Consumer Reports' latest reliability rankings spark a lively discussion as Todd and Paul welcome Alex Nizek, the associate director of auto test development. They delve into surprising shifts in the rankings, including Subaru's rise to the top spot and Rivian's paradox of high owner satisfaction despite low reliability. The episode also explores the implications of these findings on consumer choices and the automotive industry. With insights into the testing process at Consumer Reports, the hosts emphasize the importance of balancing reliability with driving enjoyment, making this a thought-provoking listen for car enthusiasts.
Topics:reliability rankingsconsumer reportssubarurivianowner satisfactionautomotive industry trendstesting processbuying advice
The reliability rankings from Consumer Reports have been released! The guys speak with Alex Knizek, associate director of test development at CR's Auto Testing Center in Connecticut. They debate something enjoyable for Isaiah K. in VA, who has a Camaro but wants something fun for his wife. Social media questions ask if the guys carry fire extinguishers in their cars, how much does it cost to ship a car from Europe to the USA, and are they concerned with AI replacing them?
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"plate. Even though Mazda is generally pretty reliable overall, just look at what's going on with the CX 90. They're having some issues. It's a brand new platform. Longitudinal rear wheel drive based new inline six. And like, it's a nice vehicle to drive. Don't get me wrong. But reliability"
"That's great. When I love that, that's good. Yeah, MR2 spider, our garage is that 2005 speed, also a 2000 Toyota 4-Runner 5-speed. Okay. All of these purchased before I worked here, so back when they were alive. I didn't hear that. No, no, no, no, no, no. They're two thousand"
"in the autumn of its life. That's currently working. Ladies and gentlemen. Yes. Okay. Uh-huh. 20 grand is very decent because I thought used Mazda CX-5. It is an SUV, even though you know she likes it. But I'm thinking she might really like how it drives. It always presents itself."
"...ow, swollen fenders. It looks like a big Chrysler Crossfire. We saw one this past weekend outside Laguna Saga..."
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This is a car show, but it's also more because cars connect us to every part of our lives. Families, careers, hobbies, and adventures we never expected. So you should have a car you love. We're here to help. I'm Todd. I'm Paul, and this is the everyday driver car debate. Hello everybody, happy Tuesday. Welcome back to the podcast. We have a really cool guest today that we're going to get to in a minute. But before we do that, we have been raging and I will give you
props, Paul. We have been raging against the BMW B-Retief forever. Yeah. It's not a good look. Now it isn't across their whole lineup. But did you see this today? It's still kind of rumored. It came out of Bimmer Post and that kind of stuff. But the potential mockups of the new three series, looking like the new class are out. And they're not sure it's right, but it shows the kind of new class thinking that was their concept car that you actually were a big fan of. It shows kind of the new class thinking on the potential new three
series that they're talking about. Okay. Yeah. I know. It improved. Definitely improved. However, I have to say that I can't help but see some Fisker Karma design in that front end. Maybe even in the rear, I feel like it's Fisker Karma, which is not
necessarily bad thing because that was a great looking car. But I'm curious to see this. Curious to see how they take that new class styling and
executed across their lineup. I mean, this is the thing we've seen Lotus and others have done where they do their new new styling
direction car. There's not meant to be a car. And then that trickles through all of their design. But this is the first time I've seen
anything on this three series. Let's hope it's right. I just saw that today was quite intrigued.
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upgrades made easy. It's been a while since we've had a guest and joining us on the phone shortly is Alex Nizek, consumer reports
associate director of auto test development. I didn't know consumer reports has been around since 1936. They just
released annual rankings and they approached us to discuss industry changes and why some car companies have moved around on the
list. Consumer reports surveys its members about the experience they've had with all the vehicles they've owned in the
previous 12 months. They report on the problems that they had big or small and then they come up with their rankings. It's
pretty fascinating because you may have already seen I've seen a lot of it in the last couple days on Instagram. There's been people
very much cherry picking this data since it just came out and going look this proves this. What's interesting about jumping on with
Alex is we're going to talk about all of the data. The good stuff, the bad stuff, the things that have moved around in
perception, the things that have moved around in reliability. Stuff didn't go where we expected. So consumer reports has data on over
300,000 cars from the year 2000 to 2024 model years and just now some early 2025. So we are curious to speak with Alex and we're calling him now.
Alex, this is Paul and Todd. Hey Paul. Hey Todd. Thank you for joining us. We're thrilled to have you with us. We've talked about consumer reports often on through the years
because of course we we are not a financial podcast. So we make a lot of bad financial decisions for people and we are also not
mechanics. So we we recommend a lot of cars and then we kind of say, you know, okay, is it reliable? Is it not people ask us that we have always said,
well, you know, Paul and I drive them when they're brand new. So I don't know. Right. But you guys do all the research and we often
say consumer reports and I love that we can have you on to talk about this and the latest reliability ratings. It's just exciting.
Yeah. Yeah. I'm excited and I'm also very grateful that you you give that shout out. And yeah, we're we're also drive new cars. But yeah,
the reliability component of things is so important to people. It's important to us and people go in the cars. So yeah, it's a key piece of
the puzzle you might say. Yeah, especially as we talk to people as you know, people have preconceived notions and all that kind of
stuff. And I kind of want to get into that right away. People have well, I'm not going to ever buy brand X because it's never going to run. And you go,
well, hang on. I don't know that's the case. And that leads us actually to this report that just came out. I understand it's a little bit of a
watershed moment because it's always been Toyota Lexus Toyota Lexus Toyota Lexus. But this year, it's not most. Yeah, for most of the time and for a lot of
years, yeah, you see Toyota and Lexus hovering, you know, basically competing with themselves for those top two spots, right? Yeah, but it actually isn't the first time that
Toyota has been defroamed, so to speak. Just a couple of years ago, Mazda was actually up at the top. Love it. And you see, there's yeah, they're still within the mix, right? They're
you know, in that top 10 this year as well, Subaru and I'm sorry Lexus and Toyota, yeah, they just tend to make really reliable cars. And they've
been doing that for a long time. But yes, every automaker kind of ebbs and flows a little bit. They're historically at the
or near the top. And you know, they still do make really reliable cars. Absolutely. As things change, you know, they do move up and down within our rankings. And so
yeah, now this year, you know, Subaru taking that top spot is pretty pretty unique in first time for them.
I mean, if it were just strictly reliability purchasing decisions, Alex, yeah, only Subaru would exist in your
chart entitled how the brands stack up only Subaru's would be the car to buy from here on out. We'd have to
recommend Todd Subaru's we would all the time because here's the side. The other part of this Alex is that we're in the
Rocky Mountains. We're in Park City, Utah, and it's an ongoing joke. The Pacific Northwest, the Rocky Mountains,
and like Vermont and Maine, the official cars have been Subaru outbacks forever. But now what you're telling me
is that the plague of Subaru outbacks that I have been seeing since I moved here 15 years ago, shall continue
because they are reliable and refuse to die.
The reliable plague is not only going to see new ones, but you'll probably see old ones driving around.
Yep. Well, I mean, we knew this, but there's there's the detail to back it up Subaru's reliable by
yourself and outback and run until the earth stops spinning. It's kind of where this goes, you're right.
