Chad Kirchner (00:00)
They're all former racing dogs, so like it's, it's, you know, but.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:02)
Yep.

All right, this is episode 448 of Wheel Bearings. I am Sam Abuelsamid from Telemetry.

Chad Kirchner (00:11)
And I am not your normal guest slash host. am Chad Kirschner. I talk about EVs. I freelance. crap post on the internet. And I'm really happy to be here tonight to talk, to talk, to talk about all sorts of stuff.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:22)
I'm glad to have you here.

Yeah, Robbie and Nicole were supposed to join us tonight. Both of them ended up their flights today ended up getting all screwed up. Robbie is still somewhere in the air, think right now, hopefully landing in Detroit soon for. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (00:38)
Yeah. He's in,

he's in, he was zone seven or boarding group six or seven on his Southwest flight. He's in the back with a bunch of teenagers. That's the latest Robbie report that I have. So.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:45)
Oof.

⁓

Well, while we're here, ⁓ Chad, did you drive anything this week?

Chad Kirchner (00:59)
Just my own car, which is very weird because like every time I come on here, I'm like never in a press car. But no, I didn't. Other than my own car, which I'd like to point out is a 2011 Ford Fiesta with the worst transmission Ford ever made.

Sam Abuelsamid (01:16)
you got that wonderful Power Shift dual clutch gearbox.

Chad Kirchner (01:18)
I there's something else it's called but you'd have to bleep that ⁓

But I get like 40 miles to the gallon and it sits at the airport So it does a good job at that but our guest later today was talking about a much bigger Well one of our guests later today that we're going to talk about ⁓ It's gonna talk about a car that you just bought which is way bigger and hauls way more things and gets about the same mpg So, you know, it's it's weird how technology advances who knew

Sam Abuelsamid (01:38)
Yeah.

Yeah, so we'll get to that in a little bit.

first of all, well, I did drive something. had, amazingly enough, I have manual transmission cars two weeks in a row.

Chad Kirchner (01:55)
Wow.

Sam Abuelsamid (01:56)
Yeah. So first up was the ⁓ Acura Integra A-Spec with the technology package. that's what I had last week. the one that I had, so this is basically the base Integra. They've got two variations. You get the A-Spec and you get the Type S. The A-Spec is essentially a fancier,

Chad Kirchner (02:03)
Okay.

Sam Abuelsamid (02:26)
⁓ version of a Civic Si. And the Type S is a nicer looking version of the Civic Type R. ⁓ And actually recently one of my neighbors around the corner ⁓ got ⁓ an Integra Type S. I haven't had a chance to talk to him about it yet, but I've seen him pull out a few times. But ⁓ even the A-Spec, I really like, I'm a fan of the Civic.

Chad Kirchner (02:55)
And

it's really good.

Sam Abuelsamid (02:56)
last couple,

especially the last couple generations of Civic, as you all know, if you've been listening, we owned one for eight years. It was a great car, ⁓ and we only replaced it because we wanted to buy an EV. ⁓ But, you know, so this is basically the current generation Civic ⁓ hatchback. So the Integra only comes as a four-door or five-door hatchback. ⁓ And the one that I had had the ⁓ double apex blue pearl.

paint job, ⁓ which they have some genuinely boring colors on all Acuras and then usually one or two cool colors. they have, there's a bunch of variations of black and gray and white. a, yeah, there's this white, there's two, there's a solar silver, the majestic black pearl, and for whatever reason, Acuras

Chad Kirchner (03:44)
The German rainbow, I believe is a good way to call it.

Sam Abuelsamid (03:55)
Apparently favorite color the urban gray pearl, which I find just utterly boring. It's not bad It's just it's like it disappears but the the apex the double apex blue is a fantastic color and I like the design changes to the the Integra versus the Versus the Civic, you know, I think I really like driving the current generation Civic, but I think

Chad Kirchner (04:00)
Yes. that's boring.

Sam Abuelsamid (04:22)
when they redesigned it, when they went from the 10th to the 11th generation, they made the design a little boring. ⁓ And the Integra is less boring. ⁓ It's actually quite nice. They incorporated some of the accurate design language into this thing. ⁓ It's got a significantly nicer, more upscale interior than the Civic does. And it makes it a really nice car to drive. ⁓

It's a really fantastic car to drive. 200 horsepower, 1.5 liter turbo. So again, as I said, same engine that's in the Civic Si. You can get it with a six speed automatic or six speed manual. And the one I had had the manual transmission. It's a great transmission. Honda always does great gearboxes. Shifts really nice, smooth, no notchiness to it at all. ⁓

easy to get off the line, ⁓ nice clutch feel to it. ⁓ Honda, I think, makes some really good seats. They don't necessarily have a huge number of adjustments, ⁓ and this one didn't either, ⁓ but it seems, at least for my body, they always seem to fit my body really well. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (05:43)
Well, if you can,

I don't need 22 ways of adjustment if the seats just works right, you know.

Sam Abuelsamid (05:49)
Yeah.

And then the backseat is roomy enough for two and a half adults. ⁓ You know, it's not the widest car in the world. you know, depending on how broad shouldered you are and. Yeah, exactly. Or you have you have a child in the middle seat. ⁓ know. What would you know whatever your preference? ⁓ They got.

Chad Kirchner (06:03)
Depending on how you cut your third adult in half. Do you bisect them or cut them like that? ⁓ okay.

Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (06:18)
Lots of cargo space, about 26 and a half cubic feet of cargo space, which is great. And because it's a hatchback, if you need to carry bigger stuff, if it was a sedan, and you can see this if you get a Civic sedan, it's got a decent sized trunk, but the opening is not huge. And so if I had to choose between a Civic sedan or a Civic hatchback, I would always choose the hatchback. in the case of the Integra, they only offer it as a hatchback, which makes it great.

Chad Kirchner (06:48)
Well, and that counters the, ⁓ you use the analogy that it's a Civic SI. Civic SI, believe, is only a sedan, if I'm not mistaken. I'm double checking right now, but I'm pretty sure it's only a sedan. So unlike the type S and the type R, which are both hatches, this is the more practical Civic SI.

Sam Abuelsamid (06:48)
So.

Yes, think you're right.

Right. So you can fold the back seats down. You've got a huge amount of space back there, you know, to put bigger stuff. you know, if you happen to be driving around on a Saturday morning and see something cool at a yard sale and you want to pick it up, pop the hatch, fold those seats down, throw it in there. ⁓ no problem at all. ⁓ so, you know, I, I really enjoyed driving this, you know, it, it handles really well, you know, just like, just like a civic handles really well. It's got a nice blend of ride quality.

It's very easy to drive around town. It's not so big that it's a problem to park it. It's very practical, but I think reasonably stylish. And just a really nice interior. The one that I had, the interior of the one that I had, they offer two options for the interior. ⁓ One is basically black, or various shades of black and dark gray with metal trim or metal...

metal film trim as they call it across the dashboard. ⁓ And then the other one is ⁓ the Orchid, which ⁓ is ⁓ mostly sort of an off-white on the door panels and on the seats, but with some blue inserts on the seats that are really nice touch. I really like that color combination. They introduced that on the ADX last year and they've added it to the Integra. ⁓

That's actually my favorite thing about the ADX actually. ⁓ If you're considering buying an ADX, please drive an Integra and buy that instead because you have the same powertrain in the Integra and the ADX. They're based on the same platform, but the ADX is like 400 pounds, 400, 500 pounds heavier than this. It has less room inside.

Chad Kirchner (08:43)
Yeah

of rights.

Sam Abuelsamid (09:08)
So it's slower gets worse fuel economy ⁓ just

Chad Kirchner (09:11)
But it's not an

SUV, Sam.

Sam Abuelsamid (09:15)
But you've got just as much space inside because of the hatchback and the folding rear seats and this thing. Just buy the Integra. It's a better car. You will enjoy driving the Integra much more. And you can get the Integra with a manual transmission. You cannot get the manual transmission in the ADX. ADX only comes with a CVT. So ⁓ get the Integra, skip the ADX. ⁓ The one that I had came to a grand total of

Chad Kirchner (09:20)
All right.

Sam Abuelsamid (09:44)
$41,095. The only option on it was the double apex blue paint, which was $600. You want to take a guess at the destination charge?

Chad Kirchner (09:56)
I'm kind of cheating because I have the building price open but $12.95!

Sam Abuelsamid (10:00)
Yeah, it's $12.95.

Chad Kirchner (10:03)
Well, I was trying

to compare the price with the SI because I'm trying to lead in behind the scenes. I'm trying to lead into the question I want to ask, but

Sam Abuelsamid (10:06)
Okay.

Okay,

well what's your question?

Chad Kirchner (10:13)
Is it worth $8,000 more than the Civic Si? Because Civic Si base kind of is $31,495 delivery stuff at, you know, your $32,690. So roughly $8,000, $7,000, $8,000 price difference.

Sam Abuelsamid (10:30)
If all you want is the driving experience, probably not. Just get the Civic SI. Although, as I said, you can't get the Civic SI with a hatchback. But if you want that same driving experience but with a little more premium feel to the interior, then get the Integra.

Chad Kirchner (10:39)
Right, yeah, more practical in the...

Plus it doesn't look as norm core. really do think the... Yeah, the new Civic, think like the last gen, like they did a really smart thing and make it look really interesting. But I think they got a little gun shy about it because now I think the only current Civic that looks interesting is the Type R. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (10:52)
Yes, it is it is more interesting to look at.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (11:09)
And that's partially because it's got the Y body on it, plus the big boy racer wing, which I like. But it still doesn't look as wild as the previous generation's Type R. So.

Sam Abuelsamid (11:19)
That's true, yeah.

But yeah, I like the ⁓ experience of the Integra, but driving the Civic Si is not gonna be fundamentally different from this. So, I think it's good option for you. All right.

Chad Kirchner (11:39)
Well, I think that

you I think that you talk a little bit about the type S just as well. I know that we're talking about the A spec here, but Honda did announce, I'm sure you covered it, that they're sending the type S, Integra type S to Japan.

Sam Abuelsamid (11:50)
Yeah, they're going

to export them. You know, they, build all these here in the U S and they're going to start exporting the, the Integra type S with a left-hand drive, which will be interesting. Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (12:00)
but five extra horsepower so

and a better suspension setup more comfortable I should say but anyways and then your other manual I don't even I don't even know where to begin okay never mind ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (12:08)
We'll see.

That's for next week. That's for the next show. But I'll

tease it. It's a miata.

Chad Kirchner (12:19)
Oh, well, that's always the answer. It is the answer to everything. I was 72 degrees out today where I'm at, and I really wondered why I don't have a Miata. Like, it really... Yeah. I used to have an S2000, which I don't know if I've ever talked about on this show, but like, you take the top-down experience combined with Honda's best gear shift ever, and Honda makes really good gear shifts. You're just like, oh, this is best. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (12:21)
35th anniversary Miata.

It was a perfect day for a Miata. Top down.

Yeah.

All right, let's move on to some other stuff. ⁓ Let's start with Nissan.

Chad Kirchner (12:51)
Yeah,

Nissan, let's do that.

Sam Abuelsamid (12:55)
Yeah, so let's see as we're recording this, about a little more than a half hour from now. By the time you hear this, it'll already have passed.

Chad Kirchner (13:06)
you

are going to learn that the Nissan Xterra is coming back. wait, we already knew that. ⁓ But we got a teaser image of it and it's said to go on sale late in 2028. So probably a 2029 version. ⁓ We don't really know much. We just know that it's...

Sam Abuelsamid (13:11)
Yeah.

Yeah, probably.

Chad Kirchner (13:27)
Yellow, the concept that they showed us. The computer generated teaser image that they showed us is yellow. We know it's going to be body on frame. ⁓

I think that's about all we know.

Sam Abuelsamid (13:39)
I might have possibly

seen one a couple of years ago.

Chad Kirchner (13:42)
It's possible that Sam, on a trip to Japan with Robbie, maybe was there, maybe not, I know, probably saw it. Yeah, I think everybody's seen it. I'm the only one who hasn't seen it, ⁓ which kind of bums me out. But ⁓ Exterra, is it too late? Because I think that they should have brought the Exterra back like three or four years ago at this point.

Sam Abuelsamid (13:47)
No, he was not there.

But Robbie saw it a different time.

Three or four

years ago definitely would have been better. ⁓ By the time this comes out, late 2028, it's gonna be coming into a crowded marketplace. You're have Wrangler, probably, maybe by then, a next generation Wrangler. You got Bronco, ⁓ you got Forerunner, ⁓ very possibly a Hyundai, ⁓ maybe a Kia by that time. ⁓ Plus, you got... ⁓

Chad Kirchner (14:28)
Thank

Yeah, Hyundai or Kia? Both.

Sam Abuelsamid (14:37)
some sort of other stuff. So it's going to be coming into a lot crowder market space than if it showed up, let's say three years ago instead of three years from now.

Chad Kirchner (14:47)
Right. Yeah, it's a you're gonna be spoiled for choice for body on frame. And that's very, very weird to me. Because I mean, I do like body on frame vehicles. I think the new forerunner is really actually pretty nice. It's a lot of money. lot of money. Um, you know, and he sounds like, oh, we need to play in this this body on frame off road space. And it's like,

Sam Abuelsamid (15:02)
It's expensive though, yeah.

Chad Kirchner (15:12)
Do you? I mean maybe. I there is definitely some heritage there and people loved the XTERRA. Like I was convinced mid 2010s to like late 2010s. Like if they would just reopen.

plant and build X-Terra's with the same tooling and molding and stuff that they had, they probably would have sold gajillions of them. ⁓ I think there probably is some pent-up demand for it, but you're right, there's gonna be so much competition at the end of 2028, including, I believe you're right, the new Wrangler. That would be the time for it, because we got the JL in 2018. So...

It's time. They've been following a 10 year cycle. It is time.

Sam Abuelsamid (15:55)
Yeah. There, you know,

there, there is, ⁓ there is going to be Nissan is developing a new hybrid system for a body on frame vehicles. So, you know, it will have that. and, ⁓ let's see, ⁓ says here, Nissan will also complete the spectrum of consumer choice by offering plugin hybrid and range extender hybrid solutions through partnerships. So we're going to, you know, I don't know if we're going to see a range extender on the Xterra.

