woot, went out again for another spin in the Z. now i got a full cumulative 2hrs drive today. hahaha.

drove through light sprinkle on the way back so QD'ed afterwards. started pouring a few min after i got the car parked inside...but that was expected as i was driving around with weatherbug running on my droid4 watching barometric pressure and radar.

 

Picked up indian food tonight in my GE. . Had a good time driving.

Fueled up the car as well.

 

woot, motored my Z this am, filled up to top her off again, and QD'ed when i got home.

i think i might consider hibernating her pending this week's snow flurries and how much ice melt they spray.

it's super windy today and going to rain this afternoon... crap, my GE's going to look like shitola tomorrow.

 

no fit action today for me. my wife's taken out the 09 GE pretty much the entire afternoon though.

rain mixed with wind... boo~ car's going to be all sandy tomorrow with water spots. hope it POURS tonight so that it rinses off.

 

Wooooot, no snow so far. And suppose to warm up a tad later this week.

Hope this holds up. Want to wash my GE...

 

Z-car weather!!!

 

hahaha, yes, mr.onzdge. as long as there's no icemelt on the ground and dry, it's Z weather. (my Z has v-tack )

the villages didn't use much icemelt (if at all) when i drove to work this am so that was great.

will need to see how things go in the wooded areas though... they tend to spray A LOT of that crap as rich folks in the area dont give a damn about their $50K+ cars and just worried about not crashing.

i guess understandable when one's making millions and a $65K benz is pocket change. kinda like me with $0.99 matchbox cars. but wait, i take care of my matchbox cars displayed in my garage.

 

motored my GE to work today. was 25F outside... kinda chilly. anyway, i noticed slight vibration from the DWS the first 7-8 min of driving. i had 37psi at 40F, so there is plenty of pressure inside the tire (35psi+) at 25F.

car sat from saturday night to this morning. hardly any time to flatspot, but it appears these hungarian or brazilian made tires are prone to temporarily flat spot in cold weather. hummmmmm...

i also need to check if the wire loom i used for the iginition LED + variable wiper wires is vibrating somewhere under the steering column. with the colder weather things are starting to rattle. nothing major, but i like my ride quiet.

i would use that stiffened felt ive been talking about to dampen the noise source.

 

woot, looks like my box of dcon arrived. it's rat poison. i use it under the cars in the garage during hibernation. i dont have any mouse problems in the house (yet?) but im not taking any chances of them eating my car's wires or bits.

with more materials using soy (weather strips, wires) it attracts mice...and with my cars wrapped in carcovers 99% of the time during hibernation, it's a safe nesting area for rodents if there are any.

 

looking forward to my drive home in my '12 GE. been a long day...

i need to do a final re-torque check on the 09's snow set tonight. for some reason the rear passenger side still backed out a little bit. i may remove the nut and spray some cleaner into the bore and re-torque. there might be some sealant left in the friction area from last year as i usually spray polymer on the wheels before storage.

 

23F this am motored my '12 GE to work. was a good drive. my mpg on the obc is 33.4mpg consistently. not powering through the gears at all, just a casual drive.

DWS had no flatspot vibration this am... so it seems if driven pretty much every day should be no issue. will search around the internet if anyone complained about it as well. the vibration yesterday wasn't hardly anything of concern though. just detectable...and if it was my wife driving, she probably wouldn't notice it.

found bird crap on the hood when i got to work. there was snow powder on the car so didn't see it when i left this am during the quick visual inspection. i always look around the car before i pull out, mainly to check psi and bird crap. will take care of that during lunch break, i guess. it's too cold outside right now to do anything as water will just freeze.

 

cleaned up the bird crap just now. not too cold out finally, about 35F.


also ordered up maintenance stuff for my Z in prep for next season.
i saw that pioneer already released their next HU called 5500BH the other day...wow, they just can't wait for CES, huh? hahahaha. anyway, that dropped the price on the 4400BH by about $100 so i might get that sooner than later for my Z.

 

looking forward to my drive home in my GE. gotz a headache from too much bs at work. hope to wash the car too, later in the week.

looking forward to some icecream when i get home. going to relax in my music room again tonight after wife and i look over our kids' homework. no car action tonight.

 

hummm... not too many updates to post in my blog. im pretty happy with my car the way it is right now and i dont do much car projects in the winter time (my hobby cars also hibernate so even less things going on), so my updates will slow from here forward until next Spring.

i'd like to report how the DWS runs in the snow... no deep snow yet..

i was looking at a few mini-suv types for what i might replace the 09 GE with within 2yrs. i want a car that has awd that can do 30mpg hwy, and AT, ample cargo space, and reliable. i dont care if it has sportshift or not cause my wife is the primary driver and she can careless about those things. price around $25K. i dont feel like taking out a loan or doing a lease. i would like to give this car to my kids to use after my wife's done using it so it needs to be reliable.

which only leaves me with a very few choices...

 

First thing to come to mind is the CR-V AWD then the MINI Countryman S ALL4 BUT the ALL4 is 5k higher than your preffered price... and still has bugs being worked out of it. LOL

 

What about a Subie? Our 2000 Outback is still doing great with general maintenance over a decade later Looks like the 2013 Outback ticks all your boxes to me... Subaru Outback | The New 2013 Outback Wagon

 

Yah, was thinking crv too and maybe ford escape?

No outbacks for me...basically I've had it with made in Indiana subaru's. Bad experience with 06 legacy I bought new. My 09 GE replaced that car.

 

I personally wouldn't go with Ford unless its designed by SVT or is a SHO or RS model. There are WAAAAY too many software updates, stupid quality issues that occur, and poor use of available space for options and cargo (at least on the ones I've serviced when I worked at a Ford dealer).

A good example is the "entertainment center" in the middle of the dash above the console and the driver aids/controls on the steering wheel, left side of dash, and on the driver's door arm rest (if memory serves me right) on the 2012 to now Explore. Your driver aids are CLUTTERED on the steering wheel and left side of the dash; however, in the area for the climate control (near/below the Sync/Navi screen) there is a GANG load of space between the temp, mode, fan speed, etc. buttons to where Ford could have transferred some driver's aids to help the driver's side of the vehicle not feel more cluttered than a Boeing 747 cockpit.

In addition to that, their design/fix on the fly mentality with their production cars doesn't make sense what so ever. Ford's been making cars for over 100 years now... and they still can't manage to get them right.

 

I'd get a Prius/Prius C.

Although those aren't AWD.

 

Hahah... Subies from Indiana? Not all are bad. Been wanting at least an 09 Forester XT myself... Only true AWD... my opinion.