All right. All right. So, I mean, it's interesting because cars are so subjective, right? I mean,
completely. And so there are so many other things that go into buying a vehicle. And yeah, you see
Subaru at the top of the reliability charts. And again, reliability, so important to a lot of people,
you don't want to spend a lot of money fixing your car, downtime with car, all these things. But there
are plenty of other reasons to buy something that isn't a Subaru, for example. But yeah, they're
hard reliability. What are the reasons? We built an entire podcast on that. Yeah, exactly. Yeah.
Yeah, you might value other things. It's okay. But that actually leads me to a counterpoint here.
And I think it's really interesting because you guys aren't just doing reliability. You're also doing
customer satisfaction. You're doing there's lots of factors. There's a lot of charts. I want to go
there. I want to go to the opposite end of the spectrum. And I want to touch on something that I
want to make sure I'm gleaming the information properly. Tell me if I'm wrong here. But my understanding
is at the bottom of the reliability sits Rivian. However, thank you for bringing this up in owner
satisfaction. They're first. Am I right? Yeah, you're absolutely right. And yeah, it does seem
maybe a little strange at first or confusing. And yeah, there are two different things. And maybe
it would help to explain just for a quick second where this information is coming from.
Please. So we survey our consumer reports members every single year. We're basically asking them
on the reliability front. The problems they've had with their vehicle in the last 12 months.
And the problems and the questions we're asking them basically fall into these different
trouble spots. And we have major trouble spots. Things like engine failures and transmission.
Things that are going to leave the car broken for a while or be big bummers as opposed to things
that are weighted less in our survey, which is sometimes a misnomer. Everybody thinks that we
weight all these things the same, but you know, paint problems in electronics and things like that
are generally weighted less than our surveys. So covering all these things. So that's the reliability
front. But then within that survey is also the owner satisfaction. And we're basically at a very
zoomed out level asking people if they'd buy their vehicle again. How happy are they with it?
So different set to questions. Yes, you're asking these owners and these members. But yeah,
when it comes to Rivian, it's like if you think about who might be buying a Rivian at this point,
it's a brand new company making EV, you know, cars out there for the first time. So it takes a certain
type of person to buy that vehicle, right? It's not necessarily for everybody. So I think
you they're in this space right now where the people who are buying them are okay with the fact
that maybe it's not the most reliable thing, right? And they're willing to put up with some of those
issues because it's I mean, I'm sure you guys have driven them. They're pretty impressive vehicles.
A lot of ways. So you might be willing to deal with some of the negatives of it at the stage
in the game to to get a pretty impressive vehicle. So we need another chart in there somewhere.
Willing this to take it in the tea. Willing this to taller. It's your pain tolerance. Yes,
pain tolerance. One to 10. How willing are you to take pain? But the region owners are number one
on that list. Yes, they are. But the reason I also bring this up, Alex is because okay, obviously
we have the podcast, but we exist on YouTube as well. And what I find hysterical on YouTube,
and of course, we're talking YouTube comments, which is a whole toxic universe. But what I find
fascinating about YouTube comments is if we talk about a car being great to drive, but yet it
doesn't have stellar reliability, there are always those folks in the comments that would never consider
it because it's not reliable. And I've had these conversations face to face with people where they're
like, well, why would you ever get that though? Because it doesn't have bad reliability. But this
Rivian stat is to speak so to what we're talking about. Car love transcends reliability. It's
important, absolutely, but it transcends it sometimes where you know it's not going to be the
most reliable thing, Subaru, but you love it. That's the satisfaction by brand chart. Yes,
that's the, I just love it. Exactly. And are people biased when they answer the surveys?
Well, I mean, that's that's a tough thing, right? And I think people are inherently biased. But
yeah, I mean, we're trying to eliminate that as much as possible by asking the questions in
a neutral way. And you know, we also don't just take whether we're talking reliability or satisfaction,
you know, the data and just take it, you know, for what it is every, we go through it, comb through it
and, you know, excruciating detail. Ask the team who does that. It's a lot of fun to
go through some of those comments and whatnot sometimes. I'm sure that the data we're basing all of
this on, you know, we feel confident about everything. So, you know, looking for instances where,
you know, let's say on reliability, somebody's talking about an issue, but then you actually
read the words that verbatim that they've included and you're like, okay, either they're talking about
something that's different than how they listed it or, you know, this person's just unhappy with
their car and that's not necessarily a problem. So we have to do, you know, go through all this data
and really vet it and make sure that it's, you know, quality data. Sure. Dear listeners, I am quite
pleased to see that Volkswagen is the lowest ranked European brand consumer reports data. They are in
18th place and specifically reading here, Alex, the Towson ID4 are below average. Tows owners reported
problems with its engine brakes, electrical accessories, in-car electronics and noises and leaks.
I am waving me, my eye told you so flag because the Tows is a turd on wheels and the data backs me up.
Alex, you're walking into a minefield here because this has backs me up. This has been the,
the hill for Paul to die on for the better part of a year. We get close to the discussion of
the Tows and you get that rant from him. So what I read this data too and I saw that I was just like,
Paul's going to do a little happy dance. He totally is. I mean, if you, I'd encourage you to go look at
the actual road test, you know, the, the right up on our tested Tows that we had. I mean, I've driven
it. I've tested it on mode. Oh, I've driven it. Oh, I know. That dual clutch transmission and the
whole thing. Yeah, it's not a, not a winner. Well, that leads me to this question, Alex. And that
is how much do OEMs, product planners, marketing people, marketing agencies, how much do they rely on
consumer reports data to focus on changes, to focus on improvements in their own models? Or do you
not know any of that? Do you just leave it out there if people subscribe? Great. If you don't find
where the vehicle is built does not really factor in because Asian brands are Asian brands. You
know, if it's Honda Corp, Honda Corp scored highly, Mary's Villa high, but on the other hand,
how do you even, are you even aware? Are you approached by OEMs?
Asked, you know, hey, could we have some data in this particular area because we think the owners
that they're serving are really being honest with them. And the consumer reports data may be a
little more accurate or a lot more accurate to help them in improving models because I noticed
it's not always dependent on the model. Toyota didn't score first place, but the Toyota RAV4
is the most reliable vehicle of everything you've tested for 2025. Yeah, you're absolutely right.
I mean, and that goes at a higher level just to say, you know, even if a brand is at a brand level
unreliable, it doesn't mean every car they make is unreliable. And then on the other side of that
coin, right, a brand like Subaru can be towards the top that you open that that chart up and you see
that. Okay, yeah, actually, this the three row is sent, maybe isn't the greatest and the solterra
they're having some problems. So, reliable brands, not every model is reliable. But yeah, as far as
the manufacturers, I love that question, it's a great question. We work all the time with the OEMs.
You do. Yeah, I mean, not necessarily like, you know, it's more of like a relationship we have,
right? We're very transparent. We say here's what we're seeing both on the testing side and the
reliability side. And we have these conversations all the time and get questions from them about,
you know, about our data, about our test findings. And yeah, they're always looking to us to see,
not only what we think about how the cars are performing and whatnot. But then yeah, the reliability
side too. And you know, a lot of that is coming from not because they care necessarily what Alex
thinks, but they, you know, consumers are looking at us and really value our information. So,
therefore, they want to have a good standing. So yeah, we're very transparent and have these
conversations all the time. So I'm curious on the new car side. Please educate me. You guys drive
everything. Do you buy these cars? Or do you get press cars? Or how does that work? Oh yeah, no,
we got also a great question. I love this question. We are, we're buying them every, you know,
every time a car gets redesigned or even sometimes with a significant enough refresh. But yeah,
our standard process is to buy the car at a dealership, just like you or I would in our own life,
right? Or any other person. And yeah, so that's why sometimes you might see that we, you know,
our information comes out a little bit behind because we're not necessarily getting that press car.
