And then they get their 30s or 40s and they still want to go fast. Nicole Wakelin 53:51 You were spot on with your car noises tonight I just killing it. You're killing it man Roberto Baldwin 53:57 with the car noises but you know the but once you get your 30s and 40s and you want to BMW or you want to Lexus but you want something a little sporty but you kind of don't want to shift gears anymore. You got the kids in the back you got you know the dog like in your you got all these things going on. You just kind of want to get at the end of day you still want to go fast but you're just like I just can't deal with your left foot hurts from from traffic. Nicole Wakelin 54:21 I pull a muscle Roberto Baldwin 54:23 you're pulling you're pulling your muscle your knees getting older now I understand why people are moving away from from man transmissions. Nicole Wakelin 54:33 So as long as we have a group of younger folks who still learn how to drive a manual, we're good. Roberto Baldwin 54:38 Yeah, teacher kids. I don't want to I never want to see someone saying oh Millennials 100 manuals or Gen Z does not drive. Hey, are you teaching them to drive manuals? No, then shut up. Nicole Wakelin 54:49 So I try. I try to teach my younger kids. And it was it was a it was a torturous experience and I never got a chance to teach my older daughter, but then some kid at college I had a car with manual transmission and she learned how to drive when I'm like okay, well that works for me. Roberto Baldwin 55:05 I taught my wife to drive a manual transmission that's even better her and her dad. Her dad and her they tried and it didn't didn't work out I think parents teaching is well. But I told my wife and now she drives a manual transmission until her not been well now she drives an Eevee but she knows how to drive a manual transmission that matters. We got the BRC because she wanted a manual transmission fun car. Nicole Wakelin 55:26 Oh, Sam Abuelsamid 55:29 there you go. Excellent. All right. Next up from Coach Cabrera frustrating watching companies continue to raise prices on EVs. What happened to making them affordable for the non luxury buyer? They only seem to want to go to old tech in batteries like Tesla announced to make them affordable. Well, the only company that I've seen raised prices on their EVs is Tesla. Yeah, they just raised the prices on on the model three again last week, I think. Yeah. So I think the cheapest model three now is something like close to 43 or $44,000. You know, so, you know, not that they ever really sold the so called $35,000 model three. But yeah, they've been steadily raising their prices. Most of the others, I have not seen any price increases, you know, they've been holding steady. As far as I know, you or any other price increases on EVs. Nicole Wakelin 56:28 I mean, I haven't specifically seen that. But you know, what, not out of line with what every other automaker does, you know, if it's just a, you go from the 2021 ultimate or the 2022 Altima, you might have a little price increase here and there, but it's not like it's jumped drastically. So from what I'm seeing most of them are just kind of taking the average, like, every year, cars get a little bit more expensive, unless there's, unless there's something like a thought for something significantly more crazy range crazy interior, there's a reason for it. But not sort of arbitrarily. I feel like there's still a good range of affordable options out there. If you just want to get into one and you want it to be cheap. There's There's choices. And if you don't care and you have the money, there's choices if that into I'm not the choices you have for the gas engine, but you've got choices. Sam Abuelsamid 57:15 And then, when doubt is coming, did the Kona go down? Roberto Baldwin 57:19 Yeah, we bought the Kona and it went down before I before we bought, like the price went down, the new design came out. And we bought it like four days later. I'm like, Well, Nicole Wakelin 57:27 how much did it go down? Oh, gosh. Roberto Baldwin 57:29 Let me see the Kona electric. Hold on. I think it was a couple 1000 Nicole Wakelin 57:32 Oh, a couple 1000 I think it was like 450 or something, you know, Sam Abuelsamid 57:37 right? And when GM launched the the refresh bolt earlier this year, they dropped the price on that by $5,000. Roberto Baldwin 57:45 Oh, yeah, right. Yeah, there was a drop in price. Sam Abuelsamid 57:50 And there there are other other EVs coming in the next year or two. That will be significantly cheaper. Like GM has promised an equinox sized crossover that should be priced around $30,000 That should maybe be up by end