A rear shock is a part that helps the car absorb bumps and keep the wheels planted. If it’s blown, the car can feel out of control over rough roads and can make loud slamming noises.
A Ford Fusion is a regular Ford sedan. The speaker is saying their specific Fusion had a rear shock problem, so the car felt like it had basically no suspension.
Stellantis is a big company that makes lots of different car brands. It’s the kind of company your listener’s guest might work for if they’re in the auto industry.
They’re using an official government-style database of economic numbers. The goal is to find long-term trends about cars and costs, not just one recent article.
They’re quoting a statistic about how many U.S. homes own at least one car. The point is that cars aren’t a niche purchase—they’re common for everyday life.
They’re sharing a commuting statistic—how many workers get to work using a car. It’s used to show that cars are a big part of everyday transportation.
Concept
regional rail
“Regional rail” is a train that runs between nearby cities and towns. It’s not a local subway, and it’s not a long-distance cross-country train either.
Concept
work shuttle
A “shuttle” is just a vehicle that drives a group of people between places on a set route. Here, it sounds like a special van used for getting workers or students around, not a normal public bus.
Concept
transit
Here, “transit” just means public transportation, like buses or trains. They’re saying most people don’t commute that way.
“All time high” just means the highest point on record. They’re saying car prices are near their peak, and they’re also talking about how that peak compares when you adjust for inflation.
Inflation adjustment means they’re translating older prices into today’s money. That way, you can tell if cars are actually getting more expensive in a meaningful way, not just because the dollar has changed.
CPI is a common way to measure how prices rise over time. This time they’re talking about a version that focuses only on car prices, so you can see whether cars are getting more expensive beyond normal inflation.
The Subaru Outback is a family-friendly car that’s part wagon, part crossover. The hosts mention it because its starting price has gone up a lot compared to earlier years.
A model refresh is when a car company updates an existing model partway through its “life cycle.” The hosts are saying the pandemic delayed these updates, so cars may have stayed in their older spec longer and gotten more expensive.
The BMW 3 Series is one of BMW’s most common and well-known car models. The hosts bring it up because big model updates can get pushed back, which can change pricing and features.
A manual is a car where you change gears yourself using a clutch pedal and a stick. The speaker is saying older versions of the Civic were more likely to be offered in a simpler, manual form.
“Straight piped” means the exhaust was changed to remove parts that quiet the sound. The car gets louder, and depending on what was removed, it may not meet emissions rules.
They’re talking about a Toyota Supra, which is a sporty Toyota coupe. They also mention it being “straight piped,” meaning the exhaust was modified to be louder.
JD Power is a company that tracks how reliable cars are and reports survey results. The speaker is using their data to say new cars may be having more problems lately.
Cars today run on a lot of computer software, not just mechanical parts. The speaker is saying software problems—like glitches—can cause issues in new cars.
“Supply chain issues” means problems getting the parts needed to build cars. If manufacturers can’t get the usual parts on time, it can affect how well the cars turn out.
The Toyota RAV4 is a compact SUV that’s meant for everyday driving. The podcast mentions the “RAV4 XLE,” which is a specific trim level with extra features compared to the base version. It comes up because it’s the car they’re using as a reference for their driving style.
These are the air vents in the back of the car that blow warm or cool air. If the car doesn’t have them, people in the back may not get comfortable as easily.
They’re talking about Apple CarPlay misbehaving. CarPlay is the phone-to-car screen system, and the “glitch” means the display acts up or disconnects briefly.
They’re talking about their Nissan (the car brand). They’re saying the car’s Bluetooth signal works farther than what they’ve experienced in other vehicles.
Bluetooth range is how far away your phone can be and still stay connected to the car. If the range is good, you can keep listening or using the phone without the connection dropping.
They’re talking about the next Ferrari that will replace the 812. The 812 is a famous high-end Ferrari, and people care a lot about what comes after it.
This is the button or control that starts the car and can stop it when you’re idling. The speaker is criticizing how it’s implemented in the car they’re discussing.
It’s a touch screen that senses your finger using electricity. The downside is you don’t get the same “push” feeling as real buttons, so it can be harder to use quickly.
Term
interior refresh option
They’re talking about an option that updates the car’s interior. The speaker’s point is that the car already has a way to change things, so the original setup still feels like a bad choice.
A turbo is a device that helps the engine make more power by pushing extra air into it. They’re basically saying they want to really push the turbo-powered car hard.
Concept
vehicle dependent dependability ratings
They’re talking about how car dependability is measured—basically, how often problems show up in different cars. The claim is that those dependability scores have been getting worse over the years.
Fuel efficiency means how far a car can go on a gallon (or how much energy it uses to travel). They’re saying gas cars haven’t improved much lately, while electric and other alternative powertrains have driven most of the gains.
EVs are electric cars that run on batteries instead of gasoline. They’re saying most recent efficiency improvements are coming from electric cars rather than regular gas cars.
The Chevrolet Nova is a car model made by Chevrolet. Different versions were produced over many years. In the podcast, it’s mentioned mainly because the name is recognizable and used for a bit.
CVT means “continuously variable transmission.” It’s a type of automatic gearbox that can smoothly change ratios so the engine doesn’t have to jump between fixed gears.
EV means electric vehicle. Instead of using gasoline, it runs on electricity from a battery, which can make it cheaper to drive depending on charging costs.
They’re talking about different types of gasoline. Premium and mid-grade have different octane levels, and some engines are designed to use them to run properly.
A mild hybrid is a car that has a small battery and electric motor to help the gas engine. It can improve smoothness and efficiency, but it also adds extra parts that could need repairs.
The Civic Type R is the sporty, high-performance version of the Honda Civic. It costs more than a normal Civic because it’s built with stronger performance parts.
The Audi RS 3 is a high-performance version of the Audi A3. It’s meant to be quicker and more sporty than a regular A3. The podcast mentions it while talking about how much it costs compared to another option.
Car
GTI
The GTI is the sporty version of the Volkswagen Golf. It’s designed to be more fun to drive than a regular Golf, usually with a stronger engine.
The Volkswagen Golf is a small car, usually a hatchback, made for everyday use. The podcast talks about it in the context of how expensive the performance versions have become. It’s brought up because people compare Golf models when deciding what to buy.
They’re saying used cars are still priced way higher than what people consider normal. In other words, the market never returned to the cheaper prices you might remember.
Carvana is a company that sells used cars, mostly through an online process. The speaker is saying they sold their car through Carvana and recommends doing that.
“Heavily modified” means the car was changed a lot from how it left the factory. People do this to make it faster, handle better, or feel different to drive.
“At the wheels” means the power measured at the tires on a dyno. It’s the real-world power that gets to the road, and it’s usually different from the factory horsepower number.
The “glove box” is the storage compartment in the passenger side of the dashboard. The speaker implies something important was left there, suggesting the car had been set up with specific items or documentation for the next owner.
Finance rates are the interest rates banks and lenders charge for car loans. Higher finance rates usually make the monthly payment and total cost go up.
Your monthly payment is what you pay each month to pay off the car. It depends on the loan size, the interest rate, and how many months you’re paying for.
They’re talking about the typical terms of loans for brand-new cars. If more loans are for longer periods, you might pay more total interest even if the monthly payment is lower.
A used car loan is money you borrow to buy a pre-owned car. The hosts are talking about typical loan lengths and amounts to estimate the overall cost of buying a used car.
“Amount financed” is the price the bank is funding for the car purchase. It’s basically the loan amount, which may not exactly match what the car costs on the sticker.
This is a reminder that just because two things seem related doesn’t mean one caused the other. For example, a chart might show problems happening alongside something, but that doesn’t prove the thing caused the problems.
The Fiat 500 is a tiny, easy-to-drive car made by Fiat. The hosts are talking about how someone barely drove it, but still managed to use it more than you’d expect.
Limp mode is what a car does when it senses a problem. It reduces power so you can drive carefully to get it checked, even though the car won’t feel normal.
Repossession means the lender takes the car back. “Per capita” just means the number is adjusted for how many people are in the area, so it’s easier to compare.
This means people stopped paying their car loan for a long time—at least about 3 months. Lenders track this because it’s a strong sign the loan may be heading toward trouble like repossession.
Subprime means the loan is going to someone with a lower credit score or higher risk of missing payments. If more car loans are subprime, more of them can fall behind when things get expensive.
PPI is a measure of how prices change earlier in the supply chain (for businesses). In this segment, it’s being used to support the point that insurance costs have gone up a lot.
Safety systems are the newer features that help prevent crashes or reduce injury. If they get damaged in an accident, fixing them can be expensive and slow, which can affect whether the car gets written off.
“Totaled” means the insurance company decides it’s not worth repairing the car. With newer cars, repairs can cost more because there are more advanced systems to fix.
A deductible is the amount a policyholder must pay out of pocket before insurance coverage kicks in for a claim. The segment suggests that many drivers now have deductibles over $1,000, which can make insurance claims more painful.
This is about deaths of people on foot or on bicycles, not people inside cars. It highlights that road danger often hits the most exposed road users hardest.
Vision Zero is a plan cities use to make roads safer. The goal is to reduce or eliminate serious crashes by changing how streets are designed, not just by writing tickets.
A roundabout is a circular intersection where cars go around in a loop. It often makes crashes less severe because speeds are lower and drivers have fewer straight-on collision paths.
The Cadillac Escalade is a big, tall SUV. The concern is that when a large vehicle hits a pedestrian, the impact can be more severe because the car’s front is higher off the ground.
They’re using a fun “index” to compare how hard it is to buy a Honda Civic. Instead of just looking at the price, they’re trying to measure affordability using a simple comparison method.
The Honda Civic is a popular everyday car model. Here, they’re talking about it in the context of figuring out how affordable it is—like how long it might take to buy one depending on the version you choose.
The Big Mac Index is a simple way economists compare prices across places using the cost of a Big Mac. Here, they’re using it as inspiration for a similar kind of affordability comparison for cars.
The Honda Accord is a popular Honda family car. It’s generally bigger and more comfortable than a Civic, so it’s often chosen for commuting and road trips.
Residual value is what a car is still worth after a few years. The speaker is saying that if a car is only about five years old and in great shape, it can be worth a lot when you sell it.
A trade-in is when you give your current vehicle to a dealer as part of the purchase of another vehicle, and the dealer applies a value to it. The speaker contrasts people who “made out like they are sold” when trading in, implying they got a strong trade-in amount.
A “flying car” is a vehicle that’s supposed to be able to both drive and fly. The hosts are pointing out that, despite talk and teasing, we still don’t have them in everyday life.
“Mass delusion” means lots of people believed the same thing, even if it didn’t match reality. In this conversation, they’re saying early EV excitement may have gotten ahead of the facts.
Car
Lotus chassis
They’re saying the early Tesla Roadster used a Lotus-based frame. The chassis is basically the car’s skeleton that everything else mounts to, and it affects how the car handles.
The Tesla Model S is Tesla’s main electric car. In this discussion, they mention it because Tesla planned to base the next Roadster on the same underlying platform as the Model S.
Tesla Semi is an all-electric big rig (a heavy truck). It’s the kind of vehicle that hauls freight, and Tesla showed a prototype at a special event before it was widely available.
A kWh rating tells you how much energy the battery can store. More kWh generally means the car can potentially drive farther, but it also depends on efficiency.
The Cupra Born is an electric hatchback. It’s designed to be a normal daily car, but powered by electricity. The podcast mentions it while talking about EV timelines and announcements.
The Tesla Roadster is an electric sports car from Tesla. The hosts are talking about the famous stunt where a Roadster was launched into space.
