Sam Abuelsamid (00:01)
This is episode 451 of Wheel Bearings. I am Sam Abuelsamid from Telemetry.

Nicole Wakelin (00:08)
I am Nicole Wakelin from Test Miles and Top Speed.

Roberto Baldwin (00:11)
And I am Roberto Baldwin from SAE International.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:14)
And last week we missed Nicole. So where were you?

Nicole Wakelin (00:21)
I was in New Orleans. I learned not to say New Orleans like a loser. It's New Orleans, I guess. This is close as I'm going to get from offending you and you're from there, sorry. I tried. So I was there with Acura because Acura sponsors, there's a trombone player named Trombone Shorty who is quite famous in his circles and he has a thing called the Trombone Shorty Foundation that sponsors kids who are

trying to get into music, sort of keep that sort of authentic New Orleans music experience alive, especially after Katrina, when so much of it was sort of lost. A lot of those communities were hit really hard and they help fund this foundation with transportation, back and forth performances and just general funding through the year. And they have this big thing called Shorty Fest that they do at Jazz Fest. And we get to attend that and you see Trumbo and Shorty drive up in his little Acura MDX. And then we had a day where we drove the Acura MDX.

and yeah, basically spent the weekend in New Orleans. got to see you guys, I got to see Rod Stewart. He's still playing music. He's still going. And he, you know what? He's in his eighties. He was pretty lively. He will, and then he walked by me. He was staying at my hotel, which I didn't know. And I was standing outside on the phone, chatting with someone. And I had this like, excuse me. I'm like, I'm sorry. like, my God, that was Rod Stewart.

Roberto Baldwin (01:23)
Of he is.

You should let him know. Especially if you like his body.

Sam Abuelsamid (01:30)
Ha ha.

Nicole Wakelin (01:40)
So that was kind of funny. so Jazz Fest, which was an amazing experience, but also a bunch of time to drive the MDX and to hear about what the Trombone Shorty Foundation is doing. I love it when companies do like philanthropic things like that. think it's cool. Companies give back a lot to communities and this is how one of the many ways Accurate gives back. And I ate a lot of really good food. You guys, the beignets. Have you had beignets in New Orleans?

Sam Abuelsamid (02:01)
Excellent.

I have never been to New Orleans. New Orleans.

Roberto Baldwin (02:07)
Neither have I so

Nicole Wakelin (02:10)
Have,

you've never, okay, so the beignets, they're like little raised donuts. Some people like, we have fry dough in New Hampshire that we do in the beach. It's a big piece of dough you fry it, put powdered sugar on it.

Roberto Baldwin (02:11)
thanks for nothing. Thanks for nothing Acura

Sam Abuelsamid (02:21)
Yeah,

here in Michigan they have ⁓ punch-keys. They call them punch-keys. ⁓ It's very much like that. they make them especially ⁓ like right before Carnival. ⁓ Sometimes, yeah, they can be done without cream. But it's a Polish thing. There's a big Polish community in the Detroit area.

Nicole Wakelin (02:29)
it's kind of like that, but these are, they're like that.

But punch keys, don't punch keys. Are they filled with cream though, right? Cream and jelly or no?

Yes, I know

that because I'm Polish. The beignets are a Creole thing. I'm going to say Creole, I believe. Very, right? And this is Norland's version. you go to this, the touristy place to go is the Café du Monde. So I have not been there in like 30 years. So that's exactly what I did. I wandered down to the Café du Monde, got myself a plate of beignets with so much powdered sugar on it, you look a little bit like...

Roberto Baldwin (02:49)
French?

Sam Abuelsamid (02:51)
Yeah. There's a lot of different variations on the same concept.

Roberto Baldwin (02:53)
I thought they were French.

Sam Abuelsamid (03:10)
Yeah, I saw the picture

you posted on Instagram. It looked like there was more powdered sugar than beignet there.

Nicole Wakelin (03:13)
It's.

That's exactly it. It's almost just a powdered sugar delivery system, and there is no way you can walk away without you. You're like, I got it. I have no powdered sugar. You get back to the hotel and you're like, how is there powdered sugar on my shoulder? Like it's somewhere on you and you have missed it as you're eating. It's just floating in the air and then a coffee. Exactly.

Roberto Baldwin (03:16)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (03:26)
It's just floating in the air in this place.

Roberto Baldwin (03:27)
on your s-

You're like Batman, you throw one down, there's a cloud pops up, you can disappear.

Sam Abuelsamid (03:34)
Ha

ha ha.

Nicole Wakelin (03:36)
So, yeah, so it was, I had that and then a chicory coffee, which is, I guess it's chicory root is what they put in the coffee at the Cafe du Monde. So I had some coffee and then I had more beignets for breakfast in the morning. It's funny, the morning, so they didn't have a formal breakfast and it was a very small program. They said order from the hotel. And you know the cards they leave on your bed that say, you you can order your breakfast if you put the card out by like 2 a.m. and you'll have your breakfast. Somebody had started to fill it out and change their mind.

What I didn't want with the person who had started to fill it out and change their mind wanted. So I put a giant X through it and wrote no and underlined no like three times. And then I put down what I wanted. What do you think I got?

Sam Abuelsamid (04:16)
Big plate of beignets.

Roberto Baldwin (04:16)
The other thing.

Nicole Wakelin (04:18)
everything. As he's opening up his little thing and I'm looking, I'm like, I was, I had, so I had my breakfast. I had a crawfish omelet because crawfish, cause New Orleans and beignets. I had a cappuccino. I had a latte. I had a pot of coffee. I put one person on the thing. How much coffee did you think I'd eat? I had a basket full of

Roberto Baldwin (04:20)
they just gave you everything from both your order and their order, right?

No.

Nicole Wakelin (04:41)
Like pastries, I had two orders of toast. I'm like, oh, for the love of God, it was the most expensive room service for one ever. I actually apologized to Acura. I'm like, really sorry, I really didn't order food for 12. That's just what they sent. So, but they had beignets there and they were actually, I think, at this Windsor Hotel, better than the ones at Cafe de Mont, which is sort of scandalous. It could be, but they're like always really hot. They're like hot, you'll burn your mouth if you eat them right away. Oh, they're so good.

Sam Abuelsamid (05:01)
⁓

Roberto Baldwin (05:02)
Maybe they just got them from there.

Sam Abuelsamid (05:04)
possible.

Nicole Wakelin (05:09)
And then we saw music, listened to music and got to drive the car. It's this most beautiful blue. It's the, what do they call it? Double apex blue is the Acura MDX Type S. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (05:19)
That's

the same shade of blue as the Integra I was driving a few weeks ago.

Nicole Wakelin (05:24)
⁓ It's such a pretty blue and this one what color was the inside of your Integra Sam?

Sam Abuelsamid (05:29)
I had, ⁓ what do they call it? ⁓ shoot. It was the cream color with the blue accents. I forget what they call it.

Nicole Wakelin (05:35)
Mine was red. I don't know what the...

Okay, so cream in blue, mine

was red, really red, bright red, which I actually love a red interior on any car, but the red with the blue was so bright. I think some people thought it was too much. It's not too much, it's gorgeous. And then you have red brake calipers, the Brembo brakes that say Acura on the side of it, and they're bright red. It's bright red, bright blue. It's a beautiful car. Orchid, okay. So I don't...

Sam Abuelsamid (06:02)
Orchid is what they call it. Yeah, it's an awful off

white with with blue accents.

Nicole Wakelin (06:09)
I couldn't find a name for the red on mine. I just kept finding red when I looked it up. Red interior, red trim. But it was absolutely beautiful. It was really nice to drive. And we played around, know, there's drive modes and there's seating for three, so you can actually fit three people inside of it. And it was fun driving it. We had a very brief drive. It was more focused on other stuff. It was a sort of a lifestyle event. So the car was almost secondary, which is weird for me as someone who the car is the primary reason I go anywhere.

I was like, little more about the car, but it was very fun to drive. thought it was it was a really nice car. I enjoyed driving it. It was fun to to get to tool around New Orleans and we got to drive along Lake Punch train, which is Big Lake. And we went to breakfast lunch and had someplace where they, know, New Orleans, they have pretty big drinking culture, but obviously we're not drinking at lunchtime, especially on a drive program. So they all these mocktails. Right. To make sure I was awake.

Sam Abuelsamid (07:01)
Well that's probably why they sent you a full pot of coffee. They just assume that if you're

Roberto Baldwin (07:01)
Whatever.

Sam Abuelsamid (07:05)
in New Orleans that...

Nicole Wakelin (07:06)
Well,

you know, it was really funny. they give you, you know, they give you sometimes a little pack of stuff like to like snacks or whatever. And you're in a drive. It'll be like chips and mixed nuts and a soda or something. They had a little pack in the room and the pack in the room for the four days we were there. There were like little eye things to put under your eyes. You know, if you had like your eyes are tired, there was like saline stuff to put in your eyes when your eyes were red. There was the IV stuff that you mixed, you know, the liquid IV that you mix with your water. There was like

Roberto Baldwin (07:15)
you

Nicole Wakelin (07:34)
How hungover do you expect all of us to get while we're here? So that was very much a theme. I did not need that. I did not drink like that. I had a drink, honestly, just one. So I drank both.

Roberto Baldwin (07:45)
The Acura folks,

they're good at the little goody bag when you get your room for Monterey Car Week one year. They're like, what kind of snacks do you like? And I don't really eat a lot of candy. I eat a lot of nuts and what do call it? Trail mix and yeah, stuff like that. And so that's what they had. had a bunch of that stuff. And I was like, aw.

Nicole Wakelin (07:50)
Yeah!

Nice. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, granola and stuff, yeah.

Yeah, they did

have, they had ⁓ some, they made me think of Cheetos, but they weren't Cheetos. They were like a New Orleans brand, like a regional Cheetos company. And they had this little apple pie thing that again was a regional company. They had a bunch of regional food, like little snack foods in there too, so that you could have some gum. That was helpful. Some sunscreen is super helpful because we're in the sun. was 9,000 degrees. I love New Orleans, but man.

humidity there. You walk out the door. ⁓ my gosh, it was so humid. In fact, the day I walked down, was only about a, it was a 12 minute walk from the hotel to the beignets. And I got there and I didn't change to the beignets and it was 12 minutes. And I thought, I'm just going to walk out. I put my stuff in my room, a walk out and just had like a, like a long sleeve, like light shirt on in jeans. By the time I got there, I'm dripping. You think I've been outside for like a month.

Sam Abuelsamid (08:39)
I was just gonna ask if it was real humid already.

Roberto Baldwin (08:50)
From the hotel to the beignets.

Nicole Wakelin (09:05)
And I thought, I probably should have put on a pair of shorts. I'm going to regret this decision. It was worth it for the beignets and the coffee.

Roberto Baldwin (09:12)
Yay.

Nicole Wakelin (09:13)
Yeah, so that's why I was not here last week.

Sam Abuelsamid (09:16)
So according to Acura, it's simply just red for the interior. There's no, yeah, there's no fancy. You can get the orchid. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (09:20)
That's what I kept finding, just red.

You can. I

saw one with the orchid. They had one there with that orchid. It was like a light, creamy, of tannish color. It was pretty. They had one. I did the red one.

Sam Abuelsamid (09:33)
But

but but on the MDX the orchid hat. So I guess the orchid is the the off white ⁓ and they have it with black accents in the MDX and.

Nicole Wakelin (09:42)
Yes, that was the one.

They had one car there like that. It was sort of their chase car. All of us had the red and the blue, but there was one with an orchid and the blue. It was pretty.

Sam Abuelsamid (09:49)
And yeah, in the Integra

and the ADX, it's the orchid with the blue accents.

Nicole Wakelin (09:57)
I like that better. I like the idea of having

the blue accents. I like it when they do blue accents in a car, like because they don't often, there was the day when it was like the Navy seats a million years ago, but now it's just when they do like a blue, like that dark blue accent, I think it looks pretty against like, somebody does it with a tan, like with a darker, like, not tan, like a chocolate brown. It looks really cool. Somebody has a dark, I like, I like the interior. You stare at it all the time. You only stare at the car when you walk up to it. You stare at the inside of it all the time.

Sam Abuelsamid (10:17)
Yeah.

Yeah, it's

fun. It's nice to have have a little fun, you know, just instead of just having it all black or gray monochromatic.

Nicole Wakelin (10:31)
Right?

It's kind of fun to have some kind of little little pop of color happening. I like that. I'm pro pop of color in my cars.

Sam Abuelsamid (10:42)
All right. Well, I mean, do you want to go ahead and tell us more about the MDX besides the colors? You know what the driving experience was like?

Nicole Wakelin (10:48)
Yeah, no, I'm talking about

the colors. So let me. Yes, I since I was talking about it, let me pull it up. So I wrote up a story about it and basically whether the MDX is sort of worth it, right? Because it's a it's a three row SUV. It's a luxury vehicle. ⁓ The MDX type S has a three liter turbo V6 engine, 355 horsepower, gets a 10 speed automatic. It's sporty, but it's still it's still an SUV. You know, you're not going to get something. This isn't a ⁓ super sports car.

kind of thing. But realistically, you don't generally want that in something that's a three-year-old SUV. It's hard to do because you've got three rows, so you have a lot of weight to it. And if you've got three rows, you're probably not just throwing it around the corners. You probably have your kids or your friends or your family in the car. So you want something that has a little bit of pep to it and moves, but that isn't necessarily something that's going to make your passengers hate riding along in your car. And that's what this strikes a nice balance. And there's also modes, and there is a sport mode that

lowers the suspension a little bit, tightens things up a little bit. And again, it's so subtle. Interestingly, so I was driving with a woman ⁓ who is not normally someone who rides in cars. Most of the people there were not automotive journalists. And some of them had a hard time seeing what the difference was, which isn't a bad thing or criticism about Acura. It's how subtle they are. Like you have to get used to how a car, everything sort of tightens up in sport mode. It's a feeling that if it's done really subtly, you don't notice it unless you've driven a million cars.

And it's very subtle in this, which I like. It gives you little more control, little better handling, little more sporty without going overboard, which I like. I also really like the interior. It's incredibly roomy. It's very comfortable. And the tight baskets, all sorts of stuff. There's a bangle, some sound system. There's a hands-free power liftgate. You've got a 12.3-inch touchscreen, a digital instrument cluster. It has a lot in it. And when you look at how much it's

I just lost the price as I was scrolling through my own story. I just lost it free. It's actually it's priced really well. The starting price for the MDX at this with the type S is up there with just the starting price straight up for things like the GV80 and the BMW X5 is even more expensive. I think it's maybe like two or $3,000 less than the base GV80 just to give some context. And you're getting a really...