of next year or sometime in early part of 2023 I think for that car and there's there's other stuff coming I don't think we've seen prices yet for stuff like the Hyundai ionic five they they announced a pricing for that yet Nicole Wakelin 58:26 pricing should know by the middle of December I bet Sam Abuelsamid 58:31 yeah. It's gonna be going on sale. So yeah, yeah. Yeah. So you know, those Yeah, you know, those will probably be starting somewhere in the like 35 to $37,000 price range. So there is stuff still out there. You know, you know, aside from Tesla, nobody else has been really upping their prices by any significant amount. Now, there is one factor that could cause some price increases and that is the price of lithium has almost tripled in the past year because of demand and that could drive increases in battery prices. But aside from that, nothing else so far. Roberto Baldwin 59:15 The kinda went down $3,000 3003 grand that's that's a good but I think there's Nicole Wakelin 59:21 not like it's a super expensive car to begin with. Roberto Baldwin 59:24 Yeah, chunk of money. Yeah, so yeah, went down. 3000 So yeah, they're they're going down. I we still needed we still need a mid you know, $20,000 Evie? That's what we need because yeah, 30 anywhere in the 30,000 mark. That's that's a lot of money for a car. That's no yeah, that's still that's that's tough to sort of, to first people who need to buy a car and if $30,000 is tough, that means that's probably your only car so we need cheaper cars. I think you know, Volkswagen says they're working on it. Everyone's everyone wants to come out with a less expensive car. They just got to get battery prices down and then the lithium thing is gonna like mess them up. For a little while, that's gonna screw everything up. But um, yeah, they'll they will come down as battery prices come down. And as you know, the economy of scale, blah, blah, blah, you know, the more they build the cheaper it gets to build them blah, blah blah. So they will come down for the most part, most of the industry has been dropping prices on their sort of entry level, except for Tesla. The end the end. Sam Abuelsamid 1:00:26 All right, next up from Z BM, or depending on where you're from, it might be Zed. BM, I'm trying to understand the automotive media's obsession with horsepower and torque. Is he says that his own there's something problem with some problem with being obsessed with horsepower and torque. Anyway, some of the most engaging vehicles I've owned, were underpowered manual vehicles such as air cooled VW early 80s diesels, I, since owned recent nine elevens, and plug in hybrids, smiles and OnRamps survived and all. So what do you say to this comment about our supposedly obsession with portfolios, Nicole Wakelin 1:01:04 we get an obsession, but I mean, like, if you're going to describe a car and its power, to have some kind of benchmark to say it is a powerful car or not, if I just say it's powerful, it gets on onramps. Well, what like, I need more than that, like the number gives you some quantity, it lets you quantify, you can say all the things you want, but if you at least say this is a 100 horsepower car, you have an idea of what you're looking at, if you say this is a 700 horsepower car, you know, that's at the higher end of the range. I think it just gives people something. A number just helps quantify it. I don't think I mean, we like the horsepower, but I don't think it's an obsession, I think it is truly a good way to sort of give consumers an idea of, you know, are you looking at a sports car? Are you really looking at one or is this just a mess and and it helps Roberto Baldwin 1:01:51 it's a it's a it's a consistent metric? Well, for the most part, you know, because you always have to, you have to factor in weight, etc. Nicole Wakelin 1:01:57 But the rest of your story does like say 700 horsepower, but it weighs a ton Roberto Baldwin 1:02:02 or 1000 pounds. Yeah, exactly. So Nicole Wakelin 1:02:04 you quantify it all? Yeah, but I feel like Yeah, but Roberto Baldwin 1:02:09 but the I'm gonna say this it's funner to slow to drive a slow car fast and fast cars and fast car fast. That's all it's that's why that Miata car. So fast cars slow. A Miata, the BRC 586, all those vehicles. They're great. They're wonderful cars. They're not the people will continue to tell you that the Miata and the cyan and the BRC whatever you want to call it. They're underpowered etc. But drives them they're just so much fun to drive and I think that's I think your your enjoyment out of a vehicle doesn't always correspond with the idea that you need a lot of power to enjoy