Sam Abuelsamid (00:00)
five of wheel bearings. I am Sam Abuelsamid from Telemetry.

Roberto Baldwin (00:04)
I am Roberto Baldwin from SAE International.

Stephanie Brinley (00:08)
And I'm Stephanie Brinley from Mobility Global. We have a new name since you talked to me last in a new company.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:15)
Yeah, you split off from split off from part of your company.

Stephanie Brinley (00:19)
Yeah.

as Mobility Global used to be S P Global Mobility. we went public on our own on July first. And so we still have and do and continue all of the analysis and and and everything around car buying, car selling, production, planning, forecasting, vehicles, engines, powertrain components, Carfax is part of our company.

And a couple of other elements that reach out to speak a lot to to dealers, automotive mastermind being one of them. So we still have the the whole massive collection of of data and and insights around the industry to to deliver, but we're we're now independent from SP. for me it feels like going back to being independent because when I started we were still IHS and we were independent from at that point. But at any rate, new company. my job is fundamentally the same.

No change there and so far it's gone great.

Sam Abuelsamid (01:20)
Awesome. Well, what have you been driving this week?

Stephanie Brinley (01:25)
You know.

I had over, you know, a week, week and a half. I had the Mercedes-Benz C L A, which was came out last year, so I'm a little bit late to the game there, but I I really, I really enjoyed it. and I also had the Lexus ES 350 electric sort of in the same time frame. and it and the Lexus is clearly, as we know, a little bit larger than the CLA. So it's a bit bigger of a sedan. and Lexus has a much different approach to things.

But it was interesting seeing both of those at the same time. and and I I found the the Lexus E S electric to be lovely and smooth and we bless Sam. shall I keep talking?

Roberto Baldwin (02:11)
We lost Sam. yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (02:17)
It happened again.

Roberto Baldwin (02:19)
no.

Sam Abuelsamid (02:19)
I I tested it for almost an hour earlier and it was

Roberto Baldwin (02:23)
Maybe

just doesn't work with other people. Maybe it just hates other people. Have you thought about that?

And you just use the just go through instead of using you're just using the web, you're just on Chrome, right? Yeah. I don't know. You're doomed. I'm sorry. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (02:42)
If if it happens again, I will migrate back upstairs to my my office. But Steph, continue carry on. You're talking about the E S or the L S versus no the E S versus the C S

Stephanie Brinley (02:55)
CLA. and again slightly different sizes, but the Lexus ES is smooth, it's comfortable, it's really lovely to drive, the interior is nice. I had my niece with me and and one of the things that she saw, she liked the volume button right below. It's a it's a little silver round dial and it's right below the screen. And and I don't think she was in the car before two or three minutes, and she's like, I like that. She views it. So that was great. But

really smooth. And then and then I got into the CLA and the CLA is is even in the scope of of electric just much more dynamic and and feels much more connected. There's more power to it, but they both have that instant torque at the at the low end. So it it didn't feel like my appreciation of the CLA was really about power so much as just seeing how different these two cars really were and the way that they felt and they were really quite true to their brands.

as well. you know, you've got a Lexus owner that that had a hybrid or had a a a regular ES before. and I can see no reason why they wouldn't just love this electric. it does everything it needs to. Range, I think, is around 220. I didn't really hit that limit of it. So I had no problems with the efficiency of the vehicle at all. I ended up having to take it to the airport twice. And and and no issues with

With feeling like that wasn't enough or that it wasn't performing well in that regard. it just the the CLA for me just felt a little bit more fun. when I was looking at the the pricing on them, there's a bit of a difference there. the CLA that I as equipped was sixty-seven thousand three hundred and thirty dollars. the base price of the electric CLA is fifty thousand five hundred. So there's quite a a bit of equipment on there. and I

And thinking about looking at the list in front of me about what the equipment's the optional things. the CLA comes with a panor fixed panoramic panoramic glass roof, but there's another thousand fifty. I don't know if I should that is for the sky control, which is a feature that changes the opacity of the of the roof. so you can have some more light and you can have a design in that. It's cool. Would I need that for a thousand dollars? I think I probably don't.

you know, I if some people might it is a wow factor. It is cool.

Roberto Baldwin (05:24)
Wow factor. I can do.

Stephanie Brinley (05:27)
It's cool. I checked it out because I remembered I needed to. And after that the other the the drive assist, because the cumber the car comes standard with all of the normal cruise controls and and ADAS systems, like taking it to the extra level of of of hands free on the freeway or whatever.

the their drive assist I is not overpriced, but it was 1950. And I was like, I could drop that. and this car had an AMG line package with night line plus with night package, which was just cosmetic stuff. So it blacks out some of the features instead of some of the the elements instead of being chrome. And that's another three grand. So of that $6700,000 at this one, I was like, okay, I could I can take five or six thousand off of that and still love the vehicle. the

The they do have a fifty eight hundred dollar option that they call Pinnacle Line with the digital extra stuff in there, which includes your HUD. It includes some of the MB assistant and and some of the I think some of the ambient lighting and stuff, the extra elevated is part of that. That, even though that's an expensive package, that's probably one that I would want to have on there. and so I thought that's that's kind of where I was at with the with the 67 was seemed like a a

pretty good price for the for the CLA, but I personally would probably not mind losing about six thousand dollars in options.

Stephanie Brinley (06:57)
and and not mind at all. The Lexus w ended up about fifty-eight thousand, which seemed to be quite reasonable. It starts at fifty-five, but just the color and and really it was mostly the color and a cold area package. There's not a lot of packages on top of that luxury.

E luxury version of the of the E350 or 350E. again, I think that that 58,000 for for that price point isn't terrible for what it is. Yeah, it's more expensive, but the than than the ES used to be, because I do think we would have a couple thousand dollars more in the ES line in general. And I think Lexus has done a decent job of sort of keeping again taking that hybrid on electric pricing and laying them, layering them.

almost on top of each other so that you can get a Lexus ES three fifty electric or a hybrid and spend similar money. Or you can go up to the more expensive the the E f ES500 electric is more powerful and and you can go up there and it gets a little bit more expensive, of course, with the extra power and battery. But you know, their pricing is it it's it's more expensive than the previous ES, but I don't think that if truly what you want is an electric in that segment and out of that company.

I don't think the pricing for the Lexus ES three fifty is is a really significant gaining factor within that segment and within that that customer. But I enjoyed both of them. and I did find the C L A a little bit more engaging as a driver's car.

Sam Abuelsamid (08:31)
the the ES you know is got a lot bigger with this generation. I

Stephanie Brinley (08:37)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (08:37)
mean it's it's actually what I think the it's l it's larger than all but the most recent generation of the L S that got discontinued.

Stephanie Brinley (08:45)
At last. Yep.

Sam Abuelsamid (08:48)
so it's it's a big car and got a lot of room in the back seat. You know, so if you got passengers, you know, they will they will be comfortable back there.

Stephanie Brinley (08:56)
They would appreciate that for sure. but I

Sam Abuelsamid (08:57)
Did did you have the executive seating package back there?

Stephanie Brinley (09:00)
did not. I was kind of surprised. Like it you know, it it's the it's the trim level that you could order that package, but it wasn't on there. Like I looked before, I was like, wait, this doesn't make sense. No, I did not have that. I was curious about that that package. I don't remember the cost of the package, but it it it's an interesting one because I feel like it's really developed for

really for for what ES wants to do in other markets. and just as a you know, we'll throw it in and the US buyers can choose it if they want to. I don't think that that outside of maybe in my box that automakers have done really well with executive packages, pardon me, in that second in that second row, not in that in that category. and Genesis has done it a couple of times and it just US consumers just don't seem to check the box enough to make that standard or make that feature last more than a model to a year.

bottle or two years. So we'll see if if Lexus holds on to it. But no I didn't I didn't have it. I I was looking forward to it, but I didn't have it.

Sam Abuelsamid (10:03)
So I haven't had a chance to spend time with one of the with either the RAV4 or the ES beyond the the first drive programs yet. I they they that particular fleet manager has not seen fit to put one in my driveway yet. so I haven't had a chance to spend a lot of time with the new infotainment system that that Toyota and Lexis have. What did you think about that after spending a week with it?

Stephanie Brinley (10:30)
it's a little bit faster I and and operates better that way, but honestly the things that I was doing, I I did use more CarPlay for navigation than I did the internal for that. so just played with it a little bit. It it's faster and it moves things around easier, incrementally improved. it didn't come away from it thinking, okay, this is head and shoulders above what they had before.

But you know, these these infotainment systems just get better and better and better. And they launch and they seem really great because they're better than what they were last year. And after a bit it doesn't feel as fast and you start finding stuff and then they make it better. So I I felt like it was in an incremental improvement, a solid incremental improvement, but not not a purchase or not purchase level of improvement.

Sam Abuelsamid (11:24)
Okay. any any other thoughts on on these two that you want to share?

Stephanie Brinley (11:32)
I think that's that's about it. they were they were quite interesting. Interesting it was I was excited that I had both of them kind of at the same time. You know,

Sam Abuelsamid (11:39)
Mm-hmm.

Stephanie Brinley (11:40)
it's not it's or roughly the same time. It's really rare to to have the a schedule line up like that, even to have one back to back. so it was it was really interesting to have two cars at the same time, or roughly the same time, and I in the two sedans and you know, I basically I think both brands have executed

really well to what they express and what they say they wanna be at price points that work for their customers. They're not price points that work for every customer, but they're price

Sam Abuelsamid (12:09)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (12:09)
points that work for their customers.

Sam Abuelsamid (12:11)
Although, you know, I mean the the ES, you know, I mean, it's not they're not neither of are cheap, but you know, the ES in particular, you know, I think for what you're getting is a pretty reasonable price point, you know, for a premium sedan, you know, that's a fairly large car. Yeah, and

Stephanie Brinley (12:29)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (12:30)
you know, fifty to sixty thousand dollars, you know, for a price range there. Not not not all that bad.

Stephanie Brinley (12:35)
It it absolutely is.

No, it's not contextually to that. But if you're an ES owner who bought one four or five years ago and you come in and and it's four grand more to get into the vehicle, like that's where a consumer might be like, but but what? But consumers do understand technology. Mm-hmm. Yep. Yep. And that and there's there's a reason for it. It's an

Sam Abuelsamid (12:50)
But yeah, but then again, you know, you look at anything, you're gonna you're gonna see the same that same kind of price increase. So Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (12:59)
only platform, it's electric, it's hybrid, it's got and and and and.

So if you're a consumer moving from one to another, y you might not like the price increase, but you understand you're getting something for that money.

Sam Abuelsamid (13:10)
And one of the one of the key things that Lexus talked about earlier when they did the launch program last spring was trying to attract younger buyers with with the new ES. What do you th I mean, do you think this car was gonna pull in younger buyers?

Stephanie Brinley (13:29)
I don't know. the exterior and interior look terrific. so visually I don't think that's a problem. I think there's some opportunity there, but it it it's it depends on kind of what that younger buyer is is is looking for. The assumption will be a longer younger buyer would want to be a little bit more engaged, but maybe not. there's potential there because of the technology that's involved in that. but it's also always the

almost always the the case. I want to go for a younger buyer is pretty standard in any marketing pitch you see. so there's opportunity to do that and a lot of that opportunity is from the technology that's there and simply making it hybrid only, a hybrid or electric only and taking out the gas. really for some younger people can can change what they're considering. so I think it it can make a difference in that it's a little bit styling, it's a little bit technology.

Sam Abuelsamid (14:23)
Cool. All right. Robbie, what about you?

Roberto Baldwin (14:27)
I drove what did I drive? I drove this whoa, it disappeared. I drove the Subaru Uncharted. Put it back in the in the spreadsheet. There we go. I drove the Subaru Uncharted. The it's a and right off the bat I got in the car that this is a weird little car. Because it is it's a weird little EV. it's it it's it you know it's of the

And that this doesn't make it bad. It's just kind of weird. It's kind of stout and sort of like it's like the ends got chopped off when you look at the design wise, like the front just stops, the back just stops. There's like someone stuck it in there, like, you know what? We made this six inches too long. Get the knife. Just hack

Stephanie Brinley (15:16)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (15:16)
off the front, hack off the back.

Send it on its way. That said, everyone who saw this thought this was a very fancy, like it was a pr like a lot of my friends like, that's a really fancy car. I'm like, no, it's not. It's a Subaru. So doesn't make fancy cars. Subaru

Sam Abuelsamid (15:31)
Ha ha.

Roberto Baldwin (15:32)
makes cars. But that yeah, so so chopping things off apparently seems to make things fancier. it you know, I f it you

For the vehicle, I felt like I was sitting a little too high. I like you know, but that's that's that's most vehicles for me nowadays, but this one felt a little like whoa, I'm a s I'm sitting a little high. And that's that's that's a seat issue. That's just you know, people want you know, people say I want to be able to see over the car in front of me, so the automaker's like, all right, add an inch or two to the bottom of the seat. Boom, done. that's it. Driving around, yeah, it's a nice little it's a it's it's a it is a a good little EV. I I was unable to do

a mileage run i i've actually have to do that today or tomorrow so i don't know if it meets its super secret range apparently like you go on like subaru doesn't give you a monroni they give you like a like a like a data sh a sheet with all the stuff but it's not like a real so you have to so then I was like I'll just look on the press site I'm like no I can't find it's like between 270s whatever and three whatever that's the range of the range and I'm like

Can you so I just went to fueleconomy.gov and I had the GT, the GT all-wheel drive with the twenty inch wheels. And so of course, because of that, it had the least amount of range, which is two seventy-three. So if I'd had the regular non twenty inch wheels, it would have been two eighty seven for the for the for the vehicle. it yeah, it's ten

Stephanie Brinley (17:03)
I don't know, can you live with with cool wheels and and

a little bit less like I I got like ten miles less range and cool wheels. I think I could do that.

Roberto Baldwin (17:09)
I I mean, I don't

know if they're cool, but they're wheels. How's

Sam Abuelsamid (17:10)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (17:12)
Yes. Fair enough.

Roberto Baldwin (17:17)
that? Well, is it better? Does it is it cooler? Like, you know, we we're we're we're sacrificing ride quality, you're sacrificing, you know, range.

Stephanie Brinley (17:22)
That's a judgment call. No. Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (17:26)
Sure. I mean when we got our car, I didn't ask like what kind of wheels we were gonna get. I just got whatever was on the car. I think she was like,

Stephanie Brinley (17:33)
Uh-huh.

Roberto Baldwin (17:33)
Well, this is what we got.

So I think that's essentially what's gonna happen. People will go into the into a dealership, they'll say, you know, what do you got? I want this car, what do you got? And then they'll say, We got these three. They all have twenty inch wheels, and they're like, Alright, I guess I'll pick the blue one. That's yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (17:50)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (17:50)
mine was grey, so it was invisible. has a seventy four point seven kilowatt hour battery pack. So if we just do the math, it gets about three point six miles per kilowatt hour, which is you know

Pretty good, especially for for Subaru or you know, they're you know, this essenti this isn't a t a Toyota is what this is. It's a t it's a rebadge Toyota. that said, you know, it has that cool hill descent that I really like on the Subaru's where it just turns on automatically when you're in off-road mode. so I I I really appreciate that. it has some pretty good ground currents ground clearance. Ground clearance. ape something. so

Sam Abuelsamid (18:32)
It's eight point

three.

Roberto Baldwin (18:33)
Yeah, eight point three. So you can actually do stuff with it if you want to. You know, your average Subaru off roading, which again is more than most people off road their Jeeps or their lifted Toyota forerunners or, you know, whatever else people are pretending they're gonna off road in and those things are pristine and the st

Sam Abuelsamid (18:49)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (18:50)
none of the paint has a single scratch or or a fleck of mud that wasn't from the target parking lot.

Stephanie Brinley (18:56)
Okay.

Roberto Baldwin (18:58)
the interior cause it's the GT is sort of the top of the line. It's actually it had

Like heated and cooled seats, which I was just like, you know, like I wasn't expecting cooled seats from a Subaru. the infotainment system is it's fine, it works, it does what it's supposed to do. Like Stephanie, you know, you end up with using CarPlay, plug it in. There's my music, there's my my stuff. The dash cluster is so incredibly busy. It's just like there's so much stuff in the bottom right hand corner. There's so many little icons that are just like all these things going on.

And the the steering wheel again is also busy. It's like one of those space cars from the eighties, like in a sci-fi movie where in the on the the steering wheel they put like an entire computer. There's so much stuff

going on on the and like I'll you know, all this all carries over from from Toyota who's like, hey, let's put everything. They can't say we don't have physical buttons. Sure, you're right, you can't. But you don't have to put them all on the steering wheel.