Roberto Baldwin (12:48)
no! Free!

Nicole Wakelin (13:12)
You're getting a great vehicle and I, you know, it was fun to drive. It's very quiet. I think a luxury SUV should always be quiet. It should make the bumps and dips in the road feel like they don't exist, which this did a great job of. We had some construction zones that we went through that were really crummy pavement and you knew you were in a construction zone, but it wasn't anything that rattled the car or made it vibrate. It was the kind of thing if somebody had been asleep in the passenger seat, they could stay asleep. I say that because

the woman I was driving with dozed off for a little bit and she stayed asleep through the construction zone. So there's your proof. it was, yeah, see? So she, she was my, in my case, she was my proof right there. So she dozed off my base level. She was asleep. I was driving over a bump. She didn't even move. So, so I overall, I like this. I think the Acurum Dix is a good car. And, and the thing is it's been like, I forget the exact like rating, but like one of the bestselling luxury three row SUV for like,

Roberto Baldwin (13:46)
There you go, she's a heavy sleeper.

Sam Abuelsamid (13:49)
evidence.

Roberto Baldwin (13:51)
my bass level.

Nicole Wakelin (14:11)
pretty much since it was introduced. So it does phenomenally well for its little segment that it's carved out there. ⁓ And Acura has been in the US for 40 years now, 40, four, zero. It's a 40th anniversary.

Roberto Baldwin (14:24)
40 years.

Sam Abuelsamid (14:26)
I mean,

that's its entire history as a brand, because it started off just as a brand just for North America. And it's still primarily a North American brand. Acura doesn't really exist outside of Canada and the US and maybe Mexico.

Nicole Wakelin (14:30)
Yep.

Right.

Yep. But 40 years. It's funny, some part of me still thinks of Acura as like that new brand. I know, but it's been 40 years. But I remember when it was introduced. Yeah, it is. So it's the, what does that make it? The old school one of that lot? Longer than Lexus, longer than Infinity. When did Lexus and Infinity come around? Now I've asked a question nobody knows.

Sam Abuelsamid (14:51)
It's longer than Lexus in infinity.

Yeah. They came

Roberto Baldwin (15:06)
90s

Sam Abuelsamid (15:08)
out as 1990 models in the late 89. So they were introduced.

Roberto Baldwin (15:10)
Yeah. Infinity

Nicole Wakelin (15:11)
Okay.

Roberto Baldwin (15:13)
had that weird ad that didn't show the car and it was a big deal.

Sam Abuelsamid (15:15)
Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (15:17)
Gosh, I don't even remember that. I remember when Lexus, yeah, it says 1989, says, yep, 89 for, were they both introduced at the same time? No, were they, really? Wow.

Sam Abuelsamid (15:21)
They were introduced at the 89 Detroit Auto Show.

Yeah, same shame same show. Yeah, they were

they were announced around the same time. Both brands launched at the same time with pretty similar. I mean, they both both of those brands launched ⁓ with two models, two sedans. ⁓ Lexus had the LS and the E.S. The LS was unique to Lexus. The E.S. was basically a rebodied ⁓ Camry.

And then for Infiniti, they had the Q45, which was their big luxury sedan, again, unique to the Infiniti brand. And they had the J20, which was a rebodied Altima. But actually, it wasn't even called Altima yet at the time. So it was a compact front wheel drive sedan. was before they, I forget what the Nissan sedan of that era was called, but it was before they changed the name to Altima.

Nicole Wakelin (15:57)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (16:27)
And so they're very similar. then the two brands kind of sort of diverged a little bit over the next 35, 40 years.

Nicole Wakelin (16:36)
So really, so Acura beat them by not very much. Four or five years, like four years basically, because that would have been 86 for Acura and 89 for these guys. But hey, that was four years. That was a little time, they were first. They did it first. So yeah, so that was my time in the MDX. I really liked it. I liked it quite a bit. I think the pricing is good. I think what you get is good. I think the style, the comfort.

Sam Abuelsamid (16:40)
Yeah. Yeah, three, four years.

How much was the Type S?

Nicole Wakelin (17:04)
Believe the type S is 55. Let me pull it back up somehow. I do not have that in front of me. And I think it starts at like 55 and change for the type S. overall that it starts at.

51 that's the base and that actually has a smaller mod a smaller What am I trying to say a smaller engine as well actually it starts at? 75 oh that's this type s advance is that different mine just what's It's really good at math so yeah, the a spec is 68 the type s advance is 75 850

Roberto Baldwin (17:36)
Well, it's advanced. It's like type S, but it's really good at math. Or it's in the higher reading group.

Sam Abuelsamid (17:47)
Advanced for accurate usually means you get some, package of extra features like, you know, heads up displays or, you know, some of the more advanced ADAS functions, things like that.

Nicole Wakelin (17:50)
Extra. Yeah.

Right. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. So overall, so I like it. I'm a fan of the MDX. I think it's pretty good. So.

Sam Abuelsamid (18:06)
Would you take one over a GV80?

Nicole Wakelin (18:12)
I take one over a GV. You know, it's tempting. OK, so the one thing that Acura has that GV, the Genesis doesn't, is that longevity. It's been around a while. They have a really solid reputation. mean, Hyundai has a great reputation, not knocking Hyundai or Genesis. But I think that Genesis is probably fancier inside, maybe. But I mean, the Acura is a little bit more. It's definitely a sportier ride, a little bit of a different focus, even the styling. Genesis goes more, I just want to coddle you in luxury.

And accuracy is I want to do that, but I also want you to feel a little bit sporty and fancy. So it's a different vibe. I'd consider it against the GV80. How's that? Okay, I would consider it. I would consider it. Absolutely.

Sam Abuelsamid (18:50)
Yeah. OK. All right.

Roberto Baldwin (18:51)
⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (18:58)
So what else you've been driving?

Nicole Wakelin (19:00)
So I also drove, I have lots of stuff. Am gonna talk about all my cars now? ⁓ It's gonna be, yeah, it's just gonna, okay. So the MDX was the drive program. Then I had two vehicles. I had last weekend, then this week's. Last week, I had, and I have the wrong one pulled out. Let me bring this one first. I had the Dodge Charger RT, which is the most base version of the Charger that you can get.

Sam Abuelsamid (19:04)
That's gonna be just like John last week where he came in, had like six cars to talk about.

Roberto Baldwin (19:08)
7000 hours.

Nicole Wakelin (19:26)
I didn't even have the scat pack or anything. Nope, this is just the six pack just as it comes four doors. It's a twin turbo inline six, 420 horsepower, 460 pound feet of torque. It has all wheel drive, but you can put it in real wheel drive as a little button if you want to have a little funsies. 4.6 seconds, zero to 60, two door four door. got the had the four door. I absolutely love this. Excuse me. I really like this car. I I've

been a fan in the new charger since they introduced it. And here is the interesting thing driving this. So I've driven the Daytona, I've driven the Scat Pack, I've driven the RT before I drove, you know, we've all driven Hellcats when they still had Hellcat chargers out there. I had a Hellcat Durango a few weeks back. ⁓ Although I love me a Hellcat, I really like the RT. I kind of feel like it is the sweet spot to get because it's more affordable.

Even when you get the scap hack, you're getting power you can't really use. There's not a lot, it delivers that power fast and it delivers that, where are you gonna go? Exactly, Robbie, where are you gonna go? ⁓

Roberto Baldwin (20:31)
Where are you gonna go? You gotta find a road out in middle of nowhere with no one around. And it's straight line,

Sam Abuelsamid (20:38)
I mean,

Roberto Baldwin (20:39)
cause you got any corners, that's it, you're dead.

Sam Abuelsamid (20:40)
yeah, unless you live in Montana or Wyoming or the Dakotas.

Nicole Wakelin (20:41)
Right?

If you live in Montana, why?

Yeah, because there's no speed limit roads there, right? Aren't there second sections of road that are no, I think.

Roberto Baldwin (20:46)
desert.

Sam Abuelsamid (20:48)
There are some where, yeah, it's,

you know, think whatever is safe and whatever. I can't remember the exact wording they use, but yeah, there are some highways where.

Nicole Wakelin (21:00)
Well, there's spaces. So

Roberto Baldwin (21:01)
something

Nicole Wakelin (21:01)
if you're

Roberto Baldwin (21:01)
made up.

Nicole Wakelin (21:01)
Montana, go get yourself a Hellcat. But if not, I really do think the RT is the right spot because you can. It has a it has a beautiful interior. It has plenty of powers. It has all the vibe that like it feels like a muscle car. It's not delicate. It's not fancy. It's in your face, loud and rough. sounds fantastic when you start up the engine. It looks the part of a muscle car. It's very aggressive looking. There's like not a refined bone in this car's body. And I say that with absolute love.

That's what you want. You don't want refinement in a muscle car go buy yourself an Acre if you want that in this you want to get something that is sort of in your face and it is in fact my neighbor who sees all the cars that come in and out of my driveway and I think two maybe three times and all the time I've been doing this she said can you please take me for a ride in that car and we go get ice cream just what we do she's like my god I wasn't even home when it was delivered she said my god have you seen what's in your driveway my god have you seen it have you seen it have you I said I I haven't seen it but I know it's coming

because I had to sign the loan form early. Can we please go get ice cream? Yes, we can get ice cream. And just her pushing the start button, she's absolutely giddy. That's what the charger does. That absolutely giddy moment where you hear it and it sounds amazing and you're sitting there and you push the little button and it revs up and it sounds fantastic right under your butt. You can feel the thing start up. That's what makes this car so much fun.

And I really like the RT. I thought about it. Would I get, would I want the more power? Your head wants to say yes all the power all the time, but you're not going to use it all. And it's almost a tiny bit frustrating to have the extra power because you have to play it easy. You can't mash the pedal. Cause if you mash the pedal, you were really going for about two feet. And then you have to hit the brakes because you have gone too far, too fast. So you, you, in a way you don't get to enjoy all that power.

90 % of the time you can enjoy it. But if you have this and you mash the gas, you can mash it and it's still super responsive, but you get to enjoy that feeling of being pressed back in your seat and just feeling like you're flying for a little bit longer because you're not going quite so fast, so fast. And you're not going to break the law immediately and lose your license. So I am, I'm a big fan of the RT. I really thoroughly enjoyed driving it for the week. It was, I thought, no, you know what? I like this. I like it. In a straight line.

very fast.

Sam Abuelsamid (23:29)
All right.

Roberto Baldwin (23:30)
I gotta let my cat out.

Nicole Wakelin (23:32)
Your cat is having a conniption, I can hear your cat. What did you...

Sam Abuelsamid (23:32)
Ha

Roberto Baldwin (23:34)
People in the chat

are like, hey, we can hear your cat.

Nicole Wakelin (23:37)
Hehehehehe

Roberto Baldwin (23:39)
He came in all gangbusters. Let's hang out. Now he's like, he's bappin' at the dogs, cause he's frustrated cause they won't let him out. I don't let my cat out. Keep talkin'.

Nicole Wakelin (23:46)
Go let your cat out. Go let your cat out and I'll keep talking.

So that's my feelings on the charger. like it. Do you like the charger, Sam?

Sam Abuelsamid (23:54)
⁓ I am I haven't driven the internal combustion one yet. I've driven the Daytona a couple times. I've got one coming ⁓ in a few weeks. I think in about three or four weeks I've got one scheduled. Let's see next week's Sentra. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (23:59)
you haven't? Okay.

Okay, do you know which one?

Sam Abuelsamid (24:16)
calendar here yet. ⁓ I think it's a scat pack, but I'm not 100 % certain.

Nicole Wakelin (24:17)
So it's a mystery charger arriving at a mystery time.

And someone is asking in the chat, and I'm gonna tell them right here, no, it's the hurricane. There's no V8 charger right now, at this time, at this moment. Could it come, maybe? Maybe? I mean, they can't comment on future product, but yeah, no. So you can't even get that. You can get...

Sam Abuelsamid (24:30)
Yeah, there's no V8 chargers at this time.

Yeah, it's gonna come.

Yeah, well, I mean we can comment all

we want because we're not the ones creating it we

Nicole Wakelin (24:47)
We can comment, ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (25:14)
⁓ So yeah, yeah, I have a

Roberto Baldwin (25:16)
⁓ all my visual

Nicole Wakelin (25:17)
That's.

Roberto Baldwin (25:17)
gags finally work for the for the podcast. So we got that going for us because we got the.

Sam Abuelsamid (25:20)
I have a four door

Nicole Wakelin (25:20)
There you go. So.

Sam Abuelsamid (25:22)
scat

pack coming on May 28th ⁓ in Blutacris, which I assume is their shade of blue on that thing.

Roberto Baldwin (25:27)
Blutacris?

Nicole Wakelin (25:28)
I love the color.

Blutacris

Roberto Baldwin (25:31)
This

ludicrous

Nicole Wakelin (25:31)
is probably the bright blue because there's a Blutacris. I think the Blutacris is that really bright blue. I had like a dark blue that almost looked black and it's not available on every trim. It's sort of like a midnight pearl eyes. Yeah, one of those when you look at it in one light it looks black, then it's slightly purple and then it's navy. But it is I think technically a really, really dark blue.

Sam Abuelsamid (25:45)
That's what I had when I had the Daytona last summer.

Roberto Baldwin (25:56)
All it plays is

ludicrous songs though, That's your, yeah, it's your cross to bear.

Nicole Wakelin (26:00)
Ha

So that was my time in the charger, which I love.

Sam Abuelsamid (26:09)
Yeah, the blutacris looks like it's kind of similar to the double apex blue on the Acura.

Nicole Wakelin (26:17)
Yeah, it does. think it's brighter. I think that the Acura is a little bit more pearlized, kind of a little bit darker.

Sam Abuelsamid (26:21)
Yeah, little dark. Yeah.

So yeah, so I will have that, I'll have that in about a month or about three weeks, three and a half weeks. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (26:31)
Well, about three weeks.

It's lovely. I love it. We'll have to see what you think. We'll have to see if you like it as much as I do, but I really genuinely, I like it a

Sam Abuelsamid (26:40)
You know, mean,

I actually, you I was like, apparently one of like the two or three people that actually liked the charger Daytona. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (26:49)
Dislike the charger Daytona. just, if you had, we'll see, you haven't driven the six pack yet. I wouldn't know you had to pick between the two once you've driven both, which you would pick Sam, but you can't answer that yet.

