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Why am I still here?
On 1/7/2017 10:08 PM, Alex wrote:
Mr. Luddite wrote: Just checked the weather forecast for today. Blizzard warning starting around 8am this morning and lasting until early tomorrow. 12-14 inches of snow with 50 mph winds. Going back to bed. I thought you moved?? We did. At least temporarily. Long story but the sale of our house was "iffy" for a long time because the buyer was going through some unusual financing for a mortgage. He was basically using the revenues of his sub-S corporation as part of the qualification and had to wait until an audit was complete before his bank would commit to the loan. Anyway, we hadn't made any decision as to where we were heading when all of a sudden, 2 weeks before the scheduled closing, his bank approved his loan and we had to get out fast. Bought a place temporarily until the dust settles. Or snow settles. Anyway, we are still "talking" about what is next. |
Why am I still here?
Alex Wrote in message:
True North wrote: Big storm has started. Maybe I'll haul out my Toro electric snowblower tomorrow and give it a whirl. You went all out on that, big spender! Wonder if he has the electric shovel or the full sized mini snowblower. -- x ----Android NewsGroup Reader---- http://usenet.sinaapp.com/ |
Why am I still here?
Alex
True North wrote: Big storm has started. Maybe I'll haul out my Toro electric snowblower tomorrow and give it a whirl. "You went all out on that, big spender" Actually, I did. I researched the best of the electric at that time and went to a dealer where I paid full retail..about $450.00 for it. Now I can get a small gasoline single stage for about $100.00 more. |
Why am I still here?
wrote:
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I owned a VW rabbit. Stick shift, fun to drive. The daughters got to learn driving a stick shift. But I guess lazy these days. Looking a buying a,Chevy volt for an around town driver, which are not stick shift. |
Why am I still here?
|
Why am I still here?
On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 11:42:47 -0600, Califbill
wrote: wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I owned a VW rabbit. Stick shift, fun to drive. The daughters got to learn driving a stick shift. But I guess lazy these days. Looking a buying a,Chevy volt for an around town driver, which are not stick shift. I have been driving a stick so long that I do not even think about it. I just instinctively shift, double clutching on the down shifts. I don't even think about it. I agree it is a pain in the ass if you are just stuck in traffic, bumping ahead 20 feet at a time. |
Why am I still here?
On Sunday, January 8, 2017 at 12:42:52 PM UTC-5, Califbill wrote:
wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I owned a VW rabbit. Stick shift, fun to drive. The daughters got to learn driving a stick shift. But I guess lazy these days. Looking a buying a,Chevy volt for an around town driver, which are not stick shift. The last stick shift I had was the Boxster, a six-speed. The Corvette was an auto, and the Audi is. Besides, while the auto eats some horsepower, they are usually faster that the manual version. Modern automatic transmissions aren't like your dad's auto. For example, the Audi's tranny is an 8-speed. The computer keeps it in the sweet spot for how you're driving. Poking along, the shift points are low for economy. Push it harder, and they move up for better performance. Put it in sport mode, and you get higher shift points and it uses engine braking when you let off the gas, like a manual tranny would. And you can shift it manually if you want to. These day there just isn't much reason in a "normal" car to get a manual tranny except for cost or nostalgia. Hell, even F1 cars use manually shifted automatics. |
Why am I still here?
On Sun, 8 Jan 2017 13:06:10 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. My most exciting snow experience was on my way to Endicott in the winter in my Corvette. When I left Harrisburg it was lightly snowing but OK and I did the illegal "drive around the barricade" thing to get on 81 in the area that was not open yet (local knowledge thing). No speed limit and no traffic, also no help if you got in trouble. Suddenly I found myself in about 8" of snow in a car with about 4" of ground clearance. I figured if I ever stopped, I would never get going again so I just cranked it up and went, looking like a snow plow with a steady stream of snow blowing out to both sides from the spoiler and coming over the hood. I did that for about 10 miles until I hit the next exit where the road was open. I was really happy to see those barricades and the people coming down the ramp were surprised to see me. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/8/17 5:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Your plow must be more sophisticated than what we had. We had three levers in the cab of the jeep that controlled the plow hydraulics...up and down, side to side,and angle. I don't recall fiddling with them much while taking a run down one side of someone's driveway. |
Why am I still here?
"Mr. Luddite" Wrote in message:
On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Do you think Harry was making it all up? -- x ----Android NewsGroup Reader---- http://usenet.sinaapp.com/ |
Why am I still here?
On Sunday, 8 January 2017 06:44:54 UTC-4, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/7/2017 10:08 PM, Alex wrote: Mr. Luddite wrote: Just checked the weather forecast for today. Blizzard warning starting around 8am this morning and lasting until early tomorrow. 12-14 inches of snow with 50 mph winds. Going back to bed. I thought you moved?? We did. At least temporarily. Long story but the sale of our house was "iffy" for a long time because the buyer was going through some unusual financing for a mortgage. He was basically using the revenues of his sub-S corporation as part of the qualification and had to wait until an audit was complete before his bank would commit to the loan. Anyway, we hadn't made any decision as to where we were heading when all of a sudden, 2 weeks before the scheduled closing, his bank approved his loan and we had to get out fast. Bought a place temporarily until the dust settles. Or snow settles. Anyway, we are still "talking" about what is next. I'd do a half and half. 6 months up here and 6 months in warmer climes. Would probably rent an apartment here so I wouldn't have to worry when away for an extended period. |
Why am I still here?