Stephanie Brinley (19:56)
Yeah. Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (19:57)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (19:58)
That said, I I I really like this little car. I drove it around, took it into the city, took it to somewhere. I don't know. Somewhere else. took it to see family, took it to Costco. yeah, it's a nice little car. Seats went down. I was able to put my giant keyboard case in there when I had to go to band practice. yeah, it's a nice it's a nice little car. it has and let me see. But is it nice enough for the price? So the starting price for this, the uncharted

it's forty three thousand seven hundred and ninety five dollars. So two hundred and seventy for the G T. So

Sam Abuelsamid (20:35)
The G T. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (20:37)
and it is it does it is quick. It is fun, you know, it does it it will get out of its way, it will go for it, if you if you want. but it charges at one hundred and fifty kilowatts. So it's four hundred you know, so you're paying forty over forty thousand for a four hundred volt vehicle, hundred and fifty kilowatts. it does have a you know

eleven kilowatts A C charging, so that's great at night. when you're just charging at home, which again most people who have a house or somewhere where they can charge. That's how they're going to charge. So that's great. so it's it's you know, for the G T are you like, sure, I guess, you know, for for that price point. when there's, you know, the E V E V V six, the the

Ionic five and other vehicles that charge a little bit quicker. if you don't go if you're not going on any sort of like real road trips, then that's hundred and fifty's fine. It's fine. That's not the end of the world. if you know, just just take a a real hard look at yourself and think to yourself, I'm gonna go on a road trip and then really think about the last time you went on a road trip. That was more than

Sam Abuelsamid (21:41)
Ha ha.

Roberto Baldwin (21:42)
like two hundred miles. Because a lot of people are like, I'm gonna go on a road trip and then you're like, Cool, when's the last time you went on a road trip? And they're like,

Sam Abuelsamid (21:52)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (21:53)
So ninety seven

Sam Abuelsamid (21:56)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (21:58)
It was for Lollapalooza and the Beastie

Stephanie Brinley (22:01)
Yes.

Roberto Baldwin (22:01)
Boys were opening. So ninety three So yeah. It's

Stephanie Brinley (22:06)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (22:07)
it's yeah. So it you know, it's it even it's it's a Toyota Sloop Subaru mash up, it's a Voltron of those two vehicles. so yeah, you could you know, I I I'm looking forward to trying out the the trailseeker still.

Fingers crossed. this does have the knack port, so you're gonna be able to and it's the f in the front fender as opposed to the rear, which I think I I still like well why are we putting the charger? I know why, but come on, just put in the front. And everyone's every time we like there's you're driving into any sort of parking lot and you know every Tesla has to back into their spot and you're driving and now you gotta wait for this person to back in the it's like when the person with the big ram truck has to back into their spot. You're like, what are we doing? What's going on?

Like, so it's quicker. No, it's not.

Stephanie Brinley (22:54)
No.

Roberto Baldwin (22:55)
I can tell you, it's not. So

Stephanie Brinley (22:57)
No.

Roberto Baldwin (22:58)
yeah, so now we're now we're forcing everyone to do that, which you know, whatever. yeah, no, I I I actually I I I like I think the infotainment screen is fine. It works well. it it does what it's supposed to do. The dash cluster, again, just so many little like icons in that lower right hand corner. And the vehicle had it needs maintenance soon.

this probably rotate the tires. I mean I get that alarm. Yeah, I get that that that

Sam Abuelsamid (23:24)
Ro rotate the tires, change the cabin air filter. Which, you know, you can do yourself in about five minutes.

Roberto Baldwin (23:30)
yeah, I get that that sort of thing. But it kept binging when I would turn the car on. Bing, bing, bing, for for like needs maintenance. I'm like this is not Subaru, this is not Toyota. This is literally every automaker. Settle down with the with the

Stephanie Brinley (23:43)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (23:44)
beeping. Because there's a signal to to noise ratio. So if everything is the most important thing

Nothing is

the most important thing. You're just creating

Stephanie Brinley (23:51)
Nothing. Yes.

Roberto Baldwin (23:52)
noise. You're not and so instead of saying, hey, let's reserve this for like the two important things. Like, my gosh, your your tire is really low. You're almost out of charge. let's say three Godzilla attacks. So

Sam Abuelsamid (24:07)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (24:08)
just

Stephanie Brinley (24:08)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (24:10)
So if you're if you know if if it's for every single thing.

Sam Abuelsamid (24:11)
Although truthfully, if Godzilla

was attacking, the the warning's probably not gonna be much help.

Roberto Baldwin (24:17)
Yeah, yeah. It's because you're probably gonna know.

Stephanie Brinley (24:21)
You might. You might.

Roberto Baldwin (24:21)
Yeah, is that mothra

flying overhead? dear. Just driving the other direction. What do I do? What do I just other way, other way, just other way.

Sam Abuelsamid (24:24)
Ha ha ha.

Stephanie Brinley (24:26)
What do I do about it? Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (24:31)
so yeah, the the the you know again I had, you know, my Kona electric for we had it for three years, and every once in a while it would just bing. Never figured out what that bing was for. You just mean drive Bing!

Sam Abuelsamid (24:43)
It was just it was just a test, just to make sure that it's like, you know, the emergency broadcast system where periodically they have to run a test. Yeah. Just gotta make sure the bang

Roberto Baldwin (24:48)
Yeah, it's just like a Yeah, it

Stephanie Brinley (24:48)
Yeah. Are you awake? Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (24:51)
is still working.

Roberto Baldwin (24:52)
Like we have emergency sirens for like tsunamis and and and we like you know, we have refineries here in Northern California for the refineries and all this stuff and the first Wednesday at noon and every month they have to test those. So if you're at home and you forget what day it is and you're brrrr Like no and you're like we gotta look at the cal no we're good. We're good. Or the thing is happening on the first Wednesday at noon and you're doomed.

Sam Abuelsamid (25:09)
Yeah, we Yeah,

we we have storm sirens here that the first first Saturday of every month at noon the the siren

Stephanie Brinley (25:14)
Yeah, we do too. A noon. Yep.

Sam Abuelsamid (25:17)
winds up and you know you can hear it.

Stephanie Brinley (25:20)
Yeah. You're like, well it's already another month. Or did

Roberto Baldwin (25:22)
Okay. You're like, I don't know, I gotta pay

I gotta pay rent. yeah,

Stephanie Brinley (25:27)
Right.

Roberto Baldwin (25:28)
so yeah, it's you know, it's it it is a a it's a good little UV. I it's is it is it spectacular or or like super rad? It does what it says. I

Sam Abuelsamid (25:42)
Well, you know, to Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (25:44)
just I you know the four hundred volt, and again this isn't Subaru's fault, this is you know, it's it is what it is with with a company who's

Still kind of a niche company, Subaru. I I

Stephanie Brinley (25:54)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (25:55)
even though everyone in in in north the northeast and everyone in Colorado owns one apparently by law.

Stephanie Brinley (26:02)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (26:04)
and I have one. So yeah. So yeah, I I I enjoyed the Subaru Uncharted. I wish it charged a little bit quicker. and I wish that it they hit there was like some settle down. I wish everyone just settled down once you sat in the driver's seat.

When there's like when it comes to the steering wheel, the dash cluster and the random beeping because hey, this needs maintenance. Okay, cool. Just tell me that on the screen, which it does, but it also is beeping me at me about it. I'm like it's not like the oil's going bad.

Sam Abuelsamid (26:34)
I think I think that's the

I think that's the Toyota heritage. Toyota likes to beep at you for all kinds of stuff.

Roberto Baldwin (26:38)
Yeah, it does. It was like

Stephanie Brinley (26:39)
Yeah, a

Roberto Baldwin (26:40)
the

Stephanie Brinley (26:40)
lot.

Roberto Baldwin (26:40)
remember the Prius where when you backed up it would beep, but it only beeped inside the car. It didn't beep on the outside of the car?

Stephanie Brinley (26:48)
Not helpful. Yeah. Yeah, Toyota's break

Roberto Baldwin (26:51)
And then my my friend

Stephanie Brinley (26:52)
that.

Roberto Baldwin (26:52)
my friend, she bought that car and I think she watched the video and she didn't believe me, I guess, and then she bought the car and then she's like, You know that thing where you said it only beeps inside the car? She's like, I bought the car, it only beeps in the car and the car How is that? Is that just to remind me that I'm back in

Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (27:08)
And you saw that, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (27:09)
A reminder

Roberto Baldwin (27:09)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (27:09)
to look over your shoulder.

Roberto Baldwin (27:11)
Yeah. I mean it's

Stephanie Brinley (27:11)
I haven't

Roberto Baldwin (27:13)
outside the car, yeah, cool. I'm totally fine with that. Tell everybody you're doing something that you can't see. Not

Stephanie Brinley (27:20)
I haven't

driven the the Suru yet, I'm looking forward to it. I've only driven the C HR Toyota Compa companion companion vehicle on the first drive. But I liked it. It like I liked the size of it. I yeah. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (27:29)
Yeah. Well, I mean it's it's exactly the same. Different headlights.

Roberto Baldwin (27:30)
Yeah, it's a it's like a Yeah, it's like a nice little car, you know, it's it's

it handles well, it you know, it takes off really if you got the GT, it's you it's it's sporty, it's fun to sort of drive. It's got eight point

Stephanie Brinley (27:41)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (27:42)
two inches of ground clearance. It's got all the cool little things that you want from a Subaru, but then also like the the all those sort of carryover from Toyota, which is just like y yeah, it's four hundred volts, one hundred and fifty kilowatt charging. all the buttons in the world on a steering wheel and like again that weird section of the dash cluster is just like

Let's just put everything right here and have it all on it all

It's like a clump of everything.

Sam Abuelsamid (28:09)
On you know, on on the pricing point, you know, the the base uncharted, the front wheel drive premium, 'cause you know, Subaru's the only company that their base trims are called premium. the premium front wheel drive actually starts at thirty five grand. And that's got the most range. So,

Stephanie Brinley (28:24)
Okay. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (28:26)
you know, that's that's actually I think fairly reasonable and you know, this the sport,

Roberto Baldwin (28:30)
Yeah, it's a pretty good deal.

Sam Abuelsamid (28:31)
the all wheel

Stephanie Brinley (28:31)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (28:31)
drive sport, you know, is forty, starts at forty. So, you know, the

It's it's actually pretty reasonable, I think, for for what you're getting. And even though, you know, the charging is not the fastest in the world, it's still more than twice as fast as it was when the Soltera first launched a few years ago.

Stephanie Brinley (28:49)
Right.

Roberto Baldwin (28:50)
yeah. Yeah, the the but it was very funny the way the difference between how Subaru and and and Toyota marked it as those vehicles, the BRZX and the Soltera was you couldn't find the BRZXQL L P you couldn't find it at the Subaru bo at

Stephanie Brinley (29:04)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (29:04)
the Toyota booth. Like I had I was looking for it and I finally found it was just on a platter spinning. And then you went to the Subaru booth and it was like

The Ewok Village that they had, except they had a Soltera like up top and center and on that giant screen. Plus they had one outfitted with all the outdoor-ish stuff on the ground. And he's just like, yeah, this is a completely different you know, the same car. A few little tweaks, but just completely different on how they were they were sort of selling it to the world. And I think

Stephanie Brinley (29:33)
Sure.

Roberto Baldwin (29:33)
Yeah, I think this is you know, and I think Subaru they want Subaru buyers want

you know, i it as outdoorsy people, they want sort of that, I should get an EV because I you know, I care about the environment, etc. etc. etc. And so now you have you have choices, which is nice.

Stephanie Brinley (29:51)
Yeah, they

that does. Subaru is one brand that it just feels like E V should be natural. Like

Roberto Baldwin (29:55)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (29:56)
like it of course they would buy one. It it just feels it just feels a little bit more right for them.

Roberto Baldwin (30:01)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (30:01)
And

you know, it it's actually surprisingly good off road. I mean, yeah, it's not gonna go, you know, run the Rubicon Trail or anything or you know, go to Moab, but you know, when when I went on the Soltera drive last summer, you know, they had a pretty decent off road course, a pretty challenging off road course. And we were driving cars that just had regular all season tires on them. You know, so the Soltera has got the same eight point three inch ground clearance as the Uncharted. And, you know

not all terrain tires like you would get on a Ionic 5 XRT or anything like that. And it did shockingly well on that stuff. So they've got they've done a good job with the the electronics that control the traction, you know, directing the torque to the the wheels that have some grip and you know the suspension setup is is well sorted out. So it you know it it's going to take you certainly I think where where any any place that any Subaru owner

Expects to be able to take their car, you know, if if it was a a combustion subaru, it's gonna work just as well with their EVs.

Roberto Baldwin (31:06)
Yeah, there's th I'm sorry, go on.

Stephanie Brinley (31:07)
And it was

and it and it kind of takes the hesitation out of that 'cause you can you can take it in that environment and not be an expert off roader and still feel confident in the vehicle, which I think is kind of where more Subaru buyers would be in the in generally in the sense that they want to go camping, they want to make sure they can get over whatever rut it is that's in the way, but they're they're not out to be outdoor or off road drivers as a hobby. They want to go camping.

and so Subaru does a good job even with it with the Antarctic too to be able to to take that ability to to to a novice or intermediate level and you don't have to feel like you have to be an expert to be able to to do it. which is you don't have to decide, you know, when when do I need low? Do I need high? Do I need this? Do I need that? You just drive it. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (31:56)
Do I need a lock do I need to lock my d diff or diff? Do I have to

do you know Subar's just like no we got this. Just go. Just go do the thing. You're fine. You're fine. If you feel fine, it's likely fine.

Stephanie Brinley (32:01)
Yeah. So it's very well aligned with what those consumers are gonna want to do with it. Yeah.

Usually.

Roberto Baldwin (32:10)
I got

Stephanie Brinley (32:11)
But on the pricing, I would say it's it's I didn't look it up right, but the Equinox EV starts around thirty five as well. So that's

Sam Abuelsamid (32:18)
Mm-hmm.

Stephanie Brinley (32:18)
kind of an interesting comparison because the the Equinox would charge a little bit faster and is larger. so you can get a lot more space and I think you're getting more range.

out of the Chevy Equinox than than out of the Uncharted. so it'll be interesting to see where that lands over over time because they're also two very different vehicles from a personality standpoint.

Roberto Baldwin (32:41)
I think they're two different and and and when you look at the brand loyalty, like Chevy people are sort you know, that sort of like Ford versus Chevy thing that was like for decades is sort of like Meanwhile Subaru people love Subaru.

Stephanie Brinley (32:54)
Yes.

Roberto Baldwin (32:55)
Absolutely love Subaru. So you're gonna get the people who are like, I was in an Impresa and now, you know, I kinda want an EV. I don't know if I need the trail seeker. I need something a little you know, I don't I don't need as much room as I thought I did. I'll you know what

Sam Abuelsamid (33:08)
You know, coming out of a

cross track, for example, you know.

Roberto Baldwin (33:10)
Yeah, I'm coming

Stephanie Brinley (33:11)
You're

Roberto Baldwin (33:11)
out of a cross track as

Stephanie Brinley (33:11)
right. Right.

Roberto Baldwin (33:11)
this is like a perfect sort of like, you know what, I want a cross track, but I want an EV. This is kind of what that is. I think the the outback going to an E V is the trailseeker and the the I don't know. The Justy. We gotta bring the Justy back, that's all I'm saying. I do not like the shifted knob. You have to push down and turn.

Sam Abuelsamid (33:33)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (33:33)
It's really

weird. I don't I like I kept like up up up and at one point I put it I accidentally just put it in neutral and I rolled out of my my park out of my driveway thinking I was in reverse and then I'm like pushing the the accelerator and nothing's happening. I'm like, what the hell's going on?

Sam Abuelsamid (33:46)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (33:47)
I looked down, I'm like, I'm in neutral. Cool.

Sam Abuelsamid (33:52)
Yeah, you know, designers getting too creative with their shifters. Just stop. Stop.

Roberto Baldwin (33:56)
Just settle down.

No one's no one's no one's impressed by your shifter.

Sam Abuelsamid (34:01)
Yeah. Now now that everything's going to electronic shifters, just go with a nice simple on the column, you know, stock. Yeah. Keep keep it simple. No it's a no brainer. Works for everybody.

Roberto Baldwin (34:13)
If you like the big

giant thing like the f F one fifty, the lightning. If you

Sam Abuelsamid (34:17)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (34:17)
like that,

Stephanie Brinley (34:17)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (34:18)
cool. 'Cause it's just like this is kinda nice. Like either on

Stephanie Brinley (34:21)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (34:22)
the stock or just a big clock clock clock clock clock clock forward and back. That's it. Everything else but you want a push button? I'm like, no. No, I don't want that.

Sam Abuelsamid (34:32)
all right. well I I had the the new twenty twenty six Jeep Cherokee Overland. and so you know the the Cherokee went away for a few years. It's back this year. and it got a lot bigger. You know, this current generation of Cherokee is actually about the same size as the previous generation Grand Cherokee. So it's substantially larger than the last Cherokee was.

And for now at least, they're only selling it with a hybrid powertrain. So it's the first time they've put a hybrid. actually actually it's the first regular non-plug-in hybrid that Chrysler sta slash Stellantis has had since the the very brief run of the Durango and Chrysler Aspen back in 2008, which was on sale for about six months before.

before they canceled the whole program, canceled those vehicles.

Stephanie Brinley (35:29)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (35:33)
so this time around they've got they've got a new hybrid system that they developed at least partially in house. I think I think it was also in partnership with with Magna. I believe it's based on on a Magna system. and it's you it's a one point six liter turbo with a power split hybrid. So it's a similar kind of architecture to what you get in a Toyota or Ford.