Sam Abuelsamid (26:59)
I mean,

I've driven the six pack in both the Wagoneer or the Hurricane in the Wagoneer and in the Ram. And I love that engine. It's a great engine. You know, it's obviously not as raucous as a Hemi in terms of the way it sounds.

Nicole Wakelin (27:14)
raucous.

That's a great word to describe the hemi raucous.

Sam Abuelsamid (27:17)
Yeah, well, mean any V8, you know, and this is this is the this is the main reason why they bought brought the ⁓ the Hemi back to the RAM because the hurricane is a better engine in every respect than the Hemi. It's more powerful. It's more efficient. It's smoother. ⁓ And it costs less to buy. And yet people want the Hemi just because of the way it sounds. It's got that raucous sound to it and.

Nicole Wakelin (27:19)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (27:46)
I think I'm pretty sure the same is going to be true as soon as they can engineer that into the charger. They almost certainly will.

And in fact, you know, they did show, where was it? I can't remember if it was at SEMA or during the Woodward Dream Cruise last year. They showed a charger, but a drag racing charger, you know, with a Hellcat in it. So clearly the engine can fit. You know, this was one that this was a concept that was just done, you know, as a drag race car, not as a not as a street car, but strictly as strictly as a track car.

Roberto Baldwin (27:56)
Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (28:15)
There you go.

We can squish it in there.

Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (28:27)
And

so they can fit it in there. I mean, this is a big car. It's like three, four inches wide. I think it's like three inches wider than the old wide body charger. So you can definitely fit a V8 in there. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (28:38)
Yes, so it's big.

yeah, it's big.

Which is also kind of cool for the cargo. It's also a hatchback now too, talking about it being big. It looks like it should have a trunk, but it is a hatchback on that thing. So you can fit a surprising amount of stuff into your charger, despite it being a sedan, which I also like. So.

Sam Abuelsamid (29:01)
Yeah, you can go buy a

really stupidly large TV at Costco and slide it right into the back of this thing.

Nicole Wakelin (29:05)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Slide

it right into the back. Yeah. I guess so it was talking about putting this carrying stuff. I couldn't get my phone out fast enough. I was behind a pickup truck this morning and he clearly had done a mulch run because there was all this bark mulch sort of coming out the edge of the tailgate. And it's like, look, he's doing the right thing with his truck. And I almost took a picture to send you guys and I wasn't fast enough before he turned. Nothing else on the charger.

Roberto Baldwin (29:09)
Bam.

Sam Abuelsamid (29:30)
All right, anything else on the charger? Shall

we take our guesses at the destination charge?

Roberto Baldwin (29:37)
Oof, 18.

Nicole Wakelin (29:39)
gosh, I just shut it. Shut the window to go to the other one. Dang it. Wait. no. I have like all these windows open when I'm talking and if I close one, everything's, it's all off.

Roberto Baldwin (29:47)
Talking.

Sam Abuelsamid (29:50)
I

feel like this is one of the ones that Dodge has cranked up the destination to like $2,000.

Nicole Wakelin (29:55)
I think it has, wait, let's see. What did you guess? I'll look it up. You guessed 18 and you said 2000. Okay, gonna, gonna, we're gonna build it and we're gonna go to very end and say summary and it says, it doesn't say. Wait, there we go. 1995 is the actual destination for the one I had for the Charger RT four four door.

Roberto Baldwin (29:57)
I was trying to be nice.

18

Sam Abuelsamid (30:02)
I said 2000.

Roberto Baldwin (30:15)
Yeah, it's free!

Sam Abuelsamid (30:18)
There we go.

Roberto Baldwin (30:22)
night

I lost

Nicole Wakelin (30:24)
You lost, sorry Robbie. You were too focused on the cat.

Roberto Baldwin (30:26)
Okay, I Was it was just I turned

around and the dog is just laying down He's peeing he's not bothering the cat the cat just goes up and just starts popping them on that on the head And then he's like and then he's mad because I won't let him out so he's like pop pop pop pop the dogs Like what the hell man?

Nicole Wakelin (30:37)
Aww.

Somebody get this guy out of my face.

So that's that's the charger.

Sam Abuelsamid (30:45)
It's funny.

Okay. Before we leave the charger, ⁓ you know, when I was looking up when I'm getting this thing, ⁓ you know, one of the fleet companies that handles Stellantis, ⁓ you know, in the, in the schedule, you know, and I click on it, you know, it shows me the VIN number and, know, which vehicle, what color it is. And eventually it has the Monrone in there as well. but it has a field in here for battery capacity and it says 0.00 kilowatt hours. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (30:49)
Yes.

Roberto Baldwin (31:13)
Not lot.

Nicole Wakelin (31:14)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (31:17)
But it's got a hurricane, a high-open hurricane, so that's okay.

Nicole Wakelin (31:21)
You can forgive a lot for the high output one. I didn't have the high output, so.

Sam Abuelsamid (31:25)
Yeah, that's that's like 550 and what 420 with the

Nicole Wakelin (31:29)
I

think 550, I have 550 in my head for the post but I don't remember the torque on that one. So it's a big difference. Yeah, so it's a big difference. Yeah, it's a big difference. But I still don't know, I don't hate on it, I just think the sweet spot for what you get for your money is actually the RT and just get the RT, what do call it, RT plus or whatever, if you want fancy inside, you can still make it, get the extra stuff and it's got like ambient lighting and the interior is very cool. I like the interiors of the new chargers, so.

Sam Abuelsamid (31:32)
Well, the high output is 550. That's the scat pack. Yeah.

The ambient

lighting is actually pretty cool, especially at night on those textured door panels. You get that grid pattern.

Nicole Wakelin (32:00)
Yeah, because yeah, the door panel,

like they're very textured, it's not a little bit like the entire door panel above the armrest is textured, like you can run your fingers across it, it's got some real texture to it, and at night, the way the light shines up into it, all that texture gets sort of highlighted neatly, so instead of just being a light, it's got some character to it. It's a really beautifully designed car.

Sam Abuelsamid (32:22)
Okay. So what was the other car you had?

Nicole Wakelin (32:24)
So

the other car, now we're up to date. This one's still in my driveway. I have the 2026 Kia Sportage Ex Pro Prestige All-Wheel Drive. That's a long title. So of the Sportage trims you can get, this sits at the top. Its base price on this is $36,690. It's the off-road focus trim. The Ex Pro always means more off-road for Kia.

So how off road depends what you think off road means. Can you take it off road? Yes, you can. You know, you can go in the dirt. How far it's it's, you know, and it has modes. has a snow, a mud, a sand. So it has some drive modes to help get you out of stuff. It is an off road. You can take it off road, but it's not rock crawling off road. It's not heavy duty off road. I feel like this is the offer that most people actually do.

Roberto Baldwin (32:58)
you

Sam Abuelsamid (33:01)
How far can you go off-road?

Nicole Wakelin (33:22)
You just have a dirt road that you're taking to a cabin or to a spot where you're putting your kayak in the river or because you just like it's a small little off road dirt road, not really off road per se, but it's a dirt road that you just, you know, when it gets muddy or rutted in the snow in the winter or in the, you know, rainstorms, it'll get you through it. So it's nice to have for the capability. And I, and I don't want to say that it's not off road worthy, but it's not hardcore off road. It's kind of light off road.

Is that fair, I think, guys, to say? So I like it. It's good. It's a little underpowered. It has a 2.5 liter four cylinder engine. It's an eight speed automatic. And it has 187 horsepower. It's not a lot of horses. That's a small number of horses. Exactly, that's the thing. Well, how hard was it for me? Hey, we're gonna give you a charger. Next week, we're gonna give you a Sportage. Come on, guys.

Roberto Baldwin (34:12)
It's a key of sportage though.

Sam Abuelsamid (34:14)
Ha

Nicole Wakelin (34:21)
So, but I think most of the time it was okay. The only time they really had a criticism of it is when you're on the highway and you're at speed already. So if you really need to get up to speed initially, it is pretty good at accelerating to get up to speed on an on-ramp. And it gets you up to speed and plenty of time to merge with traffic. But if you're in sort of heavy traffic and you need a extra burst of speed to get by somebody because you're about to miss your exit or whatever, then it is a little bit annoying. It takes a second.

Roberto Baldwin (34:49)
That's when you

go for the break. You gotta make a decision and the decisions probably break. Go behind that person.

Nicole Wakelin (34:51)
Yeah, so the decision is not speed up. The decision

is slow down and go behind the other guy. If you're right next to him, slow down is the answer. So, and that was the only time I was driving in a lot of very heavy traffic back and forth to Boston this week. I was there like two times, three times. And I noticed during that heavy rush hour traffic, it was a little bit frustrating because you have to be, especially in Boston, very, very aggressive.

You can't be polite and you can't be super aggressive in this. You can't speed up to get in. And when you slow down, the guy behind you is honking at you. It's just a thing. So that was really the only time, everyday driving, driving around town, driving on the high, just cruising on the highway, it's totally fine. It's just when you need that little extra oomph, it doesn't have the extra oomph. So that would be my main criticism. Otherwise, I like it. It has a 12.3 inch instrument cluster and infotainment screen. It's got wireless.

CarPlay and Android Auto. has a nice spot for the charging and it sort of locks it in. It's slightly raised where you're charging, where the charging pad is. So it kind of locks it in so you don't have to worry about it sliding around, which I really like. What else? You can get this, the base version of this. If you go all the way down to the bottom of the gas models, it's 28,790. This is 39,690. So it's a pretty big price swing and the features get better. You can...

If you don't want the off-road, if you don't need it as fancy, I mean, you can go like in the middle and the X-Line is gonna be 33,000. So you have a pretty good range of pricing on this. Even at 39, Key does a great job with her pricing. It's always, you look at what you have in the car and you look at what it says in the sticker and you think, yep, this matches. You don't feel like you're paying too much. You get a lot of features for that price. Even as you move up.

through the trim levels, you still look at it and think, yeah, okay, this one costs more, but I'm getting these extra things with it. So I liked it, very nice to drive. Handled really well, was good on our potholed roads that we have right now, and pretty quiet. I drove through a torrential thunderstorm, rainstorm, like raining cats and dogs moment. The world was gonna come to an end, and inside the cabin is really quiet. Like, hey, you know what? It's chaos out there. I see the lightning. I can hear the rain hitting the car, and yet,

Sam Abuelsamid (36:53)
You

Nicole Wakelin (37:03)
It was still relatively quiet, which is nice. In a car that's just a Scotiabank under $40,000 to still have it keep that quiet and serenity and calmness when outside the world is raging by you is really kind of nice. So overall, I liked the Kia Sportage. I think it's a decent little car if you're looking for an affordable SUV. But remember, this is not especially powerful. If performance and really crazy powerful

is important to you, you're going to be a little bit disappointed. So make sure you drive it and experience that before you do it.

Roberto Baldwin (37:38)
So here's a crazy thing that Kia told us on the dry program for this. Over 50 % of the sales are the top prestige ⁓ trim.

Nicole Wakelin (37:42)
Yes?

I bet because it's cheap in the grand scheme, 39,690, what you get for the, I mean, it is a pretty, can't read this really tiny list that they gave me. But I mean, you've got the infotainment screens, the know, digital instrument cluster, big infotainment screen. You've got the drive modes on this, it can tow 2,500 pounds. You've got, you know, wireless Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. This had heated seats.

Roberto Baldwin (38:09)
some motorcycles.

Nicole Wakelin (38:15)
a heated steering wheel, because I used them because it was freezing, because you it's only May. ⁓ It feels more premium than you would think for, especially, but the top trim in Kia's do this. Feels more premium than you'd expect in a Kia for a price that's less you'd expect for what you get. So I can see if you were kind of hemming and hawing, well, let's just go ahead and get the top trim. You know? Yeah. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (38:38)
Let's go for it.

Sam Abuelsamid (38:41)
Yeah, I

mean you can manage it, if you can spring for a few thousand dollars more or monthly payment, probably, I don't know, maybe 50, 75 dollars a month more for a loan payment, you're getting, compared to most of the competition in the segment, you're getting quite a bit for, it's a good value.

Nicole Wakelin (38:46)
Right?

Right?

Roberto Baldwin (38:56)
Treat yourself.

Nicole Wakelin (38:57)
Treat yourself.

It is.

Sam Abuelsamid (39:10)
Hyundai and Kia don't like us to talk about value anymore. They don't want to be considered the value brand, but the reality is even though the price gap is closer now than it used to be, they're still generally a very good value.

Nicole Wakelin (39:27)
think that, I never heard them say that. They don't want to be thought of as, but they are the value brand and that's a good thing. They're not the, because there's a difference, there's a difference between being the value brand and being the cheap brand. Those are two different things. Like cheap.

Roberto Baldwin (39:33)
You get a lot for your money.

Sam Abuelsamid (39:33)
Yeah. Well, especially today.

I think that's the

Roberto Baldwin (39:40)
Yeah, I think.

Sam Abuelsamid (39:42)
distinction they want to stay away from. And think a lot of people, they hear value, they still think cheap.

Nicole Wakelin (39:48)
Yeah, and that's not what any of us mean when we say value cheap is like, right. Got a lot of pizza for that money. It's it's that it's a value. It's not that it's cheap and that you're just buying the cheapest thing you can buy that's garbage and it doesn't. Seven, eight, but no, so the this doesn't feel like you've gone for the bottom of the barrel. This doesn't mean cheap doesn't mean that it's got terrible interiors and it's loud and it's clunky and it has no features and it's just awful to drive.

Roberto Baldwin (39:51)
Like Little Caesars, you get a lot of pizza for little money.

Sam Abuelsamid (39:58)
Yeah, but they're not five bucks anymore, are they?

Roberto Baldwin (40:02)
Seven to eight bucks, eight bucks.

Nicole Wakelin (40:17)
That's cheap. Value means that you're paying what you're getting is surprising for the amount of money that you're paying compared to the other guys. And it's a value. That's what Kia and Hyundai both do. They are truly value brands. You will get more with those two brands for the same dollar than you will in just about anybody else. value is a good thing. When someone says a car is a value or a brand is a value brand, that's a good thing. That means we're saying go buy it. It's good, especially if you have a limited budget. It's good.

Roberto Baldwin (40:41)
Yeah.

You're gonna get

a lot more for your money than you would from everyone else. And it feels far more premium even. And a lot more isn't like, you get more features, it just feels more premium. You do get a lot more features, but it does feel premium for what it is.

Nicole Wakelin (40:47)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, mm.

