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Drew Dowdell

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Everything posted by Drew Dowdell

  1. Drew Dowdell
    tumblr lved0hMkYx1r257blo1 500

    From the album: Drew's Animated Gifs

  2. Drew Dowdell
    You forget that Cadillac can and will share some of the under-parts of these cars with other divisions, so the money will go further at Cadillac than it might at Benz. Does Cadillac really need its own power window motors, airbag assemblies (I'm not talking the cover here), power seat motors, or disk brake calipers that aren't shared with Chevy, GMC, or Buick? No, not at all.... and that is just a very short list of possible cost savings that Cadillac has in its pocket that BMW and MB cannot replicate (Audi can through VW).
  3. Drew Dowdell
    Some specs you missed: ATS ~ 2.0T / 6A : 21/30 - 272hp - 295 lb-ft - Regular fuel okay, premium recommended A4 ~ 2.0T / 8A : 24/32 - 211hp - 258 lb-ft - Premium fuel required Any fuel cost savings gained by the extra mpgs in the Audi are reversed and then pushed into the negative by the Premium fuel requirement..... even if you did run regular fuel which isn't recommended, your mpg will suffer substantially. The Cadillac ATS 2.0T can run regular fuel 100% of the time and you'll just see a small performance decrease. This is also where the Cadillac 2.5 liter comes in. It runs regular fuel just fine and has almost the same HP as the Audi 2.0T though a lot less torque... and gets the 22/33 mpg Except, in the real world, none of that really holds up. As premium is recommended for full power with Cadillac's 2.0t, those numbers are achieved using premium. The Audi's engine is well documented as being under-rated, and it shows. What looks like a massive difference in horsepower simply doesn't materialize in reality. Performance data shows the the A4 and ATS as having nearly identical acceleration times, both generally around 5.8 seconds. It's the same thing with the 328i, which also looks to be at a disadvantage on paper, yet is the quickest of the bunch by far. Edmunds even dyno'd the ATS and 328i back to back, finding the the BMW had an ever so slight advantage in power. It also happens to achieve the best fuel economy, also on premium. There is a slight cost savings using regular in the Cadillac, but it's not that big a difference, especially after factoring in real driver's actual MPG (to be honest, there's very little data on fueleconomy'gov's website, but owner's forums seem to back up that data after a quick search). So yes, on paper, the Cadillac looks like a winner. In reality, they're all about the same. Not such a bad thing, and honestly, the Germans set themselves up for it by under-rated everything. But again, the point we're talking about here is that even when specs are identical, people complain about the Cadillac spec but not the equal spec from the Germans. I do wonder what the ATS performance will be once it gets the new 8-speed in August.
  4. Drew Dowdell
    HRV looked like it had mucho room inside it when i saw it at the auto show. But of course its not as girthy or comfy as a crosstour. Oddly enough the market will embrace the HRV and it will destroy crosstour sales. I could see popping for a Crosstour if you went in looking at an Accord and they offered a better deal on the Crosstout just to get rid of them. I'd consider one if the deal was can't miss good, but hey I had an Aztek once so looks is maybe not big with me...... Well my other reason for the LOL is that the Civic 5-door is coming too wow, i thought they let the Fit be the 5 door......... Nope, they were quite clear in the Civic concept press conference that they are bringing that body style back. It sounds like it might be UK built though.
  5. Drew Dowdell
    Keep in mind that this car was released in 2005 and ended it's run in 2011. It splits the Acura TSX and TL in size. So keep in mind what it would have been competing with in 2005 in the US.... The first gen CTS, the first gen TLX, the first gen Lexus IS, and the first gen Infiniti G35. Thought of in that crowd, the Alfa 159 seems quite competitive visually. They also came in an attractive wagon which I'm sure we would not have gotten. They are also built on a GM platform that we never got here in the US.
  6. Drew Dowdell
    I think we need to see the models that come over first. Had the Alfa-Romeo 159 been sold in the US, I absolutely would have bought one.
  7. Drew Dowdell
    The Fiat 500 doesn't have a trunk, it is basically a 1-box design.
  8. Drew Dowdell
    Some specs you missed: ATS ~ 2.0T / 6A : 21/30 - 272hp - 295 lb-ft - Regular fuel okay, premium recommended A4 ~ 2.0T / 8A : 24/32 - 211hp - 258 lb-ft - Premium fuel required Any fuel cost savings gained by the extra mpgs in the Audi are reversed and then pushed into the negative by the Premium fuel requirement..... even if you did run regular fuel which isn't recommended, your mpg will suffer substantially. The Cadillac ATS 2.0T can run regular fuel 100% of the time and you'll just see a small performance decrease. This is also where the Cadillac 2.5 liter comes in. It runs regular fuel just fine and has almost the same HP as the Audi 2.0T though a lot less torque... and gets the 22/33 mpg
  9. Drew Dowdell
    But the you would if it had 4 rings or a 3-pointed star? That's the point Balth is making here. Why are there complaints about Price per Interior Space on the ATS when the smaller competition doesn't get the same complaint.
  10. Drew Dowdell
    Nothing but oil changes, tire rotations, and one recall to adjust the seat mounting bolt torque.
  11. Drew Dowdell
    HRV looked like it had mucho room inside it when i saw it at the auto show. But of course its not as girthy or comfy as a crosstour. Oddly enough the market will embrace the HRV and it will destroy crosstour sales. I could see popping for a Crosstour if you went in looking at an Accord and they offered a better deal on the Crosstout just to get rid of them. I'd consider one if the deal was can't miss good, but hey I had an Aztek once so looks is maybe not big with me...... Well my other reason for the LOL is that the Civic 5-door is coming too
  12. Drew Dowdell
    While I was photographing the new Maxima last Thursday (I'll have a write up on that published later today), I spotted SMK admiring an S-Class.
  13. Drew Dowdell
    I'll believe it when I see it.
  14. Drew Dowdell
    I'll have to look again the next time I'm near a charging station that I know about.
  15. Drew Dowdell
    Huge LOL that they suggest the HRV in place of the crosstour. Such a huge difference in utility.
  16. Drew Dowdell
    The next Frontier is all but certain to contain a Cummins 4-cylinder.... so it will most likely get that rather than a Benz unit.
  17. Drew Dowdell
    It can keep up just fine. It has more power than a similarly priced 4-series or A4.
  18. Drew Dowdell
    It's great that the network is being further built out. I wonder though how visible it is to non-EV drivers. When driving along a highway, I'll regularly see signs for gas stations at the coming up exit, but never for EV station even when I happen to know a charging station is available. This reminds me of another article that I need to write.
  19. Drew Dowdell
    Pontiac GTO?
  20. Drew Dowdell
    Also... Nissan is moving up in the world. The last time they built a small pickup and re-badged it for someone else, it was Suzuki. Maybe they can dust off that old tooling?
  21. Drew Dowdell
    Also... I spy a mudmonster in the pictures.
  22. Drew Dowdell
    I've spent small bit of time in one of these with the bordello red interior..... If only my automotive needs were different, I would own one.
  23. Drew Dowdell
    I mean really... at least go to GM or Ford or Ram who each at least know how to build class leading trucks. Each of them have been "Truck of the Year" multiple times... how many times has the Titan been there?
  24. Drew Dowdell
    When was that? Late 60's? 1968 I believe... and we already know that the 1968 Toronado is not the answer, and Balth said that this plastic grille came a few years before.
  25. Drew Dowdell
    boooooo!
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