And so it the behavior is similar to what you get in a Toyota or Ford hybrid. but I think yeah, Stellantis has done a lot more work on kind of the overall refin you know, refined noise refinement of the system. Cause you get into any Toyota hybrid, and you know, with the four cylinder engines, they're pretty loud. You know when you go to accelerate

you are very well aware that that engine is revving up to 4000 rpm and sitting there because you will hear it.

Stephanie Brinley (36:33)
You really are.

Sam Abuelsamid (36:35)
and yeah this one you you can you can hear the engine but it's it's it's much more muted and it's it's a much more pleasant driving experience I think than most of the Toyota hybrids. So overall the total system output is 210 horsepower

230 foot pounds of torque, which, you know, for the size of vehicle is not bad. You know, it's not, it's not gonna win many drag races, but you know, it's in the same ballpark as what you get in a CRV hybrid and a RAV4 hybrid. and although, you know, this one is arguably a little bit larger than those, but still, you know, overall performance is pretty comparable to what you get in those. you know, it's very roomy inside, back seats got a ton of room.

we went out to the lake yesterday. I put the seat cover in there and put one of our dogs back there and you know Patty was all content on the way out to the lake on the way home. Had lots of room in the back for for the stuff, you know, you know, floats and beach chairs and and a sort of other detritus that we take along when we go to the go to the water. so lots of room in there. EPA rates this one at thirty-seven miles per gallon combined, so thirty-nine city.

35 Highway. around town, I would say it's been getting closer to about 37. overall, you know, over the course of this week. I've put over 300 miles on it because it had had to drive over to Windsor on Tuesday and then a couple trips to Detroit and to Pontiac later in the week. And right now it's averaging just shy of thirty four miles per gallon. So it's a few miles per gallon less than the label indicates for fuel economy.

but you know, it's you know, it's still thirty four miles per gallon in a Cherokee is not bad. you know, this you know, I didn't do any off roading with this. Yeah, if you're that's that's true. Yeah. You know, it's still it's still very good.

Roberto Baldwin (38:33)
You should be excited if you're in a Cherokee or any Jeep product that gets over twenty seven miles for God. You should be writing

Stephanie Brinley (38:38)
Ha ha ha.

Roberto Baldwin (38:41)
you should be having parties. You sh you should be writing like editorials in the local paper about it.

Sam Abuelsamid (38:50)
yeah. For you know, for the time being, like I said, the hybrid is the only powertrain you can get in the Cherokee. going forward, there will be there will be a trailhawk that's coming. and that one should be launched, should be introduced sometime before the end of the year, I think. and most likely the trailhawk will have the two liter turbo in there.

at least as an option, if not, you know, standard equipment. And so they'll probably have that two liter turbo available as an alternative to the hybrid for those that want it. and you know, judging by Jeep customers, you know, who do Jeep custom or you know Stellantis customers, you know, they seem like they're willing to spend more to get, you know, worse fuel economy.

Stephanie Brinley (39:42)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (39:42)
you know, especially if you look at RAM sales recently and and Durango sales.

so we'll they'll probably sell a lot of those, but at least for now, the the Cherokee hybrid is doing well. The the one that I had, like said, is the four-wheel drive overland. So, you know, it's an all-wheel drive system, it's not you know a proper, you know, all terrain four wheel drive system. it's got about a little just over eight inches of ground clearance, so it's pretty similar to the to the Subaru's. but I said, you know, this is not gonna go

Rock crawling, you know, this is on all season tires, you know, 20 inch wheels. and you know, I I l

I like the look.

Roberto Baldwin (40:22)
To be honest, that's

that's what everyone in a Cherokee everyone in Cherokee is just doing Subaru off roading. They're not doing anything else, they're

Stephanie Brinley (40:28)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (40:29)
not going

Sam Abuelsamid (40:29)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (40:29)
crazy.

Sam Abuelsamid (40:30)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (40:30)
Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (40:33)
the grand total on this one, the the the overland, you know, is kind of loaded so it's got leather s or leather seats, uniquely perforated Capri leatherette seats is what they call it on the Monroni. you know, this one was in silver zenith. you know, the the U Connect five infotainment system is fine, you know, like like the Toyota. You know, it's

There there's more stuff that's done through touch controls than I would prefer. I'd I'd prefer some more physical controls, but it has manual vents, so I can direct the airflow exactly where I want very precisely without looking at it. Yeah, I can just do it by feel. you know, get dual zone climate control in here, so my wife can set the temperature warmer for her. I like it a little colder when I'm driving. and the only options

on this one. like I say, we're the the silver zenith paint, and the advanced pro tech group, which gets you ventilated front seats, which quite nice this week 'cause it was getting quite warm and humid. the auto dimming rear view mirror, the the digital camera mirror inside, heated rear seats. also a nice feature to have and if you're you know if you got a family that you're hauling around in this thing in the wintertime.

The de icer for the windshield wipers, another very nice winter feature. This is it should really just be called a winter winter package, not more so than a a tech a pro tech package, cause most of the stuff is is really you know for winter driving. Front camera washer. Yeah, you need that more for winter driving. That was nine hundred and ninety-five bucks for the whole package. there's dual pane sunroof on you know on the overland, a whole bunch of other stuff. It's got

Adaptive cruise control, no hands-free system on the Cherokee. and so you know, it it was it's been quite pleasant to drive. yesterday, so we're recording on Sunday afternoon. Yesterday I was out, had to make a run over to Costco for some stuff, and on the way, airbag warning light came on, said, you know, service airbag now. don't know what that's all about.

Roberto Baldwin (42:52)
That's terrifying. See that's a

that's a beep that I would be I would want to hear.

Sam Abuelsamid (42:58)
Yeah. There was no beep. Just a

big warning on the cluster. yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (43:03)
Good luck with that.

Sam Abuelsamid (43:06)
So yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (43:06)
Don't crash. That's all.

Sam Abuelsamid (43:09)
So

Roberto Baldwin (43:08)
Or do crash? I don't know what you want with you in this situation.

Stephanie Brinley (43:10)
Ha ha.

Sam Abuelsamid (43:14)
one one one thing I did notice this week when I was driving, you know, Stellant a couple of years ago, Stellantis launched a partnership with a company called Haas Alerts. and what they do is they they do

Transp they have system where they they s supply transponders for emergency vehicles, so ambulances, fire trucks, police vehicles, tow trucks, bunch of other vehicles. And you know, when they're in the area, you know, if they're doing something, if there's an ambulance, you know, dealing with something or you know, fire truck, whatever, they you know, it sends its location up to the cloud that gets transmitted back to the vehicles. And so

I did the other day see an alert pop up on the infotainment screen for is it a it's for an ambulance. Yeah, there's a an alert for an ambulance. so that's actually a good thing. you know,

Roberto Baldwin (44:08)
Well that's cool.

Sam Abuelsamid (44:09)
to yeah, you know, to get alerts about that sort of stuff, you know, before you come on the scene so you can like get yourself positioned, you know, and move away from from the site. so and and also, you know, especially in town, where there's intersections.

ambulance, you know, or emergency vehicles coming, you know, you're coming up to an intersection and it's going in the, you know, the the cross street. being being more aware of where they are is definitely helpful for safety. I think Tesla also does they supply the host alerts as well on their infotainment system. So that that was a nice feature to see. so

Roberto Baldwin (44:49)
That's weird

because they keep running into emergency vehicles.

Sam Abuelsamid (44:53)
Well, it's it's for the it's for

Roberto Baldwin (44:54)
And they should know.

Stephanie Brinley (44:54)
Well it's a

Sam Abuelsamid (44:55)
it's for the drivers. The autopilot just ignores those alerts.

Roberto Baldwin (44:57)
Okay.

Only one day she's yeah. Come on guys, centrifusion. Let's get this come on.

Stephanie Brinley (45:02)
Ha ha.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:04)
So grand total on this Cherokee, forty six thousand five hundred and eighty five bucks. That's the one that's the biggest downside to this thing. it's it's a it's a little pricey, but you know, other vehicles in this category are getting pricey too, you know.

Stephanie Brinley (45:20)
And that that's with a a lot of content. I think you can you can get RAV4 up there. I think you can get C R V up there.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:24)
Yeah. absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah, you can like a CRV trail sport, you can get absolutely get that into the mid to upper forties there. one one thing that also was a little odd on this thing was the the shape of the steering wheel. it's it's this kind of octagonal shape. It's not even a squirkle, it's it's more octagonal. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (45:42)
no. It is a it's the worst.

Stephanie Brinley (45:43)
Sisquirkle. Yeah. It's just Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (45:47)
It's an octagon. It's the

it's the octagon of hate because it hates your hands.

Sam Abuelsamid (45:53)
Yeah. and so you know and it does have the the steering wheel does have capacitive sensors in there like you have on on GM Supercrews to detect hands on the wheel, but they seem to be in only a very small zone. like right in the upper part of the side segments. And so depending on how you're holding the steering wheel, you can fairly frequently get

You know, get alerts to put your hands on the wheel, even when your hands are on the wheel. so Stellanus might want to expand the the the detection area for those.

Roberto Baldwin (46:31)
It's a bad steering wheel. I have a s I have

Stephanie Brinley (46:33)
Doesn't bother me.

Roberto Baldwin (46:33)
an article coming up for for for Wired about the Cherokee. And when I talked to Cherokee the Jeep they were like, Well, what do you think about steering wheel? I'm like, I hate it. Absolutely hate it. There's where there's nowhere comfortable to put your hands. It's like

Sam Abuelsamid (46:46)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (46:46)
right when you get in the car, the first thing

The first thing that I as soon as I got in the car, I'm like, I hate this car because of the steering wheel. And then, you know, the rest of the car grew on me, but the steering wheel is just so incredibly bad.

Stephanie Brinley (46:56)
Didn't

Roberto Baldwin (46:57)
And I have big hands, so it's but it's still like there's no where do I where do I why? What are we doing with the steering wheel? Settle again, like all the beeping,

Stephanie Brinley (47:05)
It settle down.

Roberto Baldwin (47:07)
just make a round steering wheel. No one was like complaining about round steering wheels. No one was saying,

Stephanie Brinley (47:10)
It does no. I mean I

Roberto Baldwin (47:14)
these suck.

Stephanie Brinley (47:16)
No, but they were complaining about w how visibility sort of issues. I mean talk with the Subar the the the the all of the information that's in that lower corner also gets blocked by the steering wheel sometimes. but I d I haven't driven the Cherokee at home. I was just on the first drive for that a while back, whenever it was. I didn't find the steering wheel to to bother me. and I do feel like it l it lowers the top of the steering wheel, so you're not looking around. I'm short, so I'm not looking around the steering wheel.

I didn't have as many ish and a short drive on the the brief first drive, which is, you know, an hour and a half or so, whatever

Roberto Baldwin (47:50)
Mm-hmm.

Stephanie Brinley (47:50)
that was. so I didn't run into a lot of problems with it, but that that is that first take. and so not long enough to be like, I'm I'm really in com I didn't have any I didn't have any initial at bursts. I was not angry like you. I was like, it's all right, I can work with it.

Roberto Baldwin (48:03)
You weren't angry like me. Cause you could have it you could still have

it rounded and then like s you know sort of square off the top without having all the extra weird angles and and seams that it has that make it Yeah. You can still do the thing. Yeah. Like shuffle stairies is like,

Stephanie Brinley (48:13)
Yeah, yeah. You could. There is some weirdness in there. Yeah, there is.

Roberto Baldwin (48:21)
well I give up

Stephanie Brinley (48:24)
It's a Cherokee. It's okay.

Roberto Baldwin (48:27)
Well that's the whole

that's the sh there's snow, like as a when you're driving in snow

Stephanie Brinley (48:31)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (48:31)
and ice, like shuffle steering's actually pre you know, preferred for s

Stephanie Brinley (48:34)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (48:35)
and this is and it has the whole cold, you know, tech package, I guess. I don't know. I don't know.

Stephanie Brinley (48:38)
Package. I what

did you think of what colour was yours, Sam?

Sam Abuelsamid (48:45)
it was silver.

Stephanie Brinley (48:48)
that's right, I saw you. yeah, I no.

Sam Abuelsamid (48:49)
Yeah. Yeah. Not not not an exciting color, but it yeah, it was fine.

Stephanie Brinley (48:55)
Well the whole this work is gonna head next though is is it's just not it looks kind of like a Jeep, but not really. It's really kind of boring looking, isn't it? It's very anonymous.

Sam Abuelsamid (49:07)
It's it's a little more that's a little generic.

Stephanie Brinley (49:10)
Anonymous, generic. It's not unattractive. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (49:11)
That's what sells. That's boring

boring gray cars sell really great in

Sam Abuelsamid (49:18)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (49:19)
if

Stephanie Brinley (49:18)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (49:19)
you turn on its side if it looks like a C R V and a Ref 4 you're gonna do okay.

Stephanie Brinley (49:23)
Kinda likes that. You know, I think that it'll it'll sell fine, but it there there's been and it does have, you know, plenty of little Jeep DNA bits around, but I i it's not one of the more interesting designs to come out of there. it's a little more more square than they do with a regular with a grind Cherokee that often. but it

Sam Abuelsamid (49:41)
Yeah, I mean the you know, when they when

they revealed it last year, you know, they talked about trying to bring back some of the visual DNA of the old X J Cherokees from the eighties.

Stephanie Brinley (49:50)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (49:52)
you know, so had s it is a little more square, especially compared to the last Cherokee. It's a little more squared off.

Stephanie Brinley (49:57)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (49:57)
You got kind of the the rectangular, daytime running lamps around the around the headlamps, the the kind of X shape and the tail lights, you know, representing the jerry can,

Stephanie Brinley (50:08)
The the Jerry Cannes thing. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (50:10)
yeah.

and you know the the wheel center caps actually have the little Wrangler icon on there, the Wrangler loc the Wrangler profile on the

Stephanie Brinley (50:21)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (50:21)
the center caps. It's like, well, maybe, you know, why not why

Stephanie Brinley (50:24)
That really makes sense?

Sam Abuelsamid (50:25)
not do like you know, X J center caps? Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (50:27)
Right? Yeah.

I mean it looks I I think that it looks a little bit better than the last Cherokee. I do like the wit the direction that it's gone. It's almost just like they almost didn't quite go far enough

Sam Abuelsamid (50:39)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (50:40)
to be to be a little to stand out a little bit more from from the market and so it's just sort of it will it will blend in. It'll blend in nicely, but it does kind of blend in, especially in silver.

Sam Abuelsamid (50:51)
Yeah, I yeah, exactly. I think, you know, when they launch the Trailhawk, you know, it'll probably have a little bit more aggressive look to the front end. Yeah, it'll

Stephanie Brinley (51:01)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (51:02)
it'll it'll have the you know, probably the requisite, you know, tow hooks, you know, red tow hooks and everything else, you know, and just be a little more

Stephanie Brinley (51:09)
It will.

Sam Abuelsamid (51:09)
a little more jeep looking in up front. and you know, bigger wheels

Stephanie Brinley (51:12)
That yeah, that'll make a difference.

Sam Abuelsamid (51:15)
and tires.

Stephanie Brinley (51:17)
Yeah. I I I love while we're talking, I pulled up the pictures from my first drive and I had a blue I was driving a blue one, which does pop a little bit more than the silver,

Sam Abuelsamid (51:26)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (51:27)
when I did it then. But I haven't had it at home yet.

Sam Abuelsamid (51:33)
all right. Let's let's move on to some of the other stuff this week. So let's start off with the the Audi A2 Etron. so you know, Audi took the the wraps off the or mostly took the wraps off the A two Etron. You know, the the pictures that they've published, you know, still have some some some wrap, some camo wrap on them. But they published a story about

How this is the most efficient, most energy efficient Audi ever built. so back in the early 2000s, they they built a a model called the A2, which was a little subcompact hatchback, which at the time was the most efficient vehicle they had ever and was one of the most efficient vehicles of all. I think it was the first one

Stephanie Brinley (52:16)
The world. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (52:17)
in Europe to get certified for under three liters per hundred kilometers, which is about 78 miles per gallon, fuel efficiency. It had a

Tiny little diesel engine is really super aerodynamically efficient. And so they've tried to bring that back, bring bring some of those ideas back with the A two Etron, which of course is an EV. and they're claiming twelve point eight kilowatt hours per hundred kilometers, which works out to about just over twenty kilowatt hours per hundred miles. and forget what that works out to in kilo or you know.

was it 20.6 so it's almost five miles per kilowatt hour, which is pretty impressive. and you know they yeah, four point it was four point eight five miles per kilowatt hour. So they're you know they're claiming this, you know, as you know, one of the most efficient certainly the most efficient Audi they've ever done, one of the most efficient vehicles in the world. Technically,

The lucid air pure rear wheel drive is rated slightly better. but you know, as we know, you know, lucids always underperform their official ratings. and so yeah, and the VWs and Audis tend to at least match or do a little better than their official ratings. So this could actually end up doing a little better in terms of overall efficiency.

Yeah, the battery's not as huge. It's only a sixty one it's a sixty one kilowatt hour lithium iron phosphate battery. and I don't think they they didn't give a a range for it. I find let me find that note I had with the where I calculated all that out.