Chad Kirchner (16:19)
Okay.

Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (16:25)
⁓

But ⁓ they are bringing range extenders to some part of their lineup that we don't know yet. ⁓ Yeah, and that's actually probably what it'll be is probably an extension of ePower. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (16:31)
Sure. I actually think ePower would be great for a range extender.

I mean we

both drove the the cash guy probably the same cash guy and ⁓ I'll tell you what it was 20 degrees out the weather was not great it was cold and slushy and I was driving it

Sam Abuelsamid (16:44)
Yeah. Most likely, yeah.

Chad Kirchner (16:57)
Highway speeds plus a couple miles per hour and I was getting like 50 miles to the gallon in that. And I was talking to one of our collective Nissan friends who drove it in better weather and he said he got like the computer indicated 60. Like that's, I know, I understand. It was, it's Imperial miles. I did ask about that. I did ask about that ⁓ because that's the first question I had. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (17:11)
Well, keep in mind that was a European spec cash kaiso. That was probably imperial gallons. Well, and imperial miles too.

Chad Kirchner (17:26)
and they assured me that it was not Imperial Gowns because they didn't buy it in the UK. They did buy the cars. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (17:33)
Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (17:34)
they were left-hand drive cars we drove so they should be regular gallons but yeah you're right it could possibly have been imperial but the point is like if you can get 40 miles to the gallon or more out of just e-power like let's say 40 41 42 look that's something like i feel like that's something ⁓ you add some range extended you mean yeah she still would like to add the range extended eventually but like that could be really flipping competitive especially when

Sam Abuelsamid (17:40)
I know.

Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (18:04)
other hybrids haven't been delivering the hybrid goods the way that maybe they need to. I'm looking at Toyota and scolding at them a little bit. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (18:14)
You

mean with their rear drive hybrids, with their body on frame hybrids? Yeah, those definitely do not get particularly good fuel economy. Yeah, their transverse engine hybrids are great, at least in terms of efficiency. They don't sound very good, but that's a whole separate issue. ⁓ But speaking of e-power, the new Rogue, they've, when, let's see,

Chad Kirchner (18:16)
Yeah, yeah, especially those.

They do not have the juice.

Yeah. Yeah.

No, no, but ⁓ Yeah, yeah, they've they've They showed it to us we've seen it

Sam Abuelsamid (18:43)
⁓ What were was it? it was it was at that event where we drove the cash guy They they did show us a picture of what the new rogue looks like so You know, this was the same event where we also got to drive the the rogue plug-in hybrid, which is really just an outlander. Okay

Chad Kirchner (18:58)
⁓ See I drove it at a different event so I didn't get to see the new road the road

to the road until today I drove in Detroit. But yeah, but yeah, I mean so the new so the new rogue debuted Officially like we knew it was coming. He's not a set. It's coming like it's not a surprise But we're getting Our first photos and a little bit more confirmation on some of the stuff. ⁓ I like how it looks dare I say it's a handsome

Sam Abuelsamid (19:05)
⁓ okay, so then, yeah.

Yeah, it's coming this fall.

Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (19:27)
midsize crossover. Like, I kinda dig it. And ⁓ I know like it's it's end of this year. Like, it looks pretty

other than I also believe that we're only getting the higher spec models early so there's gonna be some dealer overlap with the current gen rogue which isn't bad the current gen rogue is not bad and then this new hybrid that's gonna deliver a lot better fuel economy because Nissan's hybrids in the rav or I'm sorry in the rogue in the past not good ⁓ at all yeah so this is exciting like a real competitive

Sam Abuelsamid (20:02)
No, no, they were, they were definitely mediocre hybrids. ⁓ but, this, this new third gen

e-power system is, is really good. ⁓ it's, mean, it's, it's, is like driving an EV because, because that's basically what you're doing, except that you've got, you've got an onboard generator that's running all the time.

Chad Kirchner (20:10)
It's excellent. Yeah, it drives drives well

It is.

Yeah, and unlike Honda's ⁓ parallel hybrids, or a series hybrid, I mean, I'm sorry, it doesn't, it never powers the front wheels directly. There is never a connection to the front wheels. It is all electricity going to there, ⁓ which is why I think it makes sense for an eventual range extender.

Sam Abuelsamid (20:34)
Yeah.

So, yeah.

Right.

mean, this into a quote unquote range extender, you know, is basically just a matter of expanding the size of the battery. You know, put a bigger battery in it and a plug and that's all you need. Mechanically, the rest of it doesn't have to change at all because it's already purely electrically driven. The engine is only driving a generator.

Chad Kirchner (20:51)
Yeah, yeah. And a plug. Yeah. Easy peasy.

Yep. Which should make getting all that sorted and to market easy and not super duper expensive for Nissan, which is good because they don't need a bunch of super duper expensive projects right now. ⁓ But I was really blown away by e-power, so I'm really excited for this.

Sam Abuelsamid (21:17)
Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (21:24)
I wish we still got the cash kai as the Nissan sport, the Rogue sport, because I like that size a little bit better. And the cash kais that we drove were really nice. They felt like rogues. ⁓ But.

Sam Abuelsamid (21:35)
I

mean, the previous generation cash guy was what we got as the rogue sport here a few years back. And, you know, that has been replaced now by the kicks, you the kicks, the current generation kicks is, you know, midway in size between the old rogue sport and the old kicks. So it basically took the place of both of those.

Chad Kirchner (21:39)
Yeah. And nobody bought them.

Yeah, yeah,

but I'm really bullish on e-power. I'm pretty bullish on the looks of this car. ⁓ The pricing will probably hopefully not be completely stupid. I'm not bullish on dealers that now are going to have to field e-power questions for six or seven months and try to sell cars that some people, the smart people.

Sam Abuelsamid (22:15)
I mean, all they got to do

is all they got to do is say it's our new hybrid.

Chad Kirchner (22:19)
Yeah, well, but but

but the smart people that listen to this podcast and we know them ⁓ are gonna Know

Sam Abuelsamid (22:26)
Yeah, but you don't, those smart people that are listening

to this podcast don't even have to ask the dealer what ePower is, because they already know, we've already explained it.

Chad Kirchner (22:33)
Right, but I mean, but it

is gonna be hard to sell the current gen these current gen rogue when people know there's a new one coming That's potentially a lot better. So it is weird to see this news drop this early, but I'm super excited for it think it's a smart Nissan product. I think it's a smart decision and I don't think all Nissan decisions are that so I'm super excited for that. I'm excited for Xterra. I don't know

Sam Abuelsamid (22:45)
Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (23:01)
Like it's way too early to figure out like, hey, is this going to be any good or not? Like I feel like they could drop the ball. I think they could fumble the ball. I think they could mess it up, but.

Sam Abuelsamid (23:08)
I mean, it's based

on the same architecture as the Frontier, which is actually pretty good off-road. So there's no reason why the Xterra shouldn't be good. And it'll be a more interesting design. ⁓ There's elements of the old Xterra that people really liked that are incorporated in there, but other stuff that's more modern. So I think it can do reasonably well. So we'll see. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (23:13)
Yeah. Yep. Yep.

But here's hoping.

Maybe. Maybe.

Sam Abuelsamid (23:39)
Yeah.

And then, you know, they also put out some information about, about infinity as well. know, yeah, for now, you know, basically reiterating, you know, what they've been saying for a while now about infinity that they've got, you know, they, they, they just showed the QX 65 finally publicly at the New York auto show a couple of weeks ago, but they've got,

Chad Kirchner (23:46)
Ow. That's still a company?

Sam Abuelsamid (24:09)
four more new models coming out. ⁓ So there is a mid-sized hybrid SUV, which basically is the ⁓ new Rogue e-Power, but with Infinity bodywork on it and a nice Infinity interior. There's a performance-oriented V6 sedan, which they have talked about previously. Yeah. Yeah, you know, that's always the case in this business.

Chad Kirchner (24:18)
V power? Yeah.

Yep.

Okay, they have and they've said that they're doing it I'll still believe it when I see it but Yeah

Fair

Sam Abuelsamid (24:38)
And

then two large hybrid SUVs that they say that balance refinement and capability. So presumably, you know, one of these will be a next generation replacement for a QX60, probably with e-power, and the other will be a body on frame, you next generation QX80 with the same hybrid system that's going in the Xterra.

Chad Kirchner (25:01)
Yeah, I guess maybe there's a possibility that they take the upcoming body on frame pathfinder and maybe do something with that but that could be one of those but So did I until about 10 seconds ago, yeah ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (25:09)
⁓ Yeah, that could be one of those. That's true. Yeah, I forgot that they're gonna split the Pathfinder in two.

Chad Kirchner (25:19)
Infinity I mean the reason why I'm okay. So the reason why I'm being kind of hard on them if anybody is listening from infinity is 2019 2018 I don't remember what it was but they flew a bunch of us out to Spaceport USA out in middle of the desert and They showed us a bunch of stuff and they're like this is our future. This is what's coming and then they did none of that like Zero so like

I think the brand has some issues. ⁓ I do like, yes, yeah, yeah, because if you park, if you park a QX80 and the Armada side by side at an auto show and some auto shows that like that, ⁓ the QX80 is nicer.

Sam Abuelsamid (25:52)
They need to figure out what the brand is, what it's supposed to represent.

Chad Kirchner (26:07)
Is it 15 to 20 thousand dollars nicer? I don't know because the new Armada inside is really kind of nice. ⁓ So I don't think there's enough differentiation there. ⁓ And it feels like they don't like yeah you're right I think they don't have any identity right now and I think that's a problem and I don't understand why they even keep it around other than they don't want to have to buy out dealers.

Sam Abuelsamid (26:36)
Yeah, could be. Who knows.

Chad Kirchner (26:38)
I mean sorry to be like that that guy on this but it really I I want

to believe. I am definitely David Duchaffney in X-Files and the poster. I want to believe. And I think a sporty sedan with a manual transmission like they're talking about, yeah, it's not going to be a huge seller, but it has heritage with Infinity. Infinity is not new to this idea of a sports sedan. ⁓ And Nissan likes to play up its heritage stuff. And when it does its heritage stuff right, the stuff's pretty good. So there is

There is potential there, but I think they need some help figuring out what that is and what that looks like.

Sam Abuelsamid (27:23)
All right, ⁓ let's move to another body on frame vehicle that's Kia had their investor day a few days ago in Seoul, and ⁓ they talked about some interesting stuff. I suppose it should come as no surprise that right after Hyundai showed the, confirmed the body on frame midsize pickup, and then showed the concept for the Boulder SUV that

IKEA announced that, yep, we are also gonna do body-on-frame stuff. We're doing a ⁓ pickup truck for, midsize pickup truck for the North American market. It's gonna be based on that same architecture. ⁓ And more than, would not, I would be surprised if they don't also do some sort of SUV based off of that as well. ⁓ But they also talked about a bunch of other stuff. ⁓

other manufacturers like Volkswagen is ending production of the ID4 in Chattanooga because they can't sell them. Kia is expanding their EV lineup, up to 14 different electric models by 2030, targeting 1 million annual EV sales by 2030. They're targeting growth of

Chad Kirchner (28:23)
I have thoughts about that.

Sam Abuelsamid (28:48)
up to going from 3.35 million units sold globally this year to 4.13 million units by 2030. They're also expanding their hybrid lineup, ⁓ also targeting about 1.1 million units with 13 models by 2030. They're ⁓ expanding their lineup of their ⁓ electric vans and commercial vehicles. So they've got the PV5 that they have shown here.

They're adding the PV seven and PV nine models to that as well. All by by 2030. What else here? Let's see. They're rolling out more software to find vehicles, rolling out level two plus plus systems that can do hands off driving in urban areas by early twenty twenty nine. They're going to build be building more stuff here in North America.

⁓ They're, you know, they're just cranking along. They are not backing down on any of this stuff.

Chad Kirchner (29:54)
So the real, this is, this is a general kind of philosophy that I have on HMG on the Koreans is ⁓ they have true power, like, like, ⁓ just absolute sort of dominance.

And they're very, like they talk about it, but they're still very quiet about it. This quiet dominance of just vertical integration of all the way from digging the raw materials out of the earth to putting that to, to get everything to that car and your driveway is entirely controlled. Like they're Apple, but like in some ways even more powerful. And I thought what was.

Sam Abuelsamid (30:25)
building the ships that transport the vehicles across the ocean.

Well, more powerful, I think

in part because they actually own all of the means of production for all this stuff. Apple contracts out all their stuff.

Chad Kirchner (30:42)
Yep. Yep. Yeah. Yeah.

So you have, and when Jose Munoz spoke at New York, and like he mentioned, he's like, here soon you're going to be able to buy US built Korean EVs built with US made steel. That's all Hyundai stuff. he was like swinging his, his, his maleness around because like, I mean, it's, it's BDE, it's BDE energy, like just

It's amazing. Like it is absolutely incredible. And because of that, they can do things like keep their foot on the gas on EVs while still doing, you know, building more hybrids and building more EPFs and launching more vehicles. And because they can advertise those costs across the entire supply chain and they can control those costs across the entire supply chain in a way that General Motors or Ford or anybody else would like to be able to do, but can't. Like it is...

at a really boring business level. Incredible, like absolutely incredible. If there were to be a trillion dollar car company, it's not Tesla. It should be the Koreans. Now, are there still some quality issues they need to work out, especially with EVs? Yes. Are there things, whatever? Yes. But my goodness, and you look at this this rollout plan and

They're like, they're, Kia themselves want to have 1 million EVs by 2030. If you add in Hyundai and Genesis on top of that, you're hitting numbers that Tesla only dreams of being able to sell, and they still sell hybrids and gas powered cars and p-hams and everything else on top of that. I, like, I don't want to sound like a fanboy, but like, of this business end, of this way that they're doing business, ⁓ maybe it's the NBA and me, but like,

I dig it. I, it's, it's all, it's incredible. And they're, I believe they'll be able to do most of it. And I,

Sam Abuelsamid (32:50)
Yeah. Well, I mean, they

unlike unlike Tesla, you know, everything that they have pretty much everything they have ever promised that they were going to do. They've done. Yeah, they've never gone out and promised something that they haven't ultimately achieved, you know, and within a reasonable time frame, you know, partly because they don't they don't go out and make promises for things that they that they haven't that they haven't figured out to do yet.