On Sun, 8 Jan 2017 19:39:28 -0500 (EST), justan wrote:
"Mr. Luddite" Wrote in message: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Do you think Harry was making it all up? === Has he ever done that before? :-) I'd be seriously surprised if he's ever done an honest day's work in his life. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/8/17 11:04 PM, wrote:
On Sun, 8 Jan 2017 19:39:28 -0500 (EST), justan wrote: "Mr. Luddite" Wrote in message: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Do you think Harry was making it all up? === Has he ever done that before? :-) I'd be seriously surprised if he's ever done an honest day's work in his life. No one would have more expertise on a lifetime of dishonest work than a bankster like Wayne who spent his career working for a dishonest bank. As examples of these practices still going on: On October 19, 2011, Citigroup agreed to $285 million civil fraud penalty. In 2015, Citigroup Inc.'s consumer bank was ordered to pay $770 million in relief to borrowers for illegal credit card practices. That's about a billion dollars in fines recently for the bank's "honest day's work." Is it a Trump bank? |
Why am I still here?
On 1/8/2017 6:15 PM, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 1/8/17 5:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Your plow must be more sophisticated than what we had. We had three levers in the cab of the jeep that controlled the plow hydraulics...up and down, side to side,and angle. I don't recall fiddling with them much while taking a run down one side of someone's driveway. No, same controls except I don't have "side to side" whatever that is. Up, down and angle, left or right. The control box is hand held however, not levers permanently mounted in the cab. I like manual transmissions in some cars/trucks. My Ranger had a manual as did a full sized '86 Ford pickup I had years ago but I didn't plow or tow with either of them. For towing and plowing ... especially towing, the auto is better, IMO, especially the ones they use in the full sized heavy duty trucks being the Allison in the GM's and Ford's Torqueshift. Both are designed for towing heavy loads. I saw an ad for the latest Ford Superduty F-350. It can be equipped to tow 33,000 lbs. Let's see ... other manual transmission cars I've had fairly recently include the '67 GTO (factory 4 speed), the BMW Mini Cooper turbo, and the Porsche (6 speed manual). The Mini Cooper was a fun car .. fast ... but whenever you really got on it, it tried to make a left hand turn due to torque steer. The BMW M5's were a different animal altogether. They had a hybrid, dual clutch manual that was electronically controlled for "auto" operation or you could manually control shifts with the stick or the paddles on the steering wheel. No clutch pedal though. I don't really have a need for the F-250 anymore but sometimes only a truck will do. My wife bought a little egg shaped, 20 ft camper last summer but it only weighs about 4,000 lbs loaded. She wants me to trade my truck for a smaller, compact like a Nissan or Toyota so she can learn to tow her little camper around. One nice thing about the F-250 was apparent yesterday morning when I made a Duncan Donuts run at 6 in the morning through 17" of snow. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/17 6:02 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/8/2017 6:15 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 5:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Your plow must be more sophisticated than what we had. We had three levers in the cab of the jeep that controlled the plow hydraulics...up and down, side to side,and angle. I don't recall fiddling with them much while taking a run down one side of someone's driveway. No, same controls except I don't have "side to side" whatever that is. Up, down and angle, left or right. The control box is hand held however, not levers permanently mounted in the cab. I like manual transmissions in some cars/trucks. My Ranger had a manual as did a full sized '86 Ford pickup I had years ago but I didn't plow or tow with either of them. For towing and plowing ... especially towing, the auto is better, IMO, especially the ones they use in the full sized heavy duty trucks being the Allison in the GM's and Ford's Torqueshift. Both are designed for towing heavy loads. I saw an ad for the latest Ford Superduty F-350. It can be equipped to tow 33,000 lbs. Let's see ... other manual transmission cars I've had fairly recently include the '67 GTO (factory 4 speed), the BMW Mini Cooper turbo, and the Porsche (6 speed manual). The Mini Cooper was a fun car .. fast ... but whenever you really got on it, it tried to make a left hand turn due to torque steer. The BMW M5's were a different animal altogether. They had a hybrid, dual clutch manual that was electronically controlled for "auto" operation or you could manually control shifts with the stick or the paddles on the steering wheel. No clutch pedal though. I don't really have a need for the F-250 anymore but sometimes only a truck will do. My wife bought a little egg shaped, 20 ft camper last summer but it only weighs about 4,000 lbs loaded. She wants me to trade my truck for a smaller, compact like a Nissan or Toyota so she can learn to tow her little camper around. One nice thing about the F-250 was apparent yesterday morning when I made a Duncan Donuts run at 6 in the morning through 17" of snow. I had driven an auto Tacoma truck at a local dealer's, and I thought the tranny seemed to spend a lot of time searching for and shifting gears, but it seemed only a minor annoyance. Since then, Toyota has reprogrammed the auto tranny. When I was in the mood to buy, there were hardly any 4WD Tacomas around, and I ended up buying from a non-local dealer. I tried the manual tranny model before I bought and I enjoyed the shifting and the control it gave. The tranny does not shift as smoothly as a manual in a good car, but it is good enough. I don't tow or plow with this truck, so those considerations weren't an issue. In decent weather, I do haul a lot of aggie products for my wife's gardens and the lawn. If we lived in "da Souf," I probably wouldn't have gone for the 4WD. If you are going to tow a small camper in the future and want a Toyota truck, the larger Toyota model probably would be more suitable than the Tacoma. I don't know anything about the Nissans, other than the Toyotas seem to outsell them by a large factor. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/2017 6:44 AM, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 1/9/17 6:02 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 6:15 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 5:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Your plow must be more sophisticated than what we had. We had three levers in the cab of the jeep that controlled the plow hydraulics...up and down, side to side,and angle. I don't recall fiddling with them much while taking a run down one side of someone's driveway. No, same controls except I don't have "side to side" whatever that is. Up, down and angle, left or right. The control box is hand held however, not levers permanently mounted in the cab. I like manual transmissions in some cars/trucks. My Ranger had a manual as did a full sized '86 Ford pickup I had years ago but I didn't plow or tow with either of them. For towing and plowing ... especially towing, the auto is better, IMO, especially the ones they use in the full sized heavy duty trucks being the Allison in the GM's and Ford's Torqueshift. Both are designed for towing heavy loads. I saw an ad for the latest Ford Superduty F-350. It can be equipped to tow 33,000 lbs. Let's see ... other manual transmission cars I've had fairly recently include the '67 GTO (factory 4 speed), the BMW Mini Cooper turbo, and the Porsche (6 speed manual). The Mini Cooper was a fun car .. fast ... but whenever you really got on it, it tried to make a left hand turn due to torque steer. The BMW M5's were a different animal altogether. They had a hybrid, dual clutch manual that was electronically controlled for "auto" operation or you could manually control shifts with the stick or the paddles on the steering wheel. No clutch pedal though. I don't really have a need for the F-250 anymore but sometimes only a truck will do. My wife bought a little egg shaped, 20 ft camper last summer but it only weighs about 4,000 lbs loaded. She wants me to trade my truck for a smaller, compact like a Nissan or Toyota so she can learn to tow her little camper around. One nice thing about the F-250 was apparent yesterday morning when I made a Duncan Donuts run at 6 in the morning through 17" of snow. I had driven an auto Tacoma truck at a local dealer's, and I thought the tranny seemed to spend a lot of time searching for and shifting gears, but it seemed only a minor annoyance. Since then, Toyota has reprogrammed the auto tranny. When I was in the mood to buy, there were hardly any 4WD Tacomas around, and I ended up buying from a non-local dealer. I tried the manual tranny model before I bought and I enjoyed the shifting and the control it gave. The tranny does not shift as smoothly as a manual in a good car, but it is good enough. I don't tow or plow with this truck, so those considerations weren't an issue. In decent weather, I do haul a lot of aggie products for my wife's gardens and the lawn. If we lived in "da Souf," I probably wouldn't have gone for the 4WD. If you are going to tow a small camper in the future and want a Toyota truck, the larger Toyota model probably would be more suitable than the Tacoma. I don't know anything about the Nissans, other than the Toyotas seem to outsell them by a large factor. I think the "larger" Toyota (above the Tacoma) is the Tundra. It's as big as the Ford I have now from what I've seen. She wants something smaller. The Nissan Frontier is rated to tow 6K lbs I am told. Not sure about the Tacoma. The only issue for her is that she has become accustom to automatic all wheel drive. She has had it in the Navigators she had and the Mountaineer she drives now. I am not sure but I don't think an automatic "AWD" mode is available in the smaller pickups. They have 2WD and select-able 4WD (high and low) like my F-250 but you have to know when to use it. For her by the time she realized she needed 4WD it would probably be too late. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/17 9:28 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/9/2017 6:44 AM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/9/17 6:02 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 6:15 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 5:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Your plow must be more sophisticated than what we had. We had three levers in the cab of the jeep that controlled the plow hydraulics...up and down, side to side,and angle. I don't recall fiddling with them much while taking a run down one side of someone's driveway. No, same controls except I don't have "side to side" whatever that is. Up, down and angle, left or right. The control box is hand held however, not levers permanently mounted in the cab. I like manual transmissions in some cars/trucks. My Ranger had a manual as did a full sized '86 Ford pickup I had years ago but I didn't plow or tow with either of them. For towing and plowing ... especially towing, the auto is better, IMO, especially the ones they use in the full sized heavy duty trucks being the Allison in the GM's and Ford's Torqueshift. Both are designed for towing heavy loads. I saw an ad for the latest Ford Superduty F-350. It can be equipped to tow 33,000 lbs. Let's see ... other manual transmission cars I've had fairly recently include the '67 GTO (factory 4 speed), the BMW Mini Cooper turbo, and the Porsche (6 speed manual). The Mini Cooper was a fun car .. fast ... but whenever you really got on it, it tried to make a left hand turn due to torque steer. The BMW M5's were a different animal altogether. They had a hybrid, dual clutch manual that was electronically controlled for "auto" operation or you could manually control shifts with the stick or the paddles on the steering wheel. No clutch pedal though. I don't really have a need for the F-250 anymore but sometimes only a truck will do. My wife bought a little egg shaped, 20 ft camper last summer but it only weighs about 4,000 lbs loaded. She wants me to trade my truck for a smaller, compact like a Nissan or Toyota so she can learn to tow her little camper around. One nice thing about the F-250 was apparent yesterday morning