Term
unveiled
“Unveiled” just means the company officially shows the car for the first time. That usually happens before you can actually buy it.
Term
gasoline sports car
A “gasoline sports car” is a fun-to-drive car that runs on regular fuel like gasoline. The speaker is saying it would feel very different compared to a newer kind of sports car.
A COPV is a tank designed to hold gas under very high pressure. It uses a strong outer wrap made from composite materials to make it lighter and stronger than a plain metal tank.
COPV is short for “composite overwrapped pressure vessel,” which is basically a high-pressure gas tank with a strong composite wrap. It’s used when you need the tank to be both strong and relatively lightweight.
A jet thrust nozzle is the part that helps push exhaust/gas out in a fast stream to create forward force. The shape matters because it changes how efficiently the push works.
PSI is a way to measure pressure. Saying “10,000 PSI” means the system is under extremely high pressure, which is a big deal for anything involving propulsion or pressurized fluids.
Concept
short hops
“Short hops” means very brief trips—like quick bursts rather than long, continuous operation. The idea is that the system might only work for short periods before limitations kick in.
LSD stands for limited-slip differential. It’s a part inside the drivetrain that helps both driven wheels work together so you don’t just spin one wheel when traction is poor.
Term
canyon videos of L.A.
“Canyon videos” are clips of cars driving on twisty mountain roads. They often show how well a car handles turns and braking when the driver pushes it.
Term
cold air jets
“Cold air jets” means blasting cooler air in a targeted direction. People use it to help control temperatures or airflow so a system works better.
Compressed air is regular air that’s been squeezed into a tank so it’s under pressure. When released, it can be used to push air or power certain systems.
Nitrous is a special gas people add to an engine to get a temporary power boost. It can be powerful, but it also puts extra strain on the engine if you use it too aggressively.
Active downforce means the car uses a system to push itself harder onto the road or track. More downforce usually means better grip, especially in corners.
Car
Gordon Murray T.50
The Gordon Murray T.50 is a high-end supercar. In this segment, they’re talking about how its design sends airflow around the car, which could be annoying or even risky for someone driving behind it.
Here, “fan” means a built-in airflow device on the car. The worry is that it can blast air toward other drivers, which could be uncomfortable or cause problems for the person behind.
The Gordon Murray Automotive T.50 is a very expensive, high-performance supercar. The podcast mentions it because it has a special design feature that can affect what it’s like to drive behind it. The concern is mainly about how that design impacts the driver’s windshield.
The Tesla Cybertruck is Tesla’s electric pickup truck. They mention it because Tesla focused on it first, which pushed back the timeline for a different electric car.
A “release candidate” is a version that’s very close to the final product. “Drivable” means it can be driven like a real car, so engineers can test it on the road.
“Chip shortages” means there weren’t enough computer chips available for cars. If a car needs those chips for its electronics, production gets delayed until supply improves.
They’re quoting a very fast acceleration target: reaching 60 mph in under a second. It’s basically a “wow” number, and they’re saying it’s not even the most important thing about the car.
“Veyron 300 plus” refers to the Bugatti Veyron variant that’s associated with breaking the 300 mph barrier. The speaker uses it as a benchmark for extreme speed and the tire/traction challenge that comes with it.
Michelin is a major tire company. Here it’s mentioned because the tires for these extreme cars aren’t generic—they’re engineered with top-level expertise.
They’re talking about the Lucid Air Sapphire, a high-performance version of Lucid’s electric Air sedan. The “Sapphire” name here signals it’s the more extreme, performance-focused model.
The Tesla Model Y is an electric SUV/crossover. It’s built for normal daily driving, but it can also be very quick. The podcast mentions it while talking about how fast different electric cars can accelerate.
Ride quality is how comfortable the car feels when the road gets rough. They’re saying the suspension setup makes the ride feel worse than you’d expect.
“Jet assist” means adding extra thrust from a booster system to help the car accelerate faster than its regular motor alone. It’s being mentioned as a workaround for traction limits.
Formula E is a racing series where the cars are fully electric. The host is saying the cars have gotten so advanced that they’re getting close to matching Formula 1 speed.
Race-developed tires are made for track use, where they’re designed to grip hard and handle heat from repeated fast driving. The host is saying even those tires can’t do everything people want for extreme acceleration.
Term
rubbers
They’re talking about the rubber compounds inside tires. The idea is that there’s a limit to how much tire grip you can get just by changing the rubber material.
“Steelies” usually means steel wheels. The host is hinting that wheel choice can affect how well a car performs when you’re trying to set speed records.
It means the car loses grip on all four tires at the same time. When that happens, the car can slide or spin, so it’s harder to keep it pointed where you want.
Bob Lutz is a famous person in the car industry who worked in top leadership roles. The hosts are bringing him up as a key example for their conversation.
The Dodge Viper is a loud, hardcore sports car made for speed and driver feel. The hosts are talking about the earliest Vipers and how they were stripped down compared to today’s cars.
The Shelby Cobra is a famous classic sports car. It’s known for being built for speed and for having a strong racing reputation. The podcast brings it up as a comparison to describe what a newer car was trying to capture.
The Dodge Challenger is a muscle car, meaning it’s designed for strong acceleration and performance. It’s made by Dodge and is known for a bold, sporty style. The podcast mentions it in the context of how engineers were pushed to build a performance-focused car.
The Chrysler Voyager is a minivan, which is a family vehicle built to carry people and cargo comfortably. The podcast mentions it because it was part of the lineup that helped Chrysler during tough financial times. It’s brought up as an important model in the company’s history.
Traction control helps keep the tires from spinning when you accelerate too hard. If the road is slippery, it can automatically reduce power to help you stay in control.
This means the car has a V10 engine with a total size of about 8 liters. Bigger engines like this usually feel very powerful, but they often use a lot of fuel and can be more expensive to service.
“Side pipes” are exhaust pipes that come out along the side of the car. They’re often louder and can get very hot, which is why the host jokes about getting burned.
A “canvas roof” is a fabric soft top like you’d see on many convertibles. Here, they’re saying the Viper had a canvas-roof version early on, and that changes how some people group the car’s different generations.
This is a special track version of the Dodge Viper SRT-10. “ACR” means it’s set up to be more serious for racing and fast laps. “09” means it’s from 2009.
This is a track-focused version of the Dodge Viper. “ACR” is a performance package meant for racing, and “99” means it’s from 1999. It’s basically the Viper in its most hardcore form for the track.
The Nordschleife is a famous, very twisty and challenging part of the Nürburgring race track in Germany. When someone says “Nordschleife record,” they mean the car set an extremely fast lap time there. It’s a big deal because the track is so hard.
This refers to a 2016 Dodge Viper called the GTC. It’s a special version of the Viper, and the conversation suggests it was tied to a more exclusive build option. “16” means it’s from 2016.
“Paint to sample” means you can pick a custom paint color instead of only choosing from the usual options. “Concierge/white glove” is marketing language for a premium, extra-helpful ordering process. The speaker is saying this Viper was offered in a very special, personalized way.
Term
TA 1.0
“TA 1.0” sounds like a specific special package you could choose for the Viper’s final years. The speaker also mentions “TA 2.0,” which implies there are different levels. This clip doesn’t fully explain what TA stands for or what changes.
Term
TA 2.0
“TA 2.0” is another special Viper option the speaker says you could order. They also mention “TA 1.0,” and that you could combine them. This part of the transcript doesn’t explain what TA means or the exact differences.
“Rebody” means changing the car’s outer body—like the panels and shape of the exterior. People do it to make a car look different, even if the mechanical parts stay the same.
A concept car is a one-off or prototype vehicle that shows off new ideas. It might never be sold, but it can hint at what future real cars could become.
“High mileage” just means the car has been driven a lot. Usually that means it may need more maintenance, and it can cost less than a lower-mileage car.
An engine swap means taking the engine from one car and putting it into another. It’s a big modification that usually involves more than just bolting the engine in.
The Renault Wind is a small car that’s designed to feel more open and fun to drive. The podcast mentions it in relation to how it was developed, specifically that it may not have been tested as much for airflow. That matters because airflow can affect things like stability and noise.
Autocross is a timed driving event on a course made of cones. You’re judged on how fast and accurately you can steer through the course.
Term
tractate
“Tractate” appears to be a transcription error for “track” or “tracked,” meaning the car was used on a race track. In this context, it suggests the heavily modified Viper saw real performance driving beyond autocross.
Wheel wells are the space in the car’s body where the tires sit. If you can fit bigger tires or bigger brakes “in the wheel wells,” it means there’s enough space for larger parts without rubbing.
“Breaks” is almost certainly “brakes.” The speaker is describing a Viper build with very large brakes that fit within the wheel wells, which is a common upgrade for track use to improve stopping power and heat handling.
Concept
self-immolated
They’re using a dramatic phrase to mean the van caught fire and burned badly. It’s basically describing a serious fire problem.
The Buick Regal is a midsize car made by Buick. Depending on the year, it can be offered in different body styles, including an estate/wagon version. The podcast mentions it because they liked a Regal estate they saw a couple years earlier.
LIVE
3, 2, 1.
That seems pretty good.
It's fine.
Yeah.
Hello and welcome to the 13th episode of Train Girlies Moe.
I am your host, Victoria Scott.
My pronouns are she and her.
I'm here with my co-host.
Hi.
My name is Jordan Hofstetter.
My pronouns are she and her.
Oh, I.
You can do it.
All of us just died.
Yeah, I know.
You ever just blinked too hard?
And today, you and Liam.
You and Liam.
Hi.
Hi.
You may know me from the Will There's Your Problem podcast.
My pronouns are he and him.
Yeah.
We have Liam today.
Yeah.
Liam is obviously, you know, co-hosts, Will There's Your Problem, but also 10,000 losses
if you're a Philly sports fan, which does put you in violent opposition to my co-host.
But you know.
I only care about the only PA rivalry I truly care about is the Flyers and Pens.
But even then, I have made my peace with what is happening right now.
Don't you worry.
Yeah, I see your face.
Don't you worry about it.
It's fine.
It's fine.
We need to put everyone out to pastor.
If we played a good regular season, a shockingly good regular season.
The retirement home has come home to roost.
I, LeBron James, Sidney Crosby is maybe, but also my goats maybe washed.
My goats probably washed.
She goats washed.
I will say this as a, as a kind of a newish Flyers fan as a guy who historically has
rooted for the Boston Bruins because my dad is from Boston, Massachusetts.
I am enjoying the Flyers success, but like awful lot of honkies.
It's yeah, it's it's it's rough.
It's yeah, we're getting the real like, oh, Pittsburgh's a shithole.
I'm like, guys, we live in Philadelphia and I love this city, but God, we cannot be thrown
stones.
Also, look, we're the only two real places in this state of Pennsylvania.
We got to stick together.
There's we're so far apart.
It basically doesn't matter like you all have the better mascots.
Iceberg is just a children's birthday party penguin costume.
And I think we need to recognize that as a people of Pittsburgh.
My city is currently being destroyed by the NFL draft.
That's fun.
That starts tonight.
Yeah.
They cut the bus lines two days ago.
So the story.
Uh huh.
Well, PRT is also being disassembled by Harrisburg the same way SEPTA is.
Vicki, you could just take a take a breather for a second.
We're going to discuss PA bullshit.
I was I want to get out of the buses because like that was my biggest complaint when I visited
Pittsburgh and then SEPTA is dismantling was my biggest complaint when I visited Philly.
Both lovely cities, both shockingly hard to get around in.
Card dependent.
Yeah.