a vehicle I think it's it's really comes down to the because you can get a giant SUV with a ton of horsepower doesn't mean you're gonna have fun driving it. Right. Nicole Wakelin 1:02:54 And I do think I think we all kind of say that, like what you just said, Roberto, people will say like, okay, it's sometimes it's not about the horsepower like this is the horsepower at speed, it's quick moves, but good gravy, this is just fun to drive. And it's not the horsepower, you know. Sam Abuelsamid 1:03:08 And, and you'll find that, you know, despite the fact that we, you know, we do frequently talk about power and torque, you know, a significant proportion of you know, automotive journalists do in fact own cars like Miata as br Z's 86 is you know, older GT eyes you know, even even like second and third gen GT eyes or air cooled VW 's you know, or a lot of older cars that don't have much power you know, it it's it's always an adrenaline rush to get in something with 700 horsepower you know, and hear that big supercharged V eight roar. But you know, the reality is said you can do that once in a while, but you can't do it all the time. And you know, still you know, be reasonably responsible on the roads or you know, risk risk losing your license so, it's it's kind of it is kind of pointless to have that much performance. It Yeah, you do I do. When I when I whenever I get an opportunity. Remember, I get an opportunity to drive something like that on the track. I do like to take advantage of it. Roberto Baldwin 1:04:26 Yeah, exactly the track. Like whenever I get a supercar and I have a supercar at home it's just like, What am I doing? Like what's the point? I mean, I can you know, you can only go to certain speed because I'm not going to drive like a bat out of hell on public roads because hey, it's unsafe and be it's, it's ridiculous. You're not that's not what that car is for. If you get if you're able to go to the track, then I'm like, Oh, wonderful. I get to drive a you know, a Lamborghini on a track or I get to drive you know, something amazing on a track, but in real life, like always lot of power you're just doing a lot of power from one stoplight to another How fast can you get to the next Sam Abuelsamid 1:05:09 stoplight? Not as much fun as it sounds? Nicole Wakelin 1:05:11 No, it is not. Sam Abuelsamid 1:05:15 Alright. XBM also had another question said, I'd also like to hear your input, taking my interest in all things, automotive, and investing in it. Not my nest egg, but trying to take my interest and maybe make something out of it. Lucid rivian not asking for financial advice, just interested in thoughts. I I'm gonna take a pass on this one. Nicole Wakelin 1:05:39 Okay, here, I'll take your crack at it. Invest in the automotive things to which you find interesting and appealing. Do your own thing. Yeah, I can't give advice. investing advice, man. Roberto Baldwin 1:05:52 I'm gonna tell you something. illegal for me to say something about investing? Right? Nicole Wakelin 1:05:56 No. Can we hired and sued? Yeah. Sam Abuelsamid 1:06:00 I don't I don't have any holdings in any of those actually, in any individual companies, including any automakers or suppliers or anything else. Because would be given my role is as an analyst and the information I have, it would almost certainly be unethical and probably illegal. So I just don't even bother. Yeah, investing in anything. Roberto Baldwin 1:06:23 I don't have any, any any money with anybody. For ethics reasons. I have a 401k. I don't know what it's on. I don't know what I think just some index funds. Or some real estate stuff in there. I don't know. Nicole Wakelin 1:06:38 Somewhere in there, there could be those giant 401k something about it, but it's it just Yeah, you can't. It can't do that. Yeah. Why'd you put this question in here? We can't do this. We can Sam Abuelsamid 1:06:51 say that we can't do it. I don't see like Nicole Wakelin 1:06:53 and we have no say in it. On investing Roberto Baldwin 1:06:55 talk. It's Nicole Wakelin 1:06:57 good. Go for it. Roberto Baldwin 1:06:58 Or Beanie Babies. Don't invest in Pogs. Nicole Wakelin 1:07:01 Baby, somebody that just had an 11 point 9 billion IPO. Maybe look at them. Roberto Baldwin 1:07:06 Yeah, wait. Yeah. Sec, like insider trading. There's all this stuff that makes us Nicole Wakelin 1:07:13 break if we actually did that, based on what the quote insider information. Roberto Baldwin 1:07:17 Yeah, you couldn't. Yeah. Nicole Wakelin 1:07:19 That was how we have the last episode of wheelbarrow. Roberto Baldwin 1:07:25 I'm sure there's somebody there's a really crazy guy, Jim Cramer. Is that