Roberto Baldwin (54:11)
I will say that the g the the

gravity I had actually like was better than the range they this is the first lucid that I've had during the t

Sam Abuelsamid (54:20)
yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (54:20)
where during the test it actually bested its its its EPA range.

Sam Abuelsamid (54:25)
Okay. yeah, so the this this should work out, you know, based on the rating, it should get about two hundred and eighty miles of range. which which is pretty good for you know for a little car like this. what what do you think of the the look of the A two Etron?

Stephanie Brinley (54:45)
I actually I I kinda like it. I'm looking

Roberto Baldwin (54:48)
Yeah, I think it's cool.

Stephanie Brinley (54:49)
at it right now. I think it looks cool, but I I don't have the I I didn't we we don't expect them to sell it in the United States, I believe is the case.

Sam Abuelsamid (54:57)
No, sad sadly not.

Stephanie Brinley (54:58)
Like that's the sad part of it. It is this Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (55:00)
Like, hey, look at this cool thing. Yeah, we can't have it. America.

Stephanie Brinley (55:05)
but that's they do that. They're that that decision is driven out of history because every time they have a car that small in the Audi lineup it doesn't work very well in the US. So

Roberto Baldwin (55:13)
Merced

yeah, Mercedes the A you

Stephanie Brinley (55:15)
You know.

Roberto Baldwin (55:15)
know, the A class, no one s bought the A class, even though it was awesome. Like it

Stephanie Brinley (55:19)
Yeah,

Roberto Baldwin (55:20)
luxury vehicles, luxury car l Germans and small cars outside of the Mini just don't mix.

Stephanie Brinley (55:26)
They they they unfortunately they don't. And so it's kind of interesting we can say, like so sad that we can't have it. I'm like, well, there's an answer to that. Americans could buy more small cars than we

Sam Abuelsamid (55:34)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (55:35)
could have it. So

Roberto Baldwin (55:37)
Easy talk.

Stephanie Brinley (55:38)
I know, I know. But I do like the look of it.

Sam Abuelsamid (55:39)
Americans would rather go into huge amounts of debt than than be seen driving a small car.

Roberto Baldwin (55:42)
Yep. Yeah.

Wop wop.

Stephanie Brinley (55:48)
Well, but it is it does the the the numbers that they're putting out look pretty cool and and and all the little bits of technology that they have going into it'll be interesting. And one way or another that'll still ultimately affect vehicles that are offered in the United States because as technologies and things are learned get better and all of the the things that we know about evolution and iterative improvements still apply.

Sam Abuelsamid (56:13)
Yeah, I they've done they've done a lot of work on the aero. they've done work on the motors, the battery. you know, it's a new L F P battery with prismatic cells. and they've done a lot to reduce the cost of not just the L F P but also, you know, the way the battery pack is constructed. that's should be much more cost effective to produce. So yeah.

Hopefully we'll see some of this technology filter into some Volkswagen models in the coming years.

Stephanie Brinley (56:44)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. We should.

Sam Abuelsamid (56:49)
and then also on the on the relatively low cost EV front, we have the Ford Fathom.

Stephanie Brinley (56:59)
Can we not make a joke? Let's not. Can we please? Let's just not.

Let's just not.

Sam Abuelsamid (57:04)
come on.

Roberto Baldwin (57:02)
but this it's not a

joke, it's it's a it's a it's a unit of measurement, it's a unit of depth, and a fathom is six feet. And no one thought about that.

Stephanie Brinley (57:10)
I know.

apparently they did not. They used the sort of the more colloquial thought of it.

Sam Abuelsamid (57:15)
Actually they did. It

Roberto Baldwin (57:17)
So it's six feet

under? Is that what you want? You want a dead car?

Sam Abuelsamid (57:20)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (57:24)
They have a whole

Sam Abuelsamid (57:24)
They were they were

Roberto Baldwin (57:25)
long like I read their whole little like the depth and

Stephanie Brinley (57:27)
I didn't yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (57:28)
blah blah blah I'm like

Sam Abuelsamid (57:29)
Yeah, they were looking

at it from the verb form of the word fathom, not not the

Stephanie Brinley (57:31)
Yes.

Sam Abuelsamid (57:32)
noun.

Stephanie Brinley (57:33)
Yes. And it's it's fine. It's it's fine. You know, product does not live or die in its name. Names

Roberto Baldwin (57:41)
No, it doesn't matter. I mean car

car names are dumb, to be honest. Most of don't make any sense.

Stephanie Brinley (57:45)
Most

of them don't make any sense. So I you know, I I think that after this first news cycle where they explain to us how how cool and impressive they are and this is why they use this word, 'cause it, you know, speaks to how amazing they are. like you move on. You know, we don't need the origin story f to to stick around for very much longer at all.

Roberto Baldwin (58:07)
Yeah, the the

origin, like it was just it's just word salad marketing. I like, god I'm like, guys, did you just look

Stephanie Brinley (58:11)
Yeah. And it's not

Roberto Baldwin (58:14)
in the dictionary and look up this word? 'Cause that's what people are gonna say.

Stephanie Brinley (58:16)
Right. And

what the orders orders start at the beginning of twenty seven, deliveries are c third quarter of twenty seven, so we've still got another year. And and part of this is just keeping the the vehicle in the news and keeping it which they need to do, make sure that people don't forget that they're doing it and make sure that people get excited about it when it arrives. So that's not a bad thing, but part of that whole construction is is telling a story and keeping us talking about it. And believe me, that is what I have talked about for the last few days, many

times.

Sam Abuelsamid (58:44)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (58:46)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (58:46)
And,

you know, it it does appear that, you know, the the program is delayed, because a year ago when I was talking to a little over a year ago when I was talking to Lisa Drake, who was at the time head of industrialization for Ford's Model E division, she you know, she said production was due to start in fourth quarter of this year with delivery starting early in twenty-seven. And

So, you know, now it looks like it you know, they're doing pre orders early in twenty seven.

Stephanie Brinley (59:18)
I saw that little slip. I was like, I feel like that's not what we said before.

Roberto Baldwin (59:19)
It's like a year. It's a year slip

because it's like we're gonna show it off in twenty s early twenty twenty seven

Sam Abuelsamid (59:24)
Well they they haven't actually said when deliveries are gonna happen

Roberto Baldwin (59:27)
and then fall of like twenty twenty seven. I think is

Sam Abuelsamid (59:30)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (59:30)
the the the timeline that they've given now. So so it's it's slipped a it's it's slipped

Stephanie Brinley (59:33)
Yeah. It they either said Fall or said Q three, one of the two.

Roberto Baldwin (59:36)
a year. You have to yeah, you know, t I I think when you're when you're talking about like stuff like this, you have to be careful that you don't fall into the trap of Volkswagen and the ID buzz.

Where you just keep putting out a little bit of news and a little bit of news and then seven years later the car comes out and no one cares anymore? Because you should have butt car out five years ago. So

Stephanie Brinley (59:54)
That is a risk. Yeah, yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (59:58)
yeah, we'll see. We'll see. You know, it's it's Ford's EV strategy has been they make good cars, but the strategy itself is is sort of bonkers all over the place and their pricing strategy again is sort of bonkers all over the place.

they have

Stephanie Brinley (1:00:13)
Mm-hmm.

Roberto Baldwin (1:00:13)
a h you know, so

I I know people like, Well this the slate's in trouble. I'm like, Are they though? Is this the thing that's

Stephanie Brinley (1:00:19)
Well,

Roberto Baldwin (1:00:20)
gonna I

Stephanie Brinley (1:00:21)
Slate's problems aren't related to whether or not there's a Ford Fathom.

Roberto Baldwin (1:00:24)
Exactly.

Stephanie Brinley (1:00:26)
Ford Fathom does not help slate, but but it doesn't it's not

Roberto Baldwin (1:00:28)
It doesn't help slate, but it's yeah, I think

Sam Abuelsamid (1:00:31)
But you know, I mean it's it's gonna be priced it's gonna be priced

Roberto Baldwin (1:00:31)
and I think it's two different vehicles.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:00:35)
starting at twenty eight three fifty plus fifteen ninety-five destination charge. So, you know, twenty nine nine and change. Yeah. And you know,

Roberto Baldwin (1:00:41)
Thirty thousand. The thirty thousand. Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:00:43)
Yep. And

Sam Abuelsamid (1:00:45)
for that price, you get, you know, seating for five, four doors, bed, frunk, Apple Maps navigation, you know, all all built in, power windows, locks. yeah, and they they're saying

Stephanie Brinley (1:00:57)
All that stuff. Apple CarPlay

on screens.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:01:00)
They're saying interior

volume greater than a Toyota RAV4. and RAV4 is like 98 and a half cubic feet. So, you know, this should.

Stephanie Brinley (1:01:08)
Look up the cubic

feet for Ford Maverick.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:01:11)
Ford Maverick is 100.3. So it'll probably be yeah, it'll probably

Stephanie Brinley (1:01:13)
Mm-hmm. It's already bigger.

Roberto Baldwin (1:01:13)
Yeah, so that yeah, so it doesn't

Sam Abuelsamid (1:01:16)
be about the same as the Maverick.

Roberto Baldwin (1:01:17)
Yeah, so it doesn't really that that that that thing doesn't make sense. It doesn't matter. It's like it makes

Stephanie Brinley (1:01:22)
It's it's a factory that

Roberto Baldwin (1:01:24)
it like when when for for years car makers were saying, it has a rear it has a has a rear facing camera for backing up. I'm like, Yeah, legally you have to have that.

Stephanie Brinley (1:01:31)
You have to.

Roberto Baldwin (1:01:32)
That's why are you putting that on the this yeah, this is the same thing where it has the same, you know, more interior than than spit cubic volume than a than a RAV4. I'm like, Yeah, but that's it's it's people.

space. It's not you're making it sound it's like this big cavernous like van. No, it's people space. Stop it.

Stephanie Brinley (1:01:49)
It's it's it's a weird

it's a weird for me, it feels like a weird factoid for them to just like glom onto because I'm like, Well, your truck already does. So like that it's it's not a bad thing to have. It's a good amount of space to to to have in the vehicle, but it's not something new and different that they haven't been able to do before. They already did that. So it's not an accomplishment

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:07)
Yeah. Yeah, you're like

Stephanie Brinley (1:02:09)
in terms of moving it forward or making it a better vehicle, 'cause you've already done that. So I I just I just think it's a weird number for them to

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:18)
I I'm concerned about the

Stephanie Brinley (1:02:18)
Continue to focus on.

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:19)
large digital screen thing they said, which makes me feel like w okay okay, but does that mean you're only gonna put a single screen? Are you gonna pull a a Tesla slash Volvo slash?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:02:31)
I don't think so. I think

it's gonna be you know, there's gonna be a center screen, there's gonna be a cluster. I think it's gonna

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:36)
A dash class, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:02:38)
be, you know, more like mock E style, but not not I I don't think a portrait style screen.

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:45)
It's just like large digital screen, I'm like

Stephanie Brinley (1:02:50)
and they they hit the price point,

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:51)
Mm.

Stephanie Brinley (1:02:51)
which will be good and I'll see how long they you know, we'll we'll all see how long they stay at it, but

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:55)
You have

to buy it within the first three weeks is all I'm saying. And

Sam Abuelsamid (1:02:59)
Ha ha.

Roberto Baldwin (1:02:59)
hope that your dealership doesn't rip you off.

Stephanie Brinley (1:03:03)
Yeah. Mm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:03:03)
Yeah, I mean that's that's

always a that's always a challenge.

Roberto Baldwin (1:03:05)
'Cause you 'cause you can

order it for the price that they they think and then when it shows up the dealership can screw you over because it's happen

Sam Abuelsamid (1:03:12)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:03:12)
it happened to my friends who bought Broncos and the dealership's like, Yeah, you're now your Broncos seven thousand dollars more They're like, No, but I I yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:03:17)
Well, we we talked about one

of our listeners that wrote in, you know, he had ordered one, ordered, you know, a launch edition Maverick back early on. And he got the notification from Ford that, yep, your your truck is built, it's on its way to the dealer, should be there on you know, Wednesday. called the dealer, they said, no, we don't have that vehicle. And it turns out they had basically

Stephanie Brinley (1:03:45)
Sold

Sam Abuelsamid (1:03:45)
sold it out from under him.

Even though this was a a c customer custom order from the factory, they sold it to somebody else that was willing to pay more for it.

Roberto Baldwin (1:03:55)
Yeah. And then people wonder why I'm excited about the slate. Like all this stuff.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:03:59)
Yeah. So just

Roberto Baldwin (1:04:02)
And I'm like, I don't need a center screen. I don't want any of this I don't need any of this other stuff or and again I'm a very weird edge case, so is there enough edge cases for an entire company to exist?

Stephanie Brinley (1:04:12)
That's the question. And I the edge case is there and you're out there, Robbie, and other people feel the same way about it. So Slate will find some buyers. it's just always that

Roberto Baldwin (1:04:20)
Yeah. There's

Stephanie Brinley (1:04:21)
how many and what is what comes up next.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:04:22)
I s I still think the the majority

of customers are probably gonna be commercial customers.

Stephanie Brinley (1:04:27)
Maybe.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:04:28)
yeah. And you know, they can take advantage of the you know, the cheap wraps, you know, to put their own custom

Stephanie Brinley (1:04:33)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:04:34)
graphics

Roberto Baldwin (1:04:34)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:04:34)
on there, things like that. yeah, and

Roberto Baldwin (1:04:37)
The modularity

of being able to do, you know, all these crazy things to the vehicle, specifically for your business, makes it like really like, I'm just gonna get the car, I'm gonna add the things I need instead of getting the car, stripping things off, putting things on, doing this thing, doing this other thing, and just being like, I just I just need this. And I'll get exactly this.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:04:55)
Yeah, I mean what you'll

what you'll probably see is like some commercial customers will buy them, get the the SUV cap on there, but with no back seats, you know, and outfit it

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:05)
Yeah, just

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:06)
with some racks that they can pull out, you know, with whatever they're whatever

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:08)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:09)
they're hauling or delivering. and just just for reference, the Ford Ranger, which is quite a bit larger overall than a Maverick, it only has ninety eight point three cubic feet of passenger volume.

Stephanie Brinley (1:05:20)
Yeah, it's slightly smaller.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:21)
So you actually get more room in a Maverick than you do in a Ranger.

Stephanie Brinley (1:05:25)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:26)
so yeah, it'll it'll probably be right around a hundred cubic feet in the fathom.

Stephanie Brinley (1:05:30)
And I and that'll be fine. Like I th I do think it's a good it's a good attribute, but it just seems weird that they're obsessed with it. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:35)
Some weird thing. It's a weird flex is what it is. It's a very weird flex.

Like, hey, we got lots of room for you to sit in your car.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:40)
Well, you know, the the rep

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:42)
Like Okay. Like in the Maverick?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:44)
For for the last couple of years,

RAV4 has been the number one selling nameplate in the US market. Yeah, I mean they have they I mean this year they're down a little because of initial supply problems as they switched

Stephanie Brinley (1:05:53)
Changeover. Yep.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:05:54)
over. But last year they sold 475,000 RAV4s in the US. Yeah. So yeah, it's a very popular vehicle. So to compare yourself to that.

Stephanie Brinley (1:05:58)
Right. They're doing okay. So it and it's a it's a popular vehicle.

Roberto Baldwin (1:05:58)
They're doing okay.

Stephanie Brinley (1:06:03)
Yeah, and it's a and it's a number that you that consumers can get their head around pretty quickly without looking it up and thinking about it and they'll think, Okay, I know what that means.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:06:08)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, people know how big a RAP four is.

Stephanie Brinley (1:06:12)
Right.

Roberto Baldwin (1:06:12)
I think

more more automakers need to like just throw RAF4 like hey our wheel beast is larger than the RAV4. Like Okay.

Stephanie Brinley (1:06:18)
Ha ha ha.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:06:19)
Ha ha

Roberto Baldwin (1:06:21)
Cool.

Stephanie Brinley (1:06:21)
Especially right now

when they're not they don't wanna tell us the pacifications, they don't wanna show a real picture yet. They they're holding back on a lot of things in terms of information while they're sharing sharing other little bits and pieces there. But I I it's gonna be interesting to see how it evolves. And everybody knows that base price is not generally where the biggest volume of of any product is is gonna be. So that's that's gonna be some part of the mix. I skeptical my skepticism would come in and say

they were gonna hit that $30,000 number no matter what. No matter if they make any money on that, that number was gonna get hit for at least the

Roberto Baldwin (1:06:55)
Yeah, they're no matter what they needed to do, yeah, they'll they'll be they're good.

Stephanie Brinley (1:07:01)
entry price. And it'll go up to 35, it'll go up to 40, like forty, forty two, forty five, like other that's that's pretty normal walk. Go from thirty to forty-five. That that happens in a lot of different car lines. but at least it puts it in that in that space and gets the conversation there.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:07:19)
Yeah, I remember Maverick Lobo a few weeks back. It was forty five thousand dollars.

Roberto Baldwin (1:07:24)
Twenty five thousand dollars double the price of the original Maverick.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:07:28)
Yeah. More than double.