I will say I took a bus this morning to work.
I took the five bus and it was lovely.
I was the only person on it and I was just like, why are we defunding my fainting?
I was about to say I was like your personal log real base car.
Yeah.
With your personal driver.
Get out of here lifter.
Oh God, I've been having to take too many lifts now because I'm sure Philly weather has
also been the bullshit whirlwind of spring.
Yes.
But I have a plan to walk or bike to work too many days and then at the last minute
rain or snow has happened.
I got into a Ford Fusion lift yesterday where the rear shock that I was sitting on top of
was blown the fuck out entirely and I could hear it slamming the top.
No suspension, baby.
No, no, no, no.
Thank God it was not a long drive.
But yeah.
You didn't hit any of those sinkholes.
I would have loved to have been swallowed whole by a sinkhole in the back of that Ford
Fusion.
At least it would be over.
I'll tell you something a little bougie about me.
So I have a five star lift rating, which means I get oh shit, frequent discounts and I don't
take lifts very often.
But when I do, I take lift black and that's the bougiest thing about me is like if I'm
taking it, I'm taking a lift black.
When I was still in Austin, I had my lift black of choice because when you drink in Austin,
Texas, the buses stop at when the bars close and not like right after the bars close like
when the bars close, they're done.
You know, normal, healthy.
Why?
Why are there so many DUIs of Texas who can say dirty sixth, baby?
Yeah, I was just in Austin a couple of months ago.
I my favorite Austin tidbit has nothing to do with the city itself.
So my dad went to Yukon Law, you know, a trillion years ago, his law schools of choice.
He was like, I applied to two law schools.
One was Yukon because Massachusetts didn't have a law school yet.
He like applied to BC, but was just like, I can't afford it at the time.
It was a trillion years ago.
My dad was working class and then he was just like the other one I applied to was the University
of Texas at Austin Law School and how would that have turned out for Ray?
And I was just like, poorly.
Poorly.
Poorly.
Actually, that school's full of woke leftists.
So we have, there's a new university in Austin run by a wonderful Jewish woman that, yeah.
I love my wife and I love Barry.
Oh, it's OK.
We definitely, yeah, listening to a table of old dual income New York Jews at God damn it.
There we go already.
Stella and I is wet.
That's fine.
I'll find it.
This is this.
I'm editing the podcast now.
So when I fuck up, it's my whoopsie.
650 in roughly.
650.
My wife Stella uses a pseudonym because she works kind of in the automotive industry.
So, yeah, but no.
Stella is short for Stellantis.
God damn it.
God damn it.
She's so much better than that.
She's Pujo.
Oh my God, can't have that in America.
The Pujo of women.
She might like that one.
Funky ways you can't even imagine.
Absolutely.
I, God, they're still running that bad dumb Lamar car without a wing.
It's incredible.
Anyways, but like, yeah, Pittsburgh's Pittsburgh's just we're just, they just decided to like
cut all of our public transit that isn't immediately downtown to service the draft.
And it's just, it's rendered anything outside of the city center and absolute nightmare.
And I just love that we're doing this for to watch the Steelers pick badly and then
suffer forever.
It's going to be good.
You're going to pick a, you're going to pick a DT that'll be great on the Eagles.
Absolutely.
1000%.
Yeah.
It's this.
And then yeah, we're, I think we're getting our final humiliation by the Flyers tonight
or tomorrow night as of recordings.
Saturday, Saturday, Saturday, Saturday.
So, yeah, yeah.
So I just.
By the time this airs, the final humiliation will have happened.
Yeah.
Unless we're still in it, baby.
We won't be.
Seven nothing.
And yeah, you might be.
Who's to say?
You probably won't be given that you're getting your, you're getting hosed here, but.
It's, it's worse than I, I didn't have a lot of hope for this playoff series.
And then.
I kind of thought it'd be a series at least.
I thought we'd maybe take one at home, you know, just for, just for the hope crowd.
And then.
Yeah.
No, no, no, no.
They've got to put.
They've got to put.
They've got to put Carlson in the glue factory, I think, actually.
Yeah.
I feel like it brings me to a pleasure to say this, but.
Gosh.
Well, Vicki, should we get on with the actual show?
Yeah.
Well, I mean, I was going to start us off because Liam's here.
I was going to have us do the goddamn news first, just as a, you know, to keep him comfortable
with the podcasting format.
I know my favorite thing about our base.
So I haven't announced this publicly, but I'm happy to announce it on a podcast.
I'm not historically on, which is going to be, I'm going to start writing.
Well, there's your problem blog.
For page.
Nice shit.
Yeah.
That's a good idea.
Yeah.
Yeah.
My wife was just like, you should do it.
And I was like, okay, but I, and my wife was like, no, no.
No, no.
Like, you know, voice up like the Korean is very serious voice, which is just like, no,
no, we're doing this now motherfucker.
And I was just like, okay.
Cool.
Yeah.
That's awesome.
Yeah.
I do the same thing with our Patreon blog, which is where I wrote this story that I wanted
to talk about, which, which basically, so I use blue sky probably too much.
Me too.
It's not good for you.
It's still better than X, the everything app.
But it is probably just not great in general to use it.
But anyway, people have been complaining.
And by people, I mean like 15 really loud, like guys.
Comfortable sys hat white guys who have like are very big on like Democrat party politics,
kind of like, you know, your, your abundance types at the furthest left.
And it just, it, they, their continual statement.
And this is somehow continued into the Trump era.
Like during the Biden era, there was at least a political point to it in the, in the Trump era.
It's very confusing.
But the, the whole crux of their argument is that Americans are materially doing fine.
And all of our economic problems are just vibes, which leads them to coin the phrase vibe session.
And of course, like, I've been hacking away at every edge of this whenever I get into
an argument, wherever I could.
And I was like, I should just cover this from like an auto perspective.
Because like nobody has really.
Why is a rap for $40,000 fucking dollars?
Exactly.
Exactly.
These numbers are connected with reality anymore.
We fucked up so bad.
Yeah.
Because like, you know, the New York Times did this piece recently that was poorly reported
and incomplete about how cars are too expensive now.
That's crazy.
They got like, they were like, here are all the cars available for under $25,000.
They just fully missed like three models.
So I was like, assuredly, I could do better than this.
So I dug into the Federal Reserve Economic Data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St.
Louis, Fred, as they call it.
Yes.
I'm familiar with Fred.
To go through basically all of the automotive industry numbers they've got like historical
data for.
Because I figure like, OK, cars are really expensive for most people.
And, you know, if you're renting, it's the most expensive thing you own, almost certainly.
If you're, if you're a homeowner, it's the second most expensive thing you own.
It also wears out.
So you have to like either get it maintained or buy a new one every so often.
You, I was reading 92% of American households have at least one car.
We do.
78.4% of American workers use a car, either their own or like carpool, to get to work.
3.7% of Americans use public transit to get to work, which just seems insane to me.
That's like nobody.
That feels way too low, even just knowing like the population of major metro areas.
I mean, it just got to show.
You figure though, like Philadelphia is 1.6 million, New York is what?
Seven or eight.
Yeah.
8.8 million, 8.5.
That's 10 million right there.
But a lot of people, I mean, in Philly, you saw it, Victoria, like we're a car-centric
city.
Oh my God.
Yeah.
Like I have a co-worker who takes lift to and from work because there's no bus route
that meaningfully goes to her house.
Yeah.
I mean, her husband, her husband takes the car to work because he has to work in the
suburbs.
And so like she's just stuck taking a lift.
And I was just like, she's like, I would love to take a bus.
I don't mind taking the bus, but like there's like, I would take three buses to go five
miles.
That's, I'm not doing that.
Yeah.
At a certain point, you're like your, your time.
Pissing blood basically.
Yeah.
Your time to get there is worth like far more to you than whatever amount the lift does.
Not that you're happy paying the lift, but like.
Right.
Exactly.
Yeah.
When I used to work, when I used to work on the other side of town for where we live
now, like I just had no, I just had no option that wasn't going to take me three and a half
hours.
Yeah.
And also take me deep into downtown Pittsburgh for no real reason.
Right.
Right.
So I, so I have historically commuted via transit, but I used to work out near King
of Prussia.
I lived in West Philly and commuted to King of Prussia.
My, my Mazda three pounded sand and eight shit.
And I had to take, if you, if, if we have any listeners in Philadelphia, the 124 bus
or 125 bus out to KOP, which takes about an hour.
And then I had to take another bus from there.
And that was just, or I took the high speed line to the 125 and that took me like an hour
and a half to get this like shitty bank job that I hated.
But I had my favorite commute.
While we're in it was I worked in Wilmington, Delaware for a while.
I worked at a bank, I can say a capital one, doing letters of credit financing stuff for
like international maritime work.
Okay.
So I was like, I was like pirates.
And I took, this is great.
I took the, I took regional rail down to Wilmington, Delaware.
And then they had a work shuttle that was like one of those like limo vans.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
With like the TVs and shit.
And the guy, and I was the only one who ever took it.
So it'd just be me and the driver like, yeah, man.
Let's go.
Oh, yeah.
I'm a good driver.
The guy would be like, why are you slurring?
It's 330 out of white.
Are you okay?
Why are you sweating so much, dude?
We, the Pittsburgh's public transit has failed to such a degree.
They're using those vans now for the colleges.
Like there's just college vans that go around.
Like I was just like, what's this like weird limo van for CFU.
And then I realized that is just how they have decided to shuttle students around in
the new PRT, in the new PRT like cutbacks is just like, yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I, I like, by sweet pea, uh, St. Joe's and Temple do that.
Like St. Joe's has like, I love it.
Like Penn has like limo buses, not like limo, but they're like nicer buses.
And St. Joe's just like, you get a school bus.
We bought this for $2,500 at auction and you're going to like it.
It's paid in red.
The finest red that Home Depot had to offer us at the time.
Yeah.
Sorry.
My friends working at my friend just got a job at a Sherman Williams connected.
It was gray.
I've been corrected.
It was a prison boss.
According to my wife, my friend just started working at Sherman Williams and had the
realization of how evil the logo is in real time.
It's like, what do you mean cover the world?
Like, yeah, it's just like, yeah, you're dumping red paint all over the entire globe.
Probably normal.
Well, yes.
Liam is an outlier.
Very few people use transit to get to work.
And although some people work from home, that rate has been dropping precipitously since
the pandemic began because everybody has to go back to the office now because we're doing
it.
We're doing it live.
We got to do it in the office.
It doesn't make any fucking sense.
So people are now like, so people are like, okay, I assumed I'm using cars here as like
I know about them.
And also I think they are a relatively good stand in for sort of like a metric of affordability
that impacts people very deeply.
It's we have national data.
It's not just regional.
It is something that you almost have to have if you want to participate in American life
and have a job and we have good data.
So it's a perfect contender for this.
Right off the bat, the first chart I looked up was the average amount of money financed
for a new car loan at a finance company 45 to be 45 give me 56 okay, you're both a little
high.
It's $41,742 all time high.
All time high.
Do we know the average interest rate on that?
Yeah, I'll get to that in a second.
It's horrible.
So that's the average amount financed as of December of last year.
According to Fred, the average new car transaction price is up to $49,725, according to I believe
that was Edmunds.
Oh, Cox Auto, who does month by month reporting on average price.
So 50 grand for your new car, which is almost it's all time high.
Not quite it's all time high.
What is it's all time high from?
It's all time high was like I think it was last spring and it was like around here.
Oh, yeah.
It was like 20 years ago.
No, no.
Everyone else was right.
Adjusted for inflation like that.