Chad Kirchner (33:19)
Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (33:19)
You know, they don't promise and then say, now we got to figure out how to do this. They do it. And then they say, OK, here you go. Yeah. And, you know, you know, like on the on the side, you know, in addition to expanding the line up, you know, part of this is they're also going to introduce their next generation platform. So it's going to be an upgrade from EGMP, which they have today. ⁓ Yeah. It's still it's still a great, great platform. ⁓ They're also going to be

Chad Kirchner (33:42)
which was already revolutionary and still is pretty advanced. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (33:49)
further expanding their investments into charging infrastructure. So here in the US, they are already one of the partners in IANA, which is expanding. They're ⁓ also making further investments in Korea and in Europe as well. ⁓ then strengthening their supply chain, ⁓ EV production hubs in Korea, here in the US and in Europe. They're building the EV2 and EV4 in Europe. They build the EV6 and EV9 here in the States.

They've got all their other EVs in Korea. ⁓ It's pretty amazing to see. And ⁓ on the body on frame truck, it also confirms in here that they will have hybrid and eREV versions of that as well.

Chad Kirchner (34:32)
Yep. Which, and

it won't be just the Tasman sort of rebadged from my understanding. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (34:36)
No, no, this is going to be, this is going to be something completely

new.

Chad Kirchner (34:40)
Yeah, so like that makes them that makes them incredibly competitive like in Australia with Ranger P have Which I know is not a huge market But like though they've been flooded with Chinese stuff in in that market now, they're gonna have something else that they could go with ⁓ You know here like we don't have any midsize trucks that are that are P have I think there's some that would make sense for it But like, you know, we don't really have it. ⁓ think just I

They're here they're here to win they're trying to win. Well, then I don't know but you know the body on frame midsize I expect Kia and initially I expect Kia to do the truck and I expect Hyundai to do the SUV But I think that they will both Yeah, I think that I think those are that after the I think you're gonna have one or the other ⁓ Then ignore everything. I just said I'm an idiot. Don't take me serious. I must have still been just

Sam Abuelsamid (35:24)
Hyundai has already said they're doing the truck too. They're also doing a truck.

No, they're launching the truck first. Munoz said that in New York.

Chad Kirchner (35:40)
My jaw must have still been on the floor when he was talking about how he's gonna make steel in Louisiana, make batteries in cars in Georgia, and sell them to products like me in Ohio. But even that, the speed at which they can move?

Sam Abuelsamid (35:45)
Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (35:56)
Because they hadn't necessarily, I mean, they had mostly decided they were going to do that pre-Trump, so like Trump doesn't get the credit here. But for the time that they can go from saying, we are going to build an entire process in this country to having cars roll off the line.

You know, and once that that meta plant in Georgia once that's fully up with with the LG cab batteries being built right there like that's When the pendulum politically swings back and it will and we know it well like Ford even in some ways GM Stellantis like they're gonna

Sam Abuelsamid (36:15)
Yeah.

Well, regardless

of the political pendulum, if fuel prices stay elevated, we're already seeing ⁓ uptick. When I was looking at the Q1 sales numbers and for the manufacturers that ⁓ report by month, for a lot of them, there was a big uptick from February to March. ⁓ Starting in March, we saw a significant improvement in EV sales for most manufacturers.

Chad Kirchner (36:37)
Yeah.

Well, and Michael, we're talking to later. don't know when you're placing this in behind the scenes baseball stuff, but anecdotally, he's like.

I used to be see a lot of EV9s when I was looking and now they were all reserved or taken. So I don't necessarily think people are going out and swapping their cars quite yet. I don't think it's been pricey enough, long enough, but I think if you're in the market right now, like, yeah, you're going to look at an EV or a plug-in hybrid or something maybe that you wouldn't have looked at before because $4 gallon gas and higher really stinks.

Sam Abuelsamid (37:33)
Well,

my wife is definitely glad we bought an EV last year. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (37:36)
I'm sure, I'm sure. But

yeah, mean, just genuinely impressed. Like, I really hate coming off as a fanboy. Just like I hate crapping extra hard on Infinity earlier, but like, it's very interesting to see how the Koreans are operating. And I know that it's not all sunshine and rainbows there. Like, I understand work requirements and...

you know, Hyundai and Kia have gotten in trouble for suppliers that have used perhaps underage labor and like, there's not, they're not clean, no automaker is. ⁓ But when you look at like what Hyundai Motor Group and what Jose Munoz and what Kia are promising compared to what Elon promises and who delivers on what, I think the valuations are backwards, is what I'll say.

Sam Abuelsamid (38:27)
Yeah.

Sticking with Hyundai Motor Group, Hyundai ⁓ has also teased the Beijing Motor Show is coming up next week and they're going to be launching ⁓ a couple of new concepts ⁓ in Beijing and ⁓ they are basically launching ⁓ IONIQ as a sub-brand in China just for EVs.

Chad Kirchner (38:51)
interesting.

Sam Abuelsamid (38:54)
So, you know, this and they showed two vehicles. One is a sedan and the other is a crossover. Very interesting designs, especially the sedan.

Chad Kirchner (39:05)
Yeah, yeah.

Well, they're going to have to do something like different because they're going to get crushed on charging. Like, honestly, we feel like right now we feel like, EGMP stuff and whatever is super quick and stuff here. But I mean, we're talking BYD with megawatt charging. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (39:09)
Yeah.

Yeah, but by non-Chinese standards, it's fast.

let's jump to the next story, is BYD. ⁓ BYD ⁓ is, ⁓ well, first of all, they're targeting ⁓ opening 20 dealers in Canada by the end of this year. So breaking into the Canadian market ⁓ and also eyeing local production in Canada.

Chad Kirchner (39:30)
Yeah.

Yeah, that's not surprising.

Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (39:49)
And I think it's only a matter of time. I still expect within the next 12 months we'll see groundbreaking on a B-Wite, on some Chinese EV factory in Canada. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (39:56)
Yeah, click, click, click, click.

Yeah, yeah, it's

the ticking clock is ticking and it's loud.

Sam Abuelsamid (40:06)
Yeah.

But then, you know, in Europe as well, ⁓ they have launched the ⁓ the Denso Z9 GT, which is one of their first models with megawatt charging. ⁓ And they have said that within the next 12 months, they plan to install 300, 1500 kilowatt chargers in the UK under their flash branding.

Chad Kirchner (40:33)
I mean, that's 300 for what? There's 11 million drivers in the UK. Like if you look at proportionally, that's if you were to.

Sam Abuelsamid (40:44)
It's a relatively small number still, but the UK is not that big of place physically.

Chad Kirchner (40:47)
But, as a, right,

like if you look per capita per driver, that's a lot of, that's a decent amount of chargers. You know? And, I, look, I'm not China-pilled. I think that there are concerns.

Sam Abuelsamid (40:56)
Mm-hmm and

They are doing

a lot of stuff way better than we are.

Chad Kirchner (41:12)
But are doing some stuff pretty good and charging. I don't even know if megawatt charging is the answer. Like I really think a lot more level 2 probably makes a lot more sense. I understand that our power grid here being 110, 120, whatever is rickety compared to 240 in Europe where you can just bring your own cable and whatever. I understand that there's some technical differences on why our network is rickety.

Sam Abuelsamid (41:21)
Mm-hmm.

Rickety.

Chad Kirchner (41:42)
my god 1500 watt charging like even if that's peak like i i watched a video when they installed um the temporary station the first whatever one that they invited the the british press to come and look at and it was it was like six or seven percent 93 in nine minutes eight minutes something like

Sam Abuelsamid (41:44)
I think, yeah.

Yeah, they're

saying for the Denza Z9, it's 123 kilowatt hour battery. It'll charge from 10 to 70 % in five minutes.

Chad Kirchner (42:15)
I thought 18 minutes for 10 to 80 on a eGMP was fast.

Sam Abuelsamid (42:19)
Well, I think that was on the

first iteration of that, which was only a thousand kilowatt. These are, these are 1500 kilowatt. So, you you're, you're, you're looking at adding a hundred kilowatt hours of energy to the battery in five minutes.

Chad Kirchner (42:24)
Alright, that is fast.

And if that car gets 3.5 miles per kilowatt hour, 4 miles per kilowatt hour, which probably is a little too optimistic. But still, that's...

Sam Abuelsamid (42:39)
Mm-hmm and apparently early

buyers of the the z9 GT will get 18 months of free charging at these stations So it's actually it's actually 300 charging stations at least 600 chargers Yeah

Chad Kirchner (42:49)
That's buying market share, but

Yeah. Yeah, 600 charges, yeah.

I mean, that's pumping gas, dog. Like, that is, that is fast. Like, any, any excuse on, pretty much goes out the window at that point on.

Sam Abuelsamid (43:03)
Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (43:11)
why an EV isn't as good as a gas car. Like, they've solved that. ⁓ Obviously you would need a lot more of those chargers, but when you factor in that most people charge at home, that you're not going to use fast charging, you put these in the places that make the most sense, and I... it's a solved problem. The Chinese have solved it. Again, there may be some issues with how the Chinese build cars and flooding the market and all that stuff, like...

Sam Abuelsamid (43:31)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

I mean, you know, this this particular car.

Chad Kirchner (43:40)
That's a longer discussion, but man, they figured it out.

Sam Abuelsamid (43:42)
Yeah. Yeah. And this,

isn't one of BID's cheap cars. This is going to be a hundred thousand pound car in the UK, but still, you know, once you've launched, once you've launched it in that car, they're going to be adding this to their more affordable models as well.

Chad Kirchner (43:48)
Yeah, yeah. But still, that's incredible.

Yeah, and

once the charges were out there, once the infrastructure's out there, then it's even easier to, you know, to justify doing that. And that's why I think like even like Hyundai...

slightly back to what we talking about, like they're, they've got to find a way to differentiate in China because they can't differentiate in China the way that they can differentiate in the US. And with stuff like this, I'm also not surprised that Honda said, we're having a hard time being competitive with Chinese EVs, which is why they pulled out, part of the reason why they pulled out with their EVs during their statement when they, when you guys talked about it and stuff, it was like, they said, look, we're worried about our competitiveness. Yeah, because look at this, like this is,

And it's not in China, right? Like it's it's in, it's in Blighty, you know, it's, it's in the UK. Like it's not, it's coming. And once it's in Canada.

Sam Abuelsamid (44:43)
Yeah.

Yeah, mean if they start

building some of these chargers in people are going to be wondering, hey, how come those guys can have those nice chargers and we can't?

Chad Kirchner (44:53)
Yeah, Yeah,

yeah, yeah So good for them. I more chargers more fast chargers are good faster charging curves are good I still stand by megawatt chargers shouldn't necessarily be, you know, absolutely necessary Yeah, it shouldn't be the thing we depend on but But yeah But but who won't be making evs anymore in the u.s to sell

Sam Abuelsamid (45:01)
⁓ So.

It shouldn't be the thing we depend on. We need level two everywhere.

⁓

Volkswagen

at least for the foreseeable future. Yeah, so they've been building the ID4 in Chattanooga for the last several years and they have ended production of the ID4 here. ⁓ They said that they currently have enough inventory that will carry them well into 2027. Which, well, mean, you know, see, you know, if EV sales pick up, that may not last that long.

Chad Kirchner (45:24)
Volkswagen VOTLS, not so vaulty.

That's surprising. Yeah,

yeah, that's true.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:50)
⁓

And they are going to bring in an updated version of the IT4 ⁓ at some point. ⁓ But it won't necessarily be built here.

Chad Kirchner (45:55)
Okay.

I know about you, but I find the ID4 perfectly cromulant, which I believe is a Simpsons term. like, it's fine. Like, it was, it's fine. But the problem is, it's in a segment full of stuff that's excellent. And why would you buy fine when you can buy excellent? For the same price or in some cases cheaper. mean, Ionic 5's new pricing from...

Sam Abuelsamid (46:18)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (46:28)
is almost borderline insane. So I'm not super duper surprised that this is the end result. ⁓ Not super duper surprised about anything with Volkswagen in the US anymore because like, I think they frustrate me so much because like they can do cool stuff, but then they don't want to do the cool stuff here where they shovel it onto the US like, here have this and

I know. I don't know. don't I don't the ID for was fine, but like the ID buzz priced way too expensive for what we got. It was not the right one. They should have brought. They should have brought the longer wheelbase, the bigger one for us. Like it's just ⁓ well then we didn't get the cheaper short one. Whatever one was cheaper we didn't get, you know. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (47:11)
They did. We did get the long wheelbase. Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (47:20)
and 150 kilowatt charging the MEB stuff it's fine but like it's only fine when you can get AGMP for more or even like the Toyota stuff's even better at this point like it's really hard and there were some initial teething issues with you know infotainment screen and responsiveness and stuff like that they didn't put a backlight on the climate control part of the infotainment screen like really just dumb stuff that you shouldn't make like but you know every time I go to

Sam Abuelsamid (47:45)
Well, mean,

we have talked about Thomas Schaefer, the CEO of Volkswagen, has recently said, we are not doing that anymore. We're not doing the touchscreen controls for climate control. Going back to buttons and switches, ⁓ so that's a good sign.

Chad Kirchner (47:54)
Yes, thank you,

Yeah,

and I think that, you know, it's weird that when you go to Europe and you just see ID3s everywhere. They are everywhere. It's like, why, what happened? What happened with ID4 that didn't get the magic of ID3? I don't... Was it price? Was it design? Was it just the state of the world? I don't know, but I don't see ID4s and I see a ton of ID3s.