when I made a Duncan Donuts run at 6 in the morning through 17" of snow. I had driven an auto Tacoma truck at a local dealer's, and I thought the tranny seemed to spend a lot of time searching for and shifting gears, but it seemed only a minor annoyance. Since then, Toyota has reprogrammed the auto tranny. When I was in the mood to buy, there were hardly any 4WD Tacomas around, and I ended up buying from a non-local dealer. I tried the manual tranny model before I bought and I enjoyed the shifting and the control it gave. The tranny does not shift as smoothly as a manual in a good car, but it is good enough. I don't tow or plow with this truck, so those considerations weren't an issue. In decent weather, I do haul a lot of aggie products for my wife's gardens and the lawn. If we lived in "da Souf," I probably wouldn't have gone for the 4WD. If you are going to tow a small camper in the future and want a Toyota truck, the larger Toyota model probably would be more suitable than the Tacoma. I don't know anything about the Nissans, other than the Toyotas seem to outsell them by a large factor. I think the "larger" Toyota (above the Tacoma) is the Tundra. It's as big as the Ford I have now from what I've seen. She wants something smaller. The Nissan Frontier is rated to tow 6K lbs I am told. Not sure about the Tacoma. The only issue for her is that she has become accustom to automatic all wheel drive. She has had it in the Navigators she had and the Mountaineer she drives now. I am not sure but I don't think an automatic "AWD" mode is available in the smaller pickups. They have 2WD and select-able 4WD (high and low) like my F-250 but you have to know when to use it. For her by the time she realized she needed 4WD it would probably be too late. The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/2017 9:47 AM, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 1/9/17 9:28 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/9/2017 6:44 AM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/9/17 6:02 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 6:15 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 5:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Your plow must be more sophisticated than what we had. We had three levers in the cab of the jeep that controlled the plow hydraulics...up and down, side to side,and angle. I don't recall fiddling with them much while taking a run down one side of someone's driveway. No, same controls except I don't have "side to side" whatever that is. Up, down and angle, left or right. The control box is hand held however, not levers permanently mounted in the cab. I like manual transmissions in some cars/trucks. My Ranger had a manual as did a full sized '86 Ford pickup I had years ago but I didn't plow or tow with either of them. For towing and plowing ... especially towing, the auto is better, IMO, especially the ones they use in the full sized heavy duty trucks being the Allison in the GM's and Ford's Torqueshift. Both are designed for towing heavy loads. I saw an ad for the latest Ford Superduty F-350. It can be equipped to tow 33,000 lbs. Let's see ... other manual transmission cars I've had fairly recently include the '67 GTO (factory 4 speed), the BMW Mini Cooper turbo, and the Porsche (6 speed manual). The Mini Cooper was a fun car .. fast ... but whenever you really got on it, it tried to make a left hand turn due to torque steer. The BMW M5's were a different animal altogether. They had a hybrid, dual clutch manual that was electronically controlled for "auto" operation or you could manually control shifts with the stick or the paddles on the steering wheel. No clutch pedal though. I don't really have a need for the F-250 anymore but sometimes only a truck will do. My wife bought a little egg shaped, 20 ft camper last summer but it only weighs about 4,000 lbs loaded. She wants me to trade my truck for a smaller, compact like a Nissan or Toyota so she can learn to tow her little camper around. One nice thing about the F-250 was apparent yesterday morning when I made a Duncan Donuts run at 6 in the morning through 17" of snow. I had driven an auto Tacoma truck at a local dealer's, and I thought the tranny seemed to spend a lot of time searching for and shifting gears, but it seemed only a minor annoyance. Since then, Toyota has reprogrammed the auto tranny. When I was in the mood to buy, there were hardly any 4WD Tacomas around, and I ended up buying from a non-local dealer. I tried the manual tranny model before I bought and I enjoyed the shifting and the control it gave. The tranny does not shift as smoothly as a manual in a good car, but it is good enough. I don't tow or plow with this truck, so those considerations weren't an issue. In decent weather, I do haul a lot of aggie products for my wife's gardens and the lawn. If we lived in "da Souf," I probably wouldn't have gone for the 4WD. If you are going to tow a small camper in the future and want a Toyota truck, the larger Toyota model probably would be more suitable than the Tacoma. I don't know anything about the Nissans, other than the Toyotas seem to outsell them by a large factor. I think the "larger" Toyota (above the Tacoma) is the Tundra. It's as big as the Ford I have now from what I've seen. She wants something smaller. The Nissan Frontier is rated to tow 6K lbs I am told. Not sure about the Tacoma. The only issue for her is that she has become accustom to automatic all wheel drive. She has had it in the Navigators she had and the Mountaineer she drives now. I am not sure but I don't think an automatic "AWD" mode is available in the smaller pickups. They have 2WD and select-able 4WD (high and low) like my F-250 but you have to know when to use it. For her by the time she realized she needed 4WD it would probably be too late. The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride. I was just reading up on them. They are unibody (versus frame) and are rated to tow up to 5K lbs. (2017 models) Seems that the automotive industry is moving more and more towards unibody, including trucks, and are claiming that improvements in design will allow them to perform equal to or better than frame. Not sure I agree with that. Unibody is fine for cars but not for a truck that you intend to use hard. |
Why am I still here?