Yeah, yeah.
Now here's the other interesting thing is Fred does a CPI for just car prices.
And so using that as our index, we are now basically at the most expensive cars have
ever been at a hundred and they benchmark on 1982 and 1984.
So that's your 100 cars are now 180 roughly pre pandemic cars never peaked above 150.
So they are up.
What is that 20, 20 ish percent and just never have come back down since they're all time
high was in like mid 2023, but they basically have not gotten any cheaper at all.
So I want to I want to say one thing encountered that I am just thinking about.
And I'm kind of yes, spitballing, which is like, yes, cars are nicer than they ever have been.
Yeah. Oh, I get into that, though.
I absolutely have a I have a lot of she's three steps ahead.
I was thinking because like our minimum standard, right, is like I want air conditioning,
like even like your base, base, base, base, base fucking Kia has like heated seats now.
Yeah, I think that's just like, I think it's just like a ploy to like,
well, you'll pay more because we'll look at all the shit it has.
Yeah, it's how many things are as standard now sort of stuff.
Yeah. So the the the rebuttal I have to this is that like,
yes, standard content levels are relatively higher than they used to be.
And there is a sequel story to this.
I want to run comparing equivalent trim cars in terms of weeks worked to afford car.
I didn't have time to do that for this.
But like the new outback is five thousand dollars more than it used to be.
It starts an outback starts at thirty six now.
And like I remember my mom bought a fucking thirteen
florister for like twenty three five.
Yeah, not what something not bad.
For me, it's just I feel like we're also seeing this bump because
I feel like the pandemic really delayed a lot of like refreshes
on like core models for a lot of these companies.
And I feel like because those projects got extended out by another couple of years,
they were like, well, we're making the new three series.
You want to just keep throwing shit at it?
Like, yeah, you just want to like like the new civic.
It's like the new civic is one of the nicest places I have ever sat inside.
But I go, hey, remember the civic was supposed to be like reasonable, cheap
clock seats, maybe a manual like, yeah, yeah, like reasonable daily
transportation to your city.
You got your level job, right?
Yeah, and that you could maybe have a little bit of fun with.
Right. Even even if we say, you know, because for me, personally,
I am a man like the only new car I almost ever bought in my whole life was I
almost bought a twenty eighteen Mazda six.
It was the last year for the stick shift when it had cloth seats, manual, everything.
The dealership fucking screwed me.
So I never went through with it because I was like, just let me buy the car.
I just give me a reasonable interest rate because interest rates are really low back then.
I was working a good credit.
I was working at NASA, I had a steady income.
I was like, just let me walk out of here with the car.
I am not buying any of the warranty stuff.
We sat there and argued for three and a half hours, and I walked out
to my straight piped Toyota Supra and peeled out and never returned
because they made me so bad.
Everyone should get a fuck you like that, at least once at a car dealership.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
But like that's that that was that would be what I would I would lean towards.
That's like my kind of car.
But even if you even if you're like, oh, cars are nicer,
I actually was looking into this.
JD Power has found that new car problems are being reported at their highest levels.
Oh, yeah. 2009. Right.
I mean, that that that makes sense to me because like we have like supply chain issues
and like, well, it's all the software.
And also software, right?
Like that's that's the sort of thing.
But like I there's this it's not enough to bother me, but I will say it.
So I drive like the car we have is a 24 RAV4 XLE.
So like, yeah, second highest trim level.
Yeah, nice leather, peated seats, the seventh, third thing.
Number one, no rear climate vents.
Yeah. Number two, none.
Or does now the old one didn't.
Number two, manual passenger seat.
Fuck you for what I paid.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Number three, it does this bizarre and this is not.
I don't know if this is Toyotas or Apple's fault.
This is bizarre car play glitch where the screen will just flash red.
In like seconds at a time.
Is the car getting bad at you?
Are you doing something to revoke the car?
Are you driving the RAV4 over the desert in Kuwait recently?
That may have been miss a lot.
Did you hear your tone?
Did you?
Terrain, pull up.
There's just these guys right to a pothole.
Oh, I got.
Yeah, fucking the the level of the Nissan infotainment hell
that my wife and I are constantly in just trying to get like.
Even if I even if I am the some for some reason,
our Nissan has the largest Bluetooth range that I have ever experienced
on any object ever mild.
You should have seen my old van where it would still connect to
Ross's phone, like 130 feet away.
Yeah, my wife was two blocks away.
It was like, how did is your phone in the car?
And I'm like, well, you're texting me right now.
So and I'm responding.
So probably not.
But she was just like, I'm getting your podcast in the car.
And I was just like, I don't I what I think she's like.
She's like, whatever podcast or soul.
Exactly.
She's like, why are you listening to a murder podcast?
I'm like, because I'm a white woman.
Got you.
Stella, I'll do it.
It's fine. It's fine.
I've got to listen to this full one.
I it'll be fine.
It stands for Stalantis.
It stands for Stalantis.
Um, yeah, I just knew cars are I learned at my wedding
that the last car my grandmother ever leased was an ID for.
Oh, I've been sitting on this one for a couple of weeks
because I love my family.
My family's incredible.
It is elder abuse to put anyone north of 60 in a modern car.
I think also like I'm actually an ID for especially
an ID for Victoria.
Yeah. Yeah.
She doesn't know where her hands are.
Like the capacity buttons are a bad choice.
I was I was watching a Daddy Doug reveal.
Oh, my God.
And he was talking about the the dodechi cylinder cylinder,
the Ferrari 812 replacement, right?
Oh, and he was like he was pointing out
and their comments were very like overwhelmingly negative.
The fucking start, stop switch in a
in a one of the dodechi cylinder.
Yeah. It's a capacitive touch screen on the bottom of the wheel.
Oh, my God, that's horrible.
That's horrible as they're immediately letting people pay to retrofit
real buttons in this car already has an interior refresh option.
The only good thing that he does now is like, all right, cool.
You have to pull up the fighter jet switch. Yeah.
Yeah, give me dumb toggles at the very least done little toggles
like a mini Cooper from the early 2000s.
Right. Oh, my my sister-in-law drives a 16 or 19 Cooper.
And it does have the little fighter jet switches that I like quite a bit.
Yeah, it does make you feel like the Germans are overhead a little bit,
but in a kind of flyaway.
I drove a 16 GTI, man.
I love my GTI because the Germans are just like looking as flat.
Yeah. Yeah.
We too could be fun and abusive.
It's like, yep, yep.
The most fun.
And I'm going to stress it out.
I'm going to make this turbo miserable.
This this this as you have correctly noticed cars are very touch screen filled.
JD Power has found that overall vehicle dependent
dependent dependability ratings have been trending downward for years now
because of this. So the other thing that I was going to throw in too
is that like everybody's like, well, cars are more fuel efficient than they used to be.
Not really.
Since 2015, gas powered fuel efficiency has basically stagnated
and everything has been all of the efficiency of gains
have been driven by Peaheves and EVs, which primarily go to buyers
that make one hundred and fifty thousand dollars per household or more.
That's your average buyer.
They do not have that trickled down to poor people yet.
And if you buy an EV, what is what are you laughing at me for?
No, I'm laughing because your connection just went down in a way it never has before.
It was just totally a shit.
Turn off your video.
Yeah, turn it off.
Never does that.
It's never done that before.
That was so.
I. OK.
I was like, what did I say?
Nothing, it was what you did it say.
And in fact, the synthesizer of you.
Yeah, we've done live shows where we have Nova Robot Boys.
I I I like my brav gets twenty two miles in that twenty two miles a gallon.
That's fucking horrible.
Yeah. Yeah.
My wife and I have no.
We we really like how fuel efficient are deeply boring CVT Nissan is
because we drive to New York and Chicago a lot and from Pennsylvania,
especially with gas prices now, like, you know, if I'm going to New York,
I have to drive across all of all of Pennsylvania and the other ways,
like all of Indiana and other shithole states.
I don't want to stop in those states.
And also gas on the turnpike is almost as expensive as turnpike is per mile.
Uh, the only thing we'd go to is an EV at this point, because, yeah,
we were looking to see if there was anything like we're like it is the new
like one we want to sedan.
So it's like, oh, we have three options now.
But also it's like, oh, anything is a downgrade in both fuel economy
and also everything we could switch to takes premium or mid grade.
So it's an extra like it's an extra penalty.
Yeah, like, yeah.
Yeah, I've been looking at a Volvo V 60,
the cross country that they make you buy now.
Uh-huh. And it's just like it's a turbo four cylinder.
I would get a mild hybrid, but like, that's more shit to break.
That's more shit that I have to replace.
Like, and if I'm looking at pre-owned, it's just like,
I don't know how this has been driven.
I don't know like what the, what the, what the mild hybrid system is going to look like.
You can't buy a fucking, like I was, I was talking to my wife the other day
and I was just like, I'd really like a golf arch.
She was like, OK, like maybe, like, you know, if we get a second car,
we don't really need one.
But like you, you know, we've we're in a good spot financially.
50,000 fucking dollars.
Yeah, they're 50 grand. Yeah. Yeah. Fuck you.
Yeah, absolutely. Like, yeah, absolutely.
Like get bent. Like, um, yeah.
By don't do it, Victoria. Turn it off.
My wife working again. It is working again now.
My wife. I don't know what happened there.
My wife wants a Civic type R quite badly,
but the Civic type R is a it's like a $60,000 car.
And it is it no matter how nice the new Civic is,
you're still buying the very nice Civic, you know, Civic.
I mean, this is my this is my beef with the with the Golf R.
It's like, well, it's a decontented Audi.
Absolutely. Yeah. I could go get an RS3 for
six grand more. I was going to say, not that much more. Yeah.
Yeah, I that's what pisses me off.
It's like just like the GTI is a $40,000 car now.
Especially they don't make the golf anymore.
No, they don't. I bought one in.
I bought my 16 GTI in 2019 for.
God, it was like 19 out the door with like 15,000 miles.
Oh, oh, yeah, that is a number you're never going to hear.
Even a year later, actually,
if you even tried to buy that in March of 2020,
you would like I ooh, that's the other thing where it's just
used car prices have never come back to earth.
No, that's that's my beef.
Is that like, well, I look at car max like I would.
So I bought and sold my GTI through Carvana.
So like I highly recommend selling a car to Carvana
because they're stupid and they don't do their jobs.
They almost went bankrupt.
Yeah, right.
And that they also bankers because they bought my heavily modified GTI
that made 380 at the wheels and took a fucking second look at it.
OK, they were like, oh, yeah, this is and the guy just said,
that's not stock is it?
I was like, no, but I like I told you it wasn't stock.
I told you there had been modifications
and he was like, OK, you should check.
And I was like, OK, I threw the axe
is important in the glove box.
Like good luck, everybody else.
It's still driving around Ohio.
I want it. I would have paid good money to see the guy.
Whatever idiot bought my heavily modified
380 horsepower to the front wheels, GTI
take off in a stoplight for the first time.
Driving it out of the driving it out
of the f**king vending machine at a Carvana
immediately into a retaining wall.
Yeah.
Well, I will say the data set also covers used cars
and it's also really bad there.
The one thing, the number that I really wanted to tell you,
though, because I feel like you both would enjoy this.
I just I have to tell you.
So average finance rates have not dropped below 6
percent for a new car.
Like your your APR after 2022.
We had that like one moment where it was all money was free.
And now money is over 6 percent, which is higher than basically
all the 20 tens.
The average loan length is now 60 or 72.
Well, so it's just it's just the overall average
based on all loans put together.
Seventy point three months, according to Edmunds.
So that's seventy two and eighty four.