Sure. We do still rent the cars from the manufacturers, but we won't do any formalized testing.
So we won't instrument the vehicle or go through our full process until we have the vehicle that we
buy ourselves. And that's, you know, just a remain independent because we are a nonprofit organization.
But then we also make sure that we're testing a vehicle that's representative of what
you or I would actually get, right? We're buying a mainstream trim and it hasn't been like,
you know, tweet or anything like that, you know, just being cautious and yeah, it helps us be
independent as well. I love that. You would think so that the local dealers would be like,
that guy's consumer porn is getting a good one. Yeah, get him a good one. You would think they know,
like, well, he buys for them. Okay, good. I love it. Yeah, we all share, you know, the responsibility.
So we're out here in coldchester. Can I get those, you know, over 35 of us here at the track,
but the testing team that I'm a part of, we basically and others to take, you know, we all share
basically the responsibility. And we go to these dealers and basically it's Alex buying the car
until the very last minute, I have to be like, Oh, wait, actually, it's for consumer reports.
And that's not the way they don't know until the last minute. They're not always super pleased.
You can't give it the red one. He got exactly blue with the blue with the blue one.
It's like, Oh, now we're really not giving you a kill. It's funny. Most of the time you're expecting
to like deliver that news and you you'd think the salesperson would, you know, react in a certain kind
of way. And most of the time, they're just like, Oh, okay, whatever. Interesting.
I just do the paperwork differently. Alex, I got to ask, when you are done with a vehicle
and you're selling it, do you, how does that work? Is it the consumer reports lot? And by the way,
we jump that thing. So just know that we jump that loose. It's the use car. Yeah, the lucid still have
ours. Yeah. So we keep the cars for about a year, sometimes longer. It's always at the very
least, we try to have a vehicle from each brand on hand at all times, especially in the, you know,
the day and age of over the air updates and things like that happening. So yeah. But we also,
it's, it's awesome, you know, in the sense of doing my job, testing these vehicles is, let's say,
we're testing the latest Forester. We also have the CRB and the RAV4 and all these other competitor
vehicles on hand, you know, put them side by side. So it's, it's really nice to have that lot.
But yeah, eventually the vehicles they do get sold when we're, you know, kind of done with them and
and enough time has passed and generally be awesome them off. And they still buy that they do. Yeah,
no, we're not hiding the fact that they were CR test vehicles. Interesting. Like this was the
village bicycle. Here you go. Yeah. Well, Alex is also telling me, Paul, without telling me that
we need to fly to Connecticut and do all of our film here over there fleet. We love to.
What are we filming today? Anyway, what's possible? That's right. So okay, on your testing,
I'm obviously you're doing road testing. Do you guys do use an instrument and stuff? Do you have
a dedicated track? Do you do track testing as well for parameters? Yeah, yeah, we do. So yeah, we have
our own facility here. It's about 327 acres is the property that we own. Wow. And yeah,
it's pretty cool. It's actually used to be the Connecticut dragway. So it was a drag strip.
Interesting. Okay. Back in the day. Yeah. And then it kind of went under and CR bought it. We used
to do our testing at Lyme Rock, but we're not way back into that. Oh, interesting. Yeah,
before we had our own facility, but now, yeah, we have our own road course, our own straightaway,
a couple of their different, you know, testing surfaces and whatnot. So yeah, it's
pretty beautiful thing to essentially have a track in my backyard that I get to go and take
this car out. Every single one of your cars in your fleet? It's not quite wide enough for all of
them, but yes, there's no YouTube. All YouTube, what's to see is drag race. That's really,
it just just be called drag to which means it's really all they do. The car that wins, that's
the best one. Of course, you have the drag race category. Yeah, uh-huh. This car won the drag race,
so buy that one. It's not going to be super low as cars in our fleet out there. Maybe
could be interesting. There's, there's the twist. Consumer reports wants to know which lost the drag.
Not who won. We're just too locked up. But anyway, I'd like to do that. That's great. I love
we've got a range of testing. Perfect. I love the range of testing that you guys do. So I'm
yeah, yeah, I'm curious real quick. There was there was some discussion last year and I think it's
changed for this year about EVs, PHEVs and hybrids and reliability of those through three attempts.
We talked about this lot on the podcast Alex about the word electrification because all of the brands
have been chasing. Well, every one of our cars is going to be they always say it this way electrified
by this date. And Paul and I are always stopping and going hang on, everybody. That doesn't mean
they're all EVs. Yeah, they could be PHEVs. They could be hybrids. So I'm just curious to be mild
hybrids. Absolutely. Without question. Yeah. It still works to be electrified in that moment. I'm
like careful of that word, everybody. But last year there was a huge swath of reliability quality
between an internal combustion engine car and these ranges of electrification. It's changing
now, right? Yeah, I mean, generally the trend so far and into this year is that these electrified
power trains will group them together for now are improving in terms of reliability. So if you look
at traditional hybrids, so not plug-in hybrids, just like a RAV4 hybrid, that type of system,
they're actually on par with gas cars, which is really cool. I mean, we've been making pure gas
vehicles for over 100 years now and hybrids for a while now all things considered, right? So it's
actually nice to see that the reliability is really, really similar between them and that's how
that's what we saw last year too. But the bigger shift is with plug-in hybrids and pure electric
vehicles. Their reliability is still down quite a bit compared to gas and hybrid cars, but if you compare
from last year, their reliability is improving. So while, yes, as a technology, they are less
reliable. We do see that over time in the longer these things are on the market and the technology
progresses and matures, we do see an improvement in reliability. And it's pretty big strides too.
It's not like it's 5% better. I mean, it's a noticeable shift in these figures, right?
Yeah, it is a noticeable shift. And it's interesting because with plug-in hybrids, you do have to
think about who's selling the models, right? I mean, if you do want to group a powertrain type
together, right? I mean, you have Jeep who, if you look at the reliability charts, isn't exactly
high on the list. They're making a lot of these four-by-e vehicles and whatnot. So the range of
reliability within those plug-in hybrids is pretty wide, right? You look at what Toyota is doing
versus what Jeep is doing. For example, there's a big span there. And electric vehicles too,
yeah, we see them getting more reliable. We somewhat recently had Tesla Model 3 and Model Y kind
of crossing over into that average reliability. They were below average for a while.
But you see, if you then zoom back out to the brand level, you do see that electric vehicles kind of
can drag down a brand at this point in time. Yeah, you know, look at Hyundai and Kia, right?
Generally speaking, their gas and hybrid cars are pretty good, pretty reliable. But then it's like
the Ionic 5 and the EV6 that have that below average reliability that kind of brings things down,
same with Subaru and the Soltera and Toyota, the Z4X. So yeah, it's going to take some time. EVs are
they're new. It feels like every single day we're all reading or hearing some progression with
the technology, rights and change. So it's going to take some time to work all that stuff out.