Keyser Sozo says..
"The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride." A 5k tow rating should be just enough to tow a 4000 lb trailer.....especially if it's only occasionally tows like we'd do up here. As far as the Tacoma....it would be my choice of truck if only the cab was higher. From what Consumer Reports used to say...it has the same low seat design as the old Ford Ranger. Maybe a good design to help with gas mileage but I'd want to sit up in a seat not inches off the floor and I don't have long legs. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/2017 10:25 AM, True North wrote:
Keyser Sozo says.. "The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride." A 5k tow rating should be just enough to tow a 4000 lb trailer.....especially if it's only occasionally tows like we'd do up here. As far as the Tacoma....it would be my choice of truck if only the cab was higher. From what Consumer Reports used to say...it has the same low seat design as the old Ford Ranger. Maybe a good design to help with gas mileage but I'd want to sit up in a seat not inches off the floor and I don't have long legs. Timely discussion. I just saw on the news that Ford is going to start producing a Ranger again, along with a Bronco. Both will be built in the good ol' USA. :-) I may wait and see what the new design Ranger and it's specs are. It was dropped because it's design and engines had become outdated (basically it was a Mazda B-2000). I'll bet with the more powerful and advanced 4 and 6 cylinder engines available today it could be a serious contender again. I've owned three of them in the past, one in Florida and two up here. The last one I had was the "Level 3" version (or something like that). It was a 4x4, had larger tires and sat higher than a standard Ranger. All of them were great little trucks and the only reason I traded in the Level 3 was that I needed more towing capacity at the time. Otherwise, I would have kept it. |
Why am I still here?
On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 05:51:47 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote:
No one would have more expertise on a lifetime of dishonest work than a bankster like Wayne who spent his career working for a dishonest bank. As examples of these practices still going on: On October 19, 2011, Citigroup agreed to $285 million civil fraud penalty. In 2015, Citigroup Inc.'s consumer bank was ordered to pay $770 million in relief to borrowers for illegal credit card practices. === Happened after I retired, and of course we folks who were managing technology platforms had nothing to do with it. Citi has always been a leader and innovator in banking technology. |
Why am I still here?
On Monday, 9 January 2017 11:38:38 UTC-4, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/9/2017 10:25 AM, True North wrote: Keyser Sozo says.. "The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride." A 5k tow rating should be just enough to tow a 4000 lb trailer.....especially if it's only occasionally tows like we'd do up here. As far as the Tacoma....it would be my choice of truck if only the cab was higher. From what Consumer Reports used to say...it has the same low seat design as the old Ford Ranger. Maybe a good design to help with gas mileage but I'd want to sit up in a seat not inches off the floor and I don't have long legs. Timely discussion. I just saw on the news that Ford is going to start producing a Ranger again, along with a Bronco. Both will be built in the good ol' USA. :-) I may wait and see what the new design Ranger and it's specs are. It was dropped because it's design and engines had become outdated (basically it was a Mazda B-2000). I'll bet with the more powerful and advanced 4 and 6 cylinder engines available today it could be a serious contender again. I've owned three of them in the past, one in Florida and two up here. The last one I had was the "Level 3" version (or something like that). It was a 4x4, had larger tires and sat higher than a standard Ranger. All of them were great little trucks and the only reason I traded in the Level 3 was that I needed more towing capacity at the time. Otherwise, I would have kept it. When they were getting rid of the Ranger there was talk of a new smaller pickup...mayte a F100 or something that Ford was developing. Always wondered what happened to it. Assumed it couldn't compete with the Tacoma. I like the looks of the Nissan Frontier with it's boxier cab. Almost bought one from a military family who were renting next door from another military family. The Frontier owners had been assigned to NATO in Brussels so wanted to get rid of the black Frontier with it's matching cap. Only trouble is...it had the four cylinder engine, manual transmission (not good for wife) and a low tow rating. I had leased the auto 6 cyl 2006 Ranger to tow my sailboat. Man, those hard foam low seats were hard to get used to. I remember calling my salesman and asking if I could upgrade to the F150. He said to hang on and the foam would soon conform to me. He was partially right and I actually used the Ranger to tow my mini cruiser sailboat on a 3000 mile round trip to a Rendezvous north of Toronto. Have to admit, I wasn't sad when the three year lease was up and I'm sure the wife was overjoyed. Especially when the last couple of model years dropped almost $10K in MSL price. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/2017 11:25 AM, True North wrote:
