Small / economy car deathwatch: we've passed "peak econobox" again

[Isaac Zachary]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

I'm not against Aptera; the car is an efficiency marvel.

I'm just realistic... the point of a car isn't to be efficient. The point of a car is to move people and their things in comfort and safety. Whenever something is designed around x exclusively, it comes at the expense of y and z.

I would proudly build and unveil the Aptera as my college science experiment. I'd have no expectation of creating a successful business that manufactures them.

I guess from my standpoint is I'm sick of overkill. I know a guy who got a brand new, top-of-the-line MacBook Pro with 64 GB of RAM that costs in the thousands and thousands of dollars to do book keeping that would have worked just as fine on the cheapest Chromebook. Why?

I see large, dual cab pickups used to transport a single individual. Why?

Obviously there's the swiss-army-knife way of looking at vehicles. Why buy a barrage of vehicles for different purposes when you can have a one-size-fits-all vehicle for all your personal needs?

On the other hand I do contradict myself a bit. I do want the most efficient, affordable vehicle that's still practical. So I jump between wanting a Smart Car or Aptera or even a Honda PCX to wanting a minivan. And in truth, a Trax might be exactly the kind of car I would truly benefit from, because:

1. I have a family. I do need to haul around more things than just my overgrown teenagers.
2. We do drive down dirt roads and in deep snow at times, so having a greater ground clearance would be better.
3. There are always going to be things that can't be transported in a hatchback, unless we're talking a very old school station wagon or mini van that you could take the seats out (you apparently can't do that in even the new Toyota Sienna) which necessitated a trailer. And the Trax has a tow rating, which my current car, the Avalon, does not have.
4. The Trax has a spare tire. Most other cars I look at do not.

Maybe I'm just stupid, or maybe I'm brilliant. I don't know. All I know is that I dislike things that seem like they could be more efficient than they are. The typical 5th door hatch design is -to me- practical yet innefficient. For all those miles I'm not carrying around a free dresser that my wife wants for the spare bedroom, what purpose does a squarish rear end have other than to make more air drag?

I guess the real reason for my morbid obsession of finding the most cheapest and efficient vehicles is not that I couldn't buy a bigger and better vehicle, but that I find modern cars so dead boring. My Avalon is one of the most boring cars I've ever owned. I feel like it was a big mistake to put down so much money on a car that really isn't any more practical than my 1985 VW N/A diesel. The only two things I appreciate from the Avalon is that it is safer and it gets better emissions. Other than reasons such as those, I'd rather spend as little as possible for these necessary evils on wheels. My car needs to get me from point A to point B. I don't care what it looks like, how much power it has, what fancy bells and whistles it has nor what brand it is. Just as long as it gets me from point A to point B as efficiently and cheaply as possible without being impractical.

This is why I'm not buying a Bolt any time soon. I don't want to spend more money on something that I don't need. If I could just forgo owning a vehicle altogether I would do so in a heartbeat. I will buy another vehicle when I have no other choice but to buy another vehicle.

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by JSH

Yes. EPA vehicle classifications are based on the combined passenger and cargo volumes. There has been no vanity sizing creep over the years - the classifications are the same as when created 40 decades ago.

You've caused me to add new columns to my vehicle spreadsheet. I'll let the algorithm decide for me!

[freebeard]

Originally Posted by Isaac Zachary

Obviously there's the swiss-army-knife way of looking at vehicles. Why buy a barrage of vehicles for different purposes when you can have a one-size-fits-all vehicle for all your personal needs?

My thinking is to get the oldest car you can find and put in like new condition. As for one size fitzall, that would be somewhere between the Type III Squareback and the Type II crew cab.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Isaac Zachary

I guess from my standpoint is I'm sick of overkill. I know a guy who got a brand new, top-of-the-line MacBook Pro with 64 GB of RAM that costs in the thousands and thousands of dollars to do book keeping that would have worked just as fine on the cheapest Chromebook. Why?