This is model to model from one year to the next. And we hear all the time, Alex about car companies,
just because a car is out, does it mean, well, that's it. We're done. We're going to work on.
No, next generation. They're constantly improving that. And that's why when you see the new model
year, what is the benefit? Well, there's a lot of behind the scenes kinds of improvements that
engineers have been tweaking probably based on your data. Yes. Totally. Yeah. And I've asked that
question personally to various engineers from automakers like, yes, because we've always said,
yes, they work out the kinks so to speak over time, making these improvements. But to hear it
directly from the manufacturers that, yes, the model launches, but then there's continuous improvement.
I mean, I worked that forward for a little while myself. And that's definitely happening. If you massage
things with the manufacturing process, you work with your suppliers to optimize things both,
you know, from a cost perspective, of course, but also a quality perspective. So yeah,
you're refining this vehicle, hopefully anyway, throughout its entire existence.
Well, then can we extrapolate the thought process that many people have? And that is don't buy
the first model year of something, especially when it's new technology, wait for it to, you know,
go for a couple of model years because they'll have worked out kinks. But on the other hand,
there's a lot of people that are intrigued by that new technology that does fit their lifestyle.
It's a great price. And it actually works because of a long commute or a lot of
long distance driving they're doing, they'll go ahead and buy it because man, that's the solution
I've been waiting for. How does that factor into a buying decision? Or is that just simply empirical?
And it's left up to you, the buyer. Yeah, I mean, it's totally up to the buyer. And I think it
actually goes back to that, you know, risk chart that we don't have that we might want to consider.
The paint tolerance. I'm telling you the paint tolerance. Label your paint tolerance. That's
exactly where we're definitely. Yeah. But yeah, we say that all the time, right? It's generally,
we don't recommend getting that first model year for a redesigned vehicle or a totally new name
plate. Even though Mazda is generally pretty reliable overall, just look at what's going on with
the CX 90. They're having some issues. It's a brand new platform. Longitudinal rear wheel drive
based new inline six. And like, it's a nice vehicle to drive. Don't get me wrong. But reliability
wise, they're having some issues. So that tends to hold true most of the time. And I think that's,
you know, also on the flip side of things like part of why Subaru is doing really well right now,
is they are so and it's the Toyota approach too. It's just iterate on the design, right?
The 25, the 2025 Subaru Forester, I mean, you could argue that's a refresh, right? An extensive one.
Sure, they made a lot of changes, but it's not like the platform is new and the power trains
are a whole new strategy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Take a philosophy and refine it over time. And yeah,
you might not get the flashiest thing like a Rivian, but it's going to be a vehicle that works and
and gets you where you're going. Although Nissan's refined everything to the point of zero sales.
They've refined themselves out of existence. Separate issue. But yes,
I mean, this plays into the Toyota, Toyota Lexus drop a little bit as well because,
you know, we've all seen and I know you guys are way ahead of us on this, but we've all seen and
talked about, you know, the new Toyota truck engines are proving to have their issues. So that's
dragging on that brand. And then I also thought it was interesting Cadillac who we actually really like.
And we also really like the Cadillac Lyric, but in your, in your survey, the Lyric is the least
reliable EV SUV out there. And that car alone is pulling down the entire brand in the chart.
Yes. Yeah. And yeah, it goes back to the fact that EV is just generally speaking,
having some trouble. And yeah, you look at GM's old team platform or all. And they just had some,
you know, not only was it a little late to launch, you know, relative to when they initially
planned. But yeah, just having some issues there. And it also, you know, going back to how we wait
and rank things, if they're having trouble with the battery and the motors and things like that,
that's going to really, really drag down that reliability. Of course, too. If they're having, you know,
issues with some more trivial, right? Yeah, I mean, somebody that doesn't understand how to work the
UI and concludes that UI is broken is different than the cars on the side of the road. Yeah. Totally.
Yeah. And we would try to remove if somebody was to say, yeah, I don't know how to work this,
this thing. Yeah, trying to tease out whether that's a reliability issue or they just not
quite sure how to use their car. The benefits of people making comments is you can start to
glean that stuff. And you're already coming to you guys do that, which makes total sense. But I
can imagine the man hours on that. Yeah, it's a big process. And that's why we definitely go out with
it. You know, it's a big deal for us because yeah, it's a lot of great data and definitely takes
some diligence to go through it all. But yeah, and you mentioned Toyota. It's no wonder, especially
in hindsight, right? Why the like Tacoma and the Tundra were 15 years old in their designs,
yeah, whatnot and just rock solid. And I could imagine it for internally. It sells. Why would we
change this? Yeah, exactly. That's such a hard thing to have to make. Yeah. Or maybe they didn't
have to make the decision. They're almost forced to based on powertrains and emissions and all. Yeah,
yeah, things changing around them for sure. And of course, you know, and we've heard plenty of
of Toyota truck fans that are horrified that those old engines went away. And I get it. And then of
course, we're having the same conversations, new engines, new problems. It's this moonshot stuff
that you've already identified, Alex, where you do a moonshot. And there's all kinds of stuff to fix.
And Subaru's over here going, let's tweak this. And it keeps running like it has, which makes total
sense. We offer new color, everyone. That body panel is entirely new. Here comes the all new. Yes.
It might not look like it, but just trust me. Well, Carcom is dealing with all the emissions
regulations, too, that are constantly changing. Yeah. Yeah, that makes it tough. I mean,
and you know, thinking about the domestic brands having to deal with or at least they don't seem
to stick to the strategy that they've set forth the same way some of the other brands do, right?
I mean, it's all EVs one day. And then we're back to maybe some hybrids. And then, you know,
we'll consider something else and just kind of they don't really stay this this long course on
their strategy, the way some of these other brands. V8s are awesome. You stated this. They say
to that very kindly, Alex, because we've got us here scratching our heads going, what are you doing?
Do you have a plan? You've been very nice about it, but yeah, I see your point. Where did I just see
pickup trucks had a very low reliability factor in comparison to sedans, Alex? I think you probably
know what I'm talking about some of the data that I just read. It was just overall types of cars
rather than the brands themselves. Oh, sure. And pickups were so rated so low, but yet pickup
trucks dominate the American market. I know it's interesting is they're, yeah, like is that one
of the most popular, if not the most popular body style? Yeah, yeah, we're seeing a lot of issues.
Yeah, one that really sticks out is the Colorado. We finished testing. You know, they were designed
it for 23. I think was the redesign year. And yeah, I mean, especially with a truck like that,
you move away from it's the Toyota story again, right? It's like you move away from your reliable,
you know, pretty simple by all things considered engines and sticking these turbocharged four cylinders
and whatnot and new interior technology and things like that. And you just start to have problems.
So yeah, I mean Chevrolet launched a whole new infotainment strategy bringing in Google into
the car. Yeah, yeah. We'll touch screen-based stuff. And so all these things, you know, aren't trivial.
They are difficult to execute and, you know, give some automaker problems.
