It's weird how I went from "Nothing less than a V6!" and "Horsepower is king!" to a 110HP 1.8L hatch. I ended up cutting about 10 minutes off my commute just because the shorter wheelbase makes lane-changes easier, and the mileage is awesome in start and go traffic. I'm down to half a tank and my first thought was "Great, I'm going to have to fill up sometime this month". #carchat #cars
@Areya Hyundai Elantra GT with a 6-speed manual. The clutch is garbage (no feel at all, and a vague deadzone) but for part of my commute I have about 200m to accelerate and merge with an uphill 110kph freeway so the ability to pop it from 5 to 3 and merge screaming into valhalla is worth it :D
I used to have a MkIV TDI but after the 3rd time a mechanical failure almost murdered me, a warranty started sounding pretty good for commuting.
@Areya Before that in reverse order:
2008? Toyota Solara: Crack in the exhaust manifold gave me carbon monoxide poisoning
2002 Chrysler Sebring: It was a Sebring. Surprisingly fast pickup, but no breaks or steering. Ditched it when one time it had literally no brakes.
'97 Chevy S-10 Blazer, custom indigo paint job and rolled bumpers: It was perfect, and someone ruined it :(
'93 Mercury Sable Wagon: Drunk driver t-boned me
4 different Hyundai Excels: They shared parts... and my heart.
@Phancypants that's quite the resume you got there. This is my first car, I'm still a youngin'. Looks like you had some bad luck with other drivers on the road :(
@Areya Northern Canada used to have a real bad problem with drunk drivers. Bad enough that most rural areas got a bunch of new RCMP and the driving limit got cut to .05. Almost every driver I know got tagged by a drunk at least once in the 90s.
@Phancypants Hahaha very nice. I drive an Audi A3 (a few years old, when they were still hatchbacks), so I'm in a similar situation. 6-speed manual, 2.0T inline-4 engine. Love the sport clutch, though. Any newbie driving stick can figure it out in seconds.
@Areya I've got a great love of Audi hatchbacks. I don't like their high-end stuff, but somewhere there is an HR manager saying "Wilhelm is a crazy person... send him to hatchback division"
@Phancypants Yeah I absolutely love my car. It's more than you need. The little turbo is great, decent gas mileage, and handles well. I live in Boston so it's a good size for the city.
@Areya Dear Lord, you need to drive in Boston?!
@Phancypants In an ideal world, no haha. I work a bit outside of the city so it's more convenient for the commute
@Phancypants what're you driving?