car discussion

[waltdogg]

had a jeep patriot for almost 5 years before totaling it. had decent gas mileage, just enough power and road clearance for doing off road, and i could fit a ton of music equipment in it.

picking up a chevy cruze today, hopefully. i bought it yesterday but my dealership has gotta trade for the color i wanted, they found one right across the bay but haven't heard back yet. gas mileage is even better than the jeep's was, has enough storage space for just my own equipment. i'm over being able to haul my entire band's backline. we can buy a van again when were successful enough. LOL.

[Disarm D'arcy]

I could fit my 2 members band and our PA in my Polo. Just saying.

#PoloTroll

[sylnau]

I could fit my 2 members band and our PA in my Polo. Just saying.

#PoloTroll

We dont have the Polo here in Canada.
And VW parts and labour is quite expensive.

[Disarm D'arcy]

I know. It's too small for the market while it's the best selling VW here

[Invisible Man]

All Wheel Drives are bullshit. And they cost a fuckton to run.
Get a real 4WD and go do some mud/rock work if you're in the forest a lot.
I have an 09 Suzuki Jimmy that has never let me down and cost me >$50AU a fortnight to run as a daily driver.
It has never gotten stuck on the beach or in the mud.

It's not a great car if you have a heap of stuff to haul but if you like small cars and know how to Tetris you can get by alright.

Whoa whoa pump the brakes on the AWD hate, IP. Shouldn't you be repping the shit out of Subaru? I loved my 06 Forester...five years of absolutely insane Bflo winters with nary a slip.

But, like with you, Syl, repairs got to be too much once I started driving it 1,000 miles a week. So I got a Honda Fit (a month after I paid off the Subaru (gah)).

But Mazda, Subaru Toyota, Honda...those are my jamz. Don't think you could go too wrong. For what you're doing--if you get something new--my vote is for an Outback or Crosstek.

[Invisible Man]

Also: hatchbacks FTW.

[Invisible Man]

I could fit my 2 members band and our PA in my Polo. Just saying.

#PoloTroll

We dont have the Polo here in Canada.
And VW parts and labour is quite expensive.

Isn't the Golf the super-sized NA rebranded Polo? Also a great car.

[Disarm D'arcy]

Nope. We have the Golf as well. It's just its smaller counterpart that is very successful on this side of the pond and would be of no interest on the NA market. If you can compare in Toyota units, the Polo is a Yaris and the Golf an Auris. In Audi terms the Polo is the same platform as the A1 and the Golf the same platform as an A3. To Ford, it would be the Fiesta against the Focus.

To be honest, I think this is really weird, that need for gigantic cars on the NA market. When I see the amount of shit I can fit in a Polo, unfolded or folded rear seats, I don't see the need for much more. I mean I bought a big ass comfy chair at Ikea. It fit in there. I brought back an EPAL would pallet in the trunk. I took to other people on a 3 day beach vacation with the accompanying luggage and food and sleeping stuff and shit. I moved to another city for the month of August. I was housed there, so I took 2 weeks worth of work and chill clothing, all my bathroom/hygiene stuff, my Gibson, my bicycle in the trunk, my work bag (a few books, a laptop etc...), my beach gear because it was near the ocean... And there was the second front sit left and I filled about half the trunk with the seats folded.

My mum owns a beautiful Golf of the same year as my Polo that I think would be enough car for a family of 4. After all, when I was a kid, my parents had a car this size and we would go on vacations for two weeks with my brother and me in the backseat and all the luggage.

Even the current French minivan trend that is slowly dying in favor of the small SUV/MPV hybrid (like the Jeep Renegade / Fiat 500L and 500XL, Peugeot 2008, Renault Captur) eludes me. I had a Renault MPV before the Polo, and while it was bigger, I could fit less than in the Polo because of poor backseat folding design and trunk design (weird shaped door etc...).

[Invisible Man]

Agreed, DD. Never been happy in big cars. It's definitely a philosophical difference here, though. Lots of people need (or think they need) to tow shit around in a truck. My little Honda gets grief from tons of folks who call it a go-kart...,I'm a big dude, though so it does look a little comical. Still, fits my family of four with no issues.

But even with trucks: my brother has a Ford Ranger that takes care of every need his farm has. Eh. Must be manifest destiny of the closing of the frontier or some such...Murrica.

[Disarm D'arcy]

I actually have a neighbor who had a 5.8 Dodge Ram 1500 imported. It's so comical when he starts it up and it sounds like a semi truck The guy works a white collar job downtown and lives in a flat in the suburbs. He obviously needs the towing power and the room to haul shit around. Especially as someone with a family of... well... himself.

The Honda Fit is actually available over here as the Honda Jazz. It's defo in the MPV / compact minivan camp the local market has been in the mood for. However, Honda is poorly established here (like sub 1% of the market share - all Japanese makers can't even take 10% of the French market share...) and cost of maintenance is equivalent to luxury brands.

Here, French makers hold almost 60% of the market share by themselves (that's Renault-Dacia-Nissan and Peugeot-Citroen-DS). The VW group is next with a little over 10% of the market share. Then there's GM (mostly Opel here), Ford-Mazda, BMW, Mercedes, Toyota-Lexus, and Fiat-Chrysler with about 3-5% each. The rest is split between all of the others (Honda, Suzuki, Hyundai, Kia, Volvo...). I'm a sucker for Volvos. I melt every single time I see a C30 or a V70 or a beaten up 240GL.

The Volkswagen Polo is the only non French car in the top 10 of best sold cars of 2015. And it's at the tenth position. That gives you an idea of how different our markets are

[Invisible Man]

I had no idea! I love that this info essentially reinforces the idea that France is nationalistic, which is a criticism that...perhaps you've heard.

But maybe your cars are just cooler....I sometimes see an ancient Citroen idling in town, and all I can think is that it looks like something out of a Melies film. So goddamn French. And awesome.

Does anyone/did anyone watch Top Gear?

[D.o.S.]

I actually have a neighbor who had a 5.8 Dodge Ram 1500 imported. It's so comical when he starts it up and it sounds like a semi truck The guy works a white collar job downtown and lives in a flat in the suburbs. He obviously needs the towing power and the room to haul shit around. Especially as someone with a family of... well... himself.

I know we've talked about this but it wasn't on the internet: there's a ton of that here. The dick measuring thing is real, even if it's more psychological than physical (at least as far as the law of averages is concerned). The same reason why military folks vote Republican over here: nothing to do with policy, but because it's more "masculine."

[odontophobia]

God. Damn.

Living in Michigan the dick measuring via bad ass truck is so absurd.

Also, I think Americans want to be nationalistic when it comes to cars... our manufacturing just gets sent everywhere else. Everybody just believes it isn't and they're happy to but some Chevy that was made in America.

[Disarm D'arcy]

Lol. Kinda same here. Historic French manufacturers use Spanish and Eastern European labor for pretty much everything, except design/engineering and final assembly on higher end models. I used to drive a poorly designed Renault made in Spain and nobody complained. Now I drive a a well designed Volkswagen made in Spain, and some people have given me grief for it, you know for "selling out". I don't get it, I just like my money pits to be well engineered so they are less of money pits

[Andrew]

Volkswagen Polos, man.

I'll see myself out.

I just bought myself a new Polo. Love it so much.