Sam Abuelsamid (48:25)
I mean, you know, they sold the ID4 here instead of the 3 because they figured Americans don't want a hatchback. They want a crossover. they're, aside from the body, the form factor, they're essentially the same vehicle. ⁓ Would people have bought the ID3 instead? Maybe, probably not in any more numbers than they did the ID4. Because it still would have had the same

Chad Kirchner (48:31)
Sure.

No, but they didn't. I was gonna say they didn't sell that many ID4s.

Sam Abuelsamid (48:52)
I still would

have had the same issues with the software, with the infotainment software. know, okay charging, know, okay range, but not great. Especially when you compare it to the Hyundai's and Kia's.

Chad Kirchner (48:54)
Sure.

Yeah.

And the ID.4, like the last one I drove was quiet, rode well. I've had one as a ride share before and it's nice to ride in the back seat in. It's grumulent, it's fine. And I think that that's fine with the current state of EVs, with some of the weird things that Volkswagen just hasn't quite figured out. Isn't enough. That's kind of unfortunate. I want more competition, not less.

Sam Abuelsamid (49:08)
⁓ yeah, it's a very nice car to drive.

Yeah.

All right. And then last one I want to touch on is Scout. ⁓ Yeah, Motor One and some other outlets reported that ⁓ the Scout launch may be delayed by as much as a year. And this came from Auto Forecast Solutions. They published a report saying that the production of the Traveler SUV, which is launching before the pickup,

Chad Kirchner (49:39)
See you in a Volkswagen.

Yeah, same.

Sam Abuelsamid (50:02)
was pushed back a year to September 20, 20, they got this from talking to suppliers. ⁓ When we were at Scout a couple of about three, four weeks ago, Scott Keough, the CEO said, no, are on target. We're installing equipment in the factory. ⁓ In the next few months, we're going to start doing the first of four pre-production runs of vehicles and targeting series production of the Traveler ⁓ in the fall.

Chad Kirchner (50:18)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (50:30)
of 2027 and then the pickup about five, six months behind that. Scout did issue a statement to Motor One and presumably to other outlets that I haven't read yet. says, Scout has not spoken with Auto Forecast Solutions. We do not have anything additional to share regarding timing beyond what we've already announced. As we previously shared, initial production is targeted to begin in 2027.

We will start producing initial validation vehicles this year. The effort will continue and mature into 2027. Expect customers will begin taking delivery of New Scout vehicles in early 2028. So we'll see.

Chad Kirchner (51:13)
He said she said I mean, I don't want to lower down to that because like again I know Sam over there at AFS and they seem to be pretty well-connected Having a statement come out that specifically kind of says the way that that's worded kind of makes me think that

That's as much as a denial of that report as possible. I think a no comment would have added a little more credibility to the reporting. But I think we're also probably splitting hairs of six months here. Like, I...

Sam Abuelsamid (51:45)
No, I mean the schedule that

AutoForecast published was like, yeah, was like fall of 2028, so almost a year delay. Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (51:50)
Was 2030 for the truck in what, 2020? Yeah, okay, so a year

is probably not quite splitting hairs, but you know, there is a lot more uncertainty right now than when Scout launched. ⁓ Dealers, Volkswagen dealers have started to throw a fit, which I think is stupid. ⁓

You know, and there's a plant that's supposedly still on track for for being built, but what are they going to put in there? I don't know starting a car company is hard, man. ⁓ I I don't. Scott, who has all the reasons in the world to say that they're on they're on target. ⁓ Yeah. Are they? I don't know. I don't know. There's a lot of smart people working there. I know a lot of smart people working there and. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (52:20)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (52:41)
I think the product has the potential to be compelling. ⁓ Maybe there were some kinks thrown in. Maybe they thought there'd be more full bev reservations than there were harvester reservations. there was some, once they got it out there in the real world, some changes that maybe they didn't anticipate.

Sam Abuelsamid (52:59)
Well, I think,

you know, if there is a delay, I think I would think that the most likely reason for the delay is potentially having to re-engineer the range extender because, you know, the problem they've got with the range extender is, you know, they said at the event, you know, we're mounting the engine in the back, the whole range extender is a module with the engine, the cooling system, fuel tank and everything.

is mounted in the back of the vehicle behind the rear axle. And from a packaging standpoint, makes a lot of sense. ⁓ Because you get to retain the frunk, ⁓ it's very easy to install. The downside though, is now you've put all this extra weight in the back, and when you're towing, that's where you don't want extra weight. You don't want to be taken away from the tongue load. And they acknowledged

Chad Kirchner (53:31)
Yeah, you and Craig looked for it.

Yeah.

No.

Sam Abuelsamid (53:57)
that right now the eRev has less towing capacity than the Bev. They're not saying how much, there's been reports, there were some early reports that it was as low as 3,500 pounds versus 10,000 for the Bev. It's sounding more like they're more like in the 5,000 pound range, but even if they launch it with only 5,000 pounds of towing for the eRev, that's game over. Nobody's gonna buy that.

Chad Kirchner (54:01)
sure

Yeah, I saw that.

Yeah,

it's not, it's not good. I ⁓ reference only that video that you shot with, that you guested with, with Craig Lapp, and I see on something else, because it was funny and Craig's funny. ⁓ I think it is clever, a clever place to put an engine, just because I don't think we've really seen engines like specifically like that before. ⁓ Yeah, telling though, that's a real concern, because Tongue-Late is kind of the most important thing.

Sam Abuelsamid (54:47)
I mean, if it wasn't this type

of vehicle, if it wasn't an SUV or a truck that those customers expect to tow with, then it wouldn't be as big a deal.

Chad Kirchner (54:51)
Right.

Yeah. So if

I were an analyst, I'm not. God, I'm not. But if I were, I would wonder what's more important to a traveler or the other, whatever. What's more important to that buyer? The terrier or the traveler? Is it the towing capacity or is it the frunk? It's probably the towing capacity. So...

Sam Abuelsamid (55:12)
Terra.

Yes, absolutely. 100%.

Chad Kirchner (55:23)
I like the idea of trying to preserve the frunk. I do. Maybe it's got to go. Maybe it's got to go on the EREV. ⁓ Again, I think it's super clever to try to engineer around that. I think that would even be a differentiator. Like, hey, here's our EREV pickup truck. It still has a frunk. Because I don't think it matters as much on the SUV, because you've got other storage.

Sam Abuelsamid (55:30)
Yeah.

Yeah, you've got a lot a lot of internal

Chad Kirchner (55:49)
Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid (55:49)
cargo space.

Chad Kirchner (55:50)
but in a pickup truck you don't really have a lot of lockable weatherproof storage that's not in the cab. ⁓ And I think that people that have experienced things like the Rivian R1T or the Lightning or one of the GM trucks, like once you kind of have a frunk on a pickup truck, like it's kind of a game changer for you. Frunks on other EVs and stuff, whatever. ⁓ But on a pickup truck?

Sam Abuelsamid (56:15)
Pick up and makes

a lot of difference.

Chad Kirchner (56:16)
makes so much of a difference and I mean I hope they find an engineering solution to it but I agree with you if you lose half your towing capacity because you have an erev it's not it's it would have to be really really cool and I don't think it's cool enough I mean people buy Raptors even though you lose 2500-3000 pounds of towing over a regular F-150 because the truck's cool but that's 7500 or something yeah

Sam Abuelsamid (56:41)
but you're still looking even there, 7,500, 8,000 pounds

of towing.

Chad Kirchner (56:46)
Yeah.

Yeah, five. mean, five is is Telluride towing capacity. Yeah. Or I think like the Beasley Woodland will tow five thousand pounds, I think. It either three or five. It might have been three. All right. Well, don't quote me on that again. I'm not the expert. I'm just the guy that you invite on to to pretend like I am. ⁓ But I want to be excited for Scout.

Sam Abuelsamid (56:53)
Yeah, or Honda Passport, you know, or Ridgeline.

I'm not sure. I think it's three. Whatever. Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (57:14)
I there's a lot of clever people working there. think that having a more off-road kind of focused alternative to something like a Rivian, I think is a cool idea. I have questions long-term about how Scout becomes more than two cars, ⁓ how it becomes a full line automaker, if it can become a full line automaker, but ⁓ I like seeing more competition. like...

the vibe that I get from Scout. I liked Scott's speech when he announced Scout and I sat there. It was very pro-US heavy, which is weird coming from I'm not an American, but it was pulling at the right heartstrings and it was the right messaging and yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (57:55)
Yeah, mean, know, Volkswagen has long struggled in the U.S. market. And this is the

kind of product that, you know, really gets the heart of the American market.

Chad Kirchner (58:03)
Yeah,

and it feels like Scott gets that and it feels like the people there get that. Probably helps that they hired a lot of cheap people, including the designer. But like, I hope that's not the case. I also hope the truck doesn't come out in 2030 because that's...

Sam Abuelsamid (58:08)
Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (58:23)
I that's only four years, but it's also a long four years because those markets are gonna, the market is just gonna look so different in 2030, even here in the US. I don't know, I wish I could read the tea leaves. I'd probably make a lot more money if I was more accurate at this, but. ⁓

I there's room for Scout right now. I hope there's still room for Scout when they come out, I like competition. I hope they solve this, whatever this engineering problem potentially is with EREV. But I do wonder if they expected that many EREV reservations. I mean, they would have had to have, right? They had to have known.

Sam Abuelsamid (59:00)
Yeah.

I think they did.

Well, I don't know. I don't think they expected like, you know, 85, 90 percent, but they expected it to be a significant, you know, upwards of half. And, you know, at any at any significant at any significant quantity, you know, you've got to make sure you do it right.

Chad Kirchner (59:11)
Right.

Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (59:25)
All right, well, let's wrap that up. ⁓ So next up, ⁓ we're gonna welcome one of our listeners, ⁓ Michael Burns is gonna join us and I'm gonna bring him in now.

Chad Kirchner (59:28)
Let's do that.

Sam Abuelsamid (59:42)
Alright everybody and we have a special guest joining us tonight. It is one of our listeners It's Michael Burns who you might know from the discord if you're in the discord is Moss Superm Well first Michael, where does that name come from? What does that mean?

Michael Burns (59:58)
That is an old gamer name. ⁓ I thought I had customized it. I thought I'd customized it to Mr. Burns ⁓ in the channel, but yes, that's my old gamer name for many, many years of PC gaming. if you're out there and you're looking for you, if you see me in the next, if I come up behind you and shoot you in the back, that's just, that's my old gamer name.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:00:10)
Okay

Okay.

Well, the reason I asked you to join us tonight, Michael, ⁓ is because you shared in the Discord a fairly lengthy story of your recent car shopping experience ⁓ and the process you and your wife went through in picking out a vehicle. ⁓ And rather than me just reading out this thread from the Discord, I figured, why don't you join us and...

Tell us the story yourself in your own words. So go ahead and tell us, how did this process start for your car buying process this time around?

Michael Burns (1:01:01)
Yeah, well, I really want to first of all, I want to thank you, Sam, for the invite for having me on the show. I'm happy to be here with you and Chad. Yes. And I will hopefully this is not a one time deal. Maybe I can write another thing and and get to meet Robbie and Nicole as well. You are you guys have one of the best shows, best automotive podcasts I've ever found. And I've been listening you all for several years. So

Chad Kirchner (1:01:08)
Hello. Hello, listener Michael.

Michael Burns (1:01:31)
If ⁓ anybody who is out there ⁓ listening for the first time, these guys really care about their craft and ⁓ keeping listeners informed about the automotive industry. And it's very tech heavy. That's where I first heard Sam. I heard him on ⁓ Leo Laporte's This Week in Tech on the Twitter network. So I'm very much happy to be here. ⁓ Like you said, we just went through a car buying experience and ⁓

I haven't purchased a car myself since 2023. And my wife, had not purchased a car in about 10 years. We had a 2016 Chrysler Town and Country. It's got about, I just checked it a few minutes ago before the show, it's got 90,000 miles on it. And quite a bit of dog hair in the back. That's one of the key things that I have to have.

have to have room for. We have two adopted racing greyhounds. I've mentioned that to you guys before and trying to find, when I was looking for my Jeep Wrangler, still not enough room in that thing for those two big dogs. No, no they're not. They're lanky. The little one curls up in a nice ball. The other one, the bigger one, just tolerates her or uses her as a pillow. But ⁓ they went jeeping with me this past weekend.

Chad Kirchner (1:02:42)
say those aren't small dogs. Yeah.

Michael Burns (1:02:57)
But my wife has been with the ⁓ Chrysler for, like I said, about 10 years. We got it in 2017. ⁓ And ⁓ that experience, car buying experience, was through, we used TruCar at the time. I don't know if that's still around, but it was sort of a non... Yeah, it was sort of the non-negotiable price from USAA. And that's probably one of the things I'd...

Sam Abuelsamid (1:03:15)
It's a round, but not doing great.

Michael Burns (1:03:26)
I do not like about car buying is I do not like dealing with the dealership at all. don't like and if you're if you're an employee dealership or dealer on the podcast, no disrespect at all. But it's just it's just not my forte. I don't want to really have to negotiate that sort of thing. ⁓ So the we had that car. We loved it and it's served us for many years, but it was starting to show its age.

And ⁓ I think the kicker was the air conditioning was starting to become questionable and you cannot have you cannot not have air conditioning here in ⁓ in Georgia for a summer. So that was kind of what drove us to start hunting. And ⁓ I take a lot of everything that you guys say here on the show. ⁓ And I'm a big fan of Motor Week on PBS to I take the reviews pretty seriously and try and find something that's

I drive a four by E, a PHEV, which is no longer available now, but I really wanted to get away from 18 miles, 16 miles a gallon with the vehicle. And after having driven the EV3 and on a business trip in Europe just a couple of weeks ago, I was really sold on that. I was like, you know what, if we can get, if we can get a, an EV9 or a Telluride size vehicle, a let full electric, if I can convince my wife to do that.

We're gonna be golden. ⁓ And then ⁓ certain global circumstances made ⁓ electric vehicles start to dry up almost immediately. I think you guys know what I'm talking about. ⁓ And so then it became a hunt on like, okay, what can we do? so I basically went the route with my wife ⁓ that I have been for the past two vehicles. ⁓ I got my Dodge Ram.

