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Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

wsj.com

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Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#91

Post by s1artibartfast »

xhevahir wrote: post #16
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Anyone using a washer, listens for it I hate laundry. I still have no idea how to do it; I referred to detergent as laundry sauce a few years ago after forgetting the word. (Thank you, subconscious of mine.) The new machines with screens are a nuisance. Apparently to you, somebody competent. But also to those of us for whom listening to one’s washing machine sounds like advice from a laundry Lorax.

While I greatly appreciate the coinage "laundry sauce" I think the great majority of people know how to do this stuff and it's not hard to find out how.

I think it has to do with learning styles and mental database structures.

I design complex medical implants, can build a car from scratch, and even understand some of the polymer chemistry of fabrics, but still struggle with laundry despite doing it for 20 years.

I have settled into the heuristic of warm wash & repeat until clean + dryers destroy anything but socks.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#92

Post by JumpCrisscross »

amelius wrote: post #81
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> about the same complexity as boiling an egg I’m more than happy to spend an afternoon figuring out the times and temperatures that get me various stages of runny and jammy at my altitude, on my range, in a way I couldn’t be bothered to for the benefit of having clothes again.

I have a very intelligent friend who has the same attitude towards personal finances and refuses any help. It is very sad but there's apparently nothing I can do about it.

> friend who has the same attitude towards personal finances and refuses any help

Funny, me too. Despite working in finance. (It’s quite common.) I outsource that task, too, in part because I don’t want to be day trading, in part because index funds are near bulletproof nowadays and in part to hide the money from myself.

Would note that there is a difference between hating a task and not doing it, and hating a task and managing it.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#93

Post by trashface »

The article claims people are avoiding CVTs, is this true? I found some stuff on reddit, mostly about older nissans being troublesome and some people not liking how it changes the feel of acceleration, but a lot of people say they are fine.

I bought a 9 year old honda recently with a CVT and it seems fine to me, I like how it accelerates but I'm not a pedal stomper. I also like that it has a CD player (can still use the CDs transferred from my previous 27 year old car). Minimalist touchscreen helps too, though its too old to show maps from my phone.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#94

Post by packetlost »

trashface wrote: post #93

The article claims people are avoiding CVTs, is this true? I found some stuff on reddit, mostly about older nissans being troublesome and some people not liking how it changes the feel of acceleration, but a lot of people say they are fine. I bought a 9 year old honda recently with a CVT and it seems fine to me, I like how it accelerates but I'm not a pedal stomper. I also like that it has a CD player (can still use…

CVTs are universally reviled by the people I associate with, but we're all "car people", so it might just be bias.

The problem is they only really work in anemic drive-trains because they can't handle high amounts of torque.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#95

Post by asadotzler »

codedokode wrote: post #15
Panzer04 wrote: post #7

Are these really the problem? I feel like new cars are obscenely expensive right now. Even a basic car can easily run you 30-40k, the same thing a few years used will be The difference between a brand new car and a 10 year old car is almost nil in terms of featureset nowadays (if anything, you get more because you can buy a higher end older model for less), every car has all the basics. Cars just got so good over the…

Why there are no $3k-$4k cars? I am sure most people need cheaper cars, not electric cars, or AI cars, or cars with mobile app and telemetry. Those are toys for the rich.

A Ford Pinto in 1971 was $1,919 which is $15,000 in today's dollars.

A Yugo GV in 1984 was $3,990 which is $12,000 in today's dollars.

A Chevy Spark in 2013 was $12,995 which is over $17,000 in today's dollars.

Car companies can keep up with US regulations at about the $15,000 price point. Below that is losing money.

A Nissan Versa or Mitsubishi Mirage in 2024 cost about $16,000 which is right in line with the Ford, the Yugo, and the Chevy econo-rides of the past.

$3K-$4K wouldn't build you a crash regulation compliant unibody shell, much less a full car. If a major maker went balls out to build cheap and still be legal to sell in the US, they might be able to get the price down to $10K-$12K and still break even, but below that is a fantasy. Physics simply will not bend any further.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#96

Post by JumpCrisscross »

klondike_klive wrote: post #52
amelius wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doing laundry is of about the same complexity as boiling an egg.