Possible reasons:

1. That is what they wanted
2. It is their money
3. A MacBook Pro has "status" in their friends group
4. Apple supports their laptops for 7-10 years
5. Future-proof: Who knows what the minimum spec will be in 7-10 years. It is cheaper to buy one expensive laptop or 3 cheap ones?
6. The cost per month over a 10 year life is pretty small.

Originally Posted by Isaac Zachary

I see large, dual cab pickups used to transport a single individual. Why?

Possible reasons:

1. That is what they wanted
2. It is their money
3. Their friends think dual cab trucks are cool
4. They need to transport more than 3 people at a time and do so when you aren't watching
5. They use this vehicle to do actual truck stuff on other says when you aren't watching
6. They decided against spending extra money to buy a commuter vehicle in addition to their giant vehicle and instead just spend more on gas each week.

Originally Posted by Isaac Zachary

Obviously there's the swiss-army-knife way of looking at vehicles. Why buy a barrage of vehicles for different purposes when you can have a one-size-fits-all vehicle for all your personal needs?

Which is how most buyers look at vehicles considering they cost tens of thousands of dollars. Sure you could have a fleet of vehicles to do different things - or one vehicle that does most things OK.

Originally Posted by Isaac Zachary

The typical 5th door hatch design is -to me- practical yet inefficient. For all those miles I'm not carrying around a free dresser that my wife wants for the spare bedroom, what purpose does a squarish rear end have other than to make more air drag?

That is one way to think about it. I like wagons and hatchbacks because they allow me to drive a smaller vehicle than would be needed if I had to have a sedan with a trunk big enough to carry fairly normal bulky loads. They also allow me to easily load long cargo like 2"x4" x 12' boards. If I didn't drive wagons and hatchbacks for the last 30 years I would need a sedan AND a truck or van. Hard to bring home twenty 2x4s with a sedan or a hot water heater with a sedan.

Originally Posted by Isaac Zachary

I'd rather spend as little as possible for these necessary evils on wheels. My car needs to get me from point A to point B. I don't care what it looks like, how much power it has, what fancy bells and whistles it has nor what brand it is. Just as long as it gets me from point A to point B as efficiently and cheaply as possible without being impractical.

Not a bad way at all to look at purchasing an expensive depreciating asset.

[freebeard]

Originally Posted by Isaac Zachary

I guess from my standpoint is I'm sick of overkill.

I bought and paid for a 128K Macintosh in 1984 because I thought it would change my life for the better. It did. Peaked in 1995 with a $5,500 7100.

Today I expect to replace my world-facing machine with one that's 2-3 times faster in some operations than the current model, for $110. There's even an OS for it that mimics OS X, iRaspian.

https://www.tomshardware.com › news › iraspbian-raspberry-pi-mac-os-x
iRaspbian Makes Your Raspberry Pi Work Like a Mac
The release, known as iRaspbian, mimics the look and feel of the Apple Mac OS X operating system. The iRaspbian image is available for the Raspberry Pi, working great on the Raspberry Pi 4. It has ...

I used my Squareback to carry [apartment size] washer and dryer, refrigerator, etc.

[Grant-53]

I worked in auto parts sales for 10 years after studying industrial engineering. Many of my customers were fleet operators. The formula for cost effective purchasing involves costs of annual operating costs over the economic life of the machine. All machines wear out sooner or later. Safety and productivity must be carefully examined. Ease of use is a factor in productivity. Geography affects technology selection. The margin of profit on a small car is less than a luxury vehicle. Wheelbase has a significant contribution to customer comfort. So list your needs and wants to evaluate what product best suit your needs.

[JSH]

Originally Posted by Grant-53

I worked in auto parts sales for 10 years after studying industrial engineering. Many of my customers were fleet operators. The formula for cost effective purchasing involves costs of annual operating costs over the economic life of the machine. .

The vast majority of our customers are large fleets but we do have a brand targeted at owner-operators and very small fleets. The difference between the two customers is stark.