Roberto Baldwin (1:07:31)
Cool.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:07:32)
but you know, in in this case, you know, like Ford is actually putting a lot of the hardware in as standard equipment on that base model. Like they've said, you know, that twenty-eight thousand or you know, twenty the thirty thousand dollar model will have the all the the new Blue Cruise hardware in there on every single one, just basically following Tesla's pattern, you know, of building in the hardware and making it software enabled.

as as I go along. so mm-hmm.

Stephanie Brinley (1:08:00)
Which be interesting.

one of the things I think sorry to I'm jump in but is if you're if you're at a price point where where thirty thirty two thousand dollars is like where your income can support the the monthly payment of the car, do you have another hundred bucks a month to buy blue crews on top of that? And is it you know it it eases complexity and there's lots of other reasons to just put all the equipment on there. But

if you're buying the low end, I I is that the buyer that's gonna be able to step up for some of the subscription things over time? We'll see. But I I feel

Roberto Baldwin (1:08:35)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:08:35)
like most of the other ones, the higher quick shrimps would be the people that buy it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:08:36)
Yeah, and I I think I think, you know,

there's gonna be a a bunch of customers that are not gonna sign up for subscription for Blue Cruise. but I think, you know, there's also gonna be a f a fair number of customers that that will and it's but a lot's gonna depend on how they price it. you know, you know, how you know, how much yeah, based you know, the standard blue cruise similar to what you have today, it's probably gonna be on the order of about fifty bucks a month. And, you know, I mean w what they're doing

Roberto Baldwin (1:09:02)
Which is too much money.

Stephanie Brinley (1:09:05)
they they

they said next generation blue cruise in the in the statement, so okay.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:09:08)
Yeah. Right. No, but what I'm saying is like

the you know, the the basic functionality, the hands off, you know, highway driving. you know, with you know, and it's based on their next generation, which is cheaper for them to build. it's on an all new software stack. and you know, so that'll probably run about fifty bucks a month. And you know, what you know, what companies have generally been doing is, you know

Making these, you know, so you can sign up and you know, cancel it whenever you want. You're not com you don't have a contract for it, which is, you know, if you're you know, if you decide you're gonna do that road trip finally after twenty some years, you know, you can sign up for Blue Cruise, use it, you know, when you get back from your road trip then you cancel it. Or you forget to cancel it and you keep paying for it for another six months, three years.

Roberto Baldwin (1:09:58)
Like a gym.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:09:59)
Yeah, exactly.

Stephanie Brinley (1:09:59)
Like a gym.

They just announced some new pricing. Or not just a few months ago announced some new pricing on the on Blue Cruise

Sam Abuelsamid (1:10:09)
On blue crews?

Stephanie Brinley (1:10:10)
on the s on the monthly. And I'm trying to find the Ford number and I'm not seeing it yet. They have

Sam Abuelsamid (1:10:15)
Yeah, they've they've they've changed it a few times. I can't remember what the current

number is.

Roberto Baldwin (1:10:19)
What?

For changing the price in those things. No.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:10:22)
Shocking, isn't it?

Stephanie Brinley (1:10:23)
Well, okay,

no, here it is. Okay, so right now for Ford products, Blue Cruise activation is up front twenty th one hundred dollars for three years when you order the vehicle. which is about fifty eight dollars a month if you average that out right. the same with or you can do an eight hundred dollar man annual fee, or you can do a monthly fee. So they've done that in a couple of different ways, and I think the monthly fee ends up being like seventy five bucks a month.

So that's the space they aren't in. They could have.

Roberto Baldwin (1:10:53)
Wait, I think they changed that. Isn't it low cheaper now? It's now

fifty dollars a month.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:10:58)
yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:10:59)
And

Stephanie Brinley (1:10:59)
They're

Roberto Baldwin (1:10:59)
and yeah, that's the

Stephanie Brinley (1:10:59)
going so fast. I mean, 'cause that was

that was that was that was a while ago. So yeah. Yeah, they've changed it a yet again since then and and maneuvered it around. and yeah, it's but they know. The other thing about it is right.

Roberto Baldwin (1:11:08)
Yeah. As long as they're going down, that's the I mean right now it's fifty

bucks a month with I still think it's probably too much for on on on who you are. And like if you're like, cool

Stephanie Brinley (1:11:17)
It depends on your use case, I think, for and what you're doing. I mean,

Sam Abuelsamid (1:11:21)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:11:22)
like I said about the CLA, I could probably go without that. Like my personal driving doesn't really need that. do I like using the systems usually? Do I check them out? Yeah, but do I need to buy one? I'm I might not, but my compute's not long and I don't do a lot of road trips and so it's for me it doesn't make sense, but for others it may.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:11:42)
Yeah, I was just talking with a a friend of mine earlier this morning who's currently shopping for a a used BMW I four and he was asking about, you know, the driving assistant professional package that they have with their their hands free system on there. And, you know, wanted to know if it was worthwhile. I said, you know, as long as you get the adaptive cruise control, the basic system, you probably don't need it. And especially the way he drives, you know. I mean that that's you know

When when he's going someplace with his wife and kids, they take their Volvo X C ninety. Yeah, so this is gonna be primarily

Roberto Baldwin (1:12:15)
Yeah, so

Sam Abuelsamid (1:12:17)
his car. He's not gonna be doing long road trips in his car. He's gonna be fine without

Stephanie Brinley (1:12:20)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:12:21)
it.

Stephanie Brinley (1:12:21)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:12:22)
Yeah.

It's very much a like yeah, adaptive cruise control is like and again my my my thing, what do I do with my hands with hands free systems? And they just put on the wheel because I there's nowhere else to put I can put on my lap, which is weird. It's

Stephanie Brinley (1:12:36)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:12:37)
Because I don't trust robots and so I just leave on the wheel and let the you the system does the thing and I'm like, Okay, cool, it's doing its thing but

Stephanie Brinley (1:12:43)
Yeah. But what do I yeah. Yeah. I I agree. But the

Roberto Baldwin (1:12:45)
Yeah, well I could just

Stephanie Brinley (1:12:47)
beauty of them all though is the or the you know, the longer term of this, which I'm sure we've talked about before, is that the margin on it is so fantastically high that it it doesn't matter. In some respects it doesn't matter if only thirty percent of your Fathom buyers up for the subscription because you're you're making some serious margin on those buyers. And internally Ford does not expect it to be a hundred percent. I'm sure they're probably

want more than thirty, but you know, they're they can still make decent money on on that system across the line at those at those prices and and over time should have some opportunity to your point, Robbie, to lower the price a little bit. And

still make a lot of money.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:25)
Yeah, I mean GM

GM says they're up to about forty percent take rate now on subscriptions for

Stephanie Brinley (1:13:30)
They did.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:30)
supercruise after the trial period ends. which you know is higher than I was expecting. Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:13:35)
And that may be skewed by Cadillac. It might be skewed by Cadillac buyers

and and GMC buyers, especially Denali type buyers having more tolerance for

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:45)
Mm-hmm.

Stephanie Brinley (1:13:46)
subscriptions.

Roberto Baldwin (1:13:47)
Yeah. Big money.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:13:47)
Yeah. all right, let's

move on. so this sticking with Ford for a minute. I assume both of you have driven vehicles with Ford's one liter EcoBoost, which at the moment is no longer available in North America. I don't think all the cars that had it have been discontinued.

Stephanie Brinley (1:14:03)
Yeah. Are gone.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:14:05)
But what what did you think of the one liter EcoBoost, the three cylinder engine?

Stephanie Brinley (1:14:10)
well, it was so long ago.

Roberto Baldwin (1:14:12)
I I I guess it was fine? I don't remember.

Stephanie Brinley (1:14:15)
Yeah, I didn't have any, you know I li I

Sam Abuelsamid (1:14:17)
I I liked it.

Stephanie Brinley (1:14:19)
mean I yeah, but I don't

Roberto Baldwin (1:14:19)
It's fine. I if

if I d if I can't remember it, it was probably just fine. There. It worked. It did the thing.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:14:23)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:14:24)
I mean I remember I remember versions liking

versions of the Fiesta and and focus that had it, but I don't have a big memory of the engine in and of itself. But yeah, it it was peppy enough and it was efficient in in the space and in time that it was. Apparently they're running into some timing problems. Time belt problems.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:14:46)
According to testing, the timing belt may degrade and create debris that clogs the mesh oil pump pickup screen, starving the engine of oil. which

Roberto Baldwin (1:15:01)
That's fine.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:15:02)
is rarely a good thing. especially when you're driving on the highway. from Detroit news story.

A driver on a major highway in Wilmington, Delaware reported the oil pressure light illuminated, and within one eighth of a mile, the twenty seventeen Ford focus lost all power and the engine began to sound like a tank.

Roberto Baldwin (1:15:23)
Clack clock clock clock clock clock clock clock clack clock clock clock clock. 'Cause you don't have any more lubrication.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:15:25)
Yeah. engines engines running

without oil, never a good thing.

Stephanie Brinley (1:15:29)
Never.

Never a good thing.

Roberto Baldwin (1:15:30)
Kinda they kinda need it.

Stephanie Brinley (1:15:32)
Y you kinda need to pull over and get towed at that point 'cause you go much further and you something's gonna really break.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:15:40)
Yeah, so so according to NTSA, they haven't done a full recall on these engines yet. but apparently their NHTSA is saying NHTSA investigation is showing unreasonable risk to motor vehicle safety.

Roberto Baldwin (1:15:53)
Oof.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:15:53)
So if you if you have a focus or a fiesta or an Echo Sport, you know, if you're one of the three people that bought an Echo Sport with this one liter engine in there, yeah.

Apparently the average failure mileage is about seventy thousand miles. So if you got over

Roberto Baldwin (1:16:11)
Oof, that's

Sam Abuelsamid (1:16:12)
sixty thousand miles on your one liter EcoBoost, you might want to go get it checked out. yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:16:16)
Get it done. Yep. And

Roberto Baldwin (1:16:17)
Check your time and belt. Just

so just throw a new one

Stephanie Brinley (1:16:19)
the

Roberto Baldwin (1:16:20)
on there.

Stephanie Brinley (1:16:21)
or just just throw a new one on there and start over. but the other element is if NHTSA does push an actual recall, Ford will then, if you have to do that with your EcoSport or whatever, part of that recall process will be they will reimburse you for timing timing chain, timing belt.

related repairs that you did prior to it. So if you're a consumer worried about what happens with that recall, go ahead and make the fix because if it does move to the step of recall, then you'll get reimbursed. If it doesn't move to the step of recall, maybe your engine doesn't blow up. So either way.

Roberto Baldwin (1:16:56)
I mean

you're gonna need new timing belts anyway. And to be honest, Ford's really good at recalls now because they have so many recalls.

So they're really good at this now. Like it's it

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:02)
Yeah, they've they've done more than anybody else. Even

doing even doing multiple recalls for the same problem on the same vehicles.

Roberto Baldwin (1:17:10)
They are the quality is jobed like seven or eight right now.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:18)
okay, let's see, what else? going back to Mercedes for a minute. you know, Ola Kalenius has acknowledged that yes, the auto industry went too far with removing buttons. Did did your CLA have the hyperscreen

Stephanie Brinley (1:17:35)
Yeah. It's nice to hear somebody say

Sam Abuelsamid (1:17:37)
on it?

Stephanie Brinley (1:17:38)
it did and and and there was a point that like like my niece was with me and she was gonna she wanted to change the temperature and and it like couldn't quite figure out it wasn't moving fast enough. Like she could see where to push it, but it and I was just like the hammer saves make passengers side seventy two degrees which is like one of the first times I've ever done that because I hate talking to cars. But I had a passenger who was struggling with with changing the temperature on her own and it just seemed faster.

to do that than it did to explain that she needed to push it a little bit differently or whatever, let her spend another minute and a half trying to figure out why she was too cold or too hot. so yeah, I'm gonna go with the buttons. We need more buttons. and it's and and I felt that even in the CLA. I like the steering wheel control buttons. Although it was doing something strange, there was one that like every time I turned my and I now I've forgotten what it was, so I shouldn't have said that. But

When I turned the the the turn indicator on I ended up getting this weird error that I'm like I don't I don't understand where this errors come from. Nothing's broken. It was like the sensor

can't read something and I'm like, How does that work?

Roberto Baldwin (1:18:47)
Huh. Weird. Yeah, no.

Stephanie Brinley (1:18:49)
But at any rate.

Roberto Baldwin (1:18:50)
More buttons. Like you shouldn't, again, if I shouldn't have to explain to people how to work just things that have

Stephanie Brinley (1:18:55)
Right.

Roberto Baldwin (1:18:55)
always worked for a decade. Like how to open a door. That's never a thing I should have to explain

Stephanie Brinley (1:18:58)
Yes.

Roberto Baldwin (1:18:59)
to someone. How to turn the volume up. Shouldn't have to explain to somebody. How to how

Stephanie Brinley (1:19:03)
should not have to explain it.

Roberto Baldwin (1:19:04)
to adjust the climate controls. Like there's there's so many things that we'd like, hey, let's be clever. Let's put it all on the screen or let's make it electronic. When the reality is I just want a mechanical door click. That's the the super you super.

Click, open the door, close the door. Open the door, close the door.

Stephanie Brinley (1:19:17)
Yep. Okay.

I used the assistant data as it was intended, but that does that really make the experience stronger and yeah. She could have just changed it herself.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:28)
So fut future future Mercedes models will have more buttons. So that's good.

Stephanie Brinley (1:19:33)
And

Roberto Baldwin (1:19:33)
Huzzah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:19:34)
I think that that's gonna follow through in in other automakers as well. We will start to see. We are starting to see

Sam Abuelsamid (1:19:38)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:19:38)
like the Lexus ES volume button right there. Prime and the a lot of their stuff is still touch control, but that volume button is right there underneath the screen and it's not just there in a really easy spot, but they put some effort into making it a a button that is, you know, nice to touch, right? It the action on it is nice, it's pretty.

And not that you're just gonna touch it for no reason, but it's pretty, so you're like, great, I'm gonna choose that's a that's a good experience.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:08)
yeah, and Volkswagen already going back to to more buttons on

Stephanie Brinley (1:20:13)
Uh-huh.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:13)
on some of the latest models they've introduced. Hyundai's going back to more buttons. So yeah, we'll we'll definitely see other manufacturers. Although some like Rivian just seem to continue to be insistent. No, no, no, we don't need buttons.

Stephanie Brinley (1:20:26)
No, yep.

Roberto Baldwin (1:20:26)
Whatever, man.

Stephanie Brinley (1:20:28)
Nope. RJ

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:28)
Bad, bad idea.

Stephanie Brinley (1:20:29)
Scarange says no, we don't need to do that because you'll talk to your computer your car and you'll tell it what you want and then it'll be smarter and I'm like mm mm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:33)
You'll tell you you'll yeah, you'll you'll

Roberto Baldwin (1:20:35)
Yeah, that's Mercedes

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:36)
tell you'll tell your car

Roberto Baldwin (1:20:36)
has been doing that forever

and it d they're they're going back to buttons. Mercedes has like

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:40)
You'll you'll tell

your you'll tell your Mercedes or your your Rivian exactly where you want the air to flow from your vents.

No.

Roberto Baldwin (1:20:49)
What are we doing?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:51)
evigo announced this week

Stephanie Brinley (1:20:53)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:20:53)
that they are gonna be buying superchargers from Tesla. They're gonna start installing superchargers at new stations. and they're they're getting the version four superchargers. so you know, up until now, you know, they've bought their charging equipment from a variety of different companies. and they're they're now gonna start deploying version four superchargers. Apparently.

with you know, not just the version version four dispensers, because there's a lot of supercharger stations, Tesla supercharger stations, that have version four dispensers, but they still have the old version three cabinets. So they still only charge at 250 kilowatts and 500 volts. EVGO is saying, you know, theirs will charge at you know thousand volts, up to a thousand volts. So they're evidently getting the version four cabinets as well.

they're gonna be putting those in. They're gonna be branded as EVGo. They're gonna have magic docs in them. So you don't have to carry an adapter with you, although you probably want to carry an adapter with you anyway, because you never know where you're gonna want to charge. and then Tesla will be managing the back end, the connectivity to the chargers and everything. so these will charge at up to five hundred kilowatts, they're saying, which is which is good.

and they're gonna start getting those out this fall.

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:18)
It'd be it'll

Stephanie Brinley (1:22:18)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:19)
be funny if E V Go has more version four superchargers than Tesla. Cause Tesla's

Sam Abuelsamid (1:22:24)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:22:25)
Could happen.

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:26)
like really not doing a very good job at rolling those out. Like there's

Sam Abuelsamid (1:22:29)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:29)
there's a whole other

Stephanie Brinley (1:22:30)
Well

Roberto Baldwin (1:22:30)
supercharger station, like less than a quarter of a mile from the one they just put in my in my neighborhood that is still not it's not V four. They has the V four cabinets, but it's still two fifty yeah, five hundred

v volts.