If I want a boiled egg, chances are I want it soft-boiled (runny yolk but cooked white) which is the custom here in the UK. (As children we are given a softboiled egg in an egg-cup along with rectangles of toast called "soldiers" to dip in the yolk. I guess it's an Edwardian thing, redolent of Nannies and Nurseries.) In all my 50 years I still cannot reliably produce a softboiled egg, regardless of the method. Do I b…

> Do I bring the water to the boil with the eggs already in the pan, then count from when it reaches the boil?

Safest, most fool-proof method: bring the water to a boil, kill the heat, gently lower the eggs into the water and cover. Remove at your preferred time and transfer to an ice bath.

Water boils at a consistently precise temperature (at a given altitude). If you're cooking indoors, you probably also have a somewhat-stable air temperature around the pot. This means the heat curve from ~100°C is remarkably stable across boilings. Given an egg sets between 63°C (whites thicken) and 73°C (yolk cooks), you will always--eventually--wind up with a hard-boiled egg. (You're also cooking in still water, which is obviously less violent.)

There are various guides online for this, but it's an easy-enough expermient to pull one out every minute from ~3 minutes to 15. (Presumably over several days. But not a bad brunch set-up. And you already have an ice bath for the wine!)

> For fried eggs in my stainless steel pan

Steel-clad pans aren't all steel, they're aluminium clad in steel. That means you can't get the steel safely to the ripping-hot temperatures that keep the albumen from binding to the iron.

> Scrambled eggs are nice but easy to overcook

Try soft scrambling them in a carbon-steel wok.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#97

Post by asadotzler »

Baeocystin wrote: post #53
TylerE wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The exist, in markets like India. They're death traps, not meeting Western standards of even 30 years ago.

How do the modern Chinese $10k cars compare? Genuine question.

Take the subsidies away and the car is more. Like a Tesla getting $7.5K in EV rebates, Chinese EVs are also subsidized. That Chinese BYD Dolphin, $13,000 in China is $30,000 sold outside of China. Let's assume Chinese are getting a discount and everyone else is paying a penalty, that puts the real price somewhere around $22,000.

That $22,000 vehicle is comparable to a Hyundai Kona in the US for $25,000 (not eligible for US EV rebates so Hyundai cut the sticker price dramatically) or the Chevy Equinox for about the same after rebate.

As you can see, it's not really the difference the headlines make it out to be.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#98

Post by asadotzler »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #36
Bjartr wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's at least in part because you have to meet a whole lot of regulations to make a car street legal. You can start with a simple 3k vehicle, but by time you've made the changes needed to pass all the requirements it'll be over 10k. It's worth noting that the majority of these regulations are at least nominally about safety.

A lot of the regulations are also about emissions, so conveniently that goes away with electric cars. But then your problem is that the battery is expensive. For now.

Emissions regulations add little to the cost of any one car or model. There's no secret sauce to catalytic converters or computerized fuel injectors that everyone's powertrains all copy or share.

The cost of distinct models is mostly in crash survivability and related regulated safety systems.

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#99

Post by matt-attack »

asadotzler wrote: post #98
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of the regulations are also about emissions, so conveniently that goes away with electric cars. But then your problem is that the battery is expensive. For now.

Emissions regulations add little to the cost of any one car or model. There's no secret sauce to catalytic converters or computerized fuel injectors that everyone's powertrains all copy or share. The cost of distinct models is mostly in crash survivability and related regulated safety systems.

So why not just reuse the known design that works. No one said this proposed $3k car had to look different?

This whole argument is bunk. Just settle on a design (perhaps borne out of your higher end model) let it trickle down your product line (unchanged) other than stripping useless gadgets, etc.

Why do people assume those in the market for a $3k car care that it have a brand new body style?

Re: Used cars retain designs and features more coveted than their replacements

#100

Post by pornel »

xhkkffbf wrote: post #85
pornel wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's why cyclists advocate for protected lanes and separate bike paths, instead of infrastructure made of paint.

Do you realize that at least half of the bike accidents don't involve cars? Getting rid of the cars won't get rid of the dangers of the two wheeled, unstable machines that frequently toss the riders when the brakes lock. https://discerningcyclist.com/bicycle-accident-statistics/

Page 18 of that report shows 80% of injuries are from cars/trucks/motorcycles.

People can still faceplant badly, but getting rid of cars will avoid the vast majority of fatal crashes.

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