Topic: 2005 Chevy Equinox

[micah]

nice. Not many of those on the road, but some of the reviews I read were all positive. Nicely done. Too bad the whole process cost you so much aggravation and lost money. Did you buy the elantra new? would you mind sharing how much you paid for it?

Thanks, yeah its not a very common car right now.  Back in the early 2000's Hyundai made a wagon version of the Elantra. I always thought it was butt ugly but apparently it was one of their best selling cars.  They phased it out several years ago to have more cross-over style cars (like the Tuscon that we have and its bigger brother the Santa Fe).  They brought it back in 2010 and it is sharp.  Its small but very roomy.  The body style is compact and sleek like maybe a slightly bigger Honda Fit but sticks to a modern tradition wagon look, like a tiny little Volvo Cross Country.

For a 4-cylinder front wheel drive car, it handles very nicely. Its such a big change from that gawd-awful boxy Equinox that had a horrible turning radius, couldn't pull into parking spots and felt like it would slide off the road on tight curves.  Before we bought this, we test drove it overnight (and put nearly 100 miles on it.) I wanted to make damn sure we would both enjoy driving it and not regret it later.

We got the decked-out "SE" trim, with sunroof, alloy wheels, blu-tooth, premium stereo, heated seats, etc.  The abs/traction & stability control and 6 airbags come standard. There were $1,500 in rebates because they already have the 2011 models on the lot.  After the rebate but then adding taxes and fees, it was about $21,000.  We also rolled our loss on the trade into our loan, but we got a rate of 4.9% financed through Hyundai Financing Corp.  For us, that's a big deal because six years ago when we bought our first car together we had to pay the state maximum rate (15% which I later refinanced to 10.9%) and at the time, we could only get financed through a sub prime lender.  We've really worked to improve our credit and, it seems odd, but were very proud to get a "normal" loan offer -- even if ~5% is still a little high in today's market.

[micah]

So we bought another car today.  I traded in my Hyundai Tuscon for a Subaru Outback 2.5i Premium.  Got an amazing (for us) rate of 3.9% and a great deal for our trade in to put towards the downpayment.  It was a dealer demo car so its "technically" new (we get new car financing rates and the full warranty) but it has like 5,000 miles on it.  No big deal. I feel like we got a great deal on an amazingly feature packed car.

[Jake]

those are really cool. Congrats

Why did you trade in the Tucson, didn't you just get it a year ago or something?

[hans]

I like my Subaru quite a bit so far.

[micah]

those are really cool. Congrats

Why did you trade in the Tucson, didn't you just get it a year ago or something?

Thanks,

no, that was the Hyundai touring we got last fall.
The Tucson was a 2006 we bought back in '07.

yeah, so i never thought of my self as a Subaru driver but I gotta say, this car is pretty sweet.  Its an automatic but you can switch to manual and it has paddle shifters on the steering wheel! 

[ober]

yeah, so i never thought of my self as a Subaru driver but I gotta say, this car is pretty sweet.  Its an automatic but you can switch to manual and it has paddle shifters on the steering wheel! 

My Fit has that.  I use it all the time.  You actually don't even have to switch to manual just to use it either.  You can use the paddle shifters whenever and it will shift for you otherwise.

[Mike]

yeah, so i never thought of my self as a Subaru driver but I gotta say, this car is pretty sweet.  Its an automatic but you can switch to manual and it has paddle shifters on the steering wheel! 

My Fit has that.  I use it all the time.  You actually don't even have to switch to manual just to use it either.  You can use the paddle shifters whenever and it will shift for you otherwise.

Wonder if it is like my journey.  It was a normal (D)rive position but one lower then it allows me to set the maximum gear by shifting the gear selector side to side.  I use it quite a bit when I want engine drag during down hills or when it keeps shifting to 6th on long inclines which kills the power and slows me down causing it to have to downshift anyways to get back up to speed.

[ober]

In the Fit, I have Drive and Manual.  If I put it in Drive, it acts like an automatic but I can downshift and upshift with the paddles, although it always shifts up before I normally would.  If I'm in Drive and downshifting, it will automatically take over again if it gets outside of the normal RPM ranges for automatic shifting.

In Manual, it almost completely let's me control it.  But even in Manual if you rev it too high, it will shift.  It also won't let you downshift at certain RPMs.  It's like manual for dummies... I mean it will let you drive it like a manual, but not like an idiot. 

[Govtcheez]

My wife's Forester has that "manual" mode, but it only lets you shift one gear above or below where the transmission wants to go so you don't blow the engine out by going from fourth to first on the freeway

[micah]

It's like manual for dummies... I mean it will let you drive it like a manual, but not like an idiot.

thats what I said to my wife yesterday.  On the dashboard, where it indicates what gear your in, it displays up and down arrows when you can shift up or down... and if you try to down shift when the RPMs are to high, it beeps at you and won't let you.  That, coupled with no clutch and the fact that it'll down shift for you as you come to a stop, make it perfect for someone who wants to learn the concepts of manually shifting gears but without all that hard work of thinking about what you're doing or getting the clutch timing right.

Also, i've never had a 6-speed before but I sure like it. This is only the 4-cylinder (2.5L) but it has some good pick up when you need it and while 0-60 is nice, when you're on the highway and trying to pass a tractor trailer before your lane disappears, its even nicer to have 60 to 90 as a viable option! 

My wife's Forester has that "manual" mode, but it only lets you shift one gear above or below where the transmission wants to go so you don't blow the engine out by going from fourth to first on the freeway

  Not sure I have a problem with that.  The Outback let me shift down to 4th from 6th at highway speeds with no problem. I didn't need to go any lower than that though so I don't know if it would have let me "gun it" in 3rd.

[Govtcheez]

We don't have a problem with it either.  I'm not sure she's ever actually used that except when we took it for a test drive.

[Mike]

Yeah, it won't let me downshift too far.  Generally 6th to 4th is no problem.  But 3rd is generally out until the speed comes down.

[charlie]

We just rented a car a few weeks ago to pick family at the airport. It had a strange gear shift arrangement but I didn't think too much about it and put it into drive. Five minutes later when we finally got out of the parking/crosswalks/drive 10-15 mph area the engine started revving. I was like what the fuck? Then i realized that I hadn't shifted it into drive, and shifted it into manual and it was still in first gear. Luckily I had driven a car like that once before or I would have had no idea what the hell to do. (The gears were not very well labeled so it really looked like I was in drive.)

But once I figured it out I sure had fun playing with it. Too bad my wife got dibs on driving it during the long stretch of highway to the actual airport. All I got to do was drive it home.