Stephanie Brinley (1:22:40)
It'll be interesting to see what

they need on the back end. And so Tesla's gonna support these things, right? So Tesla's gonna have to be involved in the installation in some way, shape, or form. So what bandwidth does Tesla have within its organization to deploy these, regardless of whether they're deploying it for Tesla or for EVGO, and how is that gonna affect the V4 rollout overall? It's an interesting one to watch too. I think it's good that I hope that EVGO does also

still consider some other and and they don't go to an exclusive supercharger. I it doesn't sound like they are. It doesn't sound like they

Sam Abuelsamid (1:23:13)
It doesn't sound like they are. Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:23:16)
are. But I think it's good that they're doing it. It will, it should get Tesla superchargers out a little bit faster. And and for Tesla, it's like, okay, here's some more revenue for us. Like we'll build it. We we still get they're gonna get their annual subscription or monthly subscription. Yeah. But they're providing a service, so they should get paid.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:23:30)
Yeah, they'll get they'll get paid by EV Gull for providing the back end services and everything. Mm-hmm.

Stephanie Brinley (1:23:36)
Like it's it's all I I I think it's a a positive move forward overall.

Roberto Baldwin (1:23:42)
Will it be the premium price per kilowatt that the Tesla superchargers are still? Probably. Yeah, they're like forty cents more than Iona. okay.

Stephanie Brinley (1:23:46)
Then we have T Vigo.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:23:47)
the the I think I think it's actually probably gonna be less. I think you know, Ev go

Eve Go's indicated that it it's gonna be priced a little bit a little bit more aggressively than what Tesla's doing. But we'll see. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:23:57)
lower than the Tesla. Okay, 'cause Tesla's they're s so expensive.

It's like double the price of like other ones. You're like it's like if I'm driving down the road and I see gas a dollar a gallon and I see gas two dollars a gallon. I'm like, well maybe I'll just get the dollar a gallon. Which is why I see a lot of Tesla people at like EA and EV Ghost stations.

Stephanie Brinley (1:24:17)
Yeah, are

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:17)
Well that

Stephanie Brinley (1:24:18)
you s you're saving five or ten minutes? Forty percent more per kilowatt hour?

Roberto Baldwin (1:24:21)
Yeah, it's yeah.

Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:23)
Yeah.

Well actually I mean the the you know, the EV GO and and Electrify America chargers are just as fast or faster than the superchargers.

Roberto Baldwin (1:24:33)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:34)
but you know they're not always as reliable. with yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:24:36)
'Cause they're eight hundred volts and yeah. And

they're so Tesla's around here at like seventy seven cents per kilowatt hour right now. Yeah. Yeah, and Iona's like

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:43)
So I mean lot

Stephanie Brinley (1:24:44)
Okay, so

you guys can't see that my eyes just blew up. Like that's a lot.

Roberto Baldwin (1:24:47)
Exactly. And then

meanwhile Iona is thirty six cents per kilowatt hour. And you're like

Sam Abuelsamid (1:24:53)
Yeah. Well there there's a

you know, I last week when I was talking about the Rivian R one T I was driving, you know, I mentioned the new BP Pulse charging station here in Ann Arbor. That's about ten minutes away from me here. and you know, they put in ten chargers with twenty charge ports. They're four hundred kilowatt chargers. they're alpatronic chargers. and you know, I I tried it last week with the with the Rivian and then this week

I took over our EV6 because Electron sent me their latest NAX to CCS adapter, their their Vortex Plus adapter, which visually looks exactly the same as the original one, but it's been upgraded based on the stuff they learned from working with Ford and GM and some other automakers. Cause they had they had they when when they did the deal with them to supply them with chargers, because Tesla couldn't provide enough or provide them with adapters.

yeah, they they wanted some additional testing done, like you know, Ford wanted them to do rollover testing, you know, simulate actually driving over the adapter if it's sitting on the ground with your vehicle. impact testing, you know, drop it, make sure the case doesn't shatter, things like that. and it's also the new one's also UL rated. and so they they sent me one of those and I took it over this week with our EV6.

to that BP Pulse station. And that BP Pulse station, their prices, they're off their lowest off peak price, 35 cents a kilowatt hour. And their peak price is 50 cents a kilowatt hour. And that's without any subscriptions. They don't they don't have any kind of subscription, you know, monthly subscription. You just roll up and and tap your card or use the app and start charging. and so of the twenty charge ports they have, 14 are

J3400 NAX charge ports. The other six are CCS. And yeah, I took it over there, you know, because I've used the supercharger station near me here with the EV6, but you know, because of the quirks of EGMP, those only charge at up to 84 kilowatts on a supercharger. So I took it over there and tried out the adapter, plugged it in, and you know, the battery was at about 30% start state of charge when I plugged it in.

It immediately jumped up to like 220 kilowatts. and it peaked at like two hundred and two hundred and thirty-eight, two hundred and thirty-nine at about forty-eight, forty-nine percent state of charge. and you know, I took my little thermometer with me, was checking the temperature. It was only about ten degrees above ambient temperature on the on the connector and on the adapter. So

Roberto Baldwin (1:27:43)
cool.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:27:43)
it was like it was ninety.

like ninety two degrees out and you know it was like a hundred and two hundred and three on the adapter. so it yeah it worked worked really really well so you know if you if you have access to you know to either superchargers or the increasing number of NAX charging ports that are out there from non Tesla charging stations because Iona's got them Walmart's got them EVGO's starting to

Roll them out to some of theirs. I don't think Electrify America, I think Electrify America might have a few now, but not many. Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:28:19)
They have a couple. I think one's in Santa Barbara. Like it's really far away.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:24)
but they the Electron Vortex Plus is a pretty pretty nice adapter to have, you know, if you want to just keep one in your vehicle in case you need it. they're like I think a hundred and eighty nine bucks on Amazon, something like that. Okay.

Stephanie Brinley (1:28:38)
Two hundred, one hundred ninety nine ninety nine. One hundred

eighty three for the previous version.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:44)
Yeah. So definitely definitely get the Vortex Plus, not the original one. Because it's

Roberto Baldwin (1:28:47)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:48)
it's gonna be more durable.

Roberto Baldwin (1:28:50)
You can run it over with your car for funsies.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:52)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:28:55)
And people accidents happen.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:28:57)
And like I said, you know, if you're if you're in the Ann Arbor area and you need some DC fast charging, I would definitely recommend that BP Pulse station at Briarwood Mall. lot lots of chargers there. And you can go in and do your shopping at Harvest Market while you're waiting. I think I was plugged in for I think about nine nine minutes or so and went from thirty to seventy percent state of charge. So

Roberto Baldwin (1:29:22)
Yeah,

so then you're like, okay, well now I'm at the mall. If you want to run it you by the time you walk into the mall you gotta turn around and walk out. That's the That's

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:27)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:29:29)
the weird point we are with charging. That I like it

Sam Abuelsamid (1:29:31)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:29:32)
used to be like I had a fifth like if I had a bolt, I would plug it in and then I could go shopping and do whatever I needed, blah blah blah, and I come back out and the bolt would be like charged and go. Now with like the Ionic five, I plug it in. Like I don't have enough time to eat my food when I go if I'm doing a road trip.

Stephanie Brinley (1:29:46)
Right.

Roberto Baldwin (1:29:46)
Like I'll go there's like a Mexican

You know, there's a Mexican restaurant they like to go to. And so I'll go in and I'll order my food and by the time I get my food and take like three bites, I got the thing that says, your car's at eighty percent and I'm looking outside to see I'm like, Well, there's no one there waiting. If no one's waiting, you can go above eighty percent. But if there's someone waiting you you know, as a a social contract you should go and get the hell out of the way. So I have to get my food to go so I can eat a little bit and then go in the car and then drive off.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:14)
Well that's the nice thing about having twenty charging ports, you know, that and they're hooked up to four hundred kilowatt chargers. So even if you're sharing with somebody, you're still you can still get two hundred kilowatts even with two vehicles plugged in. so lot lots of lots of room there.

all right.

Roberto Baldwin (1:30:30)
Yeah. You need to be you

charges need to be quicker or or slower. That's my problem right now. There's

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:34)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:30:36)
Okay.

Roberto Baldwin (1:30:37)
not enough time for me to eat a burrito. On the burrito index, they either need to be

Sam Abuelsamid (1:30:39)
Ha ha.

Roberto Baldwin (1:30:41)
quicker where I just like I know I can just go and get the burrito and walk out and get in the car like I get gas. Or it needs to be slower where I can go and I can enjoy my burrito as opposed to you know, housing it like a monster, like trying to get like three bites in before the my app's all bing, hey, go get your car and go away.

Stephanie Brinley (1:30:57)
gosh, is nobody ever satisfied?

Roberto Baldwin (1:31:00)
I'm never sad, there's nothing I'm gonna When it's quicker I'm gonna be like, ugh. Remember when I used to be able to relax? Now I gotta get back in my car and drive away.

Stephanie Brinley (1:31:09)
Just

Sam Abuelsamid (1:31:10)
Have a nice leisurely

Red Bull and a burrito and

Roberto Baldwin (1:31:14)
Well yeah, I need it like sometimes it's just like if there's like a this one will only charge at a hundred kilowatts. I'm like, you what? I'm just gonna go park there. I'm gonna go inside, I'm gonna have a nice meal. I don't need I don't need two hundred and fifty kilowatts of of monster energy flying into my car right now. I just I just I I just want a burrito. Yeah, it feels cheaper.

Stephanie Brinley (1:31:32)
And it's cheaper. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. That's that's it's really it's it's interesting conversation to have because these are the the things that are people just use their their cars a little bit differently and it's it makes that whole what's charging like question very difficult to answer. And and I think the experiences you're talking about are the differences between having owned an EV for a long time and thinking about getting one and it takes a while to

Find that groove for yourself.

Roberto Baldwin (1:32:03)
Yeah,

it's it's it's definitely the it's definitely a very funny it's not a real problem, is what I'm saying.

Stephanie Brinley (1:32:11)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:32:14)
all right.

Roberto Baldwin (1:32:14)
It's only a real problem, so yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:32:16)
Well, you know, the the Hyundai Ionic 5N blast to drive, but because of the especially because of the tires they put on the wheels and tires they put on it, which are great on the track. not so much for range though. you know, the Ionic 5, you know, depending on configuration, you can get well over 300 miles of range out of it. But the five N

Only 221 miles EPA rated. so Matt from the Downshift YouTube channel has a 5N. And so he's been doing running some experiments with different tires and different wheels because he wanted to get more range out of it. And first thing he did was he swapped the Pirelli P0 tires that come from the factory with some Kumho tires and got a significant boost from just that.

went to it increased let's see, added sixty-nine miles of range to it. and yeah, went from three point three to three point six miles per kilowatt hour on his on his test loop. And then and then he swapped those out and got a set of went from the twenty-one inch factory wheels to a set of custom twenty-inch wheels, and put some

different Komo exta sport all season tires on there and boosted the the range even more. So overall, the let's see he I think

Stephanie Brinley (1:33:54)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:33:55)
on on his maximum test he got he added almost a hundred miles of range on his overall drive loop which is pretty impressive.

Stephanie Brinley (1:34:05)
It's

it's it it it's impressive, but I feel like if range is your problem with the with or if your your primary decision-making point, don't buy a 5N. You

Sam Abuelsamid (1:34:15)
It's true.

Stephanie Brinley (1:34:15)
bought it for the performance, you bought it for the tires, you bought it for the look and feel of the tires and everything else. Don't mess around with it. If that's not the level that you wanted of performance, then buy the other car. If range was more important, spend another couple thousand, what, two, three, four thousand dollars on new tires and wheels.

to to get more range out of the car that you bought because it's super powerful. Like it it it it felt like a very it was interesting that he did it and could prove and show that that that's that's the kind of change that you're gonna make. But I still step back and went, W but why? If range was your ultimate, don't take away from the performance of the vehicle by downgrading the tire capability to get more range. By the range that you want, not the power that you want.

Don't buy the power that you want and then kill it. It

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:05)
Right. Well,

I think, you know, I mean part part of the you know, part of what this tells us too though is that, you know, I mean if you've already got a vehicle, you know, or if you're buying buying something used like we did, and you know, you need to replace your tires anyway, you know,

Stephanie Brinley (1:35:20)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:21)
consider what tires you get. Maybe, you know, look around, see what see what testing's been done on various tires. 'Cause you will get different performance, you know. And maybe, you know, if you're driving an E V, maybe, you know, don't

Or, you know, if you're if you're shopping for an EV, you know, like if you're if you're even if you're buying a regular Ionic five,

Stephanie Brinley (1:35:40)
Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:41)
don't you know, don't you know, don't go for the the limited trim with the twenty inch wheels. You know, stick with, you know, one of the other trims with eighteen inch wheels because it will make a difference in in your range, you

Stephanie Brinley (1:35:51)
Yeah. It will.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:35:53)
know, if you're if you're concerned about that.

Stephanie Brinley (1:35:55)
And I'd I'd like that that that the story brought that part out. But the story is true on to your point on the limited on any of them. And that's something that I don't know how many people have fully integrated into their shopping process and thought process. we traditionally like larger wheels and tires because they usually look usually look better. Not always, but usually look better. usually have a little bit more performance. But if you're looking at an E V and range is your is more of a a a performance metric that you're concerned about.

drop down your wheels and tires. Drop them down in a couple of inches and and almost all of them that have that have enough options to be able to do that.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:36:35)
So let's go in the opposite direction from all this EV stuff.

Stephanie Brinley (1:36:39)
Yes, yes.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:36:41)
Stellantis had a bunch of stuff going on this week. because they you know, this coming week, next next weekend is the Woodward Dream Cruise. And yesterday, you know, Stellantis had their annual Roadkill Nights event with drag racing on Woodward Avenue in Pontiac, Michigan. and so, you know

Stellantis did what Stellantis does these days and brought out more power. More and more power. let's let's start off with the SRT eBoost Air that we saw on Thursday. They they brought us out to the Connor Center where they store a lot of their their cool classic cars and concepts and stuff like that to show us some of the stuff that the SRT team's been working on. Earlier in the week, they had announced

a supercharger kit, a bigger supercharger kit that you can put on your RAM Rumble B, which hasn't started shipping yet. which, you know, if seven hundred and seventy seven horsepower from a Rumble B SRT isn't enough for you, now you can get over nine hundred.

Stephanie Brinley (1:37:50)
Uhhuh.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:37:52)
Is that enough?

Roberto Baldwin (1:37:55)
I mean I mean I mean

Stephanie Brinley (1:37:55)
I wish it was seven seventy seven, but that's okay. It's

Roberto Baldwin (1:37:59)
what's your alimony payment?

Sam Abuelsamid (1:38:01)
Ha ha.

Stephanie Brinley (1:38:02)
Right.

you know, it I think it as Dodge taps into that and RAM taps into that, it just it it taps into people who still just want to make their car a little bit different. I mean I know I've I know somebody who bought a dark horse and then tried to make it more powerful. You know, like that this is there there's a number of buyers out there that buy these performance vehicles and as SRT and Dodge was talking with us for the last few days,

do like start even though they bought the the TRX read they're they're they're buying a Rumble B SRT, that's the starting point for them and they want to do something to make it a little bit different and direct connection for RAM and for Solantis offers that capability. So it it I think it's a good move for them to do it and make it available. And, you know, it's a secondary thing. It's and because if they go through Gr Direct Connect, they get the warranty. If they do all of the right things for the buyer that can be important.

You know, how how how many of the kids that do they sell? I don't know. I don't know.

Roberto Baldwin (1:39:05)
I

mean it's on brand.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:39:07)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:39:08)
It's on brand and Ford's doing

Roberto Baldwin (1:39:08)
That's a thing.

Stephanie Brinley (1:39:09)
a lot of the same thing and GM does it to a lesser degree, but yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:39:11)
yeah, I mean, you know, we were we we were out at Michigan Speedway a few weeks ago for the Ford

Custom Garage, you know, where they were showing us supercharger kits on the F one fifty and the Mustang.

Stephanie Brinley (1:39:20)
I feel like thinking about the Ford version that or Ford program that we were on a couple of weeks ago and and talking to SRT this week. the the Ford the the the SRT perf performance level and the Mopar and that whole direct connection group, it it feels more integrated to the vehicle development than Ford does, even though Ford said they're integrated to the vehicle development. And right now SRT is willing to push it a little bit further and and RAM is in as example the Rumbleby trucks being

the quad cab and and shorter and longer and and making physical changes to the configuration that Ford doesn't do with with Raptor in the in the same way. they're both cold trucks. Not saying one's better or whatever than the other, but there does seem to be a deeper integration, even though they use a lot of the same words, the the integration to the process seems to be a little bit deeper at Stillanus. And I feel like they've had

more focus on Mopar for the last decade. And that's what's underpins direct connection. So yeah, I think that for I think that Stellantis is a little bit ahead and having some more flexibility and more options and and understanding how to how to upgrade quickly and simply.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:40:38)
Yeah, although, you know, they did Stellanis did sort of sideline SRT for for a long time. And it's only

Stephanie Brinley (1:40:45)
They did. But

Sam Abuelsamid (1:40:47)
in the last year that they've kind of really brought it back to life.

Stephanie Brinley (1:40:50)
They sidelined SRT, but they kept direct connection and they kept mow power. So the ability to sell parts to a consumer who wanted to make their car better themselves, they didn't really step back from, but they did step back from SRT. and this was the first time, I think, since they brought SRT back that they showed us the whole story and kind of said, This is it's the the the series production cars that that are the base of this thing. And then you do the direct connection and you do the motorsports and they all work in together and feed on one another.