• The large fleets are buying aero trucks with engines sized for maximum fuel economy. Very little is spent on cosmetics although they are willing to spend money for active safety and creature comforts for their drivers. A truck is just a tool, and total cost of ownership is all they care about.
• Owner Operators are all about the look. Traditional boxy shape, big engines, and chrome - lots of chrome. Things that will cost them $10K - $20K extra every year but their personal image is tied up in their truck so spending money to lose even more money is OK.

I was sitting in an a dealer call about a year after we launched a new vocational model and we had spend a lot of time on the hood shape to both reduce drag and increase visibility out of the front. (You know so you don't hit things or run people over on construction sites) Both of these goals resulted in a more rounded and tapered shape instead of having the hood go out in a straight rectangle. The dealers had two big complaints on the truck: The hood wasn't square enough and the exhaust stacks were not large enough. (Of course stacks aren't even needed today they are completely decorative). A couple dealers were absolutely adamant that we needed 8 inch stacks. Can't sell a truck with only 5 inch stacks.... looks wimpy.

[redpoint5]

Wait until the truck is electric with no stacks, and no hood.

[freebeard]

High-bypass capped stacks with a Coanda nozzle to re-energize the turbulent wake makes the wimpy exhaust look thicc.

[Stowed single wheel trailer has four-bars to bring it up to bed height]

[Isaac Zachary]

Originally Posted by JSH

Possible reasons:

1. That is what they wanted
2. It is their money
3. A MacBook Pro has "status" in their friends group
4. Apple supports their laptops for 7-10 years
5. Future-proof: Who knows what the minimum spec will be in 7-10 years. It is cheaper to buy one expensive laptop or 3 cheap ones?
6. The cost per month over a 10 year life is pretty small.

Possible reasons:

1. That is what they wanted
2. It is their money
3. Their friends think dual cab trucks are cool
4. They need to transport more than 3 people at a time and do so when you aren't watching
5. They use this vehicle to do actual truck stuff on other says when you aren't watching
6. They decided against spending extra money to buy a commuter vehicle in addition to their giant vehicle and instead just spend more on gas each week.

Which is how most buyers look at vehicles considering they cost tens of thousands of dollars. Sure you could have a fleet of vehicles to do different things - or one vehicle that does most things OK.



That is one way to think about it. I like wagons and hatchbacks because they allow me to drive a smaller vehicle than would be needed if I had to have a sedan with a trunk big enough to carry fairly normal bulky loads. They also allow me to easily load long cargo like 2"x4" x 12' boards. If I didn't drive wagons and hatchbacks for the last 30 years I would need a sedan AND a truck or van. Hard to bring home twenty 2x4s with a sedan or a hot water heater with a sedan.



Not a bad way at all to look at purchasing an expensive depreciating asset.

I wasn't expecting an answer to some of those questions, but you did a great job of replying!

Let me put it this way with the MacBook: He paid $4,200 for a computer that he'll never use to it's full potential ever, unless he decides to get into video editing/rendering. He could have gotten practically the same Mac, but with still with plenty more than he'll ever use and without the fans for long workloads like video rendering for $2,100, exactly half the price. He'd get only 8 processor cores instead of 16 (but his work only requires one) and 10 GPU cores instead of 40 (he has no need for GPU cores) and get 24GB of RAM instead of 64GB (right now he'd do fine with 16 or even 8GB). I can pretty much guarantee that you could put both the MacBook Pro for $4,200 and the MacBook Air for $2,100 and 10 years later test them side by side with the same spread sheets he's using and they'd be exactly just as fast as each other.

With the hatch vs. pickup I chose the small trailer route. Maybe that wouldn't work for everyone, but seeing how I drive a lot without anything and when I do get something it a lot of times would not fit in the back of a wagon (sheets of drywall, refrigerators, plywood, other boards) a 1,000lb GVWR 4x8 trailer makes the most sense for my personal needs.

For an example, I've transported a couple of full sized upright pianos with my Avalon and trailer, one of them for one guy with a Toyota RAV4 who thought he could put the piano in his RAV4. Another for a pickup owner who had a hard time figuring out how to lift the piano up into his pickup bed.