On Monday, 9 January 2017 11:38:38 UTC-4, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/9/2017 10:25 AM, True North wrote: Keyser Sozo says.. "The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride." A 5k tow rating should be just enough to tow a 4000 lb trailer.....especially if it's only occasionally tows like we'd do up here. As far as the Tacoma....it would be my choice of truck if only the cab was higher. From what Consumer Reports used to say...it has the same low seat design as the old Ford Ranger. Maybe a good design to help with gas mileage but I'd want to sit up in a seat not inches off the floor and I don't have long legs. Timely discussion. I just saw on the news that Ford is going to start producing a Ranger again, along with a Bronco. Both will be built in the good ol' USA. :-) I may wait and see what the new design Ranger and it's specs are. It was dropped because it's design and engines had become outdated (basically it was a Mazda B-2000). I'll bet with the more powerful and advanced 4 and 6 cylinder engines available today it could be a serious contender again. I've owned three of them in the past, one in Florida and two up here. The last one I had was the "Level 3" version (or something like that). It was a 4x4, had larger tires and sat higher than a standard Ranger. All of them were great little trucks and the only reason I traded in the Level 3 was that I needed more towing capacity at the time. Otherwise, I would have kept it. When they were getting rid of the Ranger there was talk of a new smaller pickup...mayte a F100 or something that Ford was developing. Always wondered what happened to it. Assumed it couldn't compete with the Tacoma. I like the looks of the Nissan Frontier with it's boxier cab. Almost bought one from a military family who were renting next door from another military family. The Frontier owners had been assigned to NATO in Brussels so wanted to get rid of the black Frontier with it's matching cap. Only trouble is...it had the four cylinder engine, manual transmission (not good for wife) and a low tow rating. I had leased the auto 6 cyl 2006 Ranger to tow my sailboat. Man, those hard foam low seats were hard to get used to. I remember calling my salesman and asking if I could upgrade to the F150. He said to hang on and the foam would soon conform to me. He was partially right and I actually used the Ranger to tow my mini cruiser sailboat on a 3000 mile round trip to a Rendezvous north of Toronto. Have to admit, I wasn't sad when the three year lease was up and I'm sure the wife was overjoyed. Especially when the last couple of model years dropped almost $10K in MSL price. According to the Ford news release the new Ranger will be a "mid sized" pickup. |
Why am I still here?
Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/9/2017 6:44 AM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/9/17 6:02 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 6:15 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 5:47 PM, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/8/2017 1:06 PM, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/8/17 2:20 AM, wrote: On Sun, 08 Jan 2017 01:02:45 -0600, Califbill wrote: I pretty much gave up on stick shifts for daily drivers in 1968. I remember miles long traffic jams from Laguna Seca raceway via Gilroy of stop and go traffic. My leg would start shaking from the clutch work. And pulling a race car trailer. Later, drop it in drive, and enjoy power brakes. I still like actually driving my sporty cars. A slush box is fine in vans and trucks. I have worked very hard to avoid stop and go traffic. I worked midnights for the past 11 years I was in DC. It was great driving home in empty lanes on the beltway and watching the cars piled up going the other way. SW Florida was very rural when I moved here and a few tricks to avoid the trouble spots kept me moving right along most of the time. They did not have much in the way of computer customers in the tourist areas I grew up on stick shift vehicles and in the winter I earned a few bucks with my dad's jeep and plow. I always thought the stick shift gave you more control over what the wheels were doing and made stopping safer because you could more easily shift the vehicle out of gear. After my experience yesterday and today with the 4WD stick shift truck, I still think I am correct. Though we only got about 7" today of snow, I got through a couple of drifts two and three times that height (where the roadway was plowed) without problems. If you are doing some serious plowing, it's hard to hold the plow controller in one hand, steer with the other and try to shift if necessary. Auto transmission makes it a lot easier. Your plow must be more sophisticated than what we had. We had three levers in the cab of the jeep that controlled the plow hydraulics...up and down, side to side,and angle. I don't recall fiddling with them much while taking a run down one side of someone's driveway. No, same controls except I don't have "side to side" whatever that is. Up, down and angle, left or right. The control box is hand held however, not levers permanently mounted in the cab. I like manual transmissions in some cars/trucks. My Ranger had a manual as did a full sized '86 Ford pickup I had years ago but I didn't plow or tow with either of them. For towing and plowing ... especially towing, the auto is better, IMO, especially the ones they use in the full sized heavy duty trucks being the Allison in the GM's and Ford's Torqueshift. Both are designed for towing heavy loads. I saw an ad for the latest Ford Superduty F-350. It can be equipped to tow 33,000 lbs. Let's see ... other manual transmission cars I've had fairly recently include the '67 GTO (factory 4 speed), the BMW Mini Cooper turbo, and the Porsche (6 speed manual). The Mini Cooper was a fun car .. fast ... but whenever you really got on it, it tried to make a left hand turn due to torque steer. The BMW M5's were a different animal altogether. They had a hybrid, dual clutch manual