Are the are the primary ones, I would say.
Yeah.
The average monthly payment for a new car is now seven hundred
and seventy seven hundred and seventy three dollars per month.
And this is a part of the economy where people go, it's like,
well, think about how many high end things are being sold in America these days.
People aren't financing those usually in a way that we talk about people.
Financing cars.
Twenty two point nine percent of new car loans
are now longer or eighty four months or longer now.
Hey, I'm dumb.
That's an amount of months where I've got to double check my math
to get backwards to years.
You know, like, like, it's like when you ever meet a parent
who uses the month system too long and it's like,
my child's forty two months.
They're like, oh, they pick a college to go to yet.
Like, yeah, like, I don't know fucking how like that gets forty five.
I don't know.
Um, I will say this, like I was I was taught.
So I know someone who paid for their car about forty five thousand ish.
And this is like a family car in cash.
Yeah, it's like cool.
Glad you can do it. Yeah.
But I like I have seen all over the place.
People are just like, yeah, like my car loans like seventy.
Like someone I know who I work with is like got like a Nissan
Ultima with like it's like a six year car loan at like six and a half percent.
And I'm like, that's terrible.
That's so bad.
And I like tried to talk them out of it.
I was like, just get like just get a civic.
Like, I know you're going to pick you.
The golf is not that much different.
Like you're still like whatever is like this is like we're in the realm
of the absurd now with car price.
Yeah. Well, and as of December twenty twenty four,
which is when Fred discontinued this data set.
So I can no longer find it.
Thanks. As I say, why would happen?
Right. Yeah.
Used car loans were at an average of sixty five point seven months.
And the average amount financed was twenty four thousand one hundred and forty eight
dollars for used cars average.
Say that number again to me.
Twenty four thousand one hundred and forty eight dollars was the average
amount financed for a used car.
So let's assume the end of twenty twenty four is down roughly.
That's thirty thousand out the door for a used car.
Yes. Yes.
Roughly what we're talking about.
Yeah. So I have had my eye on Julia Quadrifolia.
Liam, no. Oh, right.
I mean, yes, yes.
We have critical support, but also I don't like look, there's I the devil
and angel on my shoulder like, yeah.
And also like, oh, God, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
I was going to make the joke.
Five hundred five horsepower Ferrari derived V6.
I know. Say less.
I know. I have the same sickness inside me that wants that.
I want the four C, which has the Fiat five hundred motor.
That's not a good idea.
The edges, but guess what?
It's bolted down.
You can't leave it.
I almost made the joke when you were talking about like new car like issues
reported and I'm like, can you correlations not causation?
Can you show me the return of Fiat and Alfa Romeo to the U.S.
market on that graph?
Because I bet there's a I was like, I had a friend who had a Fiat
five hundred of ours in Austin and love that thing.
And I swear I saw him drive it four times a year.
And he was beating us in his beater the rest of the time
to which the Fiat was supposed to be the beater.
Did Julia Quadrifolia remember specifically because I think it was
current driver did a long term review where they were like,
we couldn't actually get enough miles on it because it was in the shop
for three months and we had twice or three hundred instead.
But they were like, if you could look aside, past that the the months
where we did drive it, it was really, really good.
It's out. I don't like this because my thing with Alfa's care, dude.
Like I'm not going to it's not I'm not going to daily it.
But I so I'm in this really weird spot where my my in-laws
was my father-in-law drives like a XT six or something like that.
XT six, whatever.
Some some boat.
And his wife, my mother-in-law is like, oh, I want like I want a car
for the summer where they're like taking trips and like this and that.
And I was like, OK, cool.
If you go in on it like Alfa Quadrifolia, she's like, you'll kill me.
And I was like, no, no, no, no, let me.
What do you care if it's reliable?
You're going to the nail salon.
Let me out my Alfa.
And she's like, she's like, I know that I'm Italian,
but I like can't in good conscience have this car.
I just you can make it to your little errands around town and limp mode.
Come on. Come on.
Fifteen miles an hour.
Fifteen hundred. Yeah, let's do this. Let's do it.
So I also wanted to say so let's say you want to buy your Julia
Quadrifolia with your $24,000.
Yeah, with your with your $24,148 car loan.
Do you know what the average interest rate was as of again, December 2024,
when this was ended for a used car loan?
Not nine.
Sixteen point five four percent.
That's loan shark.
That's in the Bible as being bad.
That's you will not see that you will not see the gates of heaven.
Yeah, user rate.
I just.
Basically, it's all time high.
It was like a handful percentage points up highest.
That's not real.
Like that's I mean, I know that it quite literally is real, but that's not real.
Like that's not a real number to me.
Do you have the chart of amount of repossessions per capita?
Like, I bet that number is actually of course.
I did actually end this with a chart of US auto loans delinquent by 90 or more
days, which that is the end of this whole article.
But just to summarize, it takes a used car loans are at their longest, basically,
ever the interest rates are higher than ever.
The CPI for them is while it is off its post pandemic high, because in 2022,
it was like insane.
You could not get you could not beg, borrow or steal a used car.
It's still, as with new cars, about 20 percent elevated above its pre pandemic
baseline. And the thing that I couldn't believe was that 20 percent of new and
used car loans together are subprime.
Yeah, according to Cox, I mean, yeah, prices, baby.
Yeah.
And yeah, the average number of auto loan delinquencies is now five point two
one percent of all auto loans.
And not so good, the highest since
two thousand and I think a love 10.
What was going on then?
Don't worry about it. OK.
Yeah, it's fine.
Yeah, there's part of me that's like, you know, it's going to be worse for the
banks about the subprime auto board auto load crisis is that.
Boy, howdy, a car is real harder to take than a house.
The house just sits there.
Car Cargo Cargo wrote Cargo Cargo a lot of places.
Yeah. And just to just to add to this,
the Fred does publish CPI for urban consumers, vehicle parts and equipment,
which is now the highest it's ever been.
Again, this one is this one is like closer to 50 percent higher than its pre
pandemic like 40 percent higher than its pre pandemic baseline.
CPI for motor vehicle maintenance and repair is also at its all time high.
Almost double what it was during 2000, like in 2008.
The cost of car insurance, according to the producer price index,
is now again, basically double what it was in 2008.
Cool.
It's never cost more to own a car in American history, basically.
And yet you have people out here saying that the average cost of living
has not got up more than like a couple of books for groceries because we just.
Yeah. Also, new cars take longer to repair.
They get totaled at higher rates than ever because of all the safety systems.
They have Americans on average have higher, you know,
which is defined as more than $1,000 deductibles for their insurance than ever before.
Meanwhile, our our cars are our roads are still like.
So dangerous, like everybody uses the adjusted for a million miles traveled
because Americans drive so much that if you evaluate our road safety
based on how many miles we drive, then they look really safe
because our infrastructure demands that we drive orders of magnitude more
than anybody else in the world.
If you look at our roads on a like normal basis as like per capita fatalities,
so the number of road deaths for the number of people that live here,
our roads are somewhere between Kazakhstan and Syria for road safety.
We have double the fatalities of basically any GWG 20 peer, at least double.
Most of the most of our deaths are driven by pedestrian and bicyclist fatalities.
Yeah, absolutely.
Because they're that you're not in the car that's now safe and bigger than ever.
It's just it will just turns you to mist.
I've written a bunch about that.
We have made some progress since the worst days of the pandemic,
but we are nowhere near close to where we need to be.
I mean, driving standards are still I here in here in Seattle.
We're not making our vision zero targets.
Vision zero is the basically the insidious leftist plot
to stop pedestrians are being killed in city streets.
So our one of our council members is like, we should just do an audit
and just like redefine what we success would be for this,
because we're not going to make it.
We're not going to get that magic.
Those numbers.
Yeah, has vision zero worked for any city?
Yes, no, no, European ones.
Yeah, in America, in America.
Yeah, yeah.
There are there are a couple of cities.
I know I don't have it right up.
I could probably find it.
There are a handful of smaller cities that have done relatively normal.
I wrote a ton about this.
How did I wrote it like two years ago?
That's why three years.
Because I know Austin was trying to implement vision zero when I worked there.
Or when I guess I did work and live there.
But I it was the it was a things got immediately worse
when we introduced roundabouts.
Yeah, in New York City, there was they actually got a few
small decrease in pedestrian fatalities after the vision zero implementation.
It was Oslo, Norway, where they were like they achieved total success,
where they had no pedestrian or cyclist fatalities in 2019,
which is crazy. That's pretty cool.
You know, it does work.
You just have to actually change infrastructure.
And also, you can't be driving around in like trucks that are machines.
Yeah, tall. Yeah.
Yeah, show me about a Cadillac Escalades in Oslo and I'll make some points here.
Yeah, I read I wrote like 4,000 well researched, interviewed words about this.
And I think 10 people read it.
So I'll post it in the show notes.
Maybe 10 more people can read it.
I think we also just need to do a better job of saying that.
Hey, we're we're also doing writing and other things on the Patriot.
This is for my old job.
Gotcha. OK. Yeah.
Yeah. No, if you want to read, if you would like to read the full roundup
of all this data I've just given to Jordan and Liam,
and you want to like see all the charts I'm referring to,
the article is on the Patreon for free.
You don't even have to subscribe to read it.
I just like sharing stuff like this.
This is the first chance I've had to do like any kind of data driven journalism
in a while because I don't have like a day job.
And I was like, yeah, I feel like doing this coming soon
will hopefully be the the Honda Civic Burger Index.
That's what I was telling you where I wanted to compare,
basically, equivalently loaded trims of cars and amount of time taken to buy one.
Based off of a combination of like doing
in doing like CPI and also the Big Mac Index, basically.
If you're familiar with the Big Mac Index, one of my favorite economic.
It's really good. Yeah. Markers. Yeah.
I just need to know what a civic starts at.
It's not. It's not an X number.
I want to say 24.
24, 695, according to. Yeah.
Google AI mode. Google AI mode.
According to Honda themselves, 24, 695.
Yeah, I use it's a good car.
So I have the I really like Gemini AI.
I'm not saying this under duress.
There's no gun point. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, yeah, your base 24, 695.
And then fucking if you want anything like finding a base model
on a lot like that's exactly right because I've been looking at
you said I look at cars a lot.
You know, I go back and forth with my mother-in-law trying to figure out
like what she would because she's able to like help us purchase one,
which is really sweet. Yeah.
But she has a lot of standards.
So we're not going to get a civic under. Yeah.
I I will say if you if you can you venture maybe to go towards
like a Honda Accord, Honda Accord is genuinely just a lot.
You're right.
Alpha Julia, Alpha Julia.
It's a reasonable family sedan.
My parents just got themselves into a Honda Civic hybrid.
Like what is an Accord start at?
Jesus, I think the I think it was below 30 when I tested it
when it first came out, but that was like two years ago.
So it's certainly about 30.
It's like I think it's thirty one, two or something.
I spent a lot of time on Honda U.S.
this website because I 2595. Oh, look at that.
I keep building I keep building preludes because I have that sickness.
I mean, the the SE trim starts at the Unisport hybrid,
thirty three, seven, nine, five.
The touring hybrid, which I assume is like super loaded at this point,
is that that's the touring hybrid is essentially a BMW from five years ago.
It's really nice.
It's really nice. Oh, my God.
It's what my parents have because they traded in a.
Also, this is the thing where if you do have like a newish car
that's like five years old,
it's worth its weight and gold if it's in good condition still.
Because yeah, I got I got out of my GTI
not ahead because I put so much into the mods.
But I I yeah, I got out about 15 bucks,
fifteen hundred bucks ahead.