Well, it feels like it gives every automaker problems, but it's interesting to see how they
how they refine over time. And I want to speak to one specifically that Paul and I are big fans of
and I thought it was interesting in the data here that the Volvo XC60, the plug-in hybrid version,
they get all the bells in the box of the XC60. We're a big fan of that. That's a model you guys
didn't use to recommend, but its reliability has improved over time and is now on the recommended
list. Yeah. Speaking to this is this gets so granular with you guys, you've got the brands at
the top, but then you got to get into the models and then the model years it changes too because as
we've all been talking about, there is this constant refinement because the manufacturers are not
they're not blind and mute to the fact these things are happening. They're working on it. But it's
interesting to watch the ebb and flow of not only brands but models. Yeah, definitely. I mean,
the brand is really just the starting place and you know, just to plug the CR or our website
for a second. We just redesigned the whole brand pages. So if you go and you do some research just
for Volvo in this example, right? You'll see a whole new kind of experience there and looking at
the brand, but then yeah, scroll down, dig into the individual models because going back to what
we were talking about before just because Volvo might might stand somewhere on the you know,
brand ranking list depending on which one you're looking at. It really is important that you look at
the model that you're actually interested to your to your exact point. Yeah, the the XC60,
you know, it's it's a pretty impressive vehicle and yeah, that that predicted reliability just
kind of increased enough to earn it that recommended status and because you know, we have thresholds
for these things. Of course, we don't want to recommend a vehicle that, you know, might be great
otherwise, but has poor reliability and you know, it might also help just real quick to talk about
what goes into that recommendation because it isn't just reliability, even though that is really
important. It does have to score really well in in our road test as well. You know, so all the test
they do from seat comfort and usability, you know, everything on the track and all that stuff too.
So that kind of all comes together to form that, whether the vehicles recommended or not.
I'm glad that's in there because we say all the time we all spend so much time on our cars. Can
you imagine yourself sitting here? Can you imagine yourself spending all that time on the car?
That does factor in and it kind of can outweigh another category that is on the paint tolerance list.
Yeah, well, that's the core of our show. The core of our show is, you know, you're spending all
this money and spending all this time. You better like what you drive. Now, of course, we're talking
about a range of interest here. Some people reliability is paramount. Some people would like to buy
a Rivian and love it. You know, with it, just based on what we're talking about here, you want to
have, and I, I mean, I'm the guy that's known to drive lotuses and people look at me like, what
on earth are you doing? But I love driving them and then I know we're going to have quirks. So this
happens. So the thing we want people to do more than anything is to love what they drive. But one
of the factors that we often talk about is when that monthly payment comes in, are you angry?
Are you frustrated? You're paying that amount for that car. And it is interesting to watch how people
vary in how much reliability is a factor, how much fun is a factor. There isn't any one reality here.
I love that you guys are covering both. We're pleased to announce that Consumer Reports has given
all of you listening our audience. If you go to CR.org slash everyday driver, it's $10
off an annual subscription. It's already baked into the button when you click on it. Very cool.
They already know it's currently live. CR.org slash everyday driver. Alex, thank you guys for giving
that to all of our listeners because Todd's right. This is how we want you to do your car shopping.
Emotion is so much a part of it. But the data matters too. I mean, my neighbor just came up to me
the other day. I was washing my car in my driveway. He has a Jeep 4-by-E, the Rubicon 4-by-E.
Yeah. And Stellantis just announced, like, well, parked the car outside because of the battery. And
you can't charge, you can't do anything with it. So just drive it in gas only mode. And so he was upset
and here, over on your mainstream list of rankings, 2025 rankings, Jeep is dead last in the mainstream
rankings. Yet we'd go to Moab and it's nothing but Jeep's as far as the I can see.
Jeep's from 30 years ago, Jeep's from five minutes ago, Jeep's. So it's a beloved brand,
and it's beloved by Jeep enthusiasts. But I understand, you know, my neighbor kind of proved the point.
And I get it while it's dead last on the list over here.
Yeah. You're always trying to find this balance right between the vehicle functioning the way
you expect and being satisfying. I mean, if you extrapolate to like something extreme, right,
you have the most reliable car possible that you could think of. But the seat is incredibly
uncomfortable. It's super noisy and the vials for gallon stink and all this stuff, right? All the
other things that matter too. And it's like, okay, now reliability doesn't seem so important.
Man, I love it. But it runs. Yeah, yeah, there is that factor. Yeah, and your threshold,
you know, that that paint tolerance again, right? That depends on the person and then what
they're after. So yeah, it's really important that you kind of look at each one and consider where
you're at and what's going to meet your needs. And yeah, I think, I think you guys had a well, right?
It's, you want to love what you drive, but the data matters too. So consider all the factors.
Well, thank you guys so much for what you do. And thank you, Alex, for spending all this time
with us and just kind of unpacking this data as we walk through it. This will be great for our
audience to use this in their drive homework. We have three wrap-up questions to leave you with
Alex. What car do you drive? Can you speak for everyone else at Consumer Reports? What are most
people buy there? Or do they ride bicycles because none of these things are reliable. They're all
junk. What is the average car? Consumer Reports law that's good. I like that one. And finally,
do any employees at Consumer Reports buy the car after you're done testing it? No one, what you
just did to it. Do you still want to buy that thing? That's hilarious. Okay, so the first one,
what do I drive? So I have the four-man version of your car top. I have the MR2 spider. Oh,
there you go. I was praying you were going to say Volkswagen Tows, but MR2 spider is the right answer.
That's great. When I love that, that's good. Yeah, MR2 spider, our garage is that
2005 speed, also a 2000 Toyota 4-Runner 5-speed. Okay. All of these purchased before I worked here,
so back when they were alive. I didn't hear that. No, no, no, no, no, no. They're two thousand
reliable ones. Yeah, that 3.4 liter is going to run until I'm dead. That's probably you're
probably right. Yeah, yeah. And those spiders are very, very fun. Yeah, it's super fun. Yeah,
now sadly, it has to go away because it just started snowing. But yeah, and then the second question,
I think, was what do most people at CR buy? Is there a car that is common for people they're
going to buy? That's a fastening question. I thought about them. Oh, that's good. It is a fastening
question. Unfortunately, I think the question or the answer is not that fastening because we own
these cars at work so long. Most of us are driving test cars all the time. Sure, sure. Yeah, for sure.
So, which is good because we're always learning new stuff and our testing almost
continues throughout the time we own the car. But I would say it's really the thing that people
end up buying for their family members or recommending to people in their family. And the reality is
a lot of it ends up being you end up recommending something like a CRV or a rev 4 or the Accord or
whatever. But then you look at the cars and our lot that get taken out the most and it's like
the Ford Mustang. And when we had our Corvette C8, right? Of course. They're never part of it, right?
Yeah, I love it. That's great. So yeah, it's funny to watch which cars, you know, sit in which
ones get taken all the time. And it's not always just like the expensive ones that people are always
driving. Sometimes those sit around more than you'd think. Car fun matters. I mean, this is the whole
reasonable. We do it. Absolutely matters. That's great. Finally, what do people buy out of the lot?
And is everybody behind their back on Snicker Snicker? I can't believe you bought that turd.
No, sure. Good on you. Good choice.
Yeah, right. Nudge, Nudge. There are a couple cars where you're like, yeah, we know what kind of
happened there. Right? I mean, some of these sports cars, you drive them a little harder. So
yeah, really the worst thing that happens is the the brakes might be a little bit more
worn than you'd think for 5,000 miles or whatever. Sure. Or certainly it needs a new set of tires,
but then you can negotiate a spoken discount. Yeah, with their own boss. But my older brother bought
our Acura Integra. Integra, excuse me, when we were done with it. So I was happy to do that and
get him into a good car and you know, get a little discount too while he's at it. So as far as he knows.