that was electronically controlled for "auto" operation or you could manually control shifts with the stick or the paddles on the steering wheel. No clutch pedal though. I don't really have a need for the F-250 anymore but sometimes only a truck will do. My wife bought a little egg shaped, 20 ft camper last summer but it only weighs about 4,000 lbs loaded. She wants me to trade my truck for a smaller, compact like a Nissan or Toyota so she can learn to tow her little camper around. One nice thing about the F-250 was apparent yesterday morning when I made a Duncan Donuts run at 6 in the morning through 17" of snow. I had driven an auto Tacoma truck at a local dealer's, and I thought the tranny seemed to spend a lot of time searching for and shifting gears, but it seemed only a minor annoyance. Since then, Toyota has reprogrammed the auto tranny. When I was in the mood to buy, there were hardly any 4WD Tacomas around, and I ended up buying from a non-local dealer. I tried the manual tranny model before I bought and I enjoyed the shifting and the control it gave. The tranny does not shift as smoothly as a manual in a good car, but it is good enough. I don't tow or plow with this truck, so those considerations weren't an issue. In decent weather, I do haul a lot of aggie products for my wife's gardens and the lawn. If we lived in "da Souf," I probably wouldn't have gone for the 4WD. If you are going to tow a small camper in the future and want a Toyota truck, the larger Toyota model probably would be more suitable than the Tacoma. I don't know anything about the Nissans, other than the Toyotas seem to outsell them by a large factor. I think the "larger" Toyota (above the Tacoma) is the Tundra. It's as big as the Ford I have now from what I've seen. She wants something smaller. The Nissan Frontier is rated to tow 6K lbs I am told. Not sure about the Tacoma. The only issue for her is that she has become accustom to automatic all wheel drive. She has had it in the Navigators she had and the Mountaineer she drives now. I am not sure but I don't think an automatic "AWD" mode is available in the smaller pickups. They have 2WD and select-able 4WD (high and low) like my F-250 but you have to know when to use it. For her by the time she realized she needed 4WD it would probably be too late. I think the newer Tacoma is about the same size as the older Tundra. I read in the newspaper that the manufactures are bringing back small pickups. My only real experience with automatic 4WD was in an Olds version of the S10 Blazer on icy road in Rochester, MN. Would go in to and out of 4x4 when a wheel started to spin and the car would want to jump sideways an inch or two. My Blazer never showed that condition, but 4x4 was a dash switch. |
Why am I still here?
|
Why am I still here?
Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/9/2017 11:25 AM, True North wrote: On Monday, 9 January 2017 11:38:38 UTC-4, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/9/2017 10:25 AM, True North wrote: Keyser Sozo says.. "The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride." A 5k tow rating should be just enough to tow a 4000 lb trailer.....especially if it's only occasionally tows like we'd do up here. As far as the Tacoma....it would be my choice of truck if only the cab was higher. From what Consumer Reports used to say...it has the same low seat design as the old Ford Ranger. Maybe a good design to help with gas mileage but I'd want to sit up in a seat not inches off the floor and I don't have long legs. Timely discussion. I just saw on the news that Ford is going to start producing a Ranger again, along with a Bronco. Both will be built in the good ol' USA. :-) I may wait and see what the new design Ranger and it's specs are. It was dropped because it's design and engines had become outdated (basically it was a Mazda B-2000). I'll bet with the more powerful and advanced 4 and 6 cylinder engines available today it could be a serious contender again. I've owned three of them in the past, one in Florida and two up here. The last one I had was the "Level 3" version (or something like that). It was a 4x4, had larger tires and sat higher than a standard Ranger. All of them were great little trucks and the only reason I traded in the Level 3 was that I needed more towing capacity at the time. Otherwise, I would have kept it. When they were getting rid of the Ranger there was talk of a new smaller pickup...mayte a F100 or something that Ford was developing. Always wondered what happened to it. Assumed it couldn't compete with the Tacoma. I like the looks of the Nissan Frontier with it's boxier cab. Almost bought one from a military family who were renting next door from another military family. The Frontier owners had been assigned to NATO in Brussels so wanted to get rid of the black Frontier with it's matching cap. Only trouble is...it had the four cylinder engine, manual transmission (not good for wife) and a low tow rating. I had leased the auto 6 cyl 2006 Ranger to tow my sailboat. Man, those hard foam low seats were hard to get used to. I remember calling my salesman and asking if I could upgrade to the F150. He said to hang on and the foam would soon conform to me. He was partially right and I actually used the Ranger to tow my mini cruiser sailboat on a 3000 mile round trip to a Rendezvous north of Toronto. Have to admit, I wasn't sad when the three year lease was up and I'm sure the wife was overjoyed. Especially when the last couple of model years dropped almost $10K in MSL price. According to the Ford news release the new Ranger will be a "mid sized" pickup. What is mid sized and full sized these days. Rented a full size car at Alamo in San Jose Cabo. Camry. |
Why am I still here?