Yeah, that is.
I know several friends of mine who when they traded in
made out like they are sold and that bought something else.
They made out like bandits because they probably bought in like twenty
eighteen, twenty nineteen, which is bottom used car market,
especially for nicer newer things.
But yeah, Vicky, William,
before we get to Tesla news that will piss me off again,
I'm going to go pee real quick.
OK, I'm going to go grab a seltzer.
Cool, I'm going to grab some water.
Yeah, let's do it.
This will be my first.
All three of us taking a break.
I'll have to edit around.
So yeah, new new challenges.
Hello, and thank you for listening to Trangirlismo.
I'm Victoria Scott, as you might already know.
Making things people enjoy is how I make my living.
But unfortunately, if I advertised you a VPN subscription
or AI services, gray market peptides,
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That's why this advertisement is for something I can really get behind.
That's right, more Trangirlismo.
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Thank you, as always, for listening.
Now back to the show.
All right, we're back.
That's pretty good.
Yeah.
So now we can move on to the part of the show
that I thought you might enjoy, which we haven't really done
like a three minutes hate segment on this show in our first dozen episodes.
And I figured we not, not for the company that is the most obvious,
I feel like we briefly with the SX discontinuation.
But I figured Liam might want to get in on talking about Tesla.
Everyone's favorite crypto fascist auto manufacturer.
I guess they're just openly fascist now.
But Elon has announced.
Why?
Elon Musk's famous catchphrase,
that and that and can I put my come inside you, but not in the normal way?
Elon has announced that the roadster is coming in May.
It will be Tesla's last.
No, it isn't.
Manually driven car.
No, it won't be.
No, it isn't.
It was.
So I just want to like run us through a quick history of this.
It was supposed to be you actually on April 1st.
That was announced as of last November's shareholder event,
but Musk claimed he chose April 1st for, quote, some deniability
because of April Fools.
Well, Lucy's honest. Yeah.
This is you don't you don't hate this guy enough.
Feel like this is you cannot make April Fools jokes during shareholder conferences.
Folks, why did people got very mad about it?
But then a few weeks before that last year, he was on Joe Rogan's show
claiming he'll be out at the end of 2025.
This was also when he teased making it a flying car because, no, quote,
my friend, Peter Teal, once reflected that the future was supposed to have flying cars,
but we don't have flying cars.
If Peter wants a flying car, he should be able to buy one end, quote.
You really don't hate this guy enough.
Yeah, it's
actionable threat, actionable threat act.
Like, I just it's the Roadster is one of those great, like.
There's it was one of the first hints that mass delusion
had entered the EV space, because that was I feel like the Roadster was before
we even knew exactly how much of an evil dipshit Elon was like we had hints.
But like, OK, well, here's the timeline.
This is this is what I wanted to go through is like, how long have we been
hearing about this car, which we have ever only seen one operable model of
as far as I'm aware of.
And some dudes got to ride in exchange for $50,000 worth of deposit.
It's been nine years.
I know I actually put it back as even further than that.
And this is why.
Well, this is available for reservation in 2017.
Well, so in early 2011, Tesla just continued the original Roadster,
which was a Lotus chassis, actually pretty great electric sports car.
It was a wonderful proof of concept.
They're charming.
Generally delightful.
Yeah. Yeah.
Like before before any of this, like he was actually still kind of
like semi sane and reasonable.
That was a proof of concept by October of 2011.
Musk had suggested there will be a new non Lotus based Roadster
sharing the platform of the Model S, which was still in development at the time
by 2014.
Oh, that was not a hard and fast plan.
That was just kind of a suggestion.
Fast forward to July of 2015, after the Model S had come out,
Musk promised the return of the Roadster at an official Tesla event.
I went to the post the archive link to their website
and he said it would arrive by 2019 with quote maximum plaid mode,
which I think was also when he started naming his cars plaid for being fast
because he watched space balls and didn't get the fucking job.
I was about to say, yeah, forever.
VW should have sued.
Yeah, I mean, not that they own plaid, but like, you know, lots of people
should have sued and then and then, yeah, November of 2017.
As Liam pointed out, was when they did the surprise unveil
of the prototype during a Tesla Semi event.
Remember the Tesla Semi?
There's apparently three of them in California as we we got corrected
a couple of weeks ago. Yeah.
I was like, those don't exist.
Apparently there's three.
So revolutionizing all of American transport.
But the surprise unveil of the prototype meant that the Roadster would come along
in 2020.
And that was when we actually got all of the data about the car
that like we still are using most more or less to this day.
This is when Musk said it would do 1.9 seconds zero to 60.
It had a somehow 200 kilowatt hour battery with 630 miles of range,
which is physically impossible for the car that was unveiled.
Yeah, like I sure man.
The seat is made out of batteries.
I don't know if you do that.
Yeah, it's just you see a panel that's a battery.
Yeah. Yeah, you'll you'll hook up your
you'll matrix style, hook your bioelectricity into it.
And you are also a battery.
Human body is basically a potato clock.
Who cares? Yeah, absolutely.
And as an Irish woman, going to keep putting potatoes in and potatoes in, potato out.
I just it's so people paid $50,000 to Tesla.
Yep, nine years ago and a couple of them got a joy ride.
Yeah, I have a joy ride in the prototype.
How much of Elon's dub bullshit has just been financed by going like
well, like MKB a stand ship.
Yeah, like, hey, you could just send me a check.
And yeah, for sure as you'll get one, don't you worry about it.
Nine years ago.
I was yeah, well, that was a $50,000 deposit
for a $250,000 car at the time.
It was supposed to cost a quarter of a million dollars.
They have removed the price from the website since then.
Wonder why. So who knows what it's going to cost when it comes out.
Yeah, I just nine years ago.
I different person, different relationship to presidents.
Different gender. Different gender.
Fucking I'm married.
I bought a house.
Like, entire people have lived lives and had an entire time.
Yeah, I moved through five states since 2017.
Yeah, how many people I married.
I married up on a house like I got married.
How many people have put that $50,000 down?
And not to be grim, have died since then.
Like, it's a non zero number.
That's the thing I think about where I'm just like,
you died believing that one day you'd still get that roadster.
And isn't that so stupid?
Yeah, I didn't even have Bert wasn't even born yet.
When the Tesla Roadster was first unveiled, I was turned around.
I didn't he he wasn't born until 2018.
I almost I almost I almost just asked
Beep Beep how old she was in 2017 because that's the level of deranged I am at this point.
Yeah, I just when did he send it into space?
Was that also 17?
Oh, that that one, I don't remember when that roadster went to space.
It was what is it, 18?
Yeah, because it was after the initial unveil.
He didn't like unveil it and then immediately be like,
and it's on the launch pad right behind it.
It was his old.
It was his old roadster they sent to space.
It wasn't a new model.
It was his actual original like 2010
Tesla Roadster that he launched to space.
You think he tried to claim it as a loss on a like teeth like.
It's like, I don't want to have to put a new battery in this fucking thing.
Do you hear how much we're charging for a battery?
Yeah, space it.
I did also want to just call out a quote from the event
from the November 2017 event where the car was unveiled.
Elon Musk said that compared to a new roadster, quote,
driving a gasoline sports car is going to feel like a steam engine
with a side of quiche and what does that mean?
Take less kind of mean man.
Is he referencing the like
quiche's gay like 19?
There was a book in the 80s that only I know about this
because it got referenced in a Roger Bohr Bond movie.
But there was like quiche was gay for a while to eat.
It's it's gay to eat egg pie or whatever.
So it's eggs. It's just eggs.
And usually like some bullshit you got around.
You just bake it into a little thing.
Yeah, I have no idea.
I could not figure out what the hell that meant.
That or he just said the wrong word.
I search several news articles that was the real quote.
I could none of them mentioned what that meant.
Then then I just want to.
So after after the car design was unveiled in June of 2018,
Musk said via still then Twitter that he would use composite
overwrapped pressure vessels or COPV that he was sourcing
from SpaceX rockets to build a SpaceX package of the Roadster
that boasted cold just cold jet thrust nozzles
to give it better acceleration and handling and breaking performance
on the Joe Rogan experience.
Musk hinted at a working pressure of 10,000 PSI
for this system, where he also suggested that it would make it fly
at least for short hops.
Yeah, man. Yeah, man.
I think LSD is beneficial in small doses.
I think it's great. Yeah, I think it's really good.
I look if I do LSD is great.
Don't don't don't associate a perfectly good drug with this asshole.
I just can you imagine the canyon videos of L.A.
If this if this car had actually come to fruition of just seeing someone
try to basically like the worst people you know,
just wait to wave dash off the side of a fucking mountain
just because they're like they hit the wrong fucking button
in their terrible, capacitive touch button Tesla like, oh, yeah.
Sorry, I sighed shimmied and then immediately was a thousand feet below myself.
I just hold it up and silence those hoops.
Yeah, absolutely.
Did it come did it come with a parachute or like this wasn't real?
This was not real.
This was just he goes on the Joe Rogan show to just like say some shit
and I hope that some of it sticks, you know.
Well, then he has people actually chase down these things because like they
according to the I think it was like VP of Tesla,
they were working on that like they were working on not making it fly,
but using like cold air jets on the actual finished project.
It's probably part of the reason it's taken them nine years
because he made a stupid joke and then they had to bend to his will.
Same reason the Cybertruck looks the way it does.
Like this is how he runs the company, you know.
Doesn't matter if it's good, it just make make Musk happy.
And like there's something to be said about potentially using
compressed air for like.
Breaking reasons, I guess.
I just don't trust him to do.
Yeah, or oh, God, by the amount of nitrous.
We never got a there's a reason we never got a production fan car.
That's the only comparison I can think of.
If you're familiar with like the Chaparral Chaparral Chaparral.
I don't know. The Chaperone.
Yeah, yeah, there we go.
The Chaperone, T.J.
It was the big it was a car that a huge fan on the bottom of it
and it sucked itself down to the air track.
It was active downforce.
It got banned immediately because it kept spitting rocks
out the back of it at other cars on the racetrack.
Like one of the killbots.
Yeah, yeah.
It's the apparently that's a huge issue
with the new Gordon Murray T.50 or whatever that also has a fan where it just
it just if you're behind it, God, God hope that your windshield is not expensive.
That dude loves fans.
He's a big fan.
Should be killed.
Oh, God.
Welcome to the last episode of Triangularies.
That's fine. Thirteen's a good number.
I'm killing my co-host.
Thirteen's good.
Yeah, but but yes, there's a reasons that these are not implemented in road cars.
That's usually because it is really bad to just shoot uncontrolled jets of air around.
But in any case, they apparently working on it.
Who knows if it'll have it?
In July 2020, Musk said that the roadster would come in late 2021 after they hit delays due to a focus on the Cybertruck.
In January of 2021, Musk said on I think by then it was X.com that it was delayed until 2022 with a quote
release candidate design drivable end quote in late summer of 2021.
In September of 2021, Elon Musk said it was due to chip shortages from the pandemic.
It was delayed until 2023 in May of 2023, Musk said it was delayed until 2024.
In February of 2024, Musk announced it would accelerate to 60 miles an hour in less than one second.
Although he claims that is the quote least interesting part and quote of the car.
He also at this time delayed it until 2025 in a series of tweets.
Oh, I was doing it in January of this year.
Tesla stated on its Q4 earnings call that the roadster is ready.
No, it isn't.
And now it is apparently if you can believe it, going to come out in May.
No, I don't.
I or if it does, it is going to be it's going to have none of the things like I can believe it's going to be a blizzard entertainment game.