his name? With the buttons in the yelling? I don't know. Nicole Wakelin 1:07:33 Who yells and screams like that's what you have to buy this week. Yeah, Roberto Baldwin 1:07:37 maybe? I don't. I think I Nicole Wakelin 1:07:40 think it is. I think you're right, I think that might say to watch him giving financial advice. Look what you've done, Roberto. Roberto Baldwin 1:07:45 Just I don't know. Ask other people. Nicole Wakelin 1:07:50 Other people that are not too far in the industry to be able to give that Yeah. Sam Abuelsamid 1:07:57 And I was I was certainly, you know, convinced the Tesla was never going to be worth $1,000 a share. So what the hell do I know? Right? Is Nicole Wakelin 1:08:04 it a definitely 12? Down to I think it's like a 1200? Almost. Sam Abuelsamid 1:08:07 That was a couple of days ago, it dropped like 12%? Yes. Yeah. Roberto Baldwin 1:08:10 I don't know. Yeah. Sam Abuelsamid 1:08:14 Anyway, last question comes from Darrell. Is Sam pleased with BMW taking away the touchscreen? Seriously, how does the chip shortage affect vehicle features this much? And will it devalue those vehicles in the second hand market. So if for those who haven't heard, yet, BMW announced the other day, that on, I think on the three series and five series, they were for the foreseeable future, they were no longer going to have touchscreen capability. So though, for the last 678 years, they've, they've BMW still had their eye drive controller in the center console. But they've also added touchscreen capability. So you can do it, you can interact with it however you want. And that because of the chip shortage, they've stopped, they stopped putting in the controllers that enable the touchscreen. So now you have to interact with the I drive controller. And we've seen other manufacturers, you know, dropping other features, like GM, for example, recently said supercruise is not going to be available for a few months. Because of the chip shortage. There's there's been other features that had been dropped. Yeah, I mean, it probably will have some effect on the specific models, resale values of these specific models. How much? I don't know. But yeah, I mean, you know, somebody's buying a used 2021 BMW, you know, three years from now. And it doesn't have touchscreen capability on it. They they might not want that might not want to buy it or not pay as much for it. Roberto Baldwin 1:09:55 Right. What is this a Mazda what's going on here? Nicole Wakelin 1:10:01 It's just like a monster. Roberto Baldwin 1:10:05 Yeah, it's Sam Abuelsamid 1:10:05 just like an older BMW, I Roberto Baldwin 1:10:07 kind of wish they could have found because touchscreens are so integral to like what people do now everything is a touchscreen, that's something people just at this point they just want or have like every car has has some sort of touchscreen so that that was the choice. There's like, oh, so not another thing. I mean, I guess, you know, that's that's the that's the chip they couldn't get. But I wonder how many of those they'll actually sell? I wonder if they're just like holding off on building them until people order them? And they're like, hey, sure, we can build you one. But you're not gonna be able to touch the glass. I mean, you can still touch it, but nothing will happen. Sam Abuelsamid 1:10:46 Yeah. Yeah, I mean, in some cases, you know, depending on what the features are, you know, manufacturers are going ahead and selling them without those features. Other stuff, you know, they're just putting the cars in storage until they until they have the parts and then they'll ship them. That's what Ford and GM have been doing with a lot of pickup trucks over the last several months. There's lots full of 1000s of f1, 50s and Silverados. Scattered around Southeast Michigan, and other locations. Yeah, just waiting for chips. Roberto Baldwin 1:11:19 It's got to be at a spin up. That's That's what that person should invest in this week building a foundry. That person should invest in building a foundry. Yeah, you're gonna be a good guy. Yeah, you're gonna be a bazillionaire. Just go out and build a foundry with that money you're going to use? Sam Abuelsamid 1:11:35 Yeah. It'll only cost you about $5 billion upfront to build the foundry but then you will have people banging on your door to get you to build them chips Roberto Baldwin 1:11:45 to make that money back in the first week. I guarantee it. I don't guarantee I don't know how that works. But you're gonna make your money back pretty quickly. Sam Abuelsamid 1:11:55 All right. That's, that's all we got for this time. Thank you very much. We'll talk to you next time. Bye.