Exactly.

It feels, and part of it is that the

feeling premium, Robbie, like you said, it's not, I can rattle off these 10 features that it has. It's just you sit down in the car and you feel like this is a nice car. I don't mind sitting here. This is comfortable. It's okay. It feels good. You sit down in a really cheap car. And again, it's not the features. It's the minute you sit down, you're like, oh, it's something that's hard to quantify, but cheap and value are not the same thing. Value is a good thing. Cheap, not so much.

Roberto Baldwin (41:09)
Yeah.

Not so much.

Nicole Wakelin (41:26)
Not so much.

Sam Abuelsamid (41:29)
⁓ Did we do destination charges? No, we didn't.

Nicole Wakelin (41:34)
Did I wait? Let's see. I thought I did. Wait, let's see. Doodly, doodly. Robbie cheated.

Roberto Baldwin (41:35)
I've already seen it. Sorry cuz I was looking up my my write-up

I'm sorry. Well, it's because we write it when we write it up We put the destination charge right there next to the price. So it's it's literally like the second graph of my article. ⁓ So this is station fee in May was 1445

Sam Abuelsamid (41:40)
You

Nicole Wakelin (41:48)
What is your article, what do you have it as? I'm curious because they're not always.

Okay, my Monroni says 13.95. Oh, so it went down. Unless this was printed six months ago, right? So this could actually, probably yours is right and mine is wrong, because this is probably an older, oh.

Roberto Baldwin (41:57)
⁓ so it went down.

Sam Abuelsamid (42:00)
That's shocking.

It probably was.

Roberto Baldwin (42:09)
it's for March. Actually, not May, sorry.

It's another month with an in it. ⁓ Yeah, Smarch.

Nicole Wakelin (42:16)
Smarch. No, $13.95 on mine, so.

Sam Abuelsamid (42:18)
Well,

let's see what it actually is as of right now. It is currently ⁓ the 3rd of May, 2026.

Nicole Wakelin (42:21)
Let's see what is the website. What does it say currently?

Roberto Baldwin (42:23)
Now we're...

Nicole Wakelin (42:30)
At 12.20.

Sam Abuelsamid (42:33)
Let's see, build your key here. Let's see.

Nicole Wakelin (42:36)
wonder if it's gone

up or gone down.

Sam Abuelsamid (42:39)
Bortage. Build yours.

Roberto Baldwin (42:41)
portas

Nicole Wakelin (42:43)
Let's partage.

Sam Abuelsamid (42:45)
Yes, put in my zip code. A zip code. Let's see. Summary. As of May 3rd, 2026, the destination charge is now $14.95. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (42:53)
Whee!

Nicole Wakelin (42:58)
So went up. So mine's

Roberto Baldwin (42:59)
⁓ fifty

Nicole Wakelin (42:59)
old

Roberto Baldwin (43:00)
dollars.

Nicole Wakelin (43:00)
with the hundred. The hundred dollars last. Sorry guys. 14.95, not 13.95.

Roberto Baldwin (43:05)
Yep.

50 bucks is more.

Nicole Wakelin (43:09)
That's so interesting,

you since we've been playing this sort of game with the destination charges, how much of the time I'm holding a memoroni that says one thing, Robbie drove it and it says another, and Sam drove it and it says something, like these change a lot. I didn't think they always changed as often as they do now.

Roberto Baldwin (43:25)
Well, the gas did go through the roof, so I can understand 50 bucks.

Nicole Wakelin (43:28)
Hmm.

Yeah, maybe. But it just...

Sam Abuelsamid (43:30)
Yeah. speaking of

Roberto Baldwin (43:32)
That's like the one

time, that's the one time I'm like, all right, it's 50 bucks, gas is now like, I don't know what, 80, $90 a gallon now.

Sam Abuelsamid (43:33)
which.

Nicole Wakelin (43:37)
⁓ $1,000. Yeah, yeah,

yeah, about that much.

Sam Abuelsamid (43:39)
Well, here

around me in southeast Michigan, ⁓ it went over 4.80 a gallon this week. So, yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (43:47)
That's like regular from here.

Nicole Wakelin (43:48)
I know you guys in California have crazy gas prices. I don't even know what ours is. I haven't looked

Roberto Baldwin (43:52)
We do. But then our roads aren't

like pothole death traps either, so we got that going for it.

Nicole Wakelin (43:56)
Well, because you don't have

snow. That's not about what we spend. That's about the fact that you don't have snow and ice and salt. But snow and ice and salt and what else? And snow.

Roberto Baldwin (44:00)
We have a lot of roads and they're always working on them.

We have snow? Like half the state

is a mountain. I grew up in snow. ⁓ California is a very large state. We got a lot of going on.

Nicole Wakelin (44:10)
You did, that's true, but every last square inch of, that's true.

Sam Abuelsamid (44:17)
Yeah, mean, we always have construction here too. ⁓ In fact, the old joke around here is we only have two seasons, winter and construction. ⁓ But despite the fact that they perpetually seem to be working on the roads, they're always in terrible shape. So I don't know how that works out.

Nicole Wakelin (44:27)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (44:34)
Yeah, don't know.

Yeah, whenever I drive around there, I'm like, you know what? Paying a little bit more for gas ain't so bad. Driving around in my BRZ on nice roads.

Nicole Wakelin (44:41)
hahahaha

Sam Abuelsamid (44:42)
Well, I'm just glad that...

I'm just glad our next operation photo trip is going to be with all EVs coming up in June. No, it's coming up in ⁓ just over a month. ⁓ Yeah, we roll out of Omaha on June 7th.

Nicole Wakelin (44:51)
And it's in the summer, right? When is it? It's coming up in May, correct?

wow, it's really close, wow.

Roberto Baldwin (44:56)
I don't know, I bought tickets.

is that where

we're leaving? I don't even know where we're leaving. I just know where I'm supposed to go.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:05)
Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (45:05)
I love it.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:06)
Well,

Nicole Wakelin (45:06)
Robbie's like, I don't know, I got a plane ticket. I'm gonna show up.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:06)
I'm actually driving from here. I leave here on the 5th because I have to drive the Escalade IQ from here to Omaha. ⁓ So I'll be leaving here on the 5th of June. So.

Roberto Baldwin (45:21)
I'll

see you on the 6th, because that's where I fly into Omaha. And then I drive to Salt Lake City, and then I leave late the night we get there in Salt Lake City, just because, But my work gives me time off for volunteer work.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:34)
excellent. My old job did. ⁓ But my current job, I don't officially have time off for that, Craig is pretty cool about that kind of stuff. absolutely. We're going to be moving a whole bunch of dogs from the Midwest up to the Pacific Northwest ⁓ with a fleet of EVs.

Nicole Wakelin (45:35)
This counts, that's kinda cool.

Roberto Baldwin (45:37)
Yeah, well that counts because I said so. ⁓

They're fine. They're fine with it.

Nicole Wakelin (45:50)
He's, yeah, it's a good cause. It's not like you're just going on vacation.

Roberto Baldwin (45:54)
Stealing dogs.

meh meh. Poop poop.

Sam Abuelsamid (46:05)
All right. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (46:05)
Do know how many dogs you're

taking yet?

Sam Abuelsamid (46:08)
Right now it looks like it's going to be about 12 or 13 dogs. Yeah. We've got four vehicles and we'll be moving about 12 or 13. Might go up by one or two depending between now and then depending if they get some puppies or something.

Roberto Baldwin (46:10)
That's a lot of dogs.

Nicole Wakelin (46:11)
Wow.

Sam Abuelsamid (46:27)
⁓ So yeah, we have to have to take turns. Dogs get tired when from driving.

Roberto Baldwin (46:28)
The dogs only get to drive an hour each though.

Nicole Wakelin (46:31)
They gotta take turns, you can't overwhelm them.

Roberto Baldwin (46:33)
Yeah, they

only have they only have learners permits. So, you know

Sam Abuelsamid (46:36)
Yeah. And you know, we

have to sit there beside them and watch them.

Nicole Wakelin (46:40)
You

have to be in the passenger side anytime the dog is driving. Mmm, reasonable. Totally reasonable. Mmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (46:42)
Exactly. Yes. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (46:44)
Hitting the

invisible brake.

Sam Abuelsamid (46:45)
I mean, you wouldn't let your teenager, you know, the first time they're driving, you know, go without you, would you? Well, actually, maybe you would. Maybe you prefer that they go without you so that you survive. But all right, let's carry on.

Roberto Baldwin (47:02)
I just

found a typo in my Sportage article, so that's gonna bother me. So instead of kilowatt, it's KK? Instead of KW?

Sam Abuelsamid (47:06)
Well...

Nicole Wakelin (47:07)
no!

Sam Abuelsamid (47:10)
So tell us.

Nicole Wakelin (47:11)
Okay. It's funny

when we find typos like that, because I swear to God for the general public, we proof the stuff that we write. You will read it and reread it. Other people read it and reread it. And the minutes it's published, look at it, you're like, how did I spell Toyota wrong in the headline? Like things you realize you've done. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (47:19)
Just...

and then months later.

Just little things, you gotta...

Sam Abuelsamid (47:31)
Well, I mean, if you

spell Toyota with a D, that's only partially wrong. mean, the family still spells their name with a D.

Roberto Baldwin (47:33)
It's still technically correct.

Nicole Wakelin (47:35)
I guess it's technically correct.

I feel like I just spell things wrong because my brain autocorrects them. I have to look at like, get a story ready, walk away for a couple hours and come back and I look at it and I think, wait, I swear I it right the first time, but no, I've...

Sam Abuelsamid (47:43)
yeah, that's why you should

Roberto Baldwin (47:48)
You gotta read it.

Sam Abuelsamid (47:49)
That's why you should always

have an editor when you're writing, know, somewhat a separate pair of eyes to look at something. But even then things still slip through.

Roberto Baldwin (47:52)
Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (47:52)
Yes.

It's not even that what you've written

is good or bad. It's just you made typos and your editor is going to find them. That is one of their responsibilities.

Roberto Baldwin (48:02)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (48:03)
So did you run a car, Robbie?

Roberto Baldwin (48:06)
I did rent a car. went to up near Yosemite, this place called Sierra Meadows. It's wonderful. If you're in California, you should go there. It's like glamping. They have like these cabins and we've been there a bunch of times. My band is Sierra Meadows.

Nicole Wakelin (48:18)
What's it called?

Go ahead.

Roberto Baldwin (48:22)
Yeah.

So my band has played there a few times. That's how I know about it. And then since playing there, now I just go there on my own. So it was nice. ⁓ But ⁓ so we always get a, we were going to, we were thinking about taking the, just the, the Ionic 5 and they're like, no, let's just take, let's rent a van for the dogs. So they have more room and they're more comfortable as opposed to being crapped, cramped in the back of the Ionic 5, which around town for like two hours are fine. But like, you know, it's like a four hour drive. ⁓

And so we got a, you know, you rolled a dice, you asked for a van and you're like, what are we going to get? And typically we get the Pacifica or the Voyager, whatever, you know, the rental car name of the Pacifica.

Nicole Wakelin (48:57)
Hahaha.

the

non-Pacifica Pacifica.

Sam Abuelsamid (49:05)
the decontented

Pacifica.

Roberto Baldwin (49:06)
Yeah, the content of Pacifica. This time we got a carnival, the carnaval as we would. And yeah, still like the carnaval. Up and down the mountain, know, with the Sierra Nevada, so, you know, big mountains. Total all, you know, freeway driving and then driving around in the area, like 24 miles per gallon, which is pretty good. On the way there, until we hit the mountains, we were averaging like 29 miles per gallon. But then, know, nope, just a regular old car.

Nicole Wakelin (49:11)
Carnival.

Sam Abuelsamid (49:33)
Is it a hybrid?

wow.

Roberto Baldwin (49:38)
And so yeah, and they were like, oh, 29. And then I'm like, oh, wait, mountain. And so yeah, lots of room. does not have Stow and Go, which was, you know, that's one of the things that's great about the Pacifica and or the Voyager is that you can put the seats all the way down so that whole big area is clear. This one had the, the second row had that middle seat, but we didn't end up taking it out.

⁓ But we still had the two seats and they don't lay flat. You gotta like yank them out if you wanna, if you want a completely flat floor. ⁓ That said, it was very comfortable. It still has, you know, they don't wanna call it, know, Kia doesn't wanna call it ⁓ a Vans, an MPV, ⁓ like the Mazda, the five. ⁓ Sure. So they, but it does have like, it does have like a little bit of a higher like sitting position.

Nicole Wakelin (50:19)
multipurpose vehicle, is that?

Sam Abuelsamid (50:25)
Whatever.

Nicole Wakelin (50:27)
Yeah

Roberto Baldwin (50:31)
than say like the Pacific or it's Sienna, just because they want you to feel more like you're in an SUV. That's like one of things I find annoying about it. I'm like, don't need to sit higher. I'm already, I'm tall too, so there's that. ⁓ And it still, it has that display that you can switch back and forth between ⁓ your climate controls and your volume. ⁓ It's fine if you're by yourself, if you're with someone.

you're always like, they're gonna like, I gotta switch it back. Cause if they might, you know, if I leave it on media control, when they go to adjust their temperature, they might like, you know, switch something, you know, it's, so that's kind of, that's still not a big fan of that, that switcheroo setup. I know they've sort of kind of taken it away in some cars, but still there in others. ⁓ I think they're just kind of running through the stock. Like we bought a bunch of these. It seemed like a good idea.

Sam Abuelsamid (51:26)
As vehicles get

Nicole Wakelin (51:27)
Hahaha.

Sam Abuelsamid (51:27)
redesigned,

that will go away. But that's the one thing that annoys my wife about the EV6.

Roberto Baldwin (51:29)
It's one of those.

Yeah, that double, like you gotta tap it to change, now doing volume, now tap it again, now you gotta do the, no. Especially when you're going from like the Bay Area through the Central Valley to the mountains. I mean, there's three different temperatures, three different areas. You're gonna be adjusting your temperature gauge quite a lot. And then, you know, we're driving, listening to music, and then we wanna talk, we wanna turn it down. And there was once or twice where I'm like, oh, I need to turn up the music. I'm like, oh, it's 80 degrees in the car now.