Yeah, it's did you ever play?
Elon Musk walking out on stage, jingling keys.
You motherfuckers like this.
Did you ever play?
Did either of you ever play like very early bungee destiny, like destiny one?
And it's just like, wow, this is really good for about three hours.
That's like, oh, is that was that it?
That was that all you had right now?
It's like, yeah, like, yeah, I portal to what it came out.
Yeah, I really truly expect this to like one.
I don't think we have the tire technology to accelerate to like unless you're putting like
dragster slicks on it, like, yeah, whatever the like, you got a Veyron 300 plus super speed,
ultimate dick shoved butthole tires that like co-developed with Michelin.
Yeah, a set of tires that will cost you $40,000.
Yeah, so like the the current top speed
top speed record for zero to 60 is I want to say and I don't have this written down.
So I'm doing it from memory.
So if I'm wrong, eat my shorts.
I'm looking for the Lucid air sapphire
can do zero to 60 in one point seven six seconds, which is enough to make
crap surface and it exists.
You can buy one and I've driven one and they're awesome.
I love I am a huge Lucid air apologist.
You're a huge apologist.
If the regime that funds Lucid, right, right?
No, but also taken.
The take in can do it in one point eight nine eight seconds.
The Lucid sapphire one point nine Tesla Model S
plaid one point nine eight.
But but the one point nine.
So the one point seven six figure comes from Lucid directly because they were that,
which I accept for the purposes of this argument.
Sure. Also, I don't just lie.
Here's the other thing where I have have either of you been
in an electric thing that does do the zero to 60 party trick.
Yeah, I drove the sapphire.
Did you get it was ridiculous?
You feel I felt very ill the one time I was in a tank and that did the full launch.
I feel I feel ill in Tesla's I have noticed.
Well, they ride like shit.
Yeah, that's a big part of it is the ride quality is just like it's
like being in a Conestoga wagon that does zero to sixty and three seconds.
The fusion I talked about earlier with the broken shot was about as comfy
as every Model Three I've ever been in the back of.
And like the Model Three wasn't broken, probably.
Yeah, I will say the fact.
My my favorite moment in the Lucid air sapphire was I was on
the I think it was I think it's California Route 33.
It's the it's the twisty road out in the middle of the forest south of San Francisco.
It's like the driving road where they've got like Alice's like the famous
biker car like driving road hang out and I was I was in the sapphire
and I was stuck behind a semi truck on the twisties for like 25 minutes.
And I was just like, all right, all right.
And finally we get to the straight section and there is a dashed yellow
and I move over and I pin it and I literally I look down and I'm like,
oh, my God, that's that's felony.
And I move back over.
I kind of jam on the brakes.
I look at the rearview mirror.
The truck is like a mile behind me at this point.
I've covered I've covered like two miles because it was instantaneous.
It's it's like it is actually I know that like for most like EVs,
yes, the party trick gets older or whatever, a Lucid air sapphire is fast enough
that if you get jaded of that, I think you maybe just need to find a new hobby
for it's it's genuinely is I really I again, I really like it.
I wish that they didn't have such close funding ties to Saudi Arabia, as I feel
the House of Saud would not be a huge fan of me personally.
One thousand two hundred and thirty four horsepower.
about the Patriot tier incoming called the Vicky Lucid air tier.
And oh, Mr.
Mr. Solomon, I didn't realize you were a big fan of the show.
They are.
So for those tires, they are approaching the theoretical limit
of like how fast they can accelerate with even the the the sapphire,
I think, is tri-motor, which is the same as the roads are supposed to be.
So to get to get a sub second zero to sixty would actually,
I think, require the jet assist, because I don't think there's any other way
to make tires transmit that much power to a road like not stop legal tires.
Anyway, I mean, you can put selects on whatever and make it do whatever.
Looks front surface, right?
But even like even the new like gens, like whatever,
four Formula E car that I'll talk about next week when we know a little bit
more about it, which is like they are finally at the point
which they think they can match F one speed wise throughout the course of a race,
which is like huge for Formula E, because those used to be like GT three car.
It was like a bunch of power wheels kind of.
Yeah, that first season, those first couple of seasons with the first car,
real Looney Tunes. Yeah.
But I even that is not on race developed tires is not doing quite that.
Like we are at the limits of like chemical science on the like what we can do with rubbers.
Like I. Yeah, and also like we got to get the speed record steelies.
Exactly. That or it's like, I'm sorry.
OK, if it does use the Genesis to do it.
One, how controllable is it if you were breaking all of all four tires loose to do so?
And also how many times can it do zero to sixty and point nine seconds?
And also only one throwing up over yourself.
I throw up over myself.
I'm not too big a girl to admit that that would make me puke my leg.
Like I like.
Yeah, but it's we'll find out in like two weeks
when it definitely becomes a real car, yeah, Vicky.
Yeah, I will bet you yes.
Twenty dollars to the charity of your choice that it does not come out.
OK, yeah, I don't really want to take that bet,
but also I'll give twenty dollars to charity. Sure.
It's just called. You got to pick a good one.
It's just called pick a Seattle charity that you like.
And also I'll send twenty bucks their way.
I just I this is so.
I've noticed other car companies are starting to do.
The Tesla speak.
Gee, like enough car executives think that they are personalities.
Like, do you know the Ford guy has a podcast?
Yeah, Jim Farley. He's got like a forecast or whatever.
I just blurred that the other day when I was trying to like look at automotive
podcast charts because I'm a maniac and I wanted to tell my parents how well we're doing.
And then I realized that the CEO Ford is competition.
But like I they all think they have to be
personalities in the post Elon going insane way.
And like, sure, we're going to get to Bob Lutz,
who was maybe the first man to do this.
But like I Bob Lutz is such a guy.
One of the guys I have a guy's critical support to Mr.
Bob Lutz as we will get to here in a second.
But just like, yeah, Tesla is emboldening other car executives to lie on purpose
instead of what they used to do, which was lie on mostly accident.
Have you seen what Tesla's stock price is?
That's probably all of the story right there is like if you just are
bombastic enough and lie enough and the market is like,
and we're going to make this stock for 15 years,
then you can just get away with whatever.
Also, if you're, you know, by a government that helps to not
it, not a bad deal if you can get it.
Yeah. On the Bob Lutz note.
So I wanted to end this this episode with something a little fun,
something a little fun specifically for our guest.
Liam, you're a viper guy. Yeah, I am.
Hey, are you OK? Yeah, hang on.
I was I was examining because so I have been paranoid
because I just found out that these have left and right ears.
They're actually marked.
I thought they weren't, but in the small spot on the correct headphones,
I had them in the right way the whole time because red means right on Sennheiser.
Yes, go ahead. Let's talk about the one viper.
Gem one viper. Are we doing it? We're doing it.
Well, OK, it's my time.
Just I just want to I just want to give a quick overview
for people who maybe are not super up on their viper lore.
The viper is, of course, the brainchild greatest car ever made.
Yeah, yeah, Bob Lutz, who was CEO of Chrysler directly after Lee Iacocca.
And he challenged Dodge engineers to build basically a Shelby Cobra for the modern age.
And this was like 1989.
According to Doron, Doron, it's been since the war, baby.
Who wrote a book about the Iacocca and Lutz air is at Chrysler.
Um, part of why Lutz spearheaded the project was to cheer up his designers
who were disappointed they had been reduced to build the
Prince money, Voyager and caravan and saved entire company K cars
because that's what car designers are like.
Every good automotive project starts as a little treat.
Yeah. Yeah.
She 220 was just like, Hey, man, you guys want to go fast?
Yeah, yeah, it was the end of the viper was very much like this.
It was the first viper, the original
19 to RT 10 had no external door handles, air conditioning,
door locks, airbags, traction control, anti-lock brakes, windows or permanent roof.
No, it did not.
Ideal ideal. The locks is always the one that gets me.
I'm like, you real lock weighs a pound.
You got to unzip the window.
You're going to unzip the window.
Oh, my God, my God, my God, my personal G.
Yep. Now, what it did have was an eight liter V10
partially designed by Lamborghini and side pipes out the fucking
they burn you. They burn you.
I have been burned by a first gen viper.
There's a big stick.
There's a big like warning sticker in the door.
You're asshole.
And I didn't listen to you.
I wrote a whole story about how the original viper is kind of like
the last ode to sort of a dying form of like
masculinity and automotive design that is actually pretty fun.
It knows what it's about, and it is an absolute riot.
It will also kill you. Oh, yeah. Don't care.
Want to put away to go more or less the viper formula.
Depending on who you ask, the viper had either three or four generations,
depending on if you count the original canvas roof,
our D10 and the 96 onwards sort of like more civilized.
Yeah. Yeah. The GTS.
Or they still had the convertible one, but they didn't.
They stopped offering the canvas roof.
If you consider that a separate car, it had four gens.
I consider it a separate car.
So I think it has four gens.
And then, of course, there's all this.
There's the special editions, which, you know, there's the 98 GT2
champion edition for the team.
Areca win at Le Mans.
There's the ACR version.
Well, there's the 99 Viper GTS ACR.
There's the 09 Viper SRT 10 ACR.
That's the one that held the Nordskleife record.
There's the 13 to 14 SRT Viper from when they were going to make SRT a brand.
Brand, right. Yes.
And then they switched it back to the Dodge Viper.
And in 2016, they gave it another ACR. Yes.
Then there was also the 16 Viper GTC,
which was the paint to sample concierge service white glove model
that was like those attempts to be Porsche.
Yeah, that was the nice one.
But that was only bad.
She's a Viper GT.
Boo. At the same time, you could also order the third in from 2013 to 2017
in the final generation of Iber, you could order the TA 1.0
and the TA 2.0, which you could also stack.
So you could have a TA 1.0 plus 2.0.
Yes. And you could put both of those on a GTC model.
Yes, you could.
And then in the final year of production in 2017,
there were actually five special editions made,
including one that was meant to reward two specific dealerships
in Texas that had sold the most famous crazy bad fucking.
This man, Ben Keating, Ben Keating is his name, Keating,
the king of Vipers.
He has I visited as a kid in Texas, his Viper only dealership,
which you go, well, that was probably useless.
Bit of real estate. Yeah, it was.
Yeah, he sold almost none of those.
But he loved it.
He was in it for the love of the game.
I fucking Viper.
It's a fucking Viper.
It's a fucking Viper.
It's a widow maker.
He took the Viper to LaBah on his own dime a couple of times.
He's a king.
He's one of those gentleman drivers that started off really bad.
It is now like an old man who is one of the better to do it.
And I I am sure I want to know nothing
about this Texas car dealers politics.
But like, you know, you know,
I'm sure he is a petite Hitler of his own right.
But I do respect that man for his racing exploits.
Now, of course, I've only covered the Viper
because there's also like a bunch of cars
that use the Viper as the base for what they became.
Most notably, there's the Alfa Romeo Zagato TZ three stradale,
which is just built off of Viper chassis,
but they just put an Alfa Romeo body on it.
There was also the Bristol fighter.
Oh, yeah.
Which I think made it to production for like four of them,
I think, OK, the Devon GTX,
which I don't think ever they made more than the prototype of.
There was also the VLF Force One V10,
which was an automotive supergroup made up of Bob Lutz again.
And Henryk Fisker.
In it, they made I checked.
They made five of them.
And were those the vipers that they gave away in conjunction with GTA five?
Possibly because they bodied so I'll buy that.
They showed a couple of vipers in like the, you know,
the fake GT, the Grand Theft Auto cars that are like basically real cars.
Yes. The serial numbers filed off. Yes.
