sac's SUV-buying saga - finally complete!

I didn't know that a third seat was an option with the Rav4. I guess I should check it out even though you're starting me off with a bad review.

i really really loved my honda pilot. i'm sorry we got rid of it.

sac said:

I didn't know that a third seat was an option with the Rav4. I guess I should check it out even though you're starting me off with a bad review.

So many people love it - and we absolutely love our Toyota Corolla. It just wasn't the right car for us. Don't let that deter you! It's consistently one of the top-ranked crossover SUVs.

You might also consider the non-hybrid Highlander as well. We liked it very much but it was a little too big for us at the time of our purchase. The Hyundai SantaFe was, for us, the perfect balance between the slightly-too-small CRV and too-big Highlander.

Also the Kia Sorento has a 3rd row, which is comprarable to the SantaFe. To be honest I can't recall why we didn't look at it; it gets good reviews and I have friends who love it.

@sac, I just read that the redesigned Rav4 does not have the third row option. So you'd want to look at 2012 or earlier models for that.

I leased the new Outback for 3 years, liked the drive, seats not comfortable. Now have a Jeep Grand C and our family hauler is the new Dodge Durango (had that for a year). I highly recommend the Durango...it is based on the Mercedges and gets surprisingly good milage for a large vehicle and is fun to drive (like the outback). No problems so far.

A mechanic fully trained in repair of a hybrid engine may be required, and it may be hard to find, but they exist. Frank DeFinis in Maplewood was in training for either the Toyota or the Chevy Volt. Or both. I can't remember.

There are very few hybrid SUVs. The only one I know of in the size class I'm looking at is the Toyota Highlander. Ford used to make a hybrid Escape, but no more.

Somewhere along the line (or perhaps on my blog) I wondered what ever happen to the car salesman's blog about car buying. Well ... he (@oldsctls67) just posted in the Tesla thread and now I found it: http://forum.maplewoodonline.com/discussion/90483/the-car-business. I'm surprised that it "died", although it is still open for posting, so I guess that could change.

Now that tax season is over (although most of mine are on extension, so not really "done"), maybe I can turn my attention to new car buying again.

http://www.motortrend.com/oftheyear/suv/1312_2014_suv_of_the_year_subaru_forester/

You were looking for a manual, you can get one in the 2.5i Premium. Although the I prefer the turbo boxer 4 in the XT even though you don't get to row your own and have to get the CVT.

supposedly one of the reasons that manual transmissions are disappearing is that they no longer give an advantage in MPG. automatic transmissions controlled by computer are better at shifting at the optimal moment than even the best human driver. I believe that for some models, the MPG for manual transmission is actually worse than automatic.

I like driving a stick shift, but finding a car that has one is increasingly difficult. they may go the way of the crank starter soon.

http://www.edmunds.com/fuel-economy/five-myths-about-stick-shifts.html

I like driving a stick, but I'm not really expecting this car to have it.

And, I am having more frequent flare-ups of an old injury to my left knee, which is sometimes aggravated by clutching. So, it may be just as well.

Why don't you go to the auto show at the Javits Center? You can see all the cars in the world there. I went yesterday and it was fun (and I don't even like cars much).

@nan that's a great idea. We happened to be in DC when one was happening and it was a great experience!! It was so helpful to actually look inside and sit in them to get a feel for the space. You don't get to test drive but you can still add or subtract cars from your list that way.

This was also where I learned that I'm apparently a car person

sac said:

I want AWD or 4WD and I'm still struggling to understand the difference.

An AWD vehicle has the ability to apply power to any of it's four wheels. How efficantly it does this depends on it's designed.

A 4WD vehicle has the ability to apply power to any of it's four wheels also. But it has an option to put/shift the transmission into a lower gear ratio(this is usually called 4low). This drastically increases the power/torque going to the wheels, but making it capable of far less speed while in 4low.

Most of the "Cross-overs" are SUV shells put onto car frames. This gives you the space of an SUV and the comfortable handling of a car. So as far as ground clearance and off pavement performance, they will be similar to car. When my buddy's 2000 Rav4(AWD) would get stuck at camp we'd pull it out with the camps 1990 F-150(2WD).

I definitely want a bit more clearance than a typical sedan or minivan, but it doesn't have to be too much. It LOOKS like most of the crossovers fit that requirement, although I haven't gotten out a tape measure.

I didn't even know that there was an auto show on now. I'll have to check that out, but I don't think I have time to go into the city until late in the week.

Ooh - found it and I see that it goes until 4/27. Maybe a good field trip with my husband next weekend!

ml1 said:

supposedly one of the reasons that manual transmissions are disappearing is that they no longer give an advantage in MPG. automatic transmissions controlled by computer are better at shifting at the optimal moment than even the best human driver. I believe that for some models, the MPG for manual transmission is actually worse than automatic.