$1,500 from CarMax and I got my current Wrangler from CarMax and I'm really happy with the experience. It's super simple. You go in there, hey, here's my car. They'll give you usually a fair price for it and you get out of it. You get what you get for the car and they'll apply it right then and there and it doesn't take three days of negotiations and sacrificial goats and that sort of thing to get the deal, which is what I absolutely do not like to deal with.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:44)
Ha

Michael Burns (1:05:49)
And I went, I just said, I pointed my wife at CarMax and said, at it. And I said, if you've got questions, you do it. Cause I'm gonna let you, I don't want to say letting my wife. She usually defers to me for the cars. And I wanted her to pick what she wanted cause she's got preferences. And so we were, were agreed on some certain requirements. We wanted a comfy front seat and then room for the Greyhounds and a human preteen.

⁓ So ⁓ that should technically be three requirements, but the preteen just hangs out with the dog. So she doesn't really, she's not too picky. just, she's waiting to drive it in a couple of years. ⁓ And yeah, so we started looking around and really the Telluride, the Palisade were at the top of the list. ⁓ And we started looking around. There's a lot of Telluride. Telluride's in the used car market.

There are a lot of palisades in the used car market. And I was a little worried about that, but then I see how many are out on the road. And I said, well, they've got to be popular. You guys have been very complimentary with the vehicle. Yeah. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (1:06:55)
There's still a bunch of them.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:06:57)
Yeah, they've been strong sellers for Hyundai and Kia.

Chad Kirchner (1:07:03)
I know

you don't know me as well as you do like Sam and Nicole and them but I mean the default three row that I recommend to people is either the Telluride or Palisade like it's just kind of it's almost the no-brainer vehicle for a lot of people that need that sort of either three row space or something like that I could see maybe certain preferences leaning towards something else but that's just it's almost like recommending a Telluride at this point like it's just kind of the no-brainer to me.

Michael Burns (1:07:12)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, and

we thought about the Grand Highlander, but that was expensive. That was expensive used. it was much, the price points on the Kias and the Hyundai's were much better. We looked at, so we had two key options that we ended up with, 2024, 2025 Kia Telluride. We were looking at the EX or SX Prestige models and we were trying to get the X line just

because there's the advantage. I like to be able to tow a trailer if we need to. You get a 5,000 pound towing capability with the X-line on those trims. those are floating around. If you're looking for right now, they're probably 40 with about, I like to get a vehicle from CarMax under or a used vehicle 20,000 miles or less just to have a little bit of manufacturer warranty, especially with the key is in the Hyundai's because you get five years, 60,000.

The base warranty and my wife will destroy a car in a heartbeat. I don't know how it happens. It's definitely not like mine ⁓ But there were just strange things that start to happen at the minute. She touches the the push button start so I needed the warranty and ⁓ the both of them both of them were perfect the the tagliate and the Palisade were both had plenty of room in the back for our dogs probably a second row room. We like the room up front

But the the way that the palisade was laid out in the center console It just felt a little more cramped than to tell you ride and it was it just felt like a lot more open center console so ⁓ We ended up looking at ⁓ Those those two models in the tell you rides locally and they were between 46 K and 48 K and We started thinking about Monthly payments and that's where because we're gonna buy this you can't lease it used

And we started thinking, is kind of rich right now, especially with the economy kind of on the edge a little bit. ⁓ So then we also looked at a Santa Fe and I didn't think I found a Santa Fe hybrid all wheel drive. ⁓ Twenty twenty five is about 10 K cheaper. ⁓ Same same a mileage 10 to 20 K. And she actually liked it and didn't complain about that. It was a narrower vehicle or anything like that. And

So we were kind of torn. Do we want a V6? Do we want a V6 that gets 18, 25 miles per gallon, a little bit more room, some towing capability? Or do we want a Santa Fe hybrid all-wheel drive? Both of them had all-wheel drive. The X-Line gives you the all-wheel drive by default on the Kia. And, you know, it was kind of a toss-up. But the thing that she didn't like...

about the Telluride was the V6 was a bit twitchy. It has that eight speed automatic transmission. And when you're off the line, it's not very quick to respond ⁓ to throttle input relative to the turbo four hybrid in the Santa Fe. And I think that's what convinced her. Yes, it's a little smaller. Yes, we don't. It's a little narrower width ways, ⁓ you know, interior room, but

Sam Abuelsamid (1:10:31)
Mm-hmm.

Michael Burns (1:10:55)
It just ⁓ didn't feel like a boat that was a little squirrely off the line. And I don't know if we had a weird one that we'd picked out on the lot or what. ⁓ But that was the big thing for her. For me, I was super excited because we were getting a hybrid. And 35 miles per gallon. ⁓ I will say that the... ⁓ We looked at a couple other vehicles. ⁓ And if anybody's shopping, the Kia's and the...

the Hyundai's, just compare two different model years, because you're going to get the different infotainment system. The newer infotainment system was in the Santa Fe. The older one is in the Kia, and you two will know the best. I think that, when is that 2027 Telluride coming out? The one that looks more blocky? Okay, okay.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:11:39)
you

It's out now. I

think the gas version is out now and the hybrid is coming in the next few weeks.

Michael Burns (1:11:55)
Okay. Yeah, so that was kind of a key thing for us ⁓ is ⁓ the ⁓ interface, well for me anyways, the interface was a ⁓ lot nicer on the Santa Fe because ⁓ it had the, what do call it, the newer infotainment interface. And the one on the Kia, the older Kia, ⁓

The one on the older Kia just didn't it was sluggish. It didn't ⁓ it didn't ⁓ It didn't seem to respond as well and it wasn't as crisp it and it was kind of weird I was thinking if they would have the same one between the ev9 and the ⁓ the ev9 and sorry, not the evening on the ev3 that I driven in Europe and the key that I had in the tailgate ride, but

they were, it was a whole generation difference and it was kind of odd how like, how, how, when are they catching up with all this? So.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:03)
The

new ones do have the updated infotainment system.

Palisade and the Telluride.

Michael Burns (1:13:10)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:13:11)
not, I mean to not industry-splain stuff, don't take this that way. ⁓ But usually, whenever an automaker launches a new system, like it'll launch in a particular model of car and then sort of as each one gets its refresh, its mid-cycle refresh or full refresh, then the system kind of starts to spread out some more. ⁓

Michael Burns (1:13:16)
No, no.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:35)
Yeah, a lot of times

there's changes in the electronics and the older software. Updating the new software to run on the older electronics is sometimes more trouble than it's worth. If people aren't complaining about it, then it's not to their benefit to do it.

Chad Kirchner (1:13:53)
And most,

in my opinion, most people just care if it has CarPlay or Android Auto. And as long as it kind of does that, they can put up with some other things. yeah, mean, the new, now that automakers are starting to put a lot more horsepower behind their infotainments, especially the ones that are using Android Automotive as a base instead of QNX, just...

Michael Burns (1:14:01)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:14:16)
they seem so much more responsive, like going from Nissan's old system to the new one on the Leaf, or ⁓ going to these new systems in Hyundai and Kia and stuff like that. It's just, we as tech people?

Michael Burns (1:14:28)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:14:28)
I don't

want to generalize all of us here on this podcast, but like we as tech people like to have stuff that iterates quicker because they want the new, we want the new more responsive thing. And when we know there's something that has is newer or has more responsiveness, like we want to look for that. ⁓ But ⁓ yeah, there's, there's a pretty, there can be sometimes a pretty sizable difference between, between generations of the vehicle. Most people are going to notice the body design differences, but yeah, I think.

Michael Burns (1:14:55)
Yeah, I'm a-

Sam Abuelsamid (1:14:56)
Yeah.

And as you said, you know, as long as you can hook up your phone and you get that interface on there, what's sitting underneath that. Most people don't really don't ever touch that anyway.

Chad Kirchner (1:15:07)
I did run it.

Michael Burns (1:15:07)
Yeah, I

kind of fell in love with that EV3 when I was in Europe for work travel and it had that crisp. It was very crisp. It was very responsive on the Santa Fe. We also test drove, I think it was a 2025. We test drove a 2025 Carnival, used Carnival. Same, and it had the same sort of interface and I was immediately pleased with it. And then when we hit the Talia ride to test drive it, I was like, aww.

It's not the new stuff. ⁓ It just felt more responsive and everything. I mean, between the two vehicles, it was a tough choice. There were pluses on either one of them. think, though, that the I think we're very happy with saving $10,000 on the price from a standpoint of payments. And ⁓ it's got the newer, like I said, the newer infotainment system. There are some funny things that I've noticed with it.

didn't even realize there were paddles for region, controlling region. I didn't think they were going to be offering those on the pH on the, on just the hybrids. I thought that was only an EV thing. So is that unusual for, or is that something that's happening across them?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:16:18)
It is relatively

unusual in the industry, but Hyundai and Kia do it on a bunch of their vehicles.

Michael Burns (1:16:25)
Okay.

Chad Kirchner (1:16:25)
It's cheaper to leave the paddles on the steering wheel than it is to do two different versions in a lot of cases.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:16:31)
Yeah, to just just have one steering

wheel that you know, they've all they've all got paddles on them.

Chad Kirchner (1:16:34)
I a real prime example,

this doesn't work with what we're talking about here, but a real prime example is like the seventh generation Corvette. Like they had paddles for the automatic, but they didn't want to make a new steering wheel for the manuals. So the paddles in the manual control the auto rev match system. So it still has paddles with the manual transmission. It just does something else because GM wanted to save a few bucks per car. ⁓ So it's, it's...

Michael Burns (1:16:45)
Mm-hmm.

You push the one on the right, shoots confetti out the right mirror. It shoots confetti off the left mirror.

Chad Kirchner (1:17:04)
Yeah, if... Right.

Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:10)
And

on the Hyundai's and Kia's, you get the same steering wheel on the EVs and on the gas and hybrid models. On the gas models, it's for shifting the transmission. ⁓ On the hybrids and on the EVs, it's for controlling regen.

Chad Kirchner (1:17:10)
basically.

Michael Burns (1:17:25)
Yeah, I will say since you mentioned the transmission, talking about just sort of the layout of the console, the center console in both the Telluride and the Santa Fe, much less feeling cramped. It wasn't as high up on your hip, I guess is the best way to say it. So if you like that room and not having, you know, just having just an arm rest, but not like having feeling like you've got like a fighter pilot seat or a set of controls right there up next to next to your nose.

That's probably an advantage you're going to get with the TeguRide over the Palisade. ⁓ The other thing that I really liked on the Santa Fe ⁓ was that new, that ⁓ transmission stock, changing the transmission stock. The TeguRide 24 and 25 had the gear shift, all right? And it took up some space ⁓ and it had kind of the older center console set up.

with the single phone charger versus the two phone charger and two phones place that was in the Santa Fe. That little shifter, that fixed stock that's on the Santa Fe, and I guess the EV9, and I saw it first on the EV3, yeah, I love that. That is so simple. Why have them even been making ⁓ toggle switches in the Expedition Max?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:18:40)
It's on a bunch of their vehicles now.

Chad Kirchner (1:18:43)
Yeah, it's the right place for it.

Michael Burns (1:18:53)
and dials on the Stellantis vehicles. Please, just put a stalk and twist R, L, D, and P for park.

Chad Kirchner (1:19:03)
I actually I prefer like if I had to real have a preference I prefer a stock that goes up and down like ⁓ like Cadillac kind of used to do and like what like what mercedes does ⁓ And that's really like because when you throw it in reverse like if you're doing a weird parallel parking thing like it's That's probably the easiest. But yeah

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:11)
All the GM vehicles have that now.

Michael Burns (1:19:12)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:19:23)
We we had a transmission stop for a while and then we figured out that we don't need to connect that to anything Mechanical to work and then we're like, well, we've got to reinvent the wheel and put it in weird places and do weird buttons and ⁓ No, I think having it Where it is on the new HMG vehicles is a pretty good spot. Looks a little phallic to me. I don't want to bring that up too much, but ⁓

Michael Burns (1:19:47)
It is it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:49)
My only issue

with that design is where they put the start stop button on the inboard end. It's a little awkward to reach that.

Chad Kirchner (1:19:54)
Yeah, it's too close to the... Yeah, it's too close to the...

Kenbei.

Michael Burns (1:19:58)
Yeah,

that was something I noticed. I still notice that if you're in the Santa Fe and I guess the EV9 and the EV3, the screen, this is something I noted when I wrote my little Discord blurb about the EV3. It's a long reach to if you're sitting in the driver's seat in the EV3 and even more so in the Telluride and the Santa Fe, which are bigger inside.

It's a reach to get to that corner if there's something on that right hand side of that screen, because it does stretch. I don't know if that's screen newbiness for me, because I haven't had a ⁓ digital screen in a car that big until this vehicle. But the button, I agree, is behind. You can't see it. My wife, took her five minutes to... How do I start the car? I was like, this is going to be a long trip. Long trip home from the dealership.

Chad Kirchner (1:20:51)
Yes.

Some automakers.

Michael Burns (1:20:53)
or excuse me, CarMax.

Chad Kirchner (1:20:54)
some automakers that sell in both left and right hand drive markets, well, sometimes you'll get a car and it'll be configured. There's actually an option to change the orientation in the settings. I know that's not the case on your car, but I've seen, I've been in somewhere like a Toyota, Toyota's older infotainment system. Like I remember climbing in like a Highlander or something. And I'm like, why do I have to reach all the way over for this basic function? It's because it was set in right hand drive mode. So you could move like parts of the home screen over. I think as screens

Michael Burns (1:21:05)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:21:24)
get bigger like automakers really need to put more thought into okay the stuff you are going to use the touchscreen for can't be all the way over on the far side of the screen because then you got to reach you know you got to reach all the way over for it commonly used stuff should be closer to or not have a touchscreen for everything but that's that's that ship has sailed

Michael Burns (1:21:37)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah. That was the big, that

Sam Abuelsamid (1:21:46)
That's not, that's not allowed anymore.