As far as he knows. Yeah, I'll follow up with him to see if he's needed to repair it at all. That's
very funny. It's very funny. Well, Alex, thank you for so much of your time and for walking through
this. It's really great. That's right. Again, reminder, CR.org slash everyday driver 10 bucks off a
year. This will help you with drive homework. Yeah. And that gets you access to the whole site too.
So not, you know, cars and beyond. That's great to know. So everything appliances, electronics,
everything. But you know, we recommend the cars category. Of course, we're going to spend most
of the time there. Yeah. Appreciate it, Alex. Thank you so much. And to the whole team for the data.
Absolutely. Talks in. Yeah. Thank you. So my favorite thing about that is the discussion
actually of that pain tolerance meter. The you, I mean, Rivian being a great example. I saw a lot
of promotion. People were saying, look at how much people love their rivians, but forgetting the fact
they were posting that part of the of the thing. I saw this like three or four times on Instagram.
People posting that Rivian was way at the top of owner satisfaction survey, but completely ignoring
the fact they were bottom of the list on reliability, because this is what we car people do. We go,
yeah, but I love it. Look at this shiny thing in this hand. Don't look at the thing in my
other hand. Don't look at the thing that's burning. Look over here. Look over here. Rivian magic trick,
right? Hey, this is Bill Simmons from the Bill Simmons podcast here to tell you that Mick Loba Ultra,
the official beer partner of the NBA is bringing NBA fans closer than ever this season with chances
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slash courtside for free entry, entry deadlines, prizes and details. We have a cool car debate from Isaiah
writing in from Virginia. And there's a car in his life that I haven't even heard anybody mention
in years. His wife has a Chrysler 200. You remember that? When's the last time all of you listening?
When's the last time you saw a Chrysler 200 and I guarantee you at least two of you now that I
have mentioned it are going to see one in traffic. Take a photo and send us one because you're
going to be like, I haven't seen one in years either. There's one right there. Or maybe you're driving
one currently listening to your podcast. Maybe you are, but but his wife has a Chrysler 200 that
her parents gave her which I mean, that is a good gift. Any car is a gift is a good gift for sure,
but she doesn't have any issues with it, but it is it's approaching. Well, it's a little over 100,000
miles and it's starting to scare Isaiah. It's just there's nothing really wrong right now, but it's
getting a little we're unsure. He says the transmission might be in the autumn of its life. How
delicate how descriptive the leaves are changing folks. Yeah. Isaiah and his wife live in apartments,
EV charging isn't an option, but he doesn't think that would be a bad idea. Isaiah is in college.
He's working. His wife is working as well, having approximately seven mile commute and his wife
has shown inclinations of enjoying driving. So he's hoping for slightly more a slightly more enjoyable
car to drive that would make her happy. She doesn't know how to drive manual. So that is not an option.
Isaiah and his wife are looking for good fuel economy space, but not necessarily SUV kind of space.
And something that is just a little bit enjoyable to drive. Okay. They're looking to spend just
less than $20,000 if they wait a little bit. They might be able to stretch, but he says he knows
they're stretching a lot of budget. So they're distracted. There's this part. They're going to
pay more than $20,000. Got it. Okay. Good. All right. Well, she doesn't have any issues with
a sedan. Isaiah does not think an SUV would be particularly good for her right now. So they're
looking for something mainly for her. However, Isaiah owns a 2017 Camaro manual with the V6.
He says it's a really fun engine with enough power, flat foot shifting, and 30 plus miles per
gallon on the highway. There you go. He tracks it. He back roads it and he dailies it. And so he says
it's safe to say he really likes it. But he's also trying to find his grandfather's 1996 Corvette,
which is a red on red manual transmission with the LT4. If he can, he would want to sell the Camaro and
buy that particular Corvette back. Interesting. He also asks us the side note. Do we know anything
about finding a car used to own? He's got the VIN and he believes it was registered this year in
North Carolina. I think what's great is to jump on any Corvette forms. There's probably a bunch
and you can go by region Isaiah and jump in and put it out there, say here's the VIN. Put the VIN
out there for people and say I am looking. Yeah. Yeah. And just on the Corvette forms alone,
you can get the conversation going. And Isaiah, I'm going to say I'm going to step really carefully
into this. I understand the nostalgia you have that it was your grandfather's 96 Corvette. I also
understand that you really like your Camaro. I'm going to ask this question carefully. Did you ever
drive it? The Corvette? You made Corvette. Because what I'm sensing here is this is a car that you
want to get back because it's all about nostalgia. And I understand it. We've talked about this a lot
of times cars that come from family members, etc. But in most cases, if family members have a car
they love, they don't really want to burden you with that car after they're gone. So my question
for you is if you find that Corvette and if you drive it and you don't like it, that's okay. It's
okay. Yeah. That's okay. I don't want you to feel like you have to get it if it's not a car you
enjoy. You had memories. It was amazing. Hang on to those memories tightly. But especially if
you never drove it, I'm wondering if the car will drive as well as you think it will because you've
talked about liking your Camaro. I also, let's just say for sake of argument, you absolutely sell
your Camaro. You absolutely find and get that Corvette. I also want to give you the freedom that you
may have it for a few years and want to move on. And that's okay as well. So don't tie yourself to
that car. I think the sentiment here is fantastic and I really hope you find it. But don't tie yourself
to it if life means you need to move on. Yeah. For sure. And it sounds like you don't dislike your
Camaro enough to get rid of it. And now you're going to have to wait. Let's say you find that Corvette
and it's for sale and you're ready and you like it. Now you've got a decision to make. Of course,
you can daily it absolutely no problem. And they're cool cars. They're cool. Is there going to be
a preciousness factor? But are you also going to say, well, every time my Camaro was better at
blank than the Corvette? But I have my grandfather's Corvette. So I'm just going to suck it up and keep
driving it. Yeah. Yeah. Even though I still prefer the Camaro and I wish I still had it. Or I want
another experience than this. I've loved having it. But I want to know. Just give yourself the freedom
Isaiah because we've had a lot of emails over the years, nearly a thousand podcasts where people
have just had this struggle. And I know it's real. Yeah. For sure. All right. Let's dive into the
debate for your wife, Isaiah. And let's try to find you a car with a transmission that is not
in the autumn of its life. That's currently working. Ladies and gentlemen. Yes. Okay. Uh-huh.
20 grand is very decent because I thought used Mazda CX-5. It is an SUV, even though you know
she likes it. But I'm thinking she might really like how it drives. It always presents itself.
Even used. They present themselves better than they actually are. The Mazda's were always so great,
especially all those CX-5's. You can go back quite a ways to find the right $20,000 match
with the amount of miles with with the right year amenities color. You probably got a huge selection
at $20,000 for any CX-5. That's excellent. I actually have the Mazda three on my list for all
the same reasons. She wants us to dance or you can get a hatchback. There's so many out there.
They're very solid cars. The Mazda's are excellent. Now she's got about a seven mile commute.
It's not a lot. So you do have a bit of wiggle room. You don't have to fully land on, you know what?
