stephengoldberger

OK Fine, they roll very easily. And dry road handling is good, even though they do start to squeal at moderate turning speeds. But it's not all good. On wet roads, they are scary. First wet corner I took in my new CMax and stability control was all there was to save my butt. I've experienced help from stability control only rarely, only in ice and snow, and in a manner I describe as the hand of God gently pressing on the rear of the car to keep it pointed. Well, in this case, it was God shoving hard with both hands to get the car around the corner. Since then I have tread oh so gently in the wet, and still from time to time I have felt a little slip. From about 6/32" of tread depth, or about half worn, they howl from 35 mph to around 50 mph. In other words, the most usual speed on city arteries. The smoother the road, the more annoying it is. That's why, when I had the opportunity to purchase Nokian Z-line tires at a very attractive price, I jumped at it. I bought 6, along with 2 extra wheels from a junkyard, $250 delivered. I am a snowbird, and now have one extra tire and wheel assembly at each location. Yes, the mileage has dropped some. It's worth the extra to be able to drive with confidence, and in silence.

My Michelin tires have become progressively noisier as they have worn (now down to between 6/32 and 7/32 on three of them, the fourth, unfortunately, is new). I think it is characteristic of the tire/chassis combination. Noise is worst in the 35-50 mph range, and pretty much is gone at high speeds. Tires are evenly worn and rotated as needed.

Unlike your "Spark" the CMax AC is driven by an electric motor, not by an engine driven belt. And with the big lithium battery running it, you can't even tell that the a/c is on by the way the car drives. Yes it sucks up some fuel, but less that a regular car. Because the a/c runs at full speed independent of the engine speed, the compressor can be much smaller. A regular car's compressor has to be big enough to cool the cabin while idling in a Miami traffic jam. Then when running at highway speed, the capacity is way more than you need, which presents an unnecessarily large load on the engine.

I have previously owned a Sears cargo carrier that is everything you don't want ;-), except it probably won't extend over the windshield. It doesn't clamp down onto the crossbars, but rather I strap it down. Because it has "feet" that I nestle between the crossbars, I needed to extend the space between the Thule bars by an inch or two. Were I to purchase a new one, it would probably be a Thule. They've gotten pretty expensive since I bought mine in the early 1990s ;-)

I found the CMax to be typical of the electric steering cars I've tried - similar to the Mazda CX-5. The Prius was horrible - no feel at all. What it seems to lack is "on center feel" - that is, the force needed to make small corrections is the same as the force for larger corrections. Once you get into a turn, it feels more settled. A friend of mine who has one said that increasing the "toe-in" helps it. Note that the warranty covers faulty wheel alignment for the first year (and wiper blades for the first six months). Sometimes tire stores offer free alignment checks - might be worth it to have the car checked.

A couple of times I've had a "failure to launch". Maybe a hesitant push of the start button, but a lot of stuff lights up on the dash but not the double green arrow "ready to go" signal. Some more pushing on the start/stop and it wakes up.

Got it. Thanks all. Need to find that screen. In my case, it was constant speed, level ground, showing a solid "40" for several hundred miles. Consumption rate wasn't about to change. My previous car (Saab) came from the factory with a 60 mile "cushion" on DTE. That was until the software was updated. After that the "cushion" was zero.

The real concern isn't how accurate the tank is, of course, it's how accurate the "distance to empty" is. I considered my 50 mile DTE to be well beyond my comfort level - about 30 miles beyond. Only the promise of a dime a gallon kept me going ;-).

Running close to empty to reach a prime "gasbuddy" site, it said I had 60 miles to go, averaging 40, when I got there. The gauge showed 1/8 tank, Car took 12.6 gallons. Either a) the capacity is more than 13.5, or 2) the station's pump was rigged to benefit the station owner. Comments?

Interesting that Ford President Alan Mullaly was pushed out of Boeing (at least in part) b/c he favored having the majority of development and manufacture of the Dreamliner being done in-house. The board and his successor were determined to "save money" by leaving the development to the subcontractors who would supply the finished subassemblies. Guess what: the Dreamliner is years behind schedule and billions over budget, and now facing a PR disaster as their battery subcontractor appears to have ... well, performed badly. Meanwhile Ford has brought their hybrid transmission manufacturing in-house, back from (presumably Toyota supplier Aisin) Japan, designed their own battery system, and seem to be having good financial performance after being the only major US manufacturer to avoid bankruptcy. My opinion: he is one of the few massively paid corporate leaders who is really worth his compensation. And I'm no more worried about my CMax battery than I am about the one in my cell phone, but I never charge the phone while it's resting on a combustible surface...

I'd be hoping for a battery small enough to share space with a spare tire ;-)

True coolant temperature is vital for diagnosing the health of the thermostat and cooling system. Most cars today, even with "temperature gauges" display false readings generated by the car computer - anything close to normal and the needle pegs itself in the middle. Is the thermostat not closing fully, causing a slower than normal warm up? That is the usual failure mode for the part. Can't wait for delivery so I can "try" this stuff.

Exactly. My experience with racks are either the kind that attach to rails that are permanently attached to the top of the car or racks that mount into fittings built into the door frame (Saab). I never dealt with the kind that sit on the roof and "grab" the doorframe. CNCGeek (above) attached pieces of film to his roof and showed the process on his blog. It looks to me like a good idea. At the worst, you can always remove the film.

So the only thing that is permanently attached to the car is the plastic film that protects the finish from the "feet"?

Re: drag from a car-top carrier: Based on the fuel consumption with my current car, Thule "square bar" racks with my vintage Sears carrier use about 0.7 gallons per 100 miles at an indicated 70 mph (true speed about 66 mph). That would drop mpgs from 40 to a little over 30 (3.2 gal/100 miles vs. 2.5 gal/100 miles). I usually drive about 2000 miles per year with the carrier attached, so that's an extra 14 gallons of gasoline per year. Compare to the extra gas used by a car that's 20 cubic feet bigger inside (so I wouldn't need the carrier) driving 15,000 miles per year.