Michael Burns (1:21:49)
was the biggest thing that I was worried about is, if there's stuff that she can't see on the screen that she needs to see. And if it was like the EV3, my comments on the EV3 that I drove in the Netherlands, it had the actual display output of what your, what your,

your climate control settings where it's right behind the steering wheel. You can't see it in that little tiny mini middle screen, but the Santa Fe didn't have that. I didn't see anything like that in the Telluride. I will say that I think, you know, the things we gave up on the Telluride, and this is for anybody who's listening, that's, you know, thinking about buying a big car like I just had to, or my wife just did. Me and my wife just did. Do we had, you know, you got to decide, do you want 360 degree parking cameras?

Chad Kirchner (1:22:14)
I don't like that either.

Michael Burns (1:22:38)
Or you just want a backup camera. That's one thing we sacrifice. Do you want Napa leather versus whatever the leatherette kind of stuff is? I'm trying to think, you know, do you want your bum cooled or do you just want it heated? Because you'll get it. I that was I was kind of really excited about having that. My daughter loves to to to to heat it, use the seats and the minivan that we're giving up. And I think she would have really liked the cooled, cooled seats.

Chad Kirchner (1:22:52)
I mean in Georgia, probably cool.

Michael Burns (1:23:08)
⁓ But you know, those are the kind of things you're giving up with that $10,000. ⁓ The other vehicles that we looked at, ⁓ we looked at, ⁓ I really wanted her to try out the EV9. She was absolutely, and I'm curious if you have family members that like this, she would absolutely not consider an electric vehicle. And she just, the range anxiety is just there. ⁓ Or the ability to get it charged.

Chad Kirchner (1:23:32)
I've,

I've covered Evie's almost exclusively since mid 2020. ⁓ I hear that. And like, I understand, like I get where her anxiety comes from. I do, because she probably watches TV at some point or, you know, sees some stuff online or whatever. ⁓

It's not as bad as I think probably she thinks, ⁓ but it could be better. you know, it for sure could be the infrastructure and stuff could be better.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:06)
I do you have a

garage or driveway at home?

Michael Burns (1:24:11)
Is that for me? Yeah, I do. I have a driveway. We do not park the vehicles in the garage. There is an old motorcycle there that probably needs to go bye-bye. It's been sitting there since I became a dad. And then the other side is full of lawn equipment. So we park outside and I have a charger that runs underneath the garage door for level one charging of my Jeep.

Jeep and what we were planning on doing and I'm still planning on doing it is going to a 40 amp or 50 amp circuit This is an older house. So we got to figure out what that's gonna cost and how much you know What kind of a project that's gonna be but to get that full level to charge I Don't want to do product endorsements on here, but we're we're happy. I've been happy with the grizzle e it's a Canadian charger, I think it's rebranded from another brand the

Grizzly we I got that from Yeah

Sam Abuelsamid (1:25:11)
think that's what Nicole has too. I think she has a grizzly.

Chad Kirchner (1:25:13)
Yeah, she has

that. And I think they're actually the original maker on that. They're made in Canada.

Michael Burns (1:25:16)
Yeah, they're they're really nice.

If we had gotten an EV, what I would have done is gotten the gone ahead and drop the bank on getting an outlet, a 240 volt outlet, plugging one in and actually paying for there's a there's a version of a grizzly that does dual charging. And I would have I would have charged hers because mine would have been my Jeep charges up at work with the level two charging in two hours. So then I could

I could have charged as soon as mine disconnected, full voltage would have gone to hers. But like I said, it was, I was, I was very happy. I counted it as a win. I banked the win that she went with the hybrid ⁓ and that we won't be paying. Yeah, actually now it's really bad right now. ⁓ But I would have liked to have seen, ⁓ like I said, at the beginning of the, of this segment, the, the, the EB nines, they were all over.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:25:58)
Especially now.

Chad Kirchner (1:26:00)
Yeah.

Michael Burns (1:26:13)
CarMax and again, I keep going back to CarMax. That's where we, if you guys are wondering why you keep talking about CarMax, it was easiest for us to search and find and move vehicles around if we wanted to bring one from out of state. ⁓ There were EV nines all over the place. As soon as ⁓ the war in Iran started and the prices started to shoot up, reserved, reserved, reserved, reserved all across and you could not get one.

Chad Kirchner (1:26:34)
Sure.

Michael Burns (1:26:37)
And they are only just now starting to appear back in. I don't know if that's a cyclical thing or if it was truly tied to the gas prices shooting up all of a sudden, or if it's just part of the cycle in the used car market. But I would have loved to have seen what that would have looked like relative to the Talia ride, where we have gotten the same amount of space.

Chad Kirchner (1:26:56)
EV9 has been out long enough now that you're gonna have a lot of off-lease cars. So that's probably why you're starting to see kind of a flood. If you'll allow me to editorialize briefly...

Michael Burns (1:27:00)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:27:08)
No.

Michael Burns (1:27:09)
Ha ha ha.

Chad Kirchner (1:27:12)
I don't like the EV9 all that much. I don't think the ride and handling is as refined as it needs to be, especially compared to the Ionic 9, which feels like a full generation newer. ⁓ There's nothing... I mean, it's not bad, it's not wrong if somebody has it, like, hey, cool, but it's a little jittery, it's a little... Just stuff doesn't feel quite as sorted, and it feels much more sorted on...

the stuff that's kind of come out after that for what it's for for what it's worth. My question about the Santa Fe though, ⁓ how are the dogs?

Michael Burns (1:27:43)
Yeah.

The dogs are good. So just a little bit of background. If you're, if you're shopping these guys ⁓ at car max, we also, I did look at Carvana as an alternative, ⁓ probably the most dog friendly ⁓ dealership in the world. They let they, the, we took it, when we went on the test drive of the Santa Fe, the guy said,

I said, I'm going to follow you along behind you in the Jeep and then we'll stop somewhere and maybe we can change cars and I can get a test drive and see how it drives, make sure there's no noises or anything. The guy said, dude, just take your dogs with you. And I said, what? And he said, yeah, just take the dogs. We love dogs here. I said, okay. And ⁓ I said, let me go get the beds. goes, don't worry about it. Just get them in there. And we did put the beds in cause I had no intention of having long dog nails tearing up upholstery in a, in an unpaid for car. ⁓

but they got in, they fit. If you are dog person ⁓ and that's a factor in buying the car, just be aware that these bigger three row SUVs, have, ⁓ I didn't realize they'd gotten this advanced in the back. They now have all these little controls and digital controls and ⁓ extra vents. Just keep that in mind. And the Telluride, the advantage with the Telluride for dogs is all the controls are up top in the headliner and the air comes from the top.

like a more like a larger SUV, but with the, with the Santa Fe it's side vents. So we'll see how long it takes for those to become clogged with dog hair over the years. Hopefully not. It hasn't destroyed our, our minivan in 10 years, but we'll see. And I just hope they don't turn off the air conditioning back there ⁓ with their, with their bony butts in the back of the car.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:19)
Mm-hmm

Chad Kirchner (1:29:21)
You

I believe if your car, the last Santa Fe I had, it's been a minute, but ⁓ the last Santa Fe I had, think for a loan, think ⁓ I took the dog in it and the motion sensors picked up that the dog was still in the car and would send a notification to the phone as well. So like the alarm would go off plus it would send a notification to the phone like, hey, something's going on here. Yeah, I it's gonna, it's...

Michael Burns (1:29:48)
⁓ I haven't even...

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:55)
And your Santa Fe might have that, depending on what trim level it is, it's the advanced

Michael Burns (1:30:04)
child recognition system or something.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:05)
Yeah,

Chad Kirchner (1:30:06)
Something like that.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:06)
it's past our occupant detection, rear occupant detection system. ⁓

Chad Kirchner (1:30:10)
Yeah.

Michael Burns (1:30:11)
It does have that warning

as we're getting out of the car. I'm going to have to let my wife know that because if she goes in to go get dog food and she leaves the car running, definitely do not want to have a moment in the parking lot at Hollywood Feed and the car alarm going off and she doesn't know what's going on. Should be okay. Okay, that's good.

Chad Kirchner (1:30:25)
Well, if the car is running, the alarm shouldn't go off. If it's, if it's,

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:29)
Right.

Chad Kirchner (1:30:31)
it's, it's, if... Not that you're going to forget your dog, but some people do.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:31)
When you turn it off and you get out and you close the doors, if it detects motion inside the car, then it'll send you an alert.

Michael Burns (1:30:38)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:30:41)
Volvo even picks up heartbeats in the footwells now, which is pretty wild.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:46)
Yeah.

Michael Burns (1:30:46)
Wow, that's, that is, yeah, that is pretty, that's,

that is beyond what I was even thinking about. I just, I just need the two of them to be able to lay down with that. haven't laid down on top of each other and that's from my Jeep to the Santa Fe. That's a much, a big improvement. I will say, I will say that the other vehicle that we were looking at, the Subaru Ascent, that was one that my wife designated as comfortable in front. and it's pretty roomy and back for dogs. we didn't get a chance to drive one though.

Chad Kirchner (1:30:51)
Yeah

yeah, no of course.

See you at the end of this month's press.

Michael Burns (1:31:15)
The Onyx edition was the one that seemed to be the one to go for if you could get it. And it was about at 20k or below in CarMax. It was about 38-40k. So was in our price range. ⁓ And like I said, the EV9, if I could have gotten her to test drive one, and we could have found one in the current ⁓ gas climate, ⁓ those, the light long range version or the wind, they're hovering around 38-40k. ⁓ In fact, I think the winds have gone up to about

42 or 44 in the past week or two. they're starting, the prices are starting to climb used for those. I would have liked to have done a test drive. I have a little sentimentality. Our first Greyhound that we ever adopted was in a Subaru and funny anecdote, we adopted her, we were driving her way home. This is the 1999 Subaru Forester and

She immediately decorated that included rubber pad with a poo on the way home. She just got car sick and I said, well, we're keeping the dog. I'm glad this is, I can hose this out or wipe it down with some wet wipes in a parking lot. So it would have been nice to get the Subaru, but I think we're going to be super happy with the Santa Fe. I'm really hoping the quality holds up. And from what I've heard from your podcast and other shows, the

Sam Abuelsamid (1:32:16)
Haha.

Michael Burns (1:32:41)
the key is in the type and the key is in the Hyundai's really seem to hold their quality these days, whereas they used to not be.

Chad Kirchner (1:32:45)
They've gotten a lot better. Yeah, they've gotten a lot

better. I mean, if you want to give best improved award, I mean, it's definitely too. Occasionally you hear stories, but I think you have that with any automaker. And I'm not entirely sure like Toyota in 2026 deserves all of the quality recognition that it gets. So it's...

Sam Abuelsamid (1:33:04)
Yeah, Toyota's had a fair number of issues. Yeah, they're no Ford,

Chad Kirchner (1:33:09)
Yeah, sure,

Sam Abuelsamid (1:33:09)
but.

Chad Kirchner (1:33:10)
sure. ⁓ But like to kind of address sort of like, you know, the pricing discrepancy and stuff like that is like, a lot of people buy HMG stuff, the, you know, Hyundai's or Rokia's or stuff like that. And when they first came to the US, like dealers had to sell them pretty cheap. And up until not too long ago,

Michael Burns (1:33:10)
Yeah

Chad Kirchner (1:33:30)
they were severely discounting the stuff. like when you flood the market with lot of vehicles that you've discounted heavily, that really hurts that resale value. So you find them unused through a used dealer like a CarMax or whatever. And you're like, well, why are these cheaper than the Toyotas? Well, there's more of them and the dealer may have had to discount them to sell them. But ⁓ I wouldn't say that there's anything...

Michael Burns (1:33:33)
Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:33:56)
I wouldn't expect any issues knock on wood, you know, Yeah, you still got some warranty left and again, it's not forward with the most recalls any automaker has ever had and I hope that Kia's Kia and Hyundai have put the whole Kia boys Immobilizer thing behind them, but like, you know, there's And you bought all nearly a brand new car, I mean

Sam Abuelsamid (1:34:01)
And you've still got some warranty left on it, so.

Michael Burns (1:34:21)
Yeah, and I should

mention that at 36, 37 selling price, it had less than 10,000 miles on it. They were advertising it with 10,000 miles. It's not bad at all.

Chad Kirchner (1:34:32)
I mean...

I get press cars sometimes that have 10,000 miles on them. yeah, wouldn't necessarily buy a used press car, but.

Michael Burns (1:34:38)
Yeah. And we know what you guys do to them. And so no, no burnouts on our test drives

Sam Abuelsamid (1:34:46)
Although

Michael Burns (1:34:47)
with the dogs in the back.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:34:47)
Roman just did, he just bought ⁓ a Land Cruiser from the Toyota press fleet.

Chad Kirchner (1:34:50)
Oh, Roman's

a YouTuber. So, you you gotta worry about those YouTubers. No, that sounds fantastic. And I would definitely save the 10 grand. There's nothing there, I can't think of much that would make me...

Michael Burns (1:34:53)
wow, okay. Okay.

Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:01)
Yeah. mean, if it fits

Michael Burns (1:35:03)
No.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:04)
you and your wife is comfortable with it, ⁓ it's great choice. ⁓ It's a shame you couldn't get her to at least test drive an EV9 ⁓ or an IONIQ9, but the Santa Fe is not a bad choice at all.

Chad Kirchner (1:35:21)
Well, and in a couple of years too, if you decide to switch again, you're going to have used BZ Woodland and Trail Seekers, which I think is my current sort of like family EV of the moment. ⁓ You're going to have used Ag9s and EV9s, and you're going to have probably EV3s and stuff because we're getting the EV3 soon, and the Highlander. You're going to almost be spoiled for choice in the EV space come this next sort of cycle of getting a new day you

Michael Burns (1:35:21)
No, no.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:40)
and Highlanders and Subaru Getaways.

Chad Kirchner (1:35:50)
car, it's not bad.

Michael Burns (1:35:52)
What?