We've just got to have high miles to the gallon. True. We've just got to have a particular,
you know, one of those elements that you really want. She's got such a short commute, but I would
imagine that this could become maybe the lifestyle car. It seems like the mirror could be a good road
trip car, but this could become more lifestyle. You guys go do outdoor stuff or skiing or even
certainly road trips to wherever, but I'm wondering about a key in Nero hybrid. I was looking for
one of the recent ones that we drove a 23, 24 somewhere there, but interestingly not too many are
for sale used. And I suddenly found the prior generation for 10 grand and under. Oh wow. Okay.
So Isaiah, if you decide we've got such a short commute for her, it's a little bit more interesting.
Maybe it is great on gas mileage, but I also don't want you to replace the Chrysler 200 with
something that you also don't trust as much. True. I agree with that. Yeah. Yeah.
You could look at a Honda HRV. That is the SUV version of the Civic. Civic touring, what,
they're $29,000. So it's a bit outside your budget. These start at 25, 400. So it makes me
suggest slightly used on any Civic to keep it 20 grand or under. That's the top of my list.
Just slightly used current gen Civic is a phenomenal choice and it doesn't care which one you get.
They're all really good. Even if you went back to the 10th generation Civic, no problem.
I bet you could find something excellent. And the Civic really does run great. And I think she will
really like driving it. They will just run plenty of space. It could be a great commuter, good for
road trips. And then you've got the fun car too. And if you know she decides she wants to learn manual,
you know, you can always offer that surprise. That's funny. Yeah. You mentioned EVs. I don't know that
at a $20,000 price point, it's worth your dollars. I don't really think it's worth your investment.
I have discovered that Nissan Arias are dirt cheap. They're like 23, 24,000 and I bet you could
find something maybe just over 20 grand that gets you into a practically brand new SUV or EV with
some kind of decent range. The Fisker Ocean. There's a deal on there. They're dealing on those.
I don't know whose services that they are dealing. Yeah. Don't watch internet videos about the Fisker
Ocean. Don't do that. Just get one or be happy. That's very funny. That's a terrifying. Yeah.
But, you know, you could consider the Ari if you do really want to go EV because it is
practically brand new, modern, modern conveniences. But then, of course, you're driving a $20,000
Aria when you want to unload it at some point in the future. Are they going down even further?
Who's the second buyer for the people buying those $15,000 Fisker Oceans? Who's buyer two?
Is buyer two exist? Is it single owner straight to scrap? What's straight? Seriously.
I'm just now thinking about that because they're unloading those cars for like 15 grand if you
can find one. And I'm sitting here going the weird part of me that does things like buy cheap
fattens is like, wouldn't that be interesting? And then I realize there's nowhere for that to go.
You go from that that's a $15,000 whole because eventually you just get rid of it and just drive
it to the dump and walk away. You can also consider leasing a vent fast because they're cheap.
Apparently, they're so cheap. It makes it actually kind of compelling.
Really don't watch reviews of those cars. Not heard nothing but terrible things about them.
They're going to need to improve if they want to have second generations or actually offer
business in the US and North America. Food for thought, but I don't think an EV is really
something you want to consider right now because like you said, you pointed out you're in
apartment right now and it's not something that is really required yet. I don't want you to have
to go so cheap on the EV technology where if you do need a repair of some sort that it's going to
cost you more than the trouble was worth. I don't want you to think like, I kind of wish we still
had that Chrysler 200. That's the scraping bottom of the barrel that we don't want you to think about.
Well, I have a few others for you while we're talking it through. I do think that a used Honda Civic
could be great. So if you can get the current slash new model with the massive back seats and
they just they run and they work and like the whole chassis is excellent. That's the thing. In
any of the versions we've driven, even the CVTs, the chassis is excellent. They're very solid to
drive gas mileage is excellent. You might find a used Volvo S60 for 20K. Yeah, you're going to see
how far back you have to go, but just use the Volvo S60. Tons of tech, tons of comfort, tons of
space. This is your wife's car to enjoy for her small commute and you guys to go out together in
Volvo S60 could work. Now, see how far you want to go back, check consumer reports for the
reliability of the year you're chasing, but that's a thought. And then I had this idea. We're talking
about a car that they want to have just run. Gas mileage was mentioned first, small commute.
Did you know that the new slash current revised Prius, which we're actually fans of,
all of the used ones of that are 20 to 25 grand. Are they down that current version? The new
version is down to 20 to 25 grand. I looked a lot of tempest and it's the base models, but that's a
solid car. If you guys are generally worried about MPG and I'm thinking about this is the counterpoint
to your Chrysler 200. It's going to drive better than the Chrysler 200. I believe in its reliability
far more than the Chrysler 200. Long tractors drive better than the Chrysler 300. Okay, easy there,
but yes. So I think across the board it'll be better and you went straight hybrid. You can't go
fully V but you can go straight hybrid. That's a car that's just going to run. And again, I'm above
your budget. You said, maybe you'd like to do less than 20 grand, but maybe you could stretch a
bit. I'm in stretch dollars. I know I am, but 20 to 25, I looked nationwide in auto tempest. There were
options on the new slash current one in slightly used form. That's fantastic. I thought so too.
Wow. All right. Isaiah, you've got some choices. Wish you happy hunting. You've got a debate
right to us everyday driver tv edgmail.com topic Tuesday's car conclusions and car debates.
The Subaru share the love event is on from November 20 to January 2. During this event, Subaru
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Thank you guys for all your questions. I'm going to start here with Daniel who rapid fired
a bunch of questions. I'm going to answer a couple of them. Do we have a fire extinguisher in our car?
I have a mount for one in my lease and I took it out because there was limited space in that car
already and it wasn't like I was tracking it every weekend. So I did take it out. We have kept
them with us when we do our big road trips, especially when we're in our used cars where we
always had one in the support vehicle. The problem that I have with the fire extinguisher in your car
is I feel like the first thing you do with a car is when fires you get out and then you realize
the fire extinguisher is back in there. I feel like that's the progression that always happens.
Maybe it looks exploded. You put the fire out. You freak out and you get out as you show it and then
you go, oh it's in there, isn't it? It's in the cabin. So anyway there's that question.
And then he's curious about a rough estimate of shipping your car from Europe to the US. He thinks
it'd be fun to get a car in Europe and then bring it home. Now there's two ways to look at this
Daniel. If you're doing one of those European buy experiences, all of that's kind of wrapped up in
the buy. You don't have a cost because part of you're getting European delivery as they will
ship it for you. I have heard everything from 1500 to 3 grand. How are you shipping it? How fast?
How nice do you want it to be done? Those are the base prices I've heard like 1500 to 3 grand,
2500 a lot. So it depends on where you're shipping it, how you're shipping it, what's the port it's
coming to? All of these are factors. So it's a major sliding scale. If you actually just google
the problem a little bit, I've done this a few times because I've had the same idea Daniel.
You can find all kinds of shipping companies that will do it. So once you figure out, I think
what you're going to have to figure out is from your logistics, where would you like it to leave
from and where would you like it to be picked up from? Because every time I go into these little
shipping calculators, those are the two things that change the price wildly. I do have fire extinguisher
in the 928. I actually have two on road trips. But also, yes, there's always a fire extinguisher in there,
not in the Corvette or the Cayman, but the short hoses from the main fuel lines to the injectors,
those shorties, those were cracked and broken when I redid the entire engine. So now that they've
been replaced, I am far more comfortable that I won't have an engine fire, but yes, still fire extinguishers.