That all said, ⁓ it's a delightful vehicle. I really like driving the Carnival. It's very smooth. It handles for what it is. And if you're not driving like an idiot, it handles really well. ⁓ It's got the low ride height. The dogs really enjoyed it. The seats are very comfortable. ⁓ Let's see what else. Yeah, overall, it's a really, it's the Kia Carnival. It's still a really nice van. ⁓

You I think we're all team van here in the old ⁓ world bearings. There's just so much more you can do with a van than you can with an SUV. I'm always afraid I'm going to show up, you know, before one of these trips and they're going to be like, we got you an Escalade. I'm like, so I'm going to get worse mileage. It's going to be harder for the dogs to get in because they got to jump higher. And it's going to feel like I'm driving, you know, a boat versus a van, which does not feel like a boat, like, you know, like a three row SUV. just...

Sam Abuelsamid (52:36)
Absolutely.

Nicole Wakelin (52:36)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (53:01)
They feel lighter, they're easier getting out of ⁓ escalator. Hey, if I want to get picked up at the airport in a really fancy van, or if I'm taking a bunch of really fancy people somewhere and for some reason they don't understand that vans are better, yeah, sure, get an escalator. But there's a reason why in Asia, if you get a nice vehicle to take you somewhere, it's typically a van. It's the easy...

Sam Abuelsamid (53:23)
Well, when I was

in Japan the other week, they picked us up and dropped us off at the airport in the Lexus LM, which is one of these luxury minivans. ⁓ so nice. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (53:32)
It's like the seats, because there's so much room that you

Nicole Wakelin (53:33)
cool.

Roberto Baldwin (53:35)
end up getting like, like this really, it's like a lazy boy recliner in a car, because there's so much room in a van. So they have these really, really nice seats and you're like, oh. So yeah, you can't do that in, you know, a large three row SUV, because it just doesn't have the space because they're so high up. So you're losing like a foot of of like space by making it an SUV for whatever reason.

Sam Abuelsamid (53:40)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (54:01)
Yeah, vans are just better. I'm sorry. We went off road a little bit in it, which, you know, I could, again, my thing about it, you could do it in a Camry. Yeah, you could do it in a Kia Carnival. Yeah, great car. Pretty good gas mileage for what we were doing. I did have it in eco mode because again, gas here is very expensive. I think, what was I paying? Like 575. I kept finding places where it was like 575. And that's cheap.

Nicole Wakelin (54:05)
You

Roberto Baldwin (54:31)
Hahaha

Sam Abuelsamid (54:34)
During the last two operation photo trips, ⁓ we had Carnival Hybrid both times. And so I spent time on each of those trips in the Carnival Hybrid, driving it up and over the continental divide, driving through Wyoming and into Utah. ⁓ we did not do quite so well with fuel economy, ⁓ because of altitude and driving into like what

Roberto Baldwin (54:48)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (54:59)
felt like 5060 mile an hour headwinds most of the time. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (55:01)
yeah, so you hit the headwinds. Fortunately

we didn't have any headwinds this time. but yeah, the headwinds coming back from like LA, if you're coming in the afternoon, especially in the summer, like it just destroys your any, once you get past like Fresno, it just destroys your mileage. And I just, I don't care. I just want to go home.

Sam Abuelsamid (55:18)
Yeah.

But you're usually doing that with the V5 or with the IONIQ 5. it doesn't. And you got your you got your all your free, ⁓ free fast charging sessions with that thing. So.

Roberto Baldwin (55:24)
Yeah, yeah.

We only got like a month left. This is the last month of the car. And so now we're looking at an, we're looking at either getting a used one or a new one. The deals right now for the new ones are sort of bonkers, like $11,000 off, like zero APR. And I'm just like, well, like what's the, know, I'm doing a cost analysis right now. If we put a big down payment down, we can get a pretty good, you know, deal. So yeah, it's, it's,

Nicole Wakelin (55:45)
Wow.

Roberto Baldwin (56:00)
Yeah, it's the whole like, I'm gonna buy a new car. We gotta buy another car. It's typically pretty painless for us. It helps that when we walk in, my wife's like, this is my husband. He writes about cars and they're like,

Nicole Wakelin (56:12)
Hahaha!

Sam Abuelsamid (56:13)
I'll

try to hassle you.

Roberto Baldwin (56:15)
Yeah, yeah, they're just like, ⁓ all right. They're like, yeah, he's written for car and driver and he's written for wired. they're like, ⁓ well. OK, then I guess. More importantly, he does co-host the Will Barons podcast where I will I will talk smack about your dealership if you were if you were mean to me. Our local dealership has been very nice to me. So so. But yeah, Kina Carnival. ⁓ Great. ⁓ You know, if it looks more like an SUV than other vans.

Sam Abuelsamid (56:23)
More importantly, he co hosts the wheel bearings podcast.

That's good.

Roberto Baldwin (56:45)
or MPV, I don't know, man, whatever. But if you have kids, man, I just don't, if you have bikes, if you like, there's so much more you can do with a van for your active lifestyle or your child rearing lifestyle than you can with an SUV. I'm sure you could probably tow some motorcycles with it. mean, literally almost every car can tow motorcycles at this point.

Sam Abuelsamid (56:47)
Haha.

Roberto Baldwin (57:12)
So, you know, if you're towing a fifth wheel, then obviously you're gonna...

Sam Abuelsamid (57:14)
Now, you could probably

put the seats down and put the motorcycle inside the van.

Roberto Baldwin (57:20)
Yeah, you probably could take this. We're going, we're getting a motorcycle. yeah, yeah. they've bought who are in the automotive industry who have purchased ⁓ vans instead of what you would expect. Mercedes Benz salespeople who are like, yeah, I got a Honda Odyssey. But I'm like, you know what? You made the good decision.

Nicole Wakelin (57:41)
Hahaha!

Sam Abuelsamid (57:44)
Okay, ⁓ well, I, ⁓ like last time I talked about driving the Lexus GX550 Overtrail Plus. ⁓ This time I had kind of the, almost the opposite extreme within the Toyota Lexus lineup with the Toyota Corolla FX. So this is ⁓ a new variant of the Corolla hatchback. ⁓ And it's kind of a callback to the mid 1980s.

when they had the original Corolla FX16, ⁓ which was, that was when they first launched a twin cam four valve per cylinder engine. you were, Nicole, you were complaining about the, 189 horsepower of the Sportage.

Nicole Wakelin (58:29)
Yes, so the Sportage is its modest horsepower.

Sam Abuelsamid (58:31)
Yeah, well, I was just looking up the the original Corolla fx16 from like 1985 84 85 It had a 1.6 liter twin cam four valve per cylinder four cylinder all of 108 horsepower Yeah, course that car probably weighed about 2 000 pounds

Nicole Wakelin (58:48)
gosh, 108, 108.

Yeah, true.

Roberto Baldwin (58:54)
Yeah,

my 90 Honda Civic, I think, had 86 horsepower, and I blasted that thing everywhere. But the door, the room, you know, between me and the outside world was like two inches.

Sam Abuelsamid (59:05)
Yeah, well, that's like my Miata. Yeah, same thing. have

116 horsepower. You know, when I compare it, compare my Miata to the the new one that I drove a few weeks ago, you know, the doors on the new one are like six times as thick as mine. But the the the new Corolla FX ⁓ is has a two liter 16 valve four cylinder naturally aspirated. It's one hundred and forty nine horsepower. Sorry.

Oh, sorry, no. So that's a whole 169 horsepower and 151 foot pounds of torque. That torque peak comes at 4800 RPM, which is not ideal. know, ideally you want a little more torque down low, especially for, you know, smaller, lighter car like this to help it get moving. But, you know, it was it's adequate. It's adequate power. And this has

This one came with a CVT. Let's see.

It's funny, they don't even mention the transmission in ⁓ the spec sheet. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:00:21)
No,

Roberto Baldwin (1:00:22)
It's CVT, one, it's like, hey, you want something cool?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:00:26)
Yeah, don't look here. ⁓ But it's all right. ⁓ So it's funny, even though, you know, I've complained about the sound quality of Toyota four cylinder engines, this one actually wasn't bad. And, you know, even with the CVT, especially if you put it in sport mode, you know, it's was the way they've got it programmed was actually pretty decent. So I have no no real complaints with that. ⁓ The Corolla hatchback is a little bit shorter.

than a sedan, it's a shorter wheelbase. So the back seat is a little bit tighter. But ⁓ on the FX model, the one that I had, ⁓ it's got these pretty cool looking white wheels. It's a seven dual spoke wheel. And it's kind of a callback to 1980s rally cars. And ⁓ it contrasts really well with the Inferno paint on this one. So it's kind of a

Nicole Wakelin (1:01:24)
Inferno, I love the name.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:01:25)
reddish orange paint ⁓ with the white wheels. And then it's got an extra black spoiler on top of the rear hatch. ⁓ You know, some some black trim, the the ⁓ the the mirror housings and the around the lower front grill or some extra pieces of black trim there. So it looks it looks kind of fun. Yeah, it's reasonably fun to drive. You know, like I said.

It's ⁓ an adequate amount of power, not a huge amount of power, but the CVT works well enough in this thing. And ⁓ you can toss it around on some curves. It's got decent sized tires on it ⁓ and have some fun with it. And you can use the paddle shifters to do a little manual control, put the drive mode switch into sport mode and it works OK. It's not a bad little car to drive.

The seats, the seat backs on the FX version are, they've got a fixed headrest. It looks kind of sporty. It's got a reasonable amount of lateral support. The Corolla has a little bit more piano black trim on it than I would like, but it's not overwhelming. It's not covering the whole dash. It's just around the...

the screen and the climate control switches and then around the transmission shift selector. Yeah, just just the places that you're actually going to touch the most, you know, because you wouldn't want to miss out on those extra fingerprints. Yeah, cargo space is OK. You know, and it looks fun and, you know, it's reasonable to drive. So you can't really complain too much about it. Not a lot of options on this one.

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:56)
Just where your hands go.

crimes.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:03:20)
It had mud guards for 160 bucks, door sill protectors for 180. You can skip those. You don't really need those. And then ⁓ the ⁓ connected services trials, you get three years of Toyota connected services for 485 bucks. Again, if you are perhaps rightfully so increasingly paranoid about where all your data's going, you may want to take a pass on that one and leave your car unconnected.

You know Toyota is not going to be happy because you know they don't get all the profit margin from that and they don't get to collect data on you know where you've been what you know how you've been driving but you know if you want to have support for ⁓ the navigation system things like that then you'll have to get that but if you can also just ⁓ use wireless Android Auto or Apple CarPlay use the maps there and just let Apple or Google and your

wireless service provider ⁓ track everything you're doing. So it's your choice what you want to do. ⁓

Roberto Baldwin (1:04:24)
You don't

have to have an account to use mapping software to. So, there's that.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:04:31)
True, well, mean, you know, there's still, even without an account, you gotta have an account to use the phone.

Roberto Baldwin (1:04:38)
You know, I mean, you can have a burner account. have burner account phones, but it's sitting around.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:04:43)
Yeah.

So, grand total on this one on the Corolla FX came to $29,088. Would you like to guess at the destination charge?

Roberto Baldwin (1:04:46)
Just saying.

Nicole Wakelin (1:04:59)
95.

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:02)
I don't know 14 I guess that was the way that was gonna go yay

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:04)
Nicole's closer it was $11.95.

Nicole Wakelin (1:05:10)
Just cause I beat you, you were going to say the same thing.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:10)
So.

So

it's a decent little car if you're looking for something that is kind of sporty looking and ⁓ not annoying to drive, ⁓ that is reasonably priced. ⁓ The Corolla FX is a good choice. Definitely opt ⁓ for the ⁓ Inferno paint. I think that there should be more cars painted in colors like this. And it looks good with the white wheels.

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:44)
There you go. It's $10,000 less than a GR Corolla, so you got that going.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:44)
That is the Corolla FX.

Yeah, well, I mean, it's not quite as speedy as a GR Corolla. It is a lot quieter than a GR Corolla. GR Corollas. GR Corollas can get a little a little loud, but, know, like. That's true. All right, let's carry on. ⁓ So, Nicole, since we since you were last year, ⁓ you also had a first drive.

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:55)
That's what radios are for.

It probably doesn't shake your kidneys as well.

Nicole Wakelin (1:06:13)
Yes.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:06:18)
in another car from infinity.

Nicole Wakelin (1:06:20)
I did,

I did. I drove the Infiniti QX65, which is an all new model. It's not like a redo of an existing one. It is an all new version, all new car. this is, that's, that's what that, mean, Infiniti will, it's new to Infiniti. It's their new, they have not had a QX65 before. How's that?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:06:34)
Well, sort of all new.

They have not had a QX65,

but well, I'll let you carry on.

Nicole Wakelin (1:06:47)
Yes,

but so this is the QX65 is a two row SUV. So it's a mid-size SUV, it tend to be luxury. They're building it in Tennessee, which is important only because it avoids all the tariff confusions, helps with some of the supply chain issues. So the fact that they're planning on building it here means it should be a little bit more consistent in availability once it arrives. And it starts at about just under 54, 53, 990. So it looks like anybody who knows

older vehicles, the ⁓ FX, if anybody remembers that. It kind of has that fastback styling that comes off of the FX. So it looks good. It really looks nice on the outside. It's kind of dramatic, it's kind of sporty. I really like how it looks and they have this, okay, the ones they had to strive, I guess I don't know about the paints today. Sunfire Red is the color of the paint and it actually has real gold coated glass flecks.

that are applied in a three layer process. There's actual real gold. And the funny thing was, Nick Miles, who I was driving with said, how much gold? Like, if I scraped all the paint off the car, how much gold do I have? And the guy's like, huh, I don't really know, but it's a $900 option, so it can't be much more than that. And then he finishes like, and please don't scrape my car to find out, So it has this, but it's real gold pieces and it does look absolutely stunning.

It's very pretty. It's, you know, most cars when you have metallic, it's more of a silvery kind of metallic that you see, silvery white kind of metallic flex. This definitely looks, it looks gold. It looks beautiful. And in the sunlight, it's a very, very ⁓ pretty vehicle. Yes, what? You raised your hand.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:08:28)
For reference,

the current price of gold is $4,625 per ounce. So you're paying 900 bucks. You're not getting much gold.

Nicole Wakelin (1:08:35)
So far less for,

you're not getting a lot of golds.

Roberto Baldwin (1:08:40)
I mean, most

things that have gold are gold aren't really like pure gold because gold is really malleable. So like rings and all that stuff, like you couldn't like just have a pure gold ring. It would just bend every time you like move your hand or yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:08:48)
Yes, you couldn't get pure gold or it just bends. just just smooshes. Yeah, you

would like pick up a glass and it would bend as you touch the glass. So there's so to your SUV, there's a good amount of carbon car room. There's thirty five point eight behind the second row. Sixty seven seven if you fold them down. So it's it's it's a pretty roomy interior. And we were driving around in the my God, I just forgot the trim level name Lux. That's the top trim. No autograph.