And even talking with talk Tom Sakaman and talking with Matt McAllier later throughout the the organization. and it's it repeats what Tim Coniskus has been saying for the last few months too. You if you don't have the production base to work with, this doesn't work. You have to have the really you have to have the Rumble B that's not SRT before you can get to the SRT. And once you have that as a baseline, then you can start building out.

So this production and the series production reversions really is is where it starts.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:41:52)
Well they yeah, the other thing they showed us on Thursday was like I said this eBoost Pro, which is a forty-eight volt electric supercharger kit that this is not a production system yet. It's not even something you can buy aftermarket. you know, they apparently came up with the idea seven weeks ago, fab you know, did a bunch of 3D printing of intake plumbing.

put it together and got it up and running on a grand Cherokee. a Grand Cherokee, by the way, that was powered by a three liter Hurricane Inline Six. Not a

Stephanie Brinley (1:42:31)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:42:32)
product combination that you can currently buy from a Stellantis dealership. And so you know this this e chart is electronic or electric supercharger added about 90 horsepower to it so about 630 horsepower

Stephanie Brinley (1:42:51)
The the the horsepower change was not the eBoost Air. The horsepower change was things they did to the engine. Calibration and tuning. Just to be clear, the power

Sam Abuelsamid (1:42:58)
yeah. That's true. Yeah. But it's yeah, you're right. And

Stephanie Brinley (1:43:02)
the power for the engine was not part of the e boost air

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:05)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:43:06)
technology.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:07)
And then but the the eBoost air improves the responsiveness because it spins

Stephanie Brinley (1:43:11)
Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:11)
up right away so you don't have turbo lag or anything like that.

Stephanie Brinley (1:43:13)
Of a leg. Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:16)
and when this thing rolled out onto the stage, didn't sound quite like any hurricane I've heard before. I mean that's been one of the complaints about the Hurricane Six is that it's too quiet. And this one made some noise.

Stephanie Brinley (1:43:30)
Yeah. but it yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:43:34)
Yeah. Of course, you know, Stellanus is not the first to use this type of electric supercharger. Audi's had it on some of their engines. Mercedes-Benz had it, Genesis has it on their they have a version of their twin turbo V six with an electric supercharger like this. This one's plumbed. The Stellanus approach is plumbed a little bit differently instead of sucking through the turbos, it's upstream of the turbos and blowing through blowing into the turbochargers.

And yeah, so that would make it easier to do as an aftermarket kit than the the factory solutions from Genesis and Audi. my guess is we'll probably see something like this offered as an aftermarket kit probably by the end of next year. I wouldn't be surprised. And then, you know, maybe a production application a year or two after that.

Stephanie Brinley (1:44:27)
Yeah. that that sounds like timing that I would agree with. Cause you can yeah, you put it on the aftermarket thing and and like time like Sam was alluding to, you know, you you're reducing turbo lag. So then you can look at at the Rumble B direct connection to adding more no the superchargers don't work, but adding more turbo turbochargers and higher chargers to the the Hurricane Six. So this kind of feeds into where they wanna play with the the hurricane engines.

Because with bigger turbochargers you have more lag, and if this can stop that lag or redu greatly reduce the lag problem, it gives them some other spaces to play with on that upper end, I feel like. And then also it gives your consumer and the back to the the ability to change it on your own, gives them the ability to buy a bigger turbocharger than they're gonna put in the production car and buy this part and be able to work through it all. So it it's it's I I don't think that I've ever s seen

An automaker and Sam, I may be wrong, and there there's certainly you would remember, that has said here's a concept of an engine part basically.

We don't

know when we're gonna build it, we don't know if we're gonna build it, but it's a cool concept, so we're gonna talk to it. That's pff Let's Tima, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:45:45)
no, they they they show stuff like that at CMA all the time. Yeah.

So they they do show off stuff like that. and it's e yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:45:52)
It feels like a very German thing. Like I'm sure the Germans

always show me, like, hey look at this

Stephanie Brinley (1:45:56)
It's it more.

Roberto Baldwin (1:45:56)
cool thing. We will probably we may buy habits,

Sam Abuelsamid (1:45:57)
Yeah. We may or may not build it someday. Who knows?

Stephanie Brinley (1:45:59)
Yes, guys.

Roberto Baldwin (1:46:01)
we'll see.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:46:02)
But I mean, you know, th this, you know, this something like this is a great example of, you know, when we when we were at Michigan Speedway with Ford and we drove that Maverick with that kit on there that bumps it up to 300 horsepower. It's a bigger turbo on the two liter EcoBoost. And that thing had a lot of lag, you know, for an extra fifty horsepower. And if you combined it with something like this, you know, you could get that extra power.

and eliminate the lag, you know, the number that they gave us was you know 70% reduction in turbo lag 650 milliseconds to get to ninety percent of peak torque with that engine which is you know that's that's fairly quick you know you're you're not gonna really notice that very much and so yeah we we'll probably see something like this you know at least as a Mopar kit sometime in the not too distant future.

Roberto Baldwin (1:46:58)
So if you get the Mopar stuff and you put it on the car, does it d do you have to have the dealer p or the service center put it on in order to keep your warranty, or is it okay if you do it yourself?

Stephanie Brinley (1:47:07)
You have to have an ASC certified engineer technician or the dealership. You do have to have a certified technician. Install it. But that's true

Roberto Baldwin (1:47:15)
That's lame. I'm like what's the what's the point of

Sam Abuelsamid (1:47:17)
Yeah, if you want to do it yourself

in your in your garage, you're not gonna get any warranty out.

Stephanie Brinley (1:47:21)
you're not gonna

get anywhere. And that's that's that's Ford Performance is the same way. GM anything base sell

Sam Abuelsamid (1:47:24)
Yeah. Every everybody's the same way.

Stephanie Brinley (1:47:26)
is the same way. The automaker can't do that because yeah, the dealership might make a mistake

Roberto Baldwin (1:47:31)
I know, but also

Stephanie Brinley (1:47:33)
and the ASE might make a mistake, but at least there's it's a level protection for them. when you if I decide to do that by myself, I promise you I will make a mistake.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:47:42)
Ha ha.

Stephanie Brinley (1:47:42)
They do not want to be liable on a warranty level for for a mistake that you make. And it it

Sounds unfair, but it's

Roberto Baldwin (1:47:50)
I don't

yeah. No, I mean it's to be honest, most people don't work on their cars anymore. Just

Stephanie Brinley (1:47:54)
Right.

Roberto Baldwin (1:47:54)
that's at the end of the day. Again, I'm the edge case, I'm all excited I'm working on my uncle's truck in in on the weekend this weekend we're pr replacing the starter in a V eight Tundra from two thousand so the starters in underneath the intake manifold, in between the cylinders there's a little valley. So I'm just like, yeah, this is gonna be fun.

Stephanie Brinley (1:48:13)
What'd you make that so hard to get to? I was like.

Roberto Baldwin (1:48:15)
Because the V eight's bigger than the V six. The V six it has it, you

Stephanie Brinley (1:48:17)
Yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (1:48:18)
in the in the typical s place, you know, outside the engine near the flywheel. But this because

Stephanie Brinley (1:48:21)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:48:22)
You got room there in the valley of the V eight, you know. Might as well put something there.

Roberto Baldwin (1:48:24)
Yeah, so you have room in the valley of

the V8. So there's like you pull the intake manifold off and you look and there's this little valley in there. And and I was watching a video of it. I'm like, I'm like, we could do this in the afternoon, easy peasy. My uncle's like, All right. He owned a radiator shop, but he you know, he's

Sam Abuelsamid (1:48:38)
Is it

is it a two piece manifold where you can just take like the top half off and then you can or you gotta pull the whole thing?

Roberto Baldwin (1:48:41)
Nah, it it's just one big it's like this big.

It's like you gotta move all the vacuum hoses and y it's mostly moving things and it's just labeling stuff is gonna be the big the big thing. So I'm gonna get one of those label kits that if people don't know if you're like if you do engine swaps and stuff, you'll get a these little stickers and they'll have numbers or colors and or or letters and colors and so you have to just make sure you just put like, this is A one blue, this is A one blue. And then when you put the new engine in, boop, you can go, okay, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:49:12)
Match everything back up again.

Roberto Baldwin (1:49:13)
You can match everything back up again, yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:49:17)
all right. So Friday we went to M1 Concourse and we saw the new Dodge Charger Super B. Because again, 550 horsepower, just not enough. So the Super B gets bigger turbos, bigger brakes, 16 inch Brembo rotors, six piston front calipers, four piston rears. and so it's just more more of everything.

Roberto Baldwin (1:49:44)
More,

Stephanie Brinley (1:49:45)
More.

Roberto Baldwin (1:49:45)
more. I

Sam Abuelsamid (1:49:46)
I do

like the color combinations.

Stephanie Brinley (1:49:47)
I do too. The colors are great.

Roberto Baldwin (1:49:48)
Yeah, those are

I did see like a video where they just did a burnout while they were moving it forward and then it stopped and everyone's like Woo I'm like, I could do that with a a Mazda B twenty two hundred. Come on guys. That's not that just not

Sam Abuelsamid (1:49:59)
Ha ha.

Roberto Baldwin (1:50:00)
as excit do it pizza Melting tires

Stephanie Brinley (1:50:02)
Yeah, fair enough.

Roberto Baldwin (1:50:04)
is not that hard. Come on.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:05)
Yeah.

I mean, you know, the the Super B does come

Stephanie Brinley (1:50:07)
The crowd stacked.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:08)
standard with line lock and and there's also there's a button on the steering wheel because we want more steering wheel buttons, right? You

Stephanie Brinley (1:50:16)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:16)
it it tap tap the steering wheel

Roberto Baldwin (1:50:17)
At least it's a button.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:19)
tap the steering

Stephanie Brinley (1:50:19)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:50:20)
wheel button twice and goes from all wheel drive to rear wheel drive. So no no messing around in the touch screen. You can get you know you can do your burnouts really quick. So

Roberto Baldwin (1:50:25)
that's nice. Good. There you go.

Stephanie Brinley (1:50:31)
Yeah. you know,

Roberto Baldwin (1:50:31)
Re I

Stephanie Brinley (1:50:33)
it's it it looked cool. I agree with Sam. I love the colors in it. the power is is nice. And of course they've said four or five times, you know, this is not the finish line, SRT is doing something different, something more is to come and da da da. And you know, the e-boost that we were just talking about is maybe gonna play into that as well. And looking at the the H six they had in the Cherokee and telling us Grand Cherokee and telling us that it was ninety horsepower more is more than six hundred.

So you know, it it it adds

up this is the next step for them and there's more to come.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:51:04)
Well, and you know, they they invited

a bunch of builders you know, to come out for the the Roadkill Knights grudge matches. You know, they had eight builders with various built up chargers that ranged from about six hundred horsepower to three of them were over a thousand or were at least a thousand horsepower.

Stephanie Brinley (1:51:27)
least.

Yep. And that was that was impressive. I talked with Matt about that a little bit, Matt McLear that a little bit later and and and asked him, you know, if they had had, you know, how this project came about. Because I think when the grudge matches happened before, if I remember correctly, there was a bit of an application process. So there were there were people that were asking to do this. So I was like, so how did that work? Like did you go through a bunch of it? And he's like, No, no, no, no.

Not this time. It was curated. We wanted like they had a guy who did JDMs, they had a guy who did V8. So all of the builders that they had had a skill set that was a little bit different from what the traditional Dodge Charger or Challenger you would assume could do this and a different engine and different experiences. So it and they I think they picked a really strong group. I think they got what they wanted out of that in terms of putting this in the space of somebody who might not have thought of doing a charger.

With a V A, much less this one. and the results were pretty outstanding.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:52:28)
Yeah, so I mean did did you see the grudge matches yesterday? well.

Stephanie Brinley (1:52:31)
He did not get to stay long enough for the grudge matches. Unfortunately I didn't see

them run yesterday. but the the other part about it too is they got these cars I think eight weeks ago, nine weeks ago, something like that. and they have them for two years. So one of the things Matt was saying is that these guys are really excited to be there yesterday to do the grudge matches,

Sam Abuelsamid (1:52:52)
They're just getting warmed up.

Stephanie Brinley (1:52:53)
but they're just getting warmed up. He said they're just as excited about what they're gonna do when they get back. I mean

They had their eight week, whatever time frame they had to do this, they still have another 18 months with the car. So

Roberto Baldwin (1:53:04)
Cool.

Stephanie Brinley (1:53:05)
they're like, Yeah, we're gonna do more. And these cars are gonna be these and the other drift car that they showed, they'll be kind of scaled scaled around at different at different events. the drift car that they had built too, those two cars will be at at different events as well. and all of that builds into what, especially roadkill nights and near dream

Wood Dream Cruise. that's that's what owners are doing with their vehicles, and that's what they need to to keep proving again and again. They said when they launched the this charger that there was going to be the opportunity to do that. They said there were going to be direct connections, stage one, two, three, like there was the past. All of that is is in the plan. and it takes time to build up. And so the important thing about Super B here is

that that's the next step in that and and being able to kinda do that. it took a long time to get the Charger and Challenger to the point where they had as many options and as many trim packages and all of that as they did. This is also gonna take time to build up.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:54:12)
Yeah, the

For it right now. the when yeah, when we were at the investor day back in May and they took us through the design studio, you know, one of the cars they showed us in there was a charger SRT. they did not lift the hood on that, but you know, based on the shape of the hood scoops on there that were similar to what you would find on a previous generation Hellcat charger, you know.

Like everybody is assuming that there was you know, a Hellcat V eight in that thing. So

Stephanie Brinley (1:54:52)
That's been

the assumption. And the the Tim Caniskis keeps saying, but we can do more with the high output. Don't make that assumption, but maybe,

Sam Abuelsamid (1:55:01)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (1:55:02)
but blah blah blah. It's not that easy to put the V8 in that car. That car was not designed to hold that car. Right? The value of the B.

Roberto Baldwin (1:55:07)
Where do you put the starter exactly? S in the valley of the V.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:55:09)
In the Valley of the V

Stephanie Brinley (1:55:13)
you know, there's there's strut tower things, there's there's spaces in there that that don't work that well. Not that it's impossible.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:55:18)
But they but they did

show what a year and a half ago at SEMA. They they they showed a drag car, an an a charger drag car with a V eight in it. So it is doable.

Stephanie Brinley (1:55:22)
They showed a crate. Yep. They showed a dry car. They did. And

it is, but they that was a crate option that you could do for a hundred thousand dollars or whatever that that that being possible isn't the same thing as building it for for production, I don't think. I I I don't know which way they're gonna go, honestly.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:55:42)
I I agree. I mean they'll they'll probably gonna focus

on the on the hurricane for the time being, but

Stephanie Brinley (1:55:47)
I

think they n they kinda need to a little bit. they need more volume of charger overall, before they can support a Hellcat charger with all of the background that they're gonna have to do to make that car accept it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:56:01)
If they

if they can put an exhaust system like they had on that Grand Cherokee onto the Charger Hurricane, that could that could be interesting for people.

Stephanie Brinley (1:56:05)
Right? Yeah.

And you know, so I think I think they'll be able to get to their eight or nine hundred horsepower out of the the the H six at some point. so I don't know that the the the question really is is what audience, right? You do have the the V eight only. I'm not gonna consider if it's anything else, and then you have an audience that disappreciates performance and

the performance is gonna keep getting better. The importance of the Drudge Match vehicles too is showing that it can be done and that somebody else can do something and getting, you know, getting that that part of the market excited and seeing it. I I don't know if they'll put the V8 into it. I would say that I think that they won't and be more firm, except they do keep doing weird things. I'm like, it's possible. I would I would like to see them do more with the H stick.

And build up this 'cause they knew that they had the ability to do that when they made this decision. They didn't make the decision to go to the H six and think five fifty was all they were gonna do.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:57:12)
yeah. Yeah, I mean right from the right from the beginning when they announced it, Mickey Bly was saying, you know, this thing's got a lot of headroom, so

Stephanie Brinley (1:57:19)
It does. It does. So let's let's hopefully they get the chance to to actually deliver on that and and you know, and and and consumers start paying attention to it.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:57:28)
Yeah. all right. let's see. I had I also I I also had a chat with Matt after

the

Stephanie Brinley (1:57:37)
Mm-hmm.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:57:38)
presentations and I'm gonna drop that in here and we will be right back.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:57:44)
Matt McAlear, CEO of Dodge. We're here at M1 Concourse. It's day before the Roadkill Nights 2026 starts. And you've an announced some stuff today. and we also heard about some stuff yesterday from the SRT team. But sounds like you know well first off let's talk about the Super B. Yeah. tell tell us about what what has changed on the Super B.

compared to the existing Charger six

Matt McAlear (1:58:17)
This car and it's just it's flat out, it's a different machine. we started with the powertrain, the most power dense muscle car ever, 200 horsepower per liter out of the inline six.

56 millimeter Garrett twin turbos, 50% more cooling up front with a front end that's open to get that air into the system. Better arrow, better down force, 16-inch massive brakes with six piston front and four piston rear for three times better brake fade resistance. everything about this car that we changed had a purpose. better handle, better stability, better cooling, better power. Zero to sixty in three point six seconds.