If anyone is looking, ⁓ the other things I would share ⁓ about the experience right now, get pre-approved with your bank or something, gives you an option. I think that's kind of standard, especially if you can't lease with a used vehicle. ⁓ The ⁓ other thing that, ⁓ you know, ⁓ I didn't really, with a long, we did pay for the extended, like a ⁓ CarMax warranty. The good thing about this one is if you come back in six months and cancel it,

Chad Kirchner (1:36:09)
yet.

Michael Burns (1:36:24)
You can get it. They'll pro rate it and give you the refund, which you would definitely not get with a dealership. I don't think with that. So we did that. I think the other thing, ⁓ the other thing that I was going to say about this was, ⁓ know, it's just, ⁓ just know you're just be ready to, to try out a couple of cars and, don't discount the electric, the electric, if you're out there and

and you're looking for it. I really wanted her to do it, you know, that hybrid, I was super surprised. That thing keeps telling us it's 36 miles per gallon. And if that really holds up, I'm going to be super excited with it. A couple of things. The other thing is keys. When the hell did they become like $600 to get a key for a second key?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:37:14)
Ooh,

Chad Kirchner (1:37:15)
So here's

Sam Abuelsamid (1:37:16)
it's been a while.

Chad Kirchner (1:37:17)
a top tip. If you go to Costco, I don't even think you have to be a Costco member because they're sitting in the parking lot sometimes, but Costco has this deal with, I forget the key replacement thing, they offer like on the spot mostly new cars, key duplication for like a third of the dealer price. So I wouldn't, know, check the check there.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:37:41)
I wish I had known that,

I wish I had thought of that before I got a replacement key for our old Civic a couple of years ago, which ended up costing me like, by the time between the key for like 250 bucks and the time they program it and everything, I was out almost 500 bucks for that.

Michael Burns (1:37:49)
Mm-hmm.

So I think the service is called Car Keys Express and they do road shows at your local Sam's Club in Costco and their 20 % off price is still around $500. it's still, I think I've heard four figures if you go through the dealership. So fingers crossed. Right now I'm just going to accept it as, ⁓ I just won't drive it. I've got my Jeep. I'm happy with my Jeep and now I can get less heckle dog hair.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:38:05)
Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (1:38:13)
Okay.

Michael Burns (1:38:31)
wear and tear in the Jeep in the meantime. ⁓ But yeah, if anybody's out there looking, the Kia's and the Hyundai's, really nice. they're at that, what is it Sam that you say the average new car price is right now? Yeah, the transaction, what is it right now? 40 to 50,000?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:38:47)
the average transaction prices.

It's

just over 50,000 right now.

Michael Burns (1:38:54)
Yeah, so ⁓ take advantage of the used market. It's out there and ⁓ hopefully we'll have this one for long time to come. And I really do appreciate you guys giving me a chance to share kind of our buying experience and our thought process and hopefully somebody can learn from it and come away with a new car for their family and their dogs.

Chad Kirchner (1:39:16)
But we don't always buy new cars, and it's part of an experience that like, hey, we get a car every week or whatever, and we can test this and do that, but don't really work with dealers. And there are some good dealers out there. ⁓ They might even be listening to this podcast. There's also a lot of really bad dealers out there. ⁓ sometimes it can be hard to figure out where to go and who to trust. I agree that I like the CarMax model quite a bit.

Michael Burns (1:39:30)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:39:46)
on commission, I think they get paid for cars they sell, but I don't think they have the same kind of commission structure. ⁓ And up until Doug DiMiro made a big hay about CarMax's warranties, like, their extended warranties were like incredible for a while. They're still good from what I understand, but like, there was a time that you could like, he did a whole YouTube series on it, it was wild. ⁓ But yeah, I think that anybody that doesn't like negotiating, and I don't know who does, maybe, if you do,

more power to you but I would rather I think the Saturn model is ahead of its time ⁓ I think GM screwed up a lot of stuff and that's why I didn't work but the idea of just having the price and that's the price you pay makes a lot of sense to me man

Michael Burns (1:40:32)
We were,

for anybody who's wondering, ⁓ not counting them prepping the vehicle and everything, ⁓ actually they had the car, we called them on the way home. We were coming home from, again, we're big into Greyhounds. It's our hobby ⁓ as a family, volunteering and that sort of thing. We were coming from an event and we basically called this place. We had an hour and a half drive to get back from the event up to the place. They had the car ready to go. They did need to vacuum it out and do the final prep of it.

⁓ And we spent about two hours doing paperwork. already we we were on our us a app filling out the final price and the sale stuff Two hours and we two hours total once we were there and we were out the door So, you know if that's that you're kind of buying experience you don't want to spend the whole day and and like I said do you know have to dance around in circle and do ⁓ and Talk to the gods to negotiate with the finance guy or whatever ⁓

It's a much easier thing and I'm with you, Chad. I want to get in there and get out of there. And if the price is reasonable enough, I want to go. And yeah, we'll see in a couple of years. I've keeping an eye on the Rivians. The Rivians are still ridiculously expensive, especially now that the PHEV is gone from the Stellantis lineup.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:41:35)
there anywhere out the door. you if that's the kind of buying experience.

Chad Kirchner (1:41:52)
Yeah, I was just gonna ask you really quick. I know we're probably gonna wrap up your chatting about your new car, but how is your 4xE experience been? I know there's been some recalls. ⁓ They were telling people to not park it inside for a while. Like, where have you been on it?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:42:02)
lot of recalls.

Michael Burns (1:42:08)
So ⁓ I received, again it was second hand, so I don't always receive the Stellantis notifications. I did just find it in some old mail. ⁓ The second recall, the first recall that I had, ⁓ I went in and ⁓ this was the, hey, well this vehicle may burn your business and or your house down, battery thing, if it's just sitting there. ⁓ Even if you just stare at it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:42:32)
Ha!

Michael Burns (1:42:37)
So I took it in, they did a software check, it passed. So they were checking for whatever the, to see if there was a software condition that would match the one that they were seeing and I guess the damaged ⁓ battery cells, I guess from LG. And then the second one just came out in November and everybody in the discord was saying, have you gotten your vehicle checked out? ⁓ When I took it in, they said it was going to be, we're gonna do,

five or six hours of tests, we're going to rewrite the software on eight of the major out of like 30 software controllers in the car. And then ⁓ they said, if it, if it fails any of those tests, you can't take the car back and it might be three weeks before we can get it repaired for you and get, or replace it with a new pack. And when they sent me to enterprise to take that vehicle, you know, to, to have the, the ⁓ rental,

They wanted to put me in a Jeep Compass and I said, nope, I see that Wagoneer on the other side of the parking lot. Can you clean that up for me and put me in that? And then I got to drive a Wagoneer and I have completely different opinions about that, but we won't go into it on this episode. I was looking at three weeks before ⁓ if they had found something wrong and that was a little concerning. I love the vehicle. It's a fantastic car. think Nicole still has hers, right? Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:47)
.

Chad Kirchner (1:43:47)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:59)
Mm-hmm, yeah.

Chad Kirchner (1:44:00)
I would say that you talk about, you know, you were just got to spend your last weekend doing Jeep stuff, which is good because a lot of Jeep owners don't Jeep stuff. one of my best off-roading experiences ⁓

was actually on the launch of the 4xe Wrangler because off-roading in that car or in any electric car, because in electric mode, the 4xe doesn't have a true torque converter in the way, blah, blah, blah, doesn't matter. ⁓ But the point is you feel much more connected to whatever you're trying to crawl up. So, like, you give even the smallest amount of throttle application and, the wheel moves because it's just electric. It's just electric motor doing it. And it's silent, means you can hear everything.

Michael Burns (1:44:42)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:44:44)
nature, other people, know, the person you just ran over, whatever, like you can hear, you know, you can hear all of that and unlike any other Jeep model, including the 392, like you don't get that immediate responsiveness in that slow speed off road. You have to wait for the torque converter to wind up, you have to get the hamster on the wheel. I know in normal driving you don't feel any of that because it's just, hey, normal driving, but once you've off road or did anything

like in a pure EV or like a PHEV with an EV mode like in the Wrangler. Like you don't want to do it any other way. Like it's just, it's just the best way to do it.

Michael Burns (1:45:21)
I

had my Greyhounds in the back of the car, the Jeep. We went on a trail, we had some water fording about a foot and a half, a foot and a half deep. And I never had a doubt that I was completely safe being an EV. People just need to get it in their heads. The EVs can be just as capable off-road as your ICE vehicles. ⁓ But yeah, being able to do that that first time, the first time I ever took it on with another group of Jeep people.

People had 392s, they had old 1990s era Grand Cherokees or Jeep Cherokees and they were falling behind. said, your car wasn't running the whole time. was like, no, I put on full regen and I put it in four wheel drive auto and that's what I did. I didn't even know how to use four wheel drive low on the vehicle. still don't. I don't want to admit that, but they were, yeah, it's a great experience. So yeah, but.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:11)
Huh.

Chad Kirchner (1:46:15)
It's okay, nobody listens to this.

Michael Burns (1:46:19)
But I really do hope they bring something back that's the Wrangler, that is truly an electric vehicle, a fuel-efficient vehicle. I hate that they've given it up, but I also understand.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:30)
Well, they do

have the recon still tentatively coming. Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (1:46:33)
allegedly.

Michael Burns (1:46:34)
Yeah,

I've seen that. I wish I'd seen one in Europe, but I did not. It looks like a really cool vehicle. Okay.

Chad Kirchner (1:46:39)
Drive around Detroit, they're everywhere.

The Recon, was, you may have seen an Avenger in Europe. I've seen a couple there, which is the Compass. It's a little bit smaller than like the Compass, it's like the old Renegade size as a a full Bev.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:46)
Yeah, the Avengers actually selling quite well in Europe.

Michael Burns (1:46:51)
yeah, yeah, I may have seen one of those.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:53)
It's actually

smaller than a Renegade.

Chad Kirchner (1:46:55)
Yeah, it's tiny,

Michael Burns (1:46:55)
Okay.

Chad Kirchner (1:46:56)
but it's cool. I think it's really cool looking. ⁓ I know somebody that has one, but yeah, I think that Stellantis, like their full EV efforts up until now have really struggled to put it, you know, optimistically. ⁓ They need to get some stuff sorted out, but I also completely agree with you. The answer isn't to put a V8 in everything. ⁓ It is an answer, but it's not the answer. ⁓

Michael Burns (1:47:11)
Mm-hmm.

No, it's not the answer. I'm

of the same mind about the Hummer EV. ⁓ A thousand horsepower, what could we have done with the three vehicles that the batteries in that one took up? But that's a whole shopping trip that I can't even begin to afford.

Chad Kirchner (1:47:33)
Yeah, have you driven one though?

But you feel like you're

the king of of Beep Mountain. Like you just feel like you are king of the world. Though I did drive the SUV across the Golden Gate Bridge against rush hour traffic. So they had they had it like two lanes wide. And I felt like I was gonna fall off the bridge because I was so much wider. And then lanes are so narrow. And you're just kind of it was a very

Michael Burns (1:47:42)
There you go.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:47:59)
It's a very

wide vehicle.

Chad Kirchner (1:48:01)
a very harrowing experience,

Michael Burns (1:48:02)
yeah.

Chad Kirchner (1:48:04)
you know, no, like the EV3, like I'm kind of jealous you got the driving EV3 already, because like, stuff like that is the EVs that I get really excited about, the affordable or reasonably affordable. ⁓ You know, I think that's, I think it's easy to build a Hummer EV. I know their engineers would disagree with me, but I think that's easy. I think it's almost easy to build like a Rivian or an electric G-Wagon or anything like that. yeah, whenever you

Sam Abuelsamid (1:48:27)
Mm-hmm. It's the brute force approach to building an EV.

Michael Burns (1:48:31)
Mm-hmm.

Chad Kirchner (1:48:31)
have

an unlimited sort of resources, you know, you can do a lot of stuff. When you're constrained, when you know you have to hit a certain price point, you have to be innovative. You have to be creative. And I think that brings out better automotive engineering, to be honest.

Michael Burns (1:48:49)
Yeah,

the EV6 that Sam drives, the EV3 that I drove, mean, they're great. So, but next time, next vehicle, ⁓ I'll see if I can convince my wife the next turnaround and give me a couple of years and we'll come back and see if we're still hand cranking the engine that started up, so to speak. ⁓ But thank you guys for allowing me the opportunity to share that experience. hope anybody who's listening can get something out of it and... ⁓

You guys keep being awesome here on Wheel Bearings.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:49:20)
Thanks, and before you go, why don't you go ahead and plug your podcast too.

Michael Burns (1:49:24)
Yeah, if you I've been volunteering as I was telling Sam before the show I've been volunteering for Greyhound adoption for a good at least since 2013 They are a fantastic breed buddy of mine the fella I volunteer with the most he and I started a podcast If you were looking for to learn about the breed, it's Greyhound nation at Greyhound nation dot dog. That's D O G

And we're not, we don't record, probably an average of once a month. We were doing a little bit more early on in COVID when we started. And we've slowed down as he's gotten a little older and the guests of it is kind of a niche podcast. ⁓ But a lot of the things that I appreciate about some of Leo Laporte's This Week in Tech, your show, I try to incorporate some of those.

those quality things about ⁓ how the show starts and how we ⁓ present the show. So you guys set a great example with the great camaraderie that you all have here and the production value over at TWIT Network. So if you're interested in a dog and learning about the breed, ⁓ it is the only dog in the world ⁓ that can go 40, 45 miles per hour as fast as a car on its own. So one of the few breeds that can do it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:47)
I don't know, my

Corgis, when they want to chase after a car, seems like they can go 45.

Michael Burns (1:50:52)
I am

Any day any day you want to meet I'll put the corgi and a greyhound in the in the dog park and see what see what how that turns out

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:02)
Well, thank you for joining us, Michael, and glad to hear your story.

Chad Kirchner (1:51:04)
It's very nice meeting you.

Michael Burns (1:51:08)
Yeah, thank you so much guys and keep being awesome. Thanks, Chad Sam.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:12)
Okay, alright, I am gonna hit stop for a second here. So, make sure you...

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:18)
so that was a great conversation with Michael and Chad. I want to thank you again for jumping in at the last minute today.