And you ask about jack stands, yeah, I wouldn't look at Harbor Freight, but the summit racing certainly
in Jags. Look at both of those, anything that with the summit racing brand or Jags on it,
yeah, absolutely, or anything at your local parts store. But yeah, I'm not a big fan of the
Harbor Freight tools either, but I admit to having used some Harbor Freight tools and they've been
fine and they've worked fine. But there was all that, there was all that crisis and internet
conversation about the Harbor Freight ones being less than ideal. Yeah, you don't want to collapse on
you. Question from Kirk Meyer about used Jaguars, it says they're pretty cheap. Kirk has seen
XJ for 12 grand and an XF V8 for less than 10. Oh, Isaiah, would you like a less than 10 grand?
Yeah, there you go. XF V8, you could both had around or less than 100,000 miles and we have said
these are not interesting cars, but what price would a 4 to 500 horsepower V8 Jag would be worth it
as a luxury cruiser? See, that's the key twist there, Kirk, because the problem is that these cars
knew weren't dynamically good enough to compete with some of their competition. But at these kind
of prices, again, I am the $5,000 faten guy. At these kind of prices, if you're looking for a depreciated
luxury car that is you're just driving, enjoying being in, that's really compelling, I think.
Yeah, XJ, like 03 to 08, the supercharged ones going back away. You could find it for less.
These were cool. The XF V8 for that kind of money is really fascinating. It's not a car that I'm
excited about dynamically, but for what it is, here's what it is. It's the more luxurious, more
interesting Mustang of the same era, for a lot more luxury and prestige. Nobody's going to think
you spent 10 grand on that car. No one is. And if you're just out enjoying it,
use it as a GT car or a luxury commuter. Yes, now, Kirk, who's maintaining it? You need to find
somebody, just not to keep it maintained, but find somebody that knows those cars before you buy.
Yeah, agreed. And then you'll have kind of a cool jag. And jag is back at the forefront of everyone's
minds. And they'll compliment you on getting one of the good old ones, I guess. There you go.
Ted Adam Green is asking if we are concerned about being replaced by AI.
This is a fascinating conversation because I'm also following it along on the
screenwriting side of things. I was going to say we've been talking about it on editing
ability. Of course, photos are way out front. We've been talking about this on a lot of things.
You've probably heard this discussed already. Look, when they were building all these AI
brains, essentially, they were just combing the earth and consuming content. And the film industry
specifically has been very bad about enforcing their copyrights. Screenplays, movies,
stuff has been ingested by these language learning models so that they're super smart, but they
were ingesting copyrighted material. They didn't have the right to ingest. And most of the film
is big on coming in the film industry right. And most of the film industry is arguing what are
the upsides and downsides of that? And one of the things that's come up in screenwriting that
relates to you and I is, will writers be replaced by AI? And ultimately at its core, AI
iterates. It doesn't create iterates. So here's the thing. We toyed with this a
little while a few years ago. We toyed with the idea of kind of doing an automated version of
the cart debate that you could access at any time and kind of have the AI version of the two of us.
And we played with it. It didn't really go anywhere. We played with it a little bit.
Yes, theoretically, a chat's, I don't know who do this by the way, but a chat system could create
the AI Todd and Paul and the AI card debate that tells you what cart to get with a thousand
podcasts that is plenty of data for them to ingest. They could probably do it with our voices.
This is where the technology is. But they're, I think they would be hard press to come out with
a wild card out of the blue or a sniper shot. Or some car we've all forgotten about that we
haven't mentioned on the podcast that AI is never going to come up with. Yeah, because all it's
doing is working off of the data existing and doing a good job of serving out the data in a new form.
But it cannot fundamentally create. It can only cobble together from the pieces it was given.
Also, I've yet to see any AI be funny. I've seen any AI that's just funny.
It's not fun. Hopefully you're either laughing with us or laughing at us, which is not something
that an AI will do. Aaron Galinsky adds to the conversation here looking for transcripts of every
podcast ever entered. The transcripts are actually available if you go to your desktop app for
Apple podcasts. Each individual episode has had it transcribed already. I suppose you could
feed that into any system and come up with a learning model that could certainly learn, but it would
be very much to a point because it doesn't take it into consideration news of some sort of car or
classics on auction or anything like that. From a design standpoint, you're talking about writing
the creativity of coming up with new designs, fresh designs. I know the war amongst the design
community, not just car design, but any sort of iterative design. Yeah, you can ask it to spit out
50-toaster designs. Yes, 15 years. And go, oh, that's kind of a different looking thing. I wonder
how we could incorporate that. But it doesn't show you things that it knows can be built. And that is
where the power of a human designer knows and understands the product they're proposing, whether
it's a CG image they've created or a sketch, they have thought about how it can be built to be
sold for a profit. And that's why they're proposing that. AI will just generate the idea. I saw
a bunch of designers generate a whole bunch of different choices for the new Jag. We all saw the
new Jag. They came out and then they tried their own designs. Many designers, I've seen it on LinkedIn
quite a bit. They have tried their own hand at doing the entire rebranding exercise as a small side
project on the weekend. Come up with a different logo, come up with a different colorway,
and here's the car instead of that. You're right. Proportions are the same, but it looks old already
because it looks like that CX-75 that was in the Bond film. A lot of those, it looks like that,
which, you know, big motorcycle, you know, swollen fenders. It looks like a big Chrysler Crossfire.
We saw one this past weekend outside Laguna Sagan. We both kind of went, huh, small version
of the new Jaguar. So, proportions are similar, but the styling, big, beautiful, long, smooth surfaces,
but it all looks like something from 20 years ago, just in a different iteration. With different
wheels and different proportions, it doesn't look fresh and new. Weirdly, the new Jag, there's
elements of it that look fresh and new. It's just because it hasn't been executed by a design,
by a car company to that end yet, but AI is only looking at all the Jaguar images on the planet
for from now till, you know, way back until Jaguar was founded. And that's all it can rely on to come
up with some fresh new concept and it's not fresh and it's not new if you let AI do it. Well,
I also think it's funny to your point, everybody that's trying to go, well, I could do better than
that. That's the thing I think is really funny is they drop this design and people with real cred
and no cred of God, well, I could do better than that. It's just this flurry of people going,
here's my version, which I mean, again, I have to say the success here is Jaguar is being talked
about everywhere. And in that regard, it's a success. I'm also really curious to see what exists
between this thing they've shown and the first potential actual car, because I think you're going to
be able to see them from there, but I don't know that they're going to feel all that connected.
You don't have to go very far on LinkedIn. You'll find somebody using AI to redesign the
Jag proportions are the same, but the surfaces just look the same. Some of these AI generated
models didn't get better than the new introduction. True. Yeah. It isn't better. So does that make AI,
does that mean it's going to replace everything? No, the human element will never because AI is
looking at that. And then you get into copyright issues, whether it's the written word, the spoken
word video, or designs. Oh, big time. Big time. Well, it's just trolling every design that's
been created by humans for the past million years, which is a massive land mine that nobody has
thought the tackle yet. And I'm very curious to see where that goes. Thanks for all your questions.
We really appreciate it. We're always looking forward to hearing the creative car debates that
you guys are going to send us topic Tuesdays, too. And those car conclusions will always touch on those.
But in the meantime, we're always looking forward to next time.
Tuesdays, everyone.
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