Quicker than the original 707 horsepower Hellcats. This car flat out meets all of our S RT capability in the track and wears the Super B name with with Pride and we couldn't be more excited to get it to market here in the coming months. It is absolutely awesome.

Sam Abuelsamid (1:59:18)
So do you see this as more of a a drag car or a track car or both?

Matt McAlear (1:59:24)
Absolutely both. you know, it's still phenomenal and straight line, it's got line lock and launch control. but all of the modifications we made are about keeping that power run after run after run. And with its wheelbase, it is a large car, but the team

Sam Abuelsamid (1:59:40)
Definitely.

Matt McAlear (1:59:41)
knocked it out of the park and you get behind the wheel on the track and you are gonna be excited and have a lot of fun because this car has your back. all wheel drive for

You know, the ability to hook up with a new rear-wheel drive button right on the steering wheel, double tap, on-demand rear-wheel drive while you're moving, you can put it in rear wheel drive and slide it around the turns, bigger paddle shifters for better control, new improved steering wheel design. Everything about it was for you know one core reason. better track and handling capability. And we we did a great job with it with the engineering team that just hit it out of the park.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:00:18)
So with the with the bigger turbos, I mean one of the challenges there is potentially more lag. how wha what what's been done to address that?

Matt McAlear (2:00:26)
we've got torque reserve now and we increased the torque band for you know from to three thousand on the bottom end to fifty nine hundred RPMs in the top end to try and improve that that responsiveness. And and we've got some other technology I think you saw yesterday in the SRT world that can even help us in the future.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:00:45)
Is

is that something that you would expect like what what you're referring to is the eBoost Air, the electric compressor add on to go along with the the turbos. Is that something you expect to see available in production sometime in the next few years?

Matt McAlear (2:01:00)
We're

not talking about anything from a timing standpoint, but you as we were here last year and we unveiled the four hundred and twenty horsepower RT and the five hundred and fifty horsepower si Scat Pack. we told you then we were just getting started and we owed it to everybody to come back today and show you what we're doing and and bringing out the super B and taking it to six hundred horsepower and all the improvements we made for handling, braking, suspension, adaptive damping, suspension.

This isn't the finish line. We're gonna keep going. And you saw some technology yesterday that it gives us the ability to get more out of this engine and and we'll see where we go from here.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:01:33)
So, you know, one of the the challenges for a brand like Dodge right now in 2026 is fairly limited lineup. You've only got two nameplates, you got Charger, you got Durango. and it sounds like one of the things that you're focusing on besides obviously besides performance is also the customization component of it. Not just the Mopar side, the aftermarket side, but also from the factory. and you showed off some stuff today. Tell us more about

Matt McAlear (2:02:00)
Yeah, we're excited. You know, people look at these cars, they're an extension of their personality. They're an extension of who they are and what they want to be seen as. And we've had some terrific success over the years with incredible stripe packages. but this new one that the team came up with is a tone-on tone look. It's a it's a tinted clear that takes on the base paint and it gives it a subtle but yet unique appearance. We're gonna offer that very shortly here on Charger and Durango both. And then we talked about some other things we're gonna be doing here.

We've had some one on one custom paint programs in the past on our Demon vehicles and then last year on our SRT Hellcat Durangos. but those paint programs were very expensive from the factory. They cost as much as some new cars and they were for a very select few. We didn't have the capability and the throughput to take care of many as many customers as we'd like. So we went back and we said this isn't Dodge.

We revel when we take something that isn't available for the masses and find a way to bring it down at a price affordable point for everybody. So we're gonna be unveiling here in the coming months a one-on-one paint program from the factory with an affordable price point that's gonna open a lot of eyes. And I can't wait to unveil more details here before the end the year because it's something that some exotic brands do, but no one's gonna be able to do it like we are.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:03:27)
So has that required some changes in your manufacturing processes at Windsor and here in Jefferson

Matt McAlear (2:03:34)
Yeah,

we haven't announced the details on the timing or which plants are gonna be affected first. But yeah, we've absolutely been working with the with the suppliers and with the manufacturing team. it's not as easy as it sounds, but they're fully on board because they support us and where we're trying to go and push the limits with not only power but personality and color to name a few. So it's gonna be fun and they're absolutely on board working with us. So it's a great team effort.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:04:00)
Do you do you see that as really helping to boost the sales of those dodge those two Dodge Man vehicles?

Matt McAlear (2:04:07)
Well, I think

you we always say we win when we're different. we don't build Me Too commoditized products. it's not about building a better mouse trap, it's about building a different mousetrap. It's about building something that no one else in the industry is doing. No one else offers a five passenger, two door, four door, all wheel drive, rear-wheel drive when you want it, hidden hatch design that's got SUV like capability and a muscle car performance package. Nobody else offers a three row muscle SUV with a standard V8 and three available V8s and a supercharged V with 710 horse.

horsepower that toes like a class above it with active exhaust and looks like anything else with dual stripes running down the road. that is pure dodge. That is pu you know the essence of what we're all about. look different, sound different, drive different and and feel different behind the wheel. And I think this is just taking those what is made dodge dodge to the next level. And if we're not innovating, if we're not pushing the limits, we're not pushing the boundaries, we're not

We're not living up to what the core of Dodge stands for and delivering what our fans want.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:05:11)
So you mentioned sound in there. and that's one of the big complaints that a lot of people have had. You know, the the Hurricane engine, it's a fantastic engine. It's better in almost every way than a heavy. but it doesn't have the sound. And is that something that the Dodge engineers are looking at at you know how to how to enhance the or you know, change or improve the sound quality?

Matt McAlear (2:05:33)
It's something that we're actually working on finalizing with the Super B. you know, sound is subjective. I drive the the Scat Pack every day and I've had people that have

Absolutely walked up to me in a parking lot and said, what type of exhaust system do you have on that? They considered it, they thought it was aftermarket because it was that good from the factory. is it the exhaust sound that we've been known for over the years? No. Is it different? Yes. Is it great? Arguably, yes. I would say it's phenomenal. Is the Super B gonna be even better than the Scat Pack? You bet. The engineers are working on those final details and we're gonna continue to push.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:06:06)
Well that Grand Cherokee we saw yesterday with the the eBoost on there, that that didn't sound like any hurricane I've ever before.

Matt McAlear (2:06:16)
It's amazing what tene technology can do these days.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:06:18)
Yeah. so looking forward a little bit, you know, how how far can you take the hurricane? Obviously, you know, you you introduce some of the the competitors for the grudge match tomorrow. but you know, and some of them you know are putting out over a thousand horsepower out of the hurricane. But for a production version of the hurricane, how how far can that go?

Matt McAlear (2:06:42)
Well

I I don't wanna steal any of the thunder, but Tim and the SRT team are working on some incredible stuff and stay tuned.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:06:48)
Okay.

and then yeah looking a little bit further down the road, yeah, you do have a couple more models coming to the Dodge lineup. you know, I'm not sure exactly what the the what the cadence is gonna be, but you got the Copperhead and the the GLH. And you know, is the GLH in particular, you know, is that do you see is that gonna also carry forward that Dodge muscle kind of attitude with it?

Matt McAlear (2:07:18)
absolutely. It will be unlike anything else in the segment, it truly will be Dodge Performance core to its you know to its in its to its DNA. we're focused on affordability, we're focused on performance, we're offering something unique in the segment and on our showroom floor that no other brand could do and bringing affordability, performance and affordability to the masses. So yeah, you absolutely we don't plan on entering any segment in the future.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:07:51)
And you know Stalandis has a new hybrid system now in the Cherokee. I'm driving one right now, driving one this week. do you see, you know I mean obviously you've got the the Charger Daytona, but do you see hybridization being part of the mix for enhancing performance in the Dodge lineup going on

Matt McAlear (2:08:09)
It it's

simply an option. You know, you saw some other options yesterday down at the tech days. hybrids absolutely offer something in the marketplace and we're putting them in some of our vehicles on the shortroom floor now and we'll see where we go. We're always looking at all different kinds of power trains to see what makes the most sense for the platform from a performance standpoint and what meets the Dodge DNA. But yeah, we're we're absolutely always looking at that stuff.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:08:33)
And then then the copperhead. Yeah. Yeah. what what kind of time frame are we looking at to maybe see those on the road?

Matt McAlear (2:08:41)
We we said by twenty thirty it's part of the Dare Ford plan for twenty thirty.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:08:45)
Okay. All right. Anything else you want to share about

Matt McAlear (2:08:48)
Dodge.

No, I appreciate you coming out today. the Super B is is exciting. It's the next step forward. But for those who haven't got out, who haven't driven the RT yet or the Scat Pack, visit a dealer, go for a test drive, see the incredible performance, enjoy the all-wheel drive, try the rear-wheel drive, have some fun, and just see how capable and how much fun these cars really are.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:09:09)
All right, well I'm looking forward to actually getting into the six pack for the first time in a couple of weeks and and then hopefully driving the super B later on. Awesome.

Matt McAlear (2:09:18)
Yeah, we we we plan on having some fun with it. All right, thanks. Yeah, good seeing you.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:09:23)
All right. that was Matt McAleer, the CEO of Dodge Brand at Stellantis. and got a cat joining the party here. Which one's that, Robbie?

Roberto Baldwin (2:09:32)
This is this is

Stephanie Brinley (2:09:32)
Ooh.

Roberto Baldwin (2:09:33)
this is Roy. Roy's very needy.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:09:37)
Hi Roy.

Stephanie Brinley (2:09:38)
Hey right.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:09:40)
all right. GM has had a partnership in China with SAIC Shanghai Automotive Industry Group for many, many years. and yeah, there there has been, you know, some bit of speculation that you know that may or may not last too much longer in the future. They did do a big restructuring over the last couple of years as sales.

of their joint venture vehicles dropped off pretty dramatically by about almost half. and so they had to restructure a lot of stuff to get cost down. but they announced this week that they were extending their joint venture with SAIC for another twenty years. So GM apparently has no plans of abandoning the Chinese market anytime soon.

Stephanie Brinley (2:10:27)
Nope. and the other part of that too is they made an announcement earlier, maybe two months ago, about adding some production of some of the Chinese products to their Mexico plant

Sam Abuelsamid (2:10:39)
Mm-hmm.

Stephanie Brinley (2:10:40)
for South America, not necessarily they're smaller cars, they're not cars that aren't really on their way into the US. and in this announcement they talked about exporting more of the bioic electra stuff out of China into other emerging markets. So they're seeing

the opportunities to behave as though it was a BYD or a so and and this joint venture can do that. You know, it's got that the the efficiencies that the the Chinese ventures are able to do. and it gives them a way to to be able to compete in those markets with the BYDs and the G Gili's that are exporting to South America now and they're building production in South America. So I think I think this for GM is is really important for China, but I think it's really important for the international

less important for North America or the US in particular.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:11:31)
all right. And then finally for this week, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy sent a letter to six senators asking for some stuff to be included in the next highway bill. and there was a segment in there called Freedom Car, which he he would like to see

He's proposing some stuff to be included in the highway bill that would let's see, give consumers the right to drive disconnected and non-automated, provide any federal, prohibit any federal, state, tribal, or local authority from mandating the vehicles sold or operated on public roads be equipped with automated driving systems or be capable of transmitting data wirelessly. So he wants everything to be a slate.

Stephanie Brinley (2:12:31)
Or at least make sure that you can't mandate it.

Roberto Baldwin (2:12:31)
I mean Well d you you could

Sam Abuelsamid (2:12:33)
Or or like us.

Roberto Baldwin (2:12:35)
you can't man that you can't sell the slate. Okay. Was anyone mandated that you have to sell the that your car has?

Sam Abuelsamid (2:12:43)
No,

and yeah, I mean right now none of this stuff is mandated anyway, but you know, th he he wants to get something into law that prohibits any states or other authorities from mandating such a thing in the future.

Roberto Baldwin (2:12:58)
But

it's

Stephanie Brinley (2:12:59)
And

yeah.

Roberto Baldwin (2:13:02)
I mean if automaker's gonna build it i y you know they're gonna build it. They they you know, they like having that data. That's why they s in

Sam Abuelsamid (2:13:06)
Yeah. I mean pr

Roberto Baldwin (2:13:09)
there.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:13:09)
pr pretty much everything. Yeah, pretty

Stephanie Brinley (2:13:10)
Well, people like what they do with it too.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:13:12)
much

Roberto Baldwin (2:13:12)
Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:13:12)
everything for almost everything for sale in the US now has connectivity built in from the factory. And and no nobody's mandated it. You know, the companies want it, you know, because they want the data. and you

Stephanie Brinley (2:13:24)
And yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:13:25)
know, I mean this this article from the drive.

Roberto Baldwin (2:13:25)
People wanna be able to find out

where the closest Trader Joe's is. Hey carr, where's the Trader Joe's?

Sam Abuelsamid (2:13:29)
Yeah. Or, you know, how

how else can they give you over the air updates? You know, or you know, sell you subscriptions to your heated seats.

Stephanie Brinley (2:13:40)
Yeah, and there's there's and you know, we'll see and even the heated seat thing, right? Like we saw that there's the the automakers are pushed to a degree and then consumers gonna push back and say that I'm not willing to pay for that. so there is a push and pull between how much technology they can put in and how much consumers really wanna have, but that that happens by itself. It doesn't need a a a mandate like this.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:14:02)
Yeah, market forces take care of that.

Stephanie Brinley (2:14:04)
Market forces take care of that. And I and I think something like this would

have the risk anyway of coming into conflict with, you want to mandate auto autonomous vehicles. You want to d establish rules about how those vehicles should be. Does this in some unintended way, fifteen years from now, cause a conflict with something else that happens within the industry that decide we don't think this rule is is a very good rule to have. I don't think it's necessary to have it in the first place.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:14:34)
Well, I think

I think, you know, the the idea here is to prohibit governments from mandating that. You know, but if manufacturers are gonna put it in, you know, you can still have rules that govern how those systems work. You just can't tell companies that they are required to put those features in

Stephanie Brinley (2:14:49)
Right.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:14:50)
cars.

Stephanie Brinley (2:14:50)
Well, yeah. I I but there's features we don't know about yet 'cause we're not developed yet. And you know it is posturing. It's not necessary. And I do think there's

Roberto Baldwin (2:14:56)
It's posturing. It's all it's just posturing. You can't it doesn't make any s

Sam Abuelsamid (2:14:58)
Yeah. Are are are you are you you're accusing

this current administration of posturing?

Roberto Baldwin (2:15:05)
It's it's a posturing, especially when the real issue is we don't have proper privacy protection

Sam Abuelsamid (2:15:11)
Data privacy.

Roberto Baldwin (2:15:12)
laws and

Stephanie Brinley (2:15:12)
Right.

Roberto Baldwin (2:15:13)
data protection laws in this country. That's the real issue. Not this weird, hey, you can't stop people from buying cars that don't have a modem. Okay.

Stephanie Brinley (2:15:24)
Yeah. Okay.

Roberto Baldwin (2:15:29)
Sir? What are you talking about? Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (2:15:30)
You know.

Yeah. It's not the only administration to posture, by the way. but

Sam Abuelsamid (2:15:35)
Yeah. They all do.

Stephanie Brinley (2:15:37)
they all do. but yeah, so it's it's it is a red herring sort of thing out there. It leans into this conversation that that we'd want anti regulation so that you can do whatever you want in a space where it's not even being regulated in. and the market'll take care of what people want to buy. If if there are people who don't want this stuff and

That they're gonna buy the slate. Now, if slate does hit on some way that Sam and I don't really expect yet, if that happens, you can see, you know, Ford go, you know what, I'm taking that modem out of that maverick and you can just have it the way it is. It the automakers will react if if people want to do it that way. Either that or some other automaker will step in and fill the gap.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:16:23)
Yeah. I mean there there will probably if there if there's enough of a a pull for it from consumers, you know, then you know somebody somebody will find a way to fill that gap. But I I honestly don't actually expect that to happen. Yeah. Yeah. And regardless, even even if the even if customers want the connectivity in their vehicles, you know, we still need data privacy laws. Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (2:16:47)
We do.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:16:48)
And you know, that need that needs to be protected both from

corporations and from the government. We need

Roberto Baldwin (2:16:55)
Yeah, we have.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:16:56)
we need protection from both sides, not you know, not just from one side.

Stephanie Brinley (2:17:00)
Data privacy would be a better area

Sam Abuelsamid (2:17:03)
Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (2:17:03)
to address in this than this red

Roberto Baldwin (2:17:06)
But

Stephanie Brinley (2:17:06)
herring thing.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:17:08)
Yeah. All right. well that's it for this week. Thank you everybody for tuning in. Yeah.

Stephanie Brinley (2:17:14)
We got through a lot. It was a good week.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:17:17)
thanks again for joining us today, Steph. Always good to talk to you. And I'll

Stephanie Brinley (2:17:20)
Thank you. Yes, I enjoyed it. Thank you.

Sam Abuelsamid (2:17:22)
I'll see you again in a few days in Seattle. and we'll talk to you all next time. Bye.

Stephanie Brinley (2:17:31)
Bye.

Roberto Baldwin (2:17:31)
Bye.