Chad Kirchner (1:51:26)
no,

thank you for letting me come on and talk about cars because I like doing that. And as much as I joked earlier in that interview, the listeners like does the don't worry, nobody's going to hear this one. Michael was talking about something. ⁓ You've got a really great audience. I see people mentioning the show a lot in a lot of places. And it's fun to talk with smart people about the industry because sometimes the industry feels kind of crazy and sometimes the world feels

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:30)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Chad Kirchner (1:51:56)
kind of crazy and and it kind of all the the streams kind of cross and I feel like some days I want to pull a little bit of my hair out that I have left so I really I really enjoy coming on talking again to smart people and I liked hearing Michael's story because you know we don't necessarily go through the new car buying process all the time and things change and and being able to understand what regular consumers I mean he's an enthusiast but you know what regular consumers are interested in

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:57)
It definitely is.

Chad Kirchner (1:52:25)
I think only makes our job easier. It makes it better to do our jobs. So I'm glad he was on here to do that.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:52:30)
Yeah.

And then, as we say goodbye, ⁓ actually you will hear a little bit of Nicole on today's show because I've got an interview that she recorded a couple of weeks ago at the New York auto show with Alison Witherspoon, who is the chief marketing officer for Nissan. ⁓ so as soon as we say goodbye, you'll hear Nicole jump in and have a chat with Alison. So see ya.

Chad Kirchner (1:52:56)
Woo, Nicole.

hey, I'm going to pimp something. Speaking of Nicole, I don't use... Nope, that's it. Rah, stop making Robbie come back. No. ⁓ If you like Nicole or Robbie, which I'm assuming you've listened to this podcast, do. ⁓ And if you're a super...

Sam Abuelsamid (1:53:00)
okay. No, sorry, click. Stop recording. Stop recording.

Well, they're not listening for

me, that's for sure.

Chad Kirchner (1:53:16)
And if you're a super duper nerd, I just started a Star Trek podcast recently and they're both on it. Sam will have a link in the shout outs. But ⁓ if you like hearing them talk and you want to hear him talk about nerdy stuff, it's kind of fun. I just wanted to pimp that quick. All right. Thanks. Bye.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:53:28)
All right. Bye.

Nicole Wakelin (1:53:33)
name and title so I have it.

Allyson Witherspoon (1:53:35)
Allyson Witherspoon, Chief Marketing Officer for Nissan.

Nicole Wakelin (1:53:39)
starting to talk about before I hit record was the day was your not super bowl ad correct

Allyson Witherspoon (1:53:40)
Yes. Super

full adjacent. Super full adjacent. So we wanted to help drive consideration for Rogue. We're in kind of the last year. We're getting ready to come out this year in 2026 with the Rogue Hybrid. But we still have a lot of our current generation Rogue. So we want to make sure that we're continuing to grow consideration for that. we knew that we wanted to do something. We felt like we wanted to capture

We felt like we wanted to insert ourselves into the Super Bowl moment, but we didn't have the typical buy for it. So we thought about, okay, how can we connect with this moment in a way that feels natural and something that's much more, I think, like pays homage to Super Bowl? And so we were talking with our engineering team and there is this little known fact that in the Rogue, you can actually do the child latch for your child car seat.

in all three seats in the back row. And so most cars, only have it on the passenger side or the driver's side. This one you can actually use in the middle seat. So we're like, you know what else you can do with that? Like what is one of the most frustrating things about going to a Super Bowl party? It's transporting the dip. And how many times have you gone to a party and it's at your feet, you're holding it, it's going all over the place. And so we thought, let's take the idea of the security that you can have in the child seat and actually apply that to the dip.

Nicole Wakelin (1:55:08)
It's hilarious. I know it was just like a shtick for the ad, but I really want you to

Allyson Witherspoon (1:55:13)
We have a few of them. TSA took one of them. Did TSA take They did take one. They disassembled one of them. was it buried in a note? No, I think they thought maybe things were being hidden in it. When it went through the... Yeah, when we were coming back from the shoot.

Nicole Wakelin (1:55:19)
Did they think they thought it was?

Okay, I guess it's weird enough that TSA would be looking at you like,

Allyson Witherspoon (1:55:32)
Yeah, but we are so we are talking to and part of it too is we you know, obviously we work really closely internally. So we're talking with the after sales team. We wanted to see if they're like, is there any interest in this? And I think we have seen that. So yeah, you Just so I can have that. All right. All right. I'm going to go back and tell them that.

Nicole Wakelin (1:55:47)
me to buy a rope.

in your marketing. But greater purpose of this conversation aside from the fact that I love that ad was what you're trying to do with sort of raising the profile of Nissan. It's sort of flying under the radar a little bit. you talked about in the email that I got from you guys, talked about trying to sort of push the performance and the tell me about that. What's your new angle to get people to know who Nissan is again?

Allyson Witherspoon (1:56:14)
The biggest thing

is actually reinforcing the quality and durability of our vehicles. And I think that over time, we haven't necessarily focused on that enough. And so we're the number one mainstream brand for IQS from JD Power, so Initial Quality Study. And we have great vehicles. They're incredibly durable, high quality. And we want to make sure that consumers understand that about us. Because I think when you think about Nissan's, we've always been historically just

great cars can kind of get through anything totally reliable and we wanted to get back to that. So we've been really reinforcing that over the last year. We've been doing a lot of long form content, going to our engineering facilities and our testing facilities and going in depth and showing all the testing processes that our vehicles go through and kind of hearing from our actual engineers talking about how, whether it's Pathfinder or Rogue or Frontier, how we take it to the next level when it comes to testing and making sure that it's gonna.

these vehicles are really going to be built for our consumers best whatever it is that they need it for.

Nicole Wakelin (1:57:20)
There's the trend right now that everything has an off-road version. Every company has their own little road for what their off-road trim line is. Is that a key part of what you're trying to market right now for Nissan?

Allyson Witherspoon (1:57:31)
I wouldn't say that it's necessarily just about off-road. I think it's more about the overall durability because even when you look at Pathfinder, you think Pathfinder, it's a three-row family vehicle. Think about all the things that happen in a family vehicle that are still about durability. So it's about ice cream flying around in the car, a lot of things that kids are doing in the backseat, all of that kicking the seats, all of that demonstrates durability. So it's not specific just to off-road. have great, our Pro 4X with our Frontier.

and with Armada, those are great examples of more of our off-road capability. But it's showing the durability in kind of any family or any situation that a consumer is going to be in, and whether that's something going in the backseat with the kids or if you want to take it off-road. It's about kind of this broader definition of durability.

Nicole Wakelin (1:58:19)
to get that family into that Pathfinder. How do you appeal? What's your strategy to appeal to that person? To say, the Pathfinder is the vehicle that you are. This is what you want. We have the right durability, the right versatility.

Allyson Witherspoon (1:58:34)
So we actually, we just launched our refreshed Pathfinder early in February. And so what we actually wanted to do is we actually, our entire marketing around for Pathfinder is around what are all the things that a Pathfinder can do but told through the eyes of a child. So children can be very imaginative, obviously. And so we were asking kids, what do you think the Pathfinder, can the Pathfinder do this? And so then they've been drawing out all these different ideas and it's like Pickle Bridge and like a...

Fudge River. Yeah, yeah, that came out in, yeah, that came out in February, so we can send that to you.

Nicole Wakelin (1:59:09)
I haven't seen this. I apparently don't watch enough TV with commercials.

Allyson Witherspoon (1:59:14)
And so I think that's another example of how durability can be going off road but can also be in those moments. And think about kids, they have these amazing ideas, you know, they're never done. We're like, well, let's actually do one of these. Let's do what these kids are saying and actually show that the VLCO can do that.

Nicole Wakelin (1:59:31)
So

thinking about what I literally just said, don't watch enough TV to see commercials. I haven't seen those not because they're not good ads, but because I just haven't watched enough TV. How are you reaching the person who's not really watching TV the way we used to where ads are on?

Allyson Witherspoon (1:59:45)
Yeah, I think we have social is becoming so much a much larger and larger portion of what we're doing. I think TV is it's almost about 20 % of what our total mix is. Yeah. And so where we are and it's focused and when we are in TV, it's in moments where we have a lot of eyeballs and that's really around live sports. And that's kind of that's where you know, that's really where you have, you know, captive audiences. So all the other content is really going to be in social media.

streaming platforms, that's where we want to be showing up. Because we want to, it's not about dictating what a media channel strategy is, it's about being where consumers are and then meeting them there. Influencers are another big piece of it and content creators because that's a way that consumers are now discovering brands and seeing brands in a different way, which also helps us as we're trying to shift perception about Nissan.

Nicole Wakelin (2:00:38)
So do you feel like influencers

have had such a change in strategy? I'm surprised it's only 20%. I didn't know how low it was for the traditional broadcast. People trust influencers? they seen as, does that get people just saying, Nissan exists? Or does it get people saying, I want to buy that?

Allyson Witherspoon (2:00:53)
I think it's kind of a two-step process. What we're seeing is that the time lag between when you have natural awareness for a brand to when you're buying, that's not really shrunk. so consumers are, they'll see something from Nissan, they'll see something from a creator, maybe they'll configure a car, maybe they'll do something that's kind of more transactional. All that's happening in a very short amount of time. So it is kind of both. Ultimately, what we want to do is we want to get on the consideration side.

That's what, from a marketing standpoint, that's our primary objective.

Nicole Wakelin (2:01:27)
building you where to. Wait,

like you didn't even think about the Pathfinder now.

Allyson Witherspoon (2:01:30)
Yep, and taking it just a little bit, one step further in, it's not just aware of it, but it's also, I want to consider that in my, as I'm looking for SUVs or small SUVs, putting that into consideration.

Nicole Wakelin (2:01:42)
For the influencer angle and the social media angle, are you targeting all of it because there's so much social media, right? Is there one platform or one way of reaching people that way that you find that's better than others?

Allyson Witherspoon (2:01:54)
This is actually something that's constantly shifting and I was just going through this strategy a couple weeks ago actually with the team. So what we're doing is we're kind of going, a lot of these content creators, have very specific audiences. So we're matching up our models with some of their specific audiences. And some creators are better on TikTok, others are gonna be better on Instagram. We try to match that to where our consumers are and try to match that as much as possible.

Nicole Wakelin (2:02:23)
think your consumers are one of those spots more than the other.

Allyson Witherspoon (2:02:27)
it'll be all

over the place. It'll vary. Yeah, it's going to vary. That's what we've seen. And I think that's what's kind of complicated about marketing right now because we need to be all places. We don't have, you know, endlessly unlimited budgets. And so it's really about trying to be very targeted in understanding our audience. What, do they react to things? What are they interested in? And then trying to connect creators as an example with that. But you know, cause you'll, you'll have, and it's

I wish that it was as easy as saying, ⁓ the frontier, all the consumers are gonna be on TikTok. That's not the case. They're gonna be all over the place.

Nicole Wakelin (2:03:05)
even something as distinctive as truck. could be...

Allyson Witherspoon (2:03:07)
Yeah, it can be any share. You

have to target all of it. But you have to do it in different ways. And I think the other thing that makes it complicated is that content that's on TikTok doesn't perform necessarily as well as it would on Instagram because the way consumers use those platforms is very different.

Nicole Wakelin (2:03:24)
So then when you're looking at marketing now, you have to do one thing for broadcast where that works and one thing for tick tock and one thing for instance. So you have to split that budget among all the, it's not just you can run the same thing. You're going to create it for all of these different things.

Allyson Witherspoon (2:03:38)
in

different ways. Exactly and that's where technology is now a benefit because if we were trying to do this 10 years ago it'd be impossible but now we have with generative AI we're able to do a lot more of these types of assets you're able to take videos and kind of remix them in real time so that like that technology helps us a lot. The key thing that we have is this the idea is the same and how we want to talk about the car and what we want to communicate about it that's consistent regardless of what the channel of format of it is.

how it comes to life does vary by platform.

Nicole Wakelin (2:04:10)
mention generative AI which is a big thing everyone's AI AI how much does that help?

Allyson Witherspoon (2:04:18)
Yeah,

I mean we we've been really bullish on AI over the last year So I think when it comes to media delivery the actual delivery of our messaging to consumers Most of that is driven now by AI and the different AI tools that we have audience segmentation Strategy all of that's AI is embedded into all of that when it comes to content This is probably where there's been the most advanced work that's happened

over the last several months, and I would say like four months. Four months ago, would have, it really, the fidelity of the content wasn't great after like 10 seconds. Now you're getting much more to like 15 seconds, 30 seconds, where it's a lot better than it used to be. And so what we've been doing, as an example, we have our tier two, so our co-marketing program that we have with our dealers, a big piece of feedback historically for decades has been.

A dealer in the Northeast region wants to show a background that is consistent with New York City as an example. LA, those dealers are not going to want to show that. Historically, it's been impossible to try to actually shoot every single background that's needed. And we have 208 different DMAs. They're all running different assets. Now all of that, we just launched it this past quarter. We have all of that now is dynamically generated. So we have

thousands of backgrounds that our dealers can go in and select. So you can have something that's going to be capital, urban, mountains, all of that is now much more geographically specific.

Nicole Wakelin (2:05:49)
Correct.

Allyson Witherspoon (2:05:51)
Yeah.

Exactly,

exactly. And that's where technology, again, and I've been doing this for a minute, and this has been the consistent conversation that I've had with dealers for years, is that they want something that's more geographically specific. feasibility-wise, we couldn't do it. It's just too expensive. But now they're automatically, they're dynamically generated.

Nicole Wakelin (2:06:17)
95.

So with all these marketing efforts that you're making and trying to bring the brand back to sort of visibility for people, what would you hope if someone saw one of your ads anywhere? What would you hope that their thought is when they see that? What do want them to think about Nissan? When you see that ad, Nissan is.

Allyson Witherspoon (2:06:41)
I want

them to think Nissan has some great cars and I want to start looking into them.

Nicole Wakelin (2:06:49)
Thank you so much.

Allyson Witherspoon (2:06:50)
Thank you.