Calligraphy, I've gotten all my cards mixed up. Whose calligraphy, Hyundai Autograph, it was the autograph. My gosh, my brain completely, I'm like, my God, what's this called? So we had, you know, the fanciest of trims and it has open pore wood and there's leather seats and they're quilted and it's very pretty. It's a very beautiful car. It's very comfortable too. For the drive that we did, it snugs you in the seats, but it's one of those things, there's enough bolstering without being too tight.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:09:20)
calligraphy is Hyundai. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (1:09:48)
I think there's good headroom for most of the six foot crowd. Although in the back, I feel Robbie like someone like you because of that fastback, you're going to I don't know if you'd hit your head, but I feel like you might feel like it was right at your head. You know what I mean? I love that I'm doing a visual no one can see. This is a roof that doesn't hit your head. OK, not hitting your head, hitting your head right here, like right there. I just got them started. dear God. So.

Roberto Baldwin (1:09:58)
The fastback

Yeah.

Now we have like people watching the video. We could do visual gags. my god, there's so many things I could do. Hold on. I've just realized I got... There's a giant

Sam Abuelsamid (1:10:07)
We got video now.

Ha ha.

Roberto Baldwin (1:10:17)
cat head I could wear that's back there.

Nicole Wakelin (1:10:19)
I think you need to do that next time when you just have to have all masks on when we start the show or something. For the Halloween show. So it is pretty roomy and know, ton of cup holders. I love that there's bottle holders. Okay, so I had, when I was in the key of this, had a coffee mug. I went to pick Russ up at the airport and I had a coffee mug, big fat coffee like container. What am I trying to say? mug, travel container thing. it would, mug, it wouldn't fit in the door.

Roberto Baldwin (1:10:22)
There we go. That's for the Halloween show.

You said mug, I think that works. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (1:10:45)
It would not fit in the door.

So then when I got more coffee on the way home, because now we have the drive home coffee in the wee hours of the morning, I had nowhere to put this stupid, empty mug. Yeah, but I'm putting my new coffees. That's for current coffees. I need a place to put old coffees. You need the spot to hold... It didn't have coffee in it, but I can't just let what might be a little dribble of coffee roll around in the back of my press vehicle.

Roberto Baldwin (1:10:54)
Does it fit in the regular cup holders?

Yeah, I know, I'm just curious what... ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (1:11:02)
Well, you're was your old, did your old one still have coffee in it?

Just put it in the backseat.

Roberto Baldwin (1:11:11)
Yeah, it's all clink

clink clink clink clink

Nicole Wakelin (1:11:13)
Cling, clink, coffee, splash,

clink, coffee, little, yeah. So I ended up putting it in the thing, probably not super good to do this, but I have my wallet where you would charge your phone if you were charging your phone and I moved the wallet sideways and then I wedged the coffee cup sideways next to it to hold it. You don't have to do that in the infinity because it will fit into the side door. That was where that story's going. So go infinity. It was a lot.

Roberto Baldwin (1:11:32)
Alright, whew, that was a lot. That was a lot. I was like, man...

Nicole Wakelin (1:11:36)
But it was, I decided that was a super frustrating thing. Like that moment, I don't like not having a big bottle holder on the door. Power, it too tall? ⁓ it doesn't have the grippy things.

Roberto Baldwin (1:11:43)
I have the issue with the Red Bulls, if they don't have the little, no because they're thin. So if they don't have

the things that like the little holders that like retract when you put your can or cup or whatever in, it's like I gotta be careful. I have to drink it really quickly once I, yeah. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (1:11:52)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Then it wobbles and it can tip over. Mm-hmm. See? See, there's

challenges. Cup holder design isn't as easy you think. So power for this comes from a two liter turbo, 268 horsepower, 286 pound feet of torque, nine speed automatic all wheel drive. It delivers a, it's powerful enough, but it's not super robust. They talked about this being a more engaging car than I think it really was. It's,

Like I thought the Acura I drove was sportier. I thought it had a little bit more, it was more fun, it was a little bit more engaging. This is very, it handles beautifully, very smooth, very calm, absorbed the rough road surfaces, nice quiet cabin. But I felt like it could have used a little more oomph. It didn't have as much oomph as I wanted and the sound wasn't what I wanted. They talked a lot about the sound and it was, it could get a little bit loud, not in a good way.

Like when you put it in sport mode especially, so in sport mode.

Roberto Baldwin (1:12:47)
⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (1:12:49)
This is the complaint we've

had about the Infinity variable compression turbo ever since it came out.

Nicole Wakelin (1:12:54)
Yep, exactly. So when

you put it into sport mode, it revs higher, which is what you want a sport mode to do. But then it doesn't. There's a nice rev higher and there's a, no, please don't make me do this rev higher. And that's kind of how this one sounds. It just doesn't. I didn't like it. It sounded too loud enough so that I popped it out of sport mode. I, I forwent the sport mode to not have to listen to how it sounded when it was in sport mode. So

just don't put it in sport mode. And actually there were more than a few people that said that exactly, and just have a great audio system. maybe I chose poorly.

Roberto Baldwin (1:13:22)
Just, you know what? Just turn up the radio. Boop boop boop boop. Boop boop boop. If you're listening to Van Halen's

1984, you can't, it doesn't matter what you're driving.

Nicole Wakelin (1:13:32)
It has a, what

is it? always say, ⁓ Clipsch. Clipsch audio? Clipsch. I feel like I'm miss like I'm like have a list. Clish. Is it really?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:35)
Clipsh, yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:13:36)
Clips. Clips.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:40)
which believe it or not is an American brand. It

Roberto Baldwin (1:13:40)
clips.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:44)
sounds like it must be like German or something, but it's actually an American company.

Roberto Baldwin (1:13:45)
We're a melting pot.

Nicole Wakelin (1:13:47)
kidding.

Roberto Baldwin (1:13:48)
or a melting pot.

Nicole Wakelin (1:13:48)
In my head, I made it some European audio maker because it doesn't sound American, but go America. Melton Pot. Wireless charging. The wireless charging has a little built-in fan to keep your phone from overheating. Brilliant. Because my phone overheats a lot in those. Especially if it happens to be even like there's sun coming in. What? What are you tapping? Yes.

Roberto Baldwin (1:13:55)
Melton Pop.

Oh yeah. If you have a case on your phone,

unless the case is made for it, it's going to get warm because you're creating resistance so it gets really warm. yeah, and it doesn't charge. So if you have a little fan or you can take your phone out of the case, but I'm not going to do that. Come on.

Nicole Wakelin (1:14:18)
Mm-hmm.

It's a little fan, that was the big thing. No one's doing

that, no one's taking their phone out of their case every time they hop in their car. So that was something I really liked. That was a little detail between cup holders and the bottle holders on the door and the fact that you had the wireless charging pad that didn't overheat your phone, because I put my phone on there the whole time. I was using it to stream stuff and doing all the things to make it try and overheat, nope, it was perfectly fine. And normally it would have overheated, so I like that. And its starting price on this,

53, 990, so it starts affordably. It goes up as you go up to the top trims, but I think overall, is it three trims? Is there an autograph in this? I keep thinking I was driving the Lux. No, I guess it was the autograph. ⁓ So the Lux, I'm sorry, the Lux is a 53, 990.

Roberto Baldwin (1:15:09)
See, if you didn't

have to worry so much about your coffee, you remembered this. That's the things we remember though, when we drive cars. We remember the weirdest things.

Nicole Wakelin (1:15:14)
I know it was the coffee situation. It's the things you remember those right?

It's the strangest things you're like, you know what I hated. That's what I hated. ⁓ so I, so overall I liked it. It's going to be their new entry level model. So it's going to be where you're going to be starting with infinity is they're trying to, for now is they're trying to sort of, what are they calling their product renaissance? They're trying to reinvent their brand. I think this is a good vehicle for them. I think a lot of people are going to like it. I think the problem is going to be that engine that that

Sam Abuelsamid (1:15:29)
For now.

Nicole Wakelin (1:15:42)
when you put it in that sport mode, it doesn't deliver quite as much as you want. And it's just not refined enough for a vehicle that is just so nice inside. I wanted it to be a more refined ride, a more refined engine, not even the ride, just the engine. I wanted that to be.

Roberto Baldwin (1:15:56)
every vehicle's

pre-installed Van Halen's 1984.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:16:01)
Ha

Nicole Wakelin (1:16:02)
Robbie has found the solution, gentlemen. Infinity, take him up on that. Immediately.

Roberto Baldwin (1:16:03)
You hit sport mode boom you hit sport mode boom it just starts playing starts playing hot

for teacher you can't hear anything Yeah

Nicole Wakelin (1:16:11)
You don't notice the engine then.

So that was my feelings. Overall, I really liked it. I do think it's beautiful and it's comfortable and it hits the mark on all those things. Just doesn't quit hit the mark on the Yolde power train.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:16:21)
So

the reason why I was saying at the beginning that it's sort of all new. It is a new nameplate for Infiniti, but it's not really an entirely new vehicle because essentially this is a QX60 with the third row removed and the roof chopped off to give you that fastback look. And that's And in fact, I think

Nicole Wakelin (1:16:28)
Yes, yes, it is.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:16:49)
for a lot of people that may be a better solution. If you're not using the third row, if you don't want the third row, that's why you got such a large cargo area, because you got rid of that third row, and so you've just got all that space available to you. and when you put it side by side with the QX60, there's some details in the front fascia design that are different between the 60 and the 65, but you can pretty quickly tell.

Roberto Baldwin (1:16:53)
yeah, you don't need that third row.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:19)
that these are essentially the same vehicle. Most of the sheet metal is the same between the two.

Nicole Wakelin (1:17:26)
much you get gold paint worth $900? Gold paint, man!

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:28)
I don't know. I don't know if you can get that sun.

Roberto Baldwin (1:17:28)
Gold!

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:31)
I think the sunfire paint might be ⁓ might be exclusive to the QX 65. Let's see if they have it on the.

Roberto Baldwin (1:17:38)
You are gold, gold.

Nicole Wakelin (1:17:39)
I think no, it's exclusive, it's

just the QX65, it's a new thing. It wasn't anywhere else, it is only in the QX65. That's it, everyone else to heck with you, you don't get that, no other car.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:43)
Okay.

Yeah, okay.

Roberto Baldwin (1:17:51)
leaving your soul

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:53)
Let's

see. Just looking at the QX60. Yeah, yeah, you're right. It is not available on QX60. And this is only going to be the entry level model for a while because they've already said that there is a new compact crossover to replace the QX50 and QX55 that have gone away. And that's going to be a model based on the Rogue. So a little bit smaller.

Roberto Baldwin (1:17:56)
You are gold!

Nicole Wakelin (1:18:00)
Mm-hmm. Yep.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:18:22)
than this. That's going to be their new entry model sometime next year.

Nicole Wakelin (1:18:23)
Mm-hmm.

There you go.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:18:28)
All right. ⁓ So let's carry on. So when you know, I think we've all driven the current generation Fiat 500E, right?

Nicole Wakelin (1:18:40)
Yes, we have.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:18:41)
And

Roberto Baldwin (1:18:41)
yeah, I did. I broke

Sam Abuelsamid (1:18:42)
well.

Roberto Baldwin (1:18:42)
one of my GoPros. It fell off.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:18:44)
What

was the thing we all really raved about on this car?

Nicole Wakelin (1:18:47)
Wait a minute.

It was Chi.

Roberto Baldwin (1:18:52)
It was the best fiat. It's the best fiat even though it's like a bazillion dollars

Sam Abuelsamid (1:18:52)
that was the only fiat we get.

Nicole Wakelin (1:18:55)
I'm just reading this. For

reals? This is stupid. Sorry.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:00)
I think we all love the fact that it was such a great value for dollar, right?

Nicole Wakelin (1:19:09)
Value, we talked about value, value is important.

Roberto Baldwin (1:19:11)
So expensive.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:11)
Yeah,

so, you know previously it was about 32 and a half thousand dollars for a car with about a hundred and you view the about 150 miles of range well apparently for for model year 2026 Stellantis said You know, we're done. You know, we're not we're not we're ever gonna do You know zero dollar a month leases for two years on the 500 e in fact

Roberto Baldwin (1:19:19)
Yeah, that was pretty...

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:38)
What we're going to do is we're going to raise the price by $5,000.

Roberto Baldwin (1:19:43)
Perfect.

Nicole Wakelin (1:19:43)
That's ridiculous!

I don't get this at all. What's the logic behind this?

Roberto Baldwin (1:19:47)
They don't

want to sell it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:48)
I

think Antonio Fallo says, finally come to the conclusion that we have to just kill fiat in the US market without actually killing fiat.

Nicole Wakelin (1:19:57)
Make it impossible to make anyone make a rational decision that would involve buying that vehicle.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:02)
Yes, precisely.

Roberto Baldwin (1:20:04)
So could buy this or you could buy an Ionic 5. Cool.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:07)
Yeah.

That will charge twice as fast and go twice, go at least two or two or three times as far. Yeah. And, and carry passengers in the rear seat.

Roberto Baldwin (1:20:13)
Three times as far.

More room, better car overall.

Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:22)
⁓ Okay, so, you know, in case you were thinking about a Fiat 500E, you might want to look elsewhere. On the other hand, ⁓ BMW is soon going to be launching the new iX3. They've started production in Europe and it's going on sale in Europe now. ⁓ And it will be coming to the US market soon. ⁓ And ⁓ apparently, ⁓ the range

Nicole Wakelin (1:20:23)
Wow.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:52)
on this thing, which they have previously said would be approximately 400 miles on a charge. They're now saying 434 miles on a charge.

Roberto Baldwin (1:21:04)
Bum bum bum.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:21:07)
And so that's that's not too shabby. That's quite impressive. And unlike some other cars that claim to go over 400 miles on a charge, BMW is typically at least meet and almost always exceed their official rated range values, which means that you probably actually will be able to go, you know, four hundred and thirty miles or more on a charge in the IX 350 X-Drive.

Nicole Wakelin (1:21:12)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:21:36)
Yeah, X drive by the way, it's all dim wheels.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:21:40)
Yeah. So ⁓ really looking forward to trying this one out. Yeah, because this has got BMW sixth generation electric drive system in there. So all new battery, ⁓ new motors, new version of the motors that they had on the i5 and i7, you know, even more efficient. ⁓

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:02)
even

without without rare earth magnets. The thing that other automakers like you can't do that. BMW is like hold my Stein.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:22:06)
Yeah, without rare earth magnets, it's...

