Finally! Time for a New Car: $9k budget; Quick + Reliable + Luxurious

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To me, the very best SUVs are vehicles like the Tribute: good on gas, nice ride, compact size... it might not be a "real" SUV, but it's probably the best compromise as far as SUVs go.
 
neanderthal
M5power
that comment wasnt directed at you. hell, i aint to fool. a 3 year old car for $3K is a no brainer.

that comment was directed at =V8power= who seems to think all SUVs are cargo carrying, off roading kings.

most of them are crap. at everything. they are out everything'd by various genres of vehicle. but for a good combination of load and people carrying capacity, i suppose they cant be beat. but they're still crap.

and of course, in a conversation about a mazda tribute, he mentions SUVs, a jeep liberty, four wheeling and the gorilla chest thumping utility of SUVs. and when i call bull**** , say a benz estate can do that, he say, no i was only talking about suburbans and excursions and the like. :rolleyes: :rolleyes:

when did you mention full size SUVs in that comment?

as for the comment about a merc e class doing that i bet it can. it has a stiff enough structure that it wouldnt drop a wheel in that gully, and with 4matic all wheel drive it could pull through that. you're problem is that in picking an obstacle, you didnt think to pick one that plays to the SUVs strength, its height advantage. theres no obstacle there in that picture for a car to surmount. just a ditch. and any car that is long enough, has intelligent all wheel drive, a lockable diff, and a stiff enough structure is going to be able to get through that.

mercedes e class with 4 matic, and slip control? ding, ding ding, we have a winner. its wheelbase is only ten inches shorter than that same hummer. its weight is more evenly distributed so its probably less likely to want to drop a wheel in there until the CoG passes with no contact from the wheel in the air. and from that pic, it seems that wouldnt happen.
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O man now you got me started...
First off I said the Jeep Liberty Renegade was my favorite SMALL suv. M5power got a small SUV so I was telling which one was my favorite. Small SUVs however are really a joke because as you said, they offer no more than a car can do.

Okay first off, I would laugh if a Mercedes E-class tried to go over that at that same angle the hummer is. It would get stuck so easy. Station wagons hang over the rear rear waaay too much to do any offroading. Real SUVs and trucks can do things that NO other vehicle can.
Anyway let me see ANY mercedes do these:
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stus-tj-7.jpg

H2_Driveline.gif


Ya alot of people on this forum have obviously never gone off of a paved road. A station wagon is not capable of more than a little pothole in the road and you know it. Large SUVs and Trucks are capable of driving on almost any terrain possible. Cars are only usefull for dry or wet pavement.

O one more thing, I have never seen a 75inch bridge over a road. So that comment was completly pointless.
 
M5Power
To me, the very best SUVs are vehicles like the Tribute: good on gas, nice ride, compact size... it might not be a "real" SUV, but it's probably the best compromise as far as SUVs go.
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Tribute is a good choice. I would go for it for $3K.

But don't supercharge it. Dream, maybe. But save your money for when you have a car that would really be worthy of the blower.

Supercharging it will turn it from a reliable Japanese commuter to a sort-of-fast pain in the neck. And you know all about pain in the neck cars already.

The only things worth "modifying" on a car like that is a oiled cotton filter (NOT an intake, the stock ducting is just fine), and switch to a better ATF.
 
any mercedes? clown.

mb_unimog_404S_1955.jpg

an old unimog. from the 60s.

unimog_poza.jpg

how about a diagram from the spec chart?

unimog3.jpg

another old unimog. not new, old.

lionsback.jpeg

thats lionsback, in moab

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playing in the rocks

670292_4_full.jpg

more fun in the rocks. did you say show me ANY mercedes that can do that?

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some axle articulation action for you

670292_5_full.jpg

a "slight" uphill

even a comparison with the vaunted humvee

how about some video?

link of a gwagen.


theres so much stuff out there. if i didnt have rugby practise right now, id be sitting here making you look a fool.

mercedes; if you dont know, you better ask somebody.
 
Yeah, I knew those were coming. I'm not even a huge M-B fan, and I'd have posted something like that if it hadn't been already.
 
=V8 Power=
Ya alot of people on this forum have obviously never gone off of a paved road. A station wagon is not capable of more than a little pothole in the road and you know it. Large SUVs and Trucks are capable of driving on almost any terrain possible. Cars are only usefull for dry or wet pavement.

O one more thing, I have never seen a 75inch bridge over a road. So that comment was completly pointless.
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I've never seen an E-class MB wagon having to attempt crossing a large gash in the ground either - that was the whole point of the comment. You've posted pictures of people taking their cars on what is obviously an off-road course, no one would attempt to do this in a MB wagon so their inclusion is also utterly pointless isn't it.
 
This entire line of argument is utterly pointless by now. Let's move on.
 
Duke
This entire line of argument is utterly pointless by now. Let's move on.
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...Especially when you can hike the Rubicon Trail at nearly the same rate of speed as those machines. Even I have to claim those machines are pointless, unless you have tons of junk to carry.
 
Pupik
...Especially when you can hike the Rubicon Trail at nearly the same rate of speed as those machines. Even I have to claim those machines are pointless, unless you have tons of junk to carry.
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:lol: So true.
Skip
But don't supercharge it. Dream, maybe. But save your money for when you have a car that would really be worthy of the blower.
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I'm not sure. My parents are going back and forth between offering me the car free of charge, and charging me between $2k and $3k for it. I'd be superbly happy either way, but if I got it for free, I'd probably consider supercharging. If I paid, I might just go for a chip - the people on the Escape forums told me it'd cut my 1/4 mile time by about a second.

I also want to install a sunroof, which can actually be done at relatively minimal cost and in a short amount of time (a day). That's assuredly going to be done.
 
M5Power
I'm not sure. My parents are going back and forth between offering me the car free of charge, and charging me between $2k and $3k for it. I'd be superbly happy either way, but if I got it for free, I'd probably consider supercharging. If I paid, I might just go for a chip - the people on the Escape forums told me it'd cut my 1/4 mile time by about a second.

I also want to install a sunroof, which can actually be done at relatively minimal cost and in a short amount of time (a day). That's assuredly going to be done.
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Do as you please, but you will never recoup the investment of a supercharger, chip, or sunroof. The sunroof is a comfort item so I can see justifying the cost, but the chip and/or the supercharger will only expedite the wear on many, many items and will hardly be worth the cost.

With the supercharger, I see headgaskets and check engine lights in your future. Do not underestimate the complexity of this...your car will like to overheat, like to ping on cheap gas, and like to chew up transmission and drivetrain bits.

And if the chip really does cut a second off the 1/4 mile, it is doing this by firming up the transmission's shifts to a ridiculous degree, becuse there could not possibly be more than 10-15 hp to be found in that V6 by tuning alone (this is a general guess based on what I've seen on chips for various enignes of similar displacement and power). Think about it, if with a bit of software fiddling Ford/Mazda could have made their car a second faster in the 1/4 without sacrificing something, why wouldn't they have done it from the factory?
 

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