I like driving a stick shift, but finding a car that has one is increasingly difficult. they may go the way of the crank starter soon.

They're also often faster now. There is a huge debate in the Porsche community now over this very thing, as some of the historically more "driver-oriented" models are not being offered with a stick. Personally, I'll buy pre-owned before I go exclusively with a paddle.

@Bsnapps - I saw your other thread. Wondering if you want to weigh in here?

sac said:

Ooh - found it and I see that it goes until 4/27. Maybe a good field trip with my husband next weekend!

Husband just reminded me that he is scheduled for knee surgery on Friday. I guess that won't work. Anyone want to go to the car show during the day on Thursday?

@sac, we've talked about our highlander, but if you're interested in checking out our Outback, let me know. Also haven't seen you in a while!

So we got to go to the car show after all and that was a GREAT move. Thanks for the suggestion @nan! It never would have occurred to me, even if I had heard about it (which I hadn't until you posted.) We walked all around looking at different models and then, after looking at a couple would think of something new to measure or investigate and it was easy to go back and re-visit the ones we had already seen since everything was all in one place. (Yes, it's a big hall, but I can't even imagine trying to do what we did by running around between dealers. I'll bet that we covered as much "ground" research-wise in 2-3 hours as would have taken several days of running around to multiple dealers.) And we now have a few more models on our radar - the Nissan Rogue, which is really a small SUV (like a Honda CR-V or a Toyota Rav 4 but they do not have a 3rd-row option) and also the Mitsubishi Outlander. I had recently also come across the Hyundai Santa Fe which has jumped up to the top of the Consumer Reports ratings list and looked at them and liked what I saw. It also seems that the models that have been around for awhile - Nissan Pathfinder, Honda Pilot, Toyota Highlander are still good possibilities although I think that they are all a bit larger than we really need and a bit lower gas mileage than the others mentioned. It does appear to me that the gas mileage is inching up a little bit each year on most of these models, though.

The Nissan Rogue is particularly intriguing to me because it is smaller than most of the others (but big enough for us) and therefore has really impressive gas mileage - 25 city/32 highway - with a traditional gasoline engine. It is a new model (although they had a different model with the same name not too many years back) and Consumer Reports gave it cautiously high marks, but they never check-rate anything in its first year. One caveat was that CR did not like the fact that the 3rd-row seat option eliminates the spare tire and, instead, includes "run flat" tires which apparently they do not like. I'm pondering that issue (and realizing that I have only used a spare tire once or twice in all of my years of driving and wonder if this is not a worthwhile tradeoff, especially since the "run flat" tires are supposed to allow you to continue driving for a longer period of time on the "flat" to get to a place where you can get a repair or replacement.)

Anyone here have experience with 'run flat' tires? Also, it occurs to me that the primary time when we might be more worried about having no spare is on road trips when we would definitely NOT be using the third seat. So, perhaps we could get a spare tire and just carry it in the cargo area when needed, but remove it when we want to use the third seat (which would be more around town or going into NYC or other shorter trips with less cargo.

I've yet to meet anyone who liked their run flat tires.

Glad you enjoyed it sac! I was surprised at how much fun I had and I'm not even looking for a car.

What did they not like about them? And couldn't you just replace them with regular tires (and then have a regular spare to carry in the back or not as needed) if you otherwise like the car?

Rough ride, poor longevity, and, no, you can't just replace the tires. Need new rims, too.

Hmmm - If we decide to go with that car, maybe I'll just try to negotiate something with the dealer to swap off the ride-flats and sell me five regular tires on the correct size rims. I am pretty sure that the spare could fit in the cargo area just fine, even with the third seat in use, I think, so long as we don't need to put anything else back there. It just wouldn't have the custom 'well' that so many cars have for that purpose.

Steve said:

I've yet to meet anyone who liked their run flat tires.

Hate them. Hate hate hate them.

stay away from runflats, all trouble... if they were so good, you would see them everywhere and spares would be a thing of the past..

sac said:

Hmmm - If we decide to go with that car, maybe I'll just try to negotiate something with the dealer to swap off the ride-flats and sell me five regular tires on the correct size rims. I am pretty sure that the spare could fit in the cargo area just fine, even with the third seat in use, I think, so long as we don't need to put anything else back there. It just wouldn't have the custom 'well' that so many cars have for that purpose.

Rogues are package driven, so doubtful a dealer would (or can) switch out runflats on a lot car, and not sure the factory would break up the package (unless you pay full freight and even then no--we couldn't do it with BMW)...worth a shot. Most complaints on the car (styling notwithstanding) seem to be that the third row is nearly uninhabitable and storage all but nonexistent with it. May want to measure it. If you can wait a year, I believe they are coming out with a hybrid.