Nicole Wakelin (1:22:10)
can't do it without this, you must.

my Stein.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:22:16)
And ⁓ it now has an 800 volt electrical system and I think it'll charge it ⁓ upwards of 300 kilowatts Which you know by by North American standards is very very fast You know, it doesn't come close to what you can get in China, but you know, it's very fast by North American standards so ⁓ Looking forward to trying this out that my my still my my only complaint that I know of yet with this vehicle

You gotta go into the touchscreen to adjust the vents.

Nicole Wakelin (1:22:46)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:46)
Bye!

Sam Abuelsamid (1:22:48)
Come on, PMW.

Nicole Wakelin (1:22:49)
Ugh,

I hate that. Boo. Just what Robbie said, boo. Just one big boo. Boo, boo.

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:50)
Boo. Boo.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:22:52)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:55)
burns.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:22:58)
So do you guys remember back in the day, I don't know if you're maybe old enough to remember when it was not uncommon for state police in many states in this country to be driving five liter Ford Mustangs?

Roberto Baldwin (1:23:15)
yeah, I remember the Mustangs.

Nicole Wakelin (1:23:15)
I don't ever remember

those in New Hampshire. I was thinking about this. don't know if we had them or if we just had very few of them. I always have thought of chargers as being the police cars.

Roberto Baldwin (1:23:19)
We had them in California. It was a big deal.

Yeah, we had had mustangs here.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:23:25)
Yeah, well before the Chargers,

there were five liter Mustangs. Ford started doing a police package version of the Mustang back about 1986 or 87. Michigan State Police had them, California had them, Florida had them, lot of southern states had them. I remember when I was driving...

Nicole Wakelin (1:23:35)
Let me see.

We did,

apparently we did, but it was before I was driving, which is why I don't remember it, because I was never looking out for them. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (1:23:47)
Okay. When I was driving

my five liter LX Mustang in the 90s, I always had to keep an eye out for blue Mustangs with a red light on the top. Ford stopped doing police package Mustangs sometime, I guess probably when the Fox body ended. I don't think they did any after that. ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (1:24:11)
According to

this, we currently have 30 state police Mustang GTs, though they're rare sights on the road. I have never seen... Yeah, but I mean, we, it says we, New Hampshire, has 30 Mustang GTs. I had no idea. Okay, well, I gotta pay more attention to other kinds of body stuff. Not that I need to do that, because I would never break the law on this speed, never ever. I would have no reason to be looking out for this, but just, know, for, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:19)
Well, this is in New York.

⁓ really? ⁓ okay.

No, you would never have any reason to be wary of,

mean, we always drive five miles an hour below the speed limit just to be on the safe side, right? Just in case the speedometer's off a little bit, yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:24:41)
Just to be safe. ⁓ Correct. You never know

Roberto Baldwin (1:24:44)
Mm-hmm.

Nicole Wakelin (1:24:46)
when it could be improperly calibrated.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:49)
Yeah. But ⁓

the New York State police now have a bunch of Mustang GTs and they claim that they're about 30 % cheaper than patrol SUVs like the Explorer. Currently the Explorer ⁓ or the Ford Police Interceptor SUV as it's officially known is the most popular ⁓ police vehicle in the US. ⁓ the ⁓ New York State

now has 19 GTs ⁓ that they're testing as police interceptors on the highways. So New York has a relatively low speed limit anyway. I think it's like 65. Yeah, and they like to write tickets. So you might want to watch out for gray ⁓ mustangs around you.

Nicole Wakelin (1:25:34)
They're really hardcore in New York too.

Roberto Baldwin (1:25:43)
I like that they're like particularly, support enforcement efforts, particularly in aggressive driving, excessive speeding and deterrence. Like how? What is the deterrent? ⁓ there's another car. Also there shouldn't be, you every time I see a ⁓ police chase, I'm like, nope, that's not a thing that should be happening. Because you know what we have now? Helicopters, just follow the car.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:26:02)
Ha

Roberto Baldwin (1:26:09)
putting the public in danger chasing people

Sam Abuelsamid (1:26:14)
Yeah.

So while I was in Japan a couple of weeks ago, I got an email from some PR person inviting me to come to an event in San Francisco the following Monday. So like I got back from Japan on a Saturday and I think it was like on the Tuesday or Wednesday while I was in Japan. They invited me to come to the Dreamy Next event in San Francisco the following Monday. They even...

Nicole Wakelin (1:26:39)
I saw about this. Did you go to this?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:26:42)
offered to fly me out and host me there. ⁓ But being as I was in Japan, would have meant landing back home in Detroit on Saturday night and then turning around the following day and flying to San Francisco, I decided to take a pass.

Roberto Baldwin (1:26:58)
I was on vacation, they invited

Nicole Wakelin (1:26:58)
Oof.

Roberto Baldwin (1:26:59)
me as well and I was like, I'm on vacation, sorry.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:27:03)
So I took a pass on this and I'm kind of glad I did. So Dreamy is a Chinese company that mostly does like various appliances and home stuff. But they were introducing a car. ⁓ What do they call this thing? ⁓ Dreamy One or something? ⁓ It's electric.

but it also has a couple of solid rocket boosters and they claim 0 to 100 kilometer an hour, which is 0 to 62 miles an hour in 0.9 seconds.

Nicole Wakelin (1:27:40)
was trying to understand this. How is it an EV but yet rocket boosters?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:27:44)
I mean, it mostly operates ⁓ electric. ⁓ the thing is, solid rocket boosters, they're a one use thing. It's like lighting off a firework. Same basic concept. You're lighting off some propellant that burns, and then you can never refill it. after you've used it once, you throw it away and you have to get new ones.

Roberto Baldwin (1:27:59)
You can't

Nicole Wakelin (1:28:07)
So how does this work then?

Roberto Baldwin (1:28:08)
One and done. You got

You gotta go to the dreamy place and put some new dreamy rockets in your dreamy car.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:16)
This thing is just so ridiculous.

Roberto Baldwin (1:28:20)
I don't think you can ship rockets through Amazon.

Nicole Wakelin (1:28:21)
Do you think it's gonna actually, are they actually producing this?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:23)
No,

Nicole Wakelin (1:28:24)
Or is this just a, wanna do this one day? So this is not happening.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:24)
not yet.

video.

Roberto Baldwin (1:28:29)
We'll never see.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:32)
mean, it's got some pretty cool specs that they've listed. It has a full break by wire system. It's a fully dry brake system. No hydraulics. So it's electromechanical brakes. They claim 550 kilometers of range, which is a little over 300 miles. A solid state battery. They say they're at 450 watt hours per kilogram with a goal of 800 watt hours per kilogram for the battery, which is pretty impressive specs.

I mean, it's nothing more than a spec sheet. It has the MEDIS AI agent for each vehicle, whatever the heck that is.

Nicole Wakelin (1:29:11)
What does that mean?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:13)
You got a chat bot in your car.

Nicole Wakelin (1:29:17)
Mean.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:20)
And the AI works with all the other dreamy devices at your home. Again, what does that mean? I don't know, as you're approaching the house, it turns on your lights and tell.

Nicole Wakelin (1:29:27)
all the other dreamy do you have any of us do any of us

have dreamy devices do we have dreamy at all in the US does any of us we do okay

Roberto Baldwin (1:29:32)
Somebody.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:34)
They sell, yeah, they sell all this stuff here. Yeah, they

have like robot vacuums and things like that.

Roberto Baldwin (1:29:40)
Alright. So, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:44)
Well, I'm looking at the slide here from the presentation, ⁓ the solid rocket booster system. So there's two of these solid rocket boosters ⁓ and it says between the left and right rockets. Now imagine you get a pair of solid rocket boosters that are not on center. And if there's any mismatch between the output of those things or the timing, ⁓ imagine what that's going to do to your straight line stability.

or your absence of straight line stability. If one's out slightly more power and it's able to go from zero to 60 in under a second, you're going to be just spinning like mad.

Nicole Wakelin (1:30:15)
Yeah, what's straight line stability?

This sounds dangerous as heck.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:29)
Yeah, this is a horrible, horrible idea. Just just don't.

Nicole Wakelin (1:30:33)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:30:34)
but we all learned about their vacuums.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:38)
and lawn mowers, coffee makers.

Roberto Baldwin (1:30:38)
And apparently they have electric toothbrushes and yeah, so they worked. Good job.

Nicole Wakelin (1:30:46)
My gosh, that is not specialized at all, is it?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:50)
they have robotic pool cleaners too.

Nicole Wakelin (1:30:54)
I mean, now I'm in. That's the clincher right there.

Roberto Baldwin (1:30:57)
Does have a

rocket booster though? if I really need that, like, no, I got people coming over in 20 minutes, quick, clean my pool with rockets.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:31:07)
All right, so I guess we won't be buying this dreamy car anytime soon. ⁓ On the other hand, ⁓ Nicole, think of the three of us, you're the only one that's driven a car made by Lincoln Co., right?

Nicole Wakelin (1:31:22)
I did, I drove one in a rental in Europe a few years ago, a year ago or so ago, I did. That's right, I have. I picked it because I wanted to pick something I couldn't get in the US. I was like, was that a Lincoln coat? It was.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:31:23)
You had a rental in Europe when you were there.

Yeah.

Well, they have just ⁓ unveiled a new ⁓ concept, the Lincoln Co. GT. ⁓ What do you think of this thing?

Nicole Wakelin (1:31:47)
I mean, I think it looks great. And I have to be honest, I really like the car I drove. It was a really nice car. I had no real complaints about it not being able to find the charging port, which was a whole saga. But I liked the vehicle overall. And I think this looks really good.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:31:58)
Ha

Roberto Baldwin (1:32:03)
I mean, if it had rockets, I that'd be cool. Have they tried rockets or lasers?

Nicole Wakelin (1:32:06)
Mm. Or lasers or something. Yeah. Mm hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:32:06)
Yeah, I you know, this

one, unlike the dreamy that'll go zero to 60 in 0.9 seconds, this one takes two whole seconds to do that.

Nicole Wakelin (1:32:10)
Yeah.

my gosh, it's slow.

Roberto Baldwin (1:32:20)
Which

Nicole Wakelin (1:32:20)
Ugh.

Roberto Baldwin (1:32:21)
isn't fun for most people, to be honest. If you've been in a car that does 0-60 and under four, if you're the passenger, you're like, Some people, I've had people in the car with me when I've done that and they're like, don't do that again. I don't like that. That's not fun for me. I've had multiple people be like, please don't do that again.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:32:24)
you

Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:32:39)
Do not like that.

Roberto Baldwin (1:32:45)
And for some people, I've seen people who will do... I went to the Gigafactor opening in Reno 100,000 years ago and they had a Model S there. And they're like, hey, do you want to... We have a road, you can do zero to 60 in whatever mode they had at the time. Plaid, Ludicrous, I don't remember. And so I did it like, oh, cool, yeah, it's fast. my videographer was there with me and the videographer was like, oh, I'm like...

Nicole Wakelin (1:32:55)
100,000 years.

Okay.

Roberto Baldwin (1:33:14)
The guy's like, you want to try it? like, yeah, yeah, yeah. He got so overwhelmed by how fast the car was going that he forgot to brake. And so now we're coming to the end of the road and he's almost like hypnotized by the amount of power because he'd never experienced it before. He'd never done it before. And we're like, brake, brake, brake. He's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think some people are like, yeah, you gotta, there's people out there who are like, I'm gonna do this. And then they're just.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:33:23)
Ha

Roberto Baldwin (1:33:40)
their body just gets so incredibly overwhelmed by it because they're not used to it or maybe it's too fast. It's too much on a publish. Like where are you doing this? Like when I had the Lucid Air, not the Sapphire, the one below it. And I did it like, I had to wait till the middle of the night. There's a road, it's straight, but it's also uphill. And there's just like all this stuff to like, okay, there's nothing around.

Nicole Wakelin (1:33:42)
Wow, that's a scary thought.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:33:44)
It's just it's too much on public roads.

Sapphire, the Grand Touring.

Roberto Baldwin (1:34:09)
So I could do it and yeah, it was really impressive and I'm like, okay, well, it's 10 p.m. I'm on a deserted road going uphill, going real fast. And once you've done it like three times, you're like, fine. You just are like, okay. The people who get these cars do it when they first get it a couple times. They show off to their friends and then after that it's like.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:34:32)
Yeah. Well. ⁓

Lincoln Co is part of the Geely group. you know, Geely owns a whole bunch of brands. They own Volvo and Polestar and Lincoln Co and Zekr. And they also sell vehicles under their own Geely brand, along with several other brands. And recently, Mike Floyd from Motor Trend was over in China and he had the opportunity to drive the Geely EX2, which is this little

Subcompact it's about the size of a mini, know mini Cooper and It sells in China for about $10,000 And it well the headline is I just drove a $10,000 Chinese EV and it didn't suck

Nicole Wakelin (1:35:21)
Can you just imagine a car that cheap?

Exactly. Exactly.

Roberto Baldwin (1:35:31)
I

did a podcast about these prices. I'm like, that's, you know, those are homologated for China. when you look at, when you look at that, if you look at the version they sell in Mexico, it's usually like double the price of what it is in China. every time someone's like, would people in China are getting cars for 10,000. I'm like, yeah, that's because they're homologated for China and they're, let's just say their stuff is also no one in China ever goes quicker than like 30 miles an hour from whatever.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:37)
Yeah, yeah, it's not legal here

Nicole Wakelin (1:35:38)
Right, it would never be that the exact same car is not going to be that, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:58)
Yeah.

Well, like the BYD Seagull, you know, that you can get for like nine or $10,000 in China. In Mexico, it costs $22,000, which, you know, granted is still a fair and that's that's including the tariffs. You know, Mexico has pretty hefty tariffs on Chinese EVs. And so, you know, that's that's still a pretty pretty amazing price for what is a very impressive little vehicle.

Roberto Baldwin (1:36:08)
Yeah, so it's...

No, it's a great deal. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:36:26)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (1:36:28)
this car has physical vents. I mean, it doesn't have anything else that's physical, but it's got those.