They paid it. Yeah.
They paid Bertone or someone to or baby
Pininfarina or someone to rebody some vipers
in the style of the fake GTA Viper.
And so there was a Reddit story forever ago,
which I want to do like a deep dive of.
But like someone's mom won it because theoretically
the mom is the one who bought that copy of GTA five for their kid.
And then it's just like it was just in the family is like,
that's my mom's super car that she won
because she bought my 14 year old self like Grand Theft Auto five
because the because the GameStop employee was being a cop.
Like also, I mean, within Dodge also,
we had the Chrysler Firepower, which was the luxurious Chrysler concept
and the Dodge Copperhead, which was the copper platform with a like 2.7 liter.
No, the Copperhead was the the Viper.
It was like it came out like that copper orange.
I don't know what you're talking about.
Like fender arch thing.
I had like a 2.7 liter.
I think it was like a V six.
It was supposed to be like the affordable Viper.
It's like peak nineties.
I had a Hot Wheels car.
I was going to say, I was like, I feel like that is a classic.
Like you had that in a bin of Hot Wheels car.
Yeah. And then, of course, there's also like the different Viper that was on
the television show Viper that got somehow four fucking seasons.
We used to be a real country that could make twenty four episode television.
Like we used to be able to make a McDonald's anywhere in the world.
That show is like three million dollars in episode.
They spent so much money on this branding exercise for a car or something.
Calm down. It was good money.
So the question I wanted to ask you after all of this is which Viper are you taking?
Which one is your dream Viper, Liam?
If you if you get one. All right.
Can I have two? Yeah, of course.
Yes. Sixteen ACR.
Yeah, aha. Yeah, that's completely fair.
So I remember one of my earliest automotive
memories is going to a car show in Philly with my dad and seeing I want to say
like a ninety five blue and white proper go fast stripes.
Like, yeah, like the gen one point five gen two.
Yeah. So the the cheats.
Like, yeah, yeah, yes, yes, yes, that in the blue
with the go fast stripes, the blue and the whites, the correct
the correct lineup, I think.
Yeah, I think the I think the so so we should probably wrap up soon
because I guess I'm for sure. Absolutely.
Oh, yeah, we're almost done.
I have of the opinion that like the Viper is one of those cars
that you should not be able to get anything other than bonkers colors.
Yeah, absolutely. I get mad.
I get mad that Lamborghini will let you buy it in black.
You shouldn't be able to.
Yeah, it should be all. Yeah, exactly.
Skills goes exactly.
My wife and I talked about this because I was so one of the things
I've been doing surreptitiously behind my wife's back is looking at high mileage
repeats. Oh, my God.
Oh, my God, you and I have similar
bringing dead birds to our wives.
Be a car listing happens, my friend.
Yeah. High mileage repeats.
It's nothing.
Thirty thousand dollars.
They're nothing. Yeah, nothing.
They don't cost anything.
Old Astans are worthless.
It's incredible.
So I like they should like Lambos should only come in fucking Skittles colors,
right? And like, yes, my the the the two colors I'll accept for a fight.
Three colors except for four, actually.
Now that I think about it, yellow, Skittles color, red, Viper,
blue and white and that like very menacing, almost black, purple.
Yeah, yes.
Mountain pitch black.
Yeah, the color of that.
So, uh-huh.
Yeah, is the only other acceptable color out of how do you feel about like
the metallic green with the black stripes they used to do?
That one was also fuck with it.
It's not it's not for me. So fair.
For me, it's the I talked many weeks ago about how big the first Forza
Horizon game for me was in the cover card of the first horizon was
SRT 10 or SRT Viper yellow black stripes.
That's been that's been the modern Viper for me the whole time or like, you know,
not a Viper, but the Viper engine.
Do you remember the SRT 10 pickup?
Pick up. Yeah. Yep.
Yeah, I.
Yes, what we do is we took the motor out of the Viper,
put it up in the pickup truck, short bed, right?
And one pedal's little go and one cable's little.
Whoa, it works and right into it, right into a construction.
I knew my high school, my high school was in a very wealthy suburb of Houston.
So there was some dumb shit that people got for their sixteenth birthday
is that immediately got wrapped around the trees.
Two of my classmates to SRT 10 rams.
And let me tell you that one of them lasted for seventy two hours in his hands.
Yeah, yeah, that's not shocking to me.
They're both still alive.
They were unhurt.
But also I'm just like, I don't like I.
What did what did you what did you expect?
Handing a sixteenth year old in the middle of Texas.
Five hundred fifty horsepower is truck right.
A truck that goes like my goes light at the rear
because because they didn't like, I don't know, put it in a wind tunnel.
They just did it. Right.
My answer to this briefly is just there was a guy in Houston
who I was friends with who had a like even more gutted
and extremely built version of a ninety eight
with red and white stripes that he autocrossed and like tractate.
And it was like it had the biggest breaks you could physically fit inside the wheel wells
with the thickest tires you could physically fit inside the wheel wells.
It like shook the pavement when it drove past and ever since like I've driven
an RT 10 like an original RT 10 like at ninety two or whatever.
And it was really cool.
But I think I think for me, if I was like, I'm going to pick one viper,
I would go with like that like ninety eight ninety nine with the oracle,
you know, red and white paint job, because that to me is like peak viper.
That's viper. That's viper. Yeah.
Like that's yeah. That's that's if I rotate one in my mind,
that's what that's what comes is bidden to me is the like ninety eight red and white.
But yeah, anyway, thank you for playing along with my little game.
I figured we should do something a little bit more fun than bitching about Elon Musk.
Time it off. Yeah.
Do you, Liam, do you have anything you want to tell people before you go?
Like places they could find you websites?
Blue Sky WTIP pod.com, because I bought the domain name
and I can't change it back now. There we go.
I am from Well, There's Your Problem, a podcast about engineering disasters.
Victoria is also on it semi permanently.
Thanks to the Well, There's Your Problem make work program.
I am on a sports podcast, a Philadelphia pro labor sports podcast
called Ten Thousand Losses, and I host an occasional program
with Besquickelhausen, Jay Satay, called Talk Your Shit.
Hell, yeah. There is a Patreon for both Well, There's Your Problem
and Ten Thousand Losses, correct? That's correct. Cool.
Yes. What you will post in the show.
But also I'm going to be bluntly honest.
You don't look well, there's your problem.
Dear listeners of this program, ninety percent of the opportunities
I've had in the past like three years have come from being on Well, There's Your Problem.
We have had two out of the three of you on.
So we've got to we've got to find an episode to get Roz on.
Talk to them about trains. We could do that.
I'm going to make the pilgrimage.
I'm going to make the pilgrimage out to the the curve by me.
The the really impressive.
I want to I want to try to get on.
I want to try to feel what other people feel about trains.
I want to do it.
I feel like I owed it to the transgender.
Other brief just updates for our fans.
I have at the time of this recording,
stickers in hand and shirts are on the way.
As soon as the shirts arrive, I will be boxing up everybody's preorders.
Thank you so much for all your support with the money you gave me.
I bought a properly fitted bra for the first seven four years,
and I really, really appreciate it because, damn, that feels great.
And yeah, if you want to check out the article
that I referenced in the beginning of the show, it's on our Patreon for free.
And, you know, we have our Patreon with bonus episodes.
Our most recent one was reader questions.
Our next one is going to be probably watching the movie Rush.
Yeah, I think we're going to do Rush. Yeah.
I yeah.
The podcast is on Blue Sky, Trangirlismo.
We've got a website.
Yeah, they can email us.
Yeah, you know, you know what the deal is.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. As always, thank you.
Thanks so much, Liam, for coming on.
Thanks for having me. Yeah, absolutely.
This is extremely enjoyable.
And yeah, I guess I'll talk to you tomorrow
when I finish the Nissan van slide.
So we do our bonus episode.
Oh, nice. Hell yeah.
Yeah, it's just going to be me and Vicky.
Nice. Hell yeah.
We're doing the van.
The Roz and Nova are gods.
We're doing the van special.
Is it the new Nissan van? Can I have it?
OK. No.
It's the Nissan van that self-immolated so heavily
that Nissan had to cube all of them.
Oh, my God.
That's a good. That's a good app.
That's the most fun.
I need to find I've I reactivated my Facebook account
all of 30 minutes because a friend of mine went to a friend
of mine I went to high school with.
His dad worked for the well service
that you all talked about on the on the oil spill.
So I'm trying to get I am seeing if the heat
his dad still works there.
And also if they have the belt buckles to I am trying to source
belt buckles as a as a podcast podcast show of appreciation,
mutual cultural exchange.
But yeah, I yeah, I'm trying to do that.
But no, yeah, thank you so much, Liam.
And that is number 13.
Yeah. Bye, Bill. Bye.
All right. Yeah, cool.
That seems. Yeah. Uh huh.
All right.
Now, Jordan and I are going to read our shout out to your names.
Thank you all for subscribing.
I'm going to start with Theodora Constantine, John V.
A person whose name is just Buick, which hell, I love you.
Just giving me 15 bucks a month.
We said some nice things about that regal
estate from a couple years ago.
Here's 15 bucks of walking around money, girls.
That's all the marketing they've ever spent in the last two years.
Do you know that?
Adam Shepard, thank you to Stephen Duckworth.
Phalen, mildly perturbed.
Asherin, Chris Heppner, Jerry at homogameragenda.com,
which still delights me, still works, still still gets a smile.
Thank you to Dexus and Will and Princess Reese promises not to bark at loud noises.
Uh huh.
Thank you to the person who keeps changing her name,
who I know exactly who this is.
I visited Dr.
Emily Bradley and now I can't hot dog it anymore.
That's a joke for the Seattle.
Oh, good God.
Better than for Jeff, anything is possible, Ting.
So, you know, West Coast girlies stay waiting on that one.
Thank you to Nathaniel Hubbell, Wingsmith,
Penile Sparing Vaginoplasty, underscores, not spaces.
Gatrian Lanker, Finn Springs, Slugorp Grumfellow,
Slugorp Grumfellow.
That's going to be my definitive presentation.
It's one of the good user names of all time.
It's really it's really quite good.
Gavin Gattis, Crystal Storm, John Russell, Josh J and Selectric.
Thank you all so much.
We really appreciate it and we will see you on the next episode.
Absolutely.
About this episode
The conversation starts with transit gripes and quickly turns into a data-heavy look at how hard it is to afford and use a car in the U.S. From new-car prices and financing to used-car APRs, insurance, repairs, and delinquency rates, the hosts build a bleak picture of car ownership. They also roast touchscreen-heavy interiors, compare real EVs to Tesla hype, and then settle into an affectionate, detail-packed celebration of Bob Lutz-era Vipers and their wild special editions.
Hello! On this episode of Well Ther—I mean Tran Girlismo, the girls are joined by Liam McAnderson of the wonderful podcasts Ten Thousand Lossesand Well There's Your Problem!First, Liam and Jordan commiserate about Pennsylvania sports and abysmal traffic infrastructure. Next, Victoria dives into her Charts Analysis of how unaffordable it is to own a car right now (very) from her article you can read on this very Patreon! Next, we get into the Tesla Roadster, which is apparently supposed to come out in like a week. Did you know how long Elon's been saying "next week bro"?
Finally, in honor of Liam's appearance, Victoria delves into the history of the Dodge Viper, the glorious machine that it is, and everyone chooses the chariot they would most want to spin out flaming into a wall with.
Note: We have some moments where the audio "skips" for names that shouldn't be said out loud, actionable threats, etc. It is intentional because bleeps are startling.