Nicole Wakelin (1:36:31)
Huzzah!

physical

fence. They heard Sam.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:36:36)
Well, it's got it's got a steering wheel that is mostly round You know, it's got cup holders with the little things in there to hold your Red Bull cans You know, it's there's a there's a wire. It looks like there's a wireless charging pad there. So, you know this is Yeah

Roberto Baldwin (1:36:40)
There you go.

Yeah, my red bull. Alright, alright.

Nicole Wakelin (1:36:46)
My red.

Roberto Baldwin (1:36:49)
All right.

Nicole Wakelin (1:36:50)
It has what you need to make

it, to make a go of it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:36:55)
Yeah, they say about a, they estimate an EPA range, you know, so pretty close to real world of about 170 to 190 miles, which, you know, is more than that $37,000 Fiat 500E by about 40 or 50 miles.

Roberto Baldwin (1:37:03)
All right, good. Get around town.

That's true.

Nicole Wakelin (1:37:11)
Gosh, I'm still so

upset about that fiat situation. Don't bring that up again. That's making me so mad. Just ask the company here. Don't do that.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:37:19)
Yeah,

yeah, just forget it. It's over. ⁓ So, you know, obviously they would have to make a lot of changes ⁓ to make it legal for the US market, ⁓ but still, you know, it's a pretty impressive start.

Roberto Baldwin (1:37:36)
Yeah, no, mean, especially battery technology, China's still so far ahead of the United States. It's embarrassing. ⁓ but, know, and these cars, again, these cars are, they're homologated for a different country. Again, most people, you know, I was talking to an automaker.

about when China had started getting a middle class, they started having automotive journalists. Well, some of these journalists, they started going on trips because automakers want to sell cars to the Chinese public. And some of them were like, I've never gone faster than 30 miles an hour. I'm from Shanghai. There's never a time where you're doing 60. If you live in a big city, you're just kind of cruising along very slowly, which if you're in a city, why are you doing 60 miles an hour anyway?

Nicole Wakelin (1:38:15)
Geez, wow.

Hahaha!

Roberto Baldwin (1:38:27)
You know. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (1:38:27)
Manhattan.

it's like Manhattan. The average speed in Manhattan is like eight or nine miles an hour.

Roberto Baldwin (1:38:31)
Three? Yeah,

Nicole Wakelin (1:38:31)
Two.

Roberto Baldwin (1:38:33)
the average speed in Manhattan is take the subway. That's the average speed in Manhattan.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:38:39)
All right, ⁓ so one last thing with ⁓ Chinese EVs. ⁓ Recently, we've talked about Canada did a trade deal with China that would allow in up to 59,000 Chinese built EVs a year ⁓ at a relatively low, like 6 % tariff rate. And one of the first companies to take advantage of that is Tesla. ⁓ And I think Tesla ⁓ previously,

Several years back before they imposed the hundred percent tariffs on Chinese EVs. They did offer a Chinese built version of the Model 3 in Canada ⁓ But then it went away with the tariffs, but they're back again And so they are selling a base version of the Model 3 in Canada now ⁓ Starting at this built in China starting at thirty nine thousand four hundred and ninety dollars ⁓ and That works out to about twenty nine thousand dollars us

Roberto Baldwin (1:39:36)
Canadian dollars.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:39:38)
Yeah. 39,000

Roberto Baldwin (1:39:39)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:39:39)
Canadian, which is about 29,000 U S. previously the, uh, uh, the cheapest model three available in Canada was, um, 79,000 was $80,000 Canadian. So it's about half the price. Um, and, uh, that, um, you know, they, they don't get into a lot of specifics. I looked earlier this morning, I was looking at the Canadian Tesla website. Um, they don't, they don't say too much about it.

Roberto Baldwin (1:39:52)
Wow.

Nicole Wakelin (1:39:53)
Mm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:40:07)
You know, it's listed there, but they do list the range as it works out to about 273 miles of range, which means that this is probably using an LFP battery, which is primarily what they sell in China. But, you know, still, you 273 miles of range in a Model 3 for the equivalent of $29,000 US is, yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:40:32)
Oof. That is

Roberto Baldwin (1:40:33)
That's a pretty good deal.

Nicole Wakelin (1:40:35)
a very good deal.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:40:36)
You know, it's still a Tesla and you got to make up your mind if you want to give, give your money to that company. But you know, it's, it's a, it's a decent value. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:40:46)
Good value.

Nicole Wakelin (1:40:47)
I

mean, good for them.

Roberto Baldwin (1:40:48)
Suspension's gonna go out in about 60,000 miles, but then that's... They're so... Their rear suspension is just so trashed.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:40:51)
Well, yeah. Yeah, at least.

Yeah,

you lease it for a couple of years, lease it for three years, and then give it back.

Roberto Baldwin (1:40:59)
Yeah, I can get around.

Yeah. It's no Dodge, it's no Dodge Ram.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:41:03)
Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:41:07)
hahahaha

Sam Abuelsamid (1:41:10)
And then finally ⁓ The ⁓ today actually right about now. I think it the race has already started ⁓ the Miami Grand Prix Formula One race I think was starting at one o'clock Eastern Time. They pulled it ahead because of ⁓ expected thunderstorms ⁓ But this season is the first season for the Cadillac f1 team and to celebrate ⁓ Cadillac ⁓

Nicole Wakelin (1:41:34)
All right.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:41:37)
has announced this weekend a new limited edition version of the CT5V Blackwing called the F1 Collector Series. ⁓ is basically it is a matte gray CT5V Blackwing ⁓ with a six speed manual transmission. All right. ⁓ And it is the most powerful Cadillac to date. ⁓ Most powerful.

internal combustion Cadillac to date. The 6.2 liter supercharged V8 produces 685 horsepower, 673 foot pounds of torque. I am a fan of the CT5 Blackwing. It's, yeah, yeah. And this one's got Cadillac Formula One logos on the cell plates and the CNC machined F1 logo on the supercharger cover and lots of F1.

Roberto Baldwin (1:42:21)
Yeah, that's a great car.

Nicole Wakelin (1:42:23)
Mmm, it really is.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:42:35)
reminders of what you bought. However, they are only planning to produce 26 units.

Roberto Baldwin (1:42:44)
Wow, that's gonna be a lot of money.

Nicole Wakelin (1:42:45)
26.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:42:46)
They have not listed a price.

Nicole Wakelin (1:42:46)
How much are they? Do they have a price? That's why there's 26. Yep.

Roberto Baldwin (1:42:49)
Just get a regular one. Just get a regular CT5.

No one's gonna know.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:42:52)
Yeah.

Yeah, get a regular CT5, put a matte gray or black wrap on it, and you'll be good to go.

Roberto Baldwin (1:43:00)
There you go. You get 3D print on F1, whatever.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:03)
You're not going to notice the slight difference in speed because the regular one is like 670 horsepower. So you get about 15 extra horsepower.

Roberto Baldwin (1:43:08)
Yeah.

You're

going to be drifting all over the place anyway in this car. got one for, they gave me a CT5 in Las Vegas for CES one year. And people forget it's cold. The desert gets very cold in the winter and Las Vegas roads are, they have a lot of gravel in them. So they're not, they're very slippery and it rained. So everywhere I went, that car was sideways. was like, whee. It's like 38 degrees.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:14)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

Which would be great

if there was no other traffic around. But it's bumper to bumper traffic all the time.

Roberto Baldwin (1:43:41)
Yeah, no, was my... My

boss was like, uh... I'm like, that's fine. I'm like, you want to go refer a ride? She's like, I don't know, you've been telling, everyone's been telling me you're like getting sideways everywhere. I'm like, that's not my fault. And also they all lived.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:56)
Ha ha.

All right, we do have a couple of letters from listeners today. ⁓ First up from Mark, it's a fairly ⁓ long one here. It says, I'm writing about a recent positive experience I had. Before I get started with the story, a little background. I live in Michigan, less than half an hour from Ypsilanti, which is where I live, and I've lived in Michigan my entire life. I've enjoyed your podcast for close to eight years. ⁓ Now onto my story. I was going grocery shopping and also needed to address my growing mileage anxiety.

considering my car was showing it was down to 25 % in reserve or a quarter tank, according to my analog dial. I found a place to take care of my growing anxiety, seven of them on my way to the grocery store. So I started feeling better until I stopped, shut off the car, pop the refueling door on the car. Then a new fear gripped me. Would I be able to hook up my car to this machine I was parked next to or would I need an adapter? I've heard you have to have the right connection type even when you're

you found a place to get your car back up to 100 % range capacity. Then I quickly realized my car and the machine I was parked next to did indeed have corresponding parts. Crisis averted. The entire process of getting back to 100 % range capacity took under five minutes, including the time needed to swipe my credit card, enter my M-Perks number and passcode and top off my car. Not enough time for me to enjoy a burrito, some roller hot dogs, or heaven forbid, sushi. Although I do enjoy sushi in restaurants.

but eating wasn't why I was there. The reason why I wrote this email is it cracks me up when positive references when recharging electric vehicles are made. I have nothing against electric vehicles or the people who buy them. You do you is how I view it. Just don't go mandating a vehicle before there is a way for everyone to be able to charge them. Maybe it's just my stoic mindset or my quote unquote flyover sensibilities. That's my two cents worth.

Roberto Baldwin (1:45:49)
mean, no one, there was no mandate, but sure. ⁓

Sam Abuelsamid (1:45:51)
Yeah.

But by the way, my car is a 2022 Camry Hybrid, which has averaged 43 miles per gallon since I bought it three years ago. And yes, I didn't buy it for its exhaust note. I have an SL 63 AMG that fills that void.

Nicole Wakelin (1:46:05)
sorry, I'm of voice.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:08)
Thank you, Mark.

Roberto Baldwin (1:46:08)
Damn, she's

63. Jeez.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:12)
Yeah, you know, and I think, you know, we've made it pretty clear that, you know, depending on your lifestyle and what your needs are, you know, an EV may be a great choice for you. It may not be. It depends on where you live, you know, how far you have to drive. You know, if you can charge at home, you know, which is always the better solution than charging on the road unless you're doing a road trip, which for most people is not frequent. Yeah, so, you know, get what works for you.

Camry Hybrid is great choice. That 43 miles per gallon when gas is close to five bucks a gallon or $82,000 a gallon as it is in California, that's a great option for lot of people.

Nicole Wakelin (1:46:51)
gonna get a $20,000.

Roberto Baldwin (1:46:52)
82.

It's a lot.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:55)
Yeah. So, ⁓ you know, get get what works best for you in our case, in our household. And Evie works great. My wife is loving having electric vehicle right now. ⁓ But, you know, she also doesn't do that much driving.

Roberto Baldwin (1:47:11)
We do a lot of driving, we still use the, I mean, we just charge it home. So I don't have to do all this stuff.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:47:19)
And then finally from Andy got an email from Andy by patreon the other day In a random question is the Nissan e power an e rev system? If not, why not and if so, why isn't it described as such love your work? So I did respond to Andy but you know, I wanted to bring it up here Technically, yes, it is an e rev

The way the term, there's a lot of ⁓ marketing that goes behind the various terminology that gets used.

Roberto Baldwin (1:47:57)
I mean, EREV is pretty

new. Like before we would just say like a cereal hybrid. No, serious, not cereal. It's a delicious cereal Captain Crunch hybrid. Like EREV is like a pretty new like sort of like term.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:48:01)
Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:48:01)
Great.

Real.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:48:04)
I mean

Yeah, well, mean, it first it first popped up, you know, actually almost 20 years ago now with the Chevy Volt. You know, when original Volt concept came up, that was the first time anybody really started talking about it as an EREV. And so basically, when when we talk about an EREV, what we mean is a vehicle that the wheels are driven purely by electricity like any EV. But there is an engine that keeps the battery charged and, you know,

and drives a generator to provide the electricity to the wheels. In the case of the Nissan e-Power system, technically that is true. It would qualify as an e-rev. In the case of the Volt, most of the time, under most driving conditions, it also qualified as an e-rev. Something like the Ram 1500 e-rev, that one, when the wheels never

never ever drive the engine, never ever drives the wheels directly. But ⁓ it can also drive ⁓ on the battery alone without the engine running. So generally, kind of the way the industry has done it is EREV is used to refer to a series hybrid that has a plug and a large enough battery that you can do some amount of driving with the engine turned off. And then the engine can come on when the battery starts to get depleted.

In the case of the Nissan e-Power system, at least as it is sold today, it does not have a plug. So the engine is basically going to be running most of the time because it has a relatively small battery like other hybrids. ⁓ It's configured differently from, you know, from like a Toyota hybrid system because it is a series hybrid. And there's no, like I said, there's no mechanism for the wheels to ever drive or for the engine to ever drive the wheels. So that's, that's mainly what this, you know, what has become.

what most people refer to as an eRev. That there's a plug and a large enough battery to drive on electricity alone with an eRev. And something like the Nissan is just considered a series hyper.

Roberto Baldwin (1:50:24)
Serial hybrid. Made with serial.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:27)
Serial Series.

Nicole Wakelin (1:50:28)
Serial

hybrid. I went serial.

Roberto Baldwin (1:50:31)
How about serial? I driven it. It drives really well. It's really nice. It's a nice system. Stomped on the gas bunch times. It didn't sound like it was going to explode. it's always a nice, whatever your car doesn't feel like it's going to explode. Pretty, pretty good. I'm still excited about Mark's SL86 AMG. I'm like, man, that's a great two-car garage.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:35)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Nicole Wakelin (1:50:42)
That's a good thing.

Yeah, you don't want it to sound that way.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:00)
Yeah, Camry Hybrid and SL.

Nicole Wakelin (1:51:00)
hahahahah ⁓

Roberto Baldwin (1:51:03)
Like, well, I got my ass. I'm like, wait, what? It's like out of nowhere.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:09)
Yeah, I wouldn't mind a garage like that. It'd be alright. Although, you know, I would probably take a Civic or a Cord Hybrid over the Camry, but that's just me.

Roberto Baldwin (1:51:12)
Really nice to kind of garage.

Nicole Wakelin (1:51:14)
All

Roberto Baldwin (1:51:21)
Well, can go off-roading in the Camry. So, as I've noted many times.

Nicole Wakelin (1:51:21)
Okay.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:25)
Ha ha.

⁓ Alright, any final thoughts anybody?

Nicole Wakelin (1:51:32)
I don't have any, that's it. That's all my thoughts for this Sunday afternoon.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:33)
All right.

All right. Then we will talk to you all next time. Bye.

Roberto Baldwin (1:51:36)
I'm tired.

Nicole Wakelin (1:51:39)
Bye

everyone.

Roberto Baldwin (1:51:39)
Bye.