On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 12:14:05 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote:
On 1/9/17 11:22 AM, wrote: On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 05:51:47 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote: No one would have more expertise on a lifetime of dishonest work than a bankster like Wayne who spent his career working for a dishonest bank. As examples of these practices still going on: On October 19, 2011, Citigroup agreed to $285 million civil fraud penalty. In 2015, Citigroup Inc.'s consumer bank was ordered to pay $770 million in relief to borrowers for illegal credit card practices. === Happened after I retired, and of course we folks who were managing technology platforms had nothing to do with it. Citi has always been a leader and innovator in banking technology. Are you implying your employer wasn't engaging in banksterism prior to your retirement? Really? :) === Define banksterism - can't find it in my OED. Is it worse than union thuggery, loan fraud, tax cheating or spouse abuse? |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/17 1:23 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 12:14:05 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote: On 1/9/17 11:22 AM, wrote: On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 05:51:47 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote: No one would have more expertise on a lifetime of dishonest work than a bankster like Wayne who spent his career working for a dishonest bank. As examples of these practices still going on: On October 19, 2011, Citigroup agreed to $285 million civil fraud penalty. In 2015, Citigroup Inc.'s consumer bank was ordered to pay $770 million in relief to borrowers for illegal credit card practices. === Happened after I retired, and of course we folks who were managing technology platforms had nothing to do with it. Citi has always been a leader and innovator in banking technology. Are you implying your employer wasn't engaging in banksterism prior to your retirement? Really? :) === Define banksterism - can't find it in my OED. Is it worse than union thuggery, loan fraud, tax cheating or spouse abuse? Your OED? What a laugh. Bankster A portmanteau of the words "banker" and "gangster." These are intergral to the capitalist system. While the nightly news might have you believe that young black and latino men with 9mm's are the biggest threat to your life, banksters are far more dangerous. While a gangster might steal your posessions with a knife or a gun, a bankster will steal your possesiions with a pen, paper and "legal" (read "unjust") mumbo-jumbo snakeoil bull****. Bankster: Any member of the financial services industry; primarilly interested with the welfare of the capitalist class and their lackeys. Execs of banks who lined their own pockets first, when the economy was starting to crumble, then foreclosed on small town america A portmanteau of "banker" and "gangster", popularized by (among others) the economist Murray N. Rothbard, used by him to attack what he held to be the inherently fraudulent nature of Fractional-Reserve banking (as opposed to 100% gold reserve banking, which he defended as the only honest form of banking). Frequently used in reference to The Fed. In more recent popular usage, often refers in a vague way to the forces of "Wall Street", or to those persons in the financial services industry who grow rich despite the continued impoverishment of those who depend on their services, and despite their apparent inability to succeed in business without constant government assistance. "The Fed is an organized cartel of banksters, who are creating inflation, ripping off the public, destroying the savings of the average American." "The banksters crashed the economy, but thanks to generous federal bailouts, they won't have to sacrifice their fat bonuses." |
Why am I still here?
steal your posessions with a knife or a gun, a bankster will steal your possesiions with a pen, paper and "legal" (read "unjust") mumbo-jumbo snakeoil bull****. ..... Is that what happened to you? Harry is that why you're so bitter? |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/2017 12:48 PM, Califbill wrote:
Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/9/2017 11:25 AM, True North wrote: On Monday, 9 January 2017 11:38:38 UTC-4, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/9/2017 10:25 AM, True North wrote: Keyser Sozo says.. "The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride." A 5k tow rating should be just enough to tow a 4000 lb trailer.....especially if it's only occasionally tows like we'd do up here. As far as the Tacoma....it would be my choice of truck if only the cab was higher. From what Consumer Reports used to say...it has the same low seat design as the old Ford Ranger. Maybe a good design to help with gas mileage but I'd want to sit up in a seat not inches off the floor and I don't have long legs. Timely discussion. I just saw on the news that Ford is going to start producing a Ranger again, along with a Bronco. Both will be built in the good ol' USA. :-) I may wait and see what the new design Ranger and it's specs are. It was dropped because it's design and engines had become outdated (basically it was a Mazda B-2000). I'll bet with the more powerful and advanced 4 and 6 cylinder engines available today it could be a serious contender again. I've owned three of them in the past, one in Florida and two up here. The last one I had was the "Level 3" version (or something like that). It was a 4x4, had larger tires and sat higher than a standard Ranger. All of them were great little trucks and the only reason I traded in the Level 3 was that I needed more towing capacity at the time. Otherwise, I would have kept it. When they were getting rid of the Ranger there was talk of a new smaller pickup...mayte a F100 or something that Ford was developing. Always wondered what happened to it. Assumed it couldn't compete with the Tacoma. I like the looks of the Nissan Frontier with it's boxier cab. Almost bought one from a military family who were renting next door from another military family. The Frontier owners had been assigned to NATO in Brussels so wanted to get rid of the black Frontier with it's matching cap. Only trouble is...it had the four cylinder engine, manual transmission (not good for wife) and a low tow rating. I had leased the auto 6 cyl 2006 Ranger to tow my sailboat. Man, those hard foam low seats were hard to get used to. I remember calling my salesman and asking if I could upgrade to the F150. He said to hang on and the foam would soon conform to me. He was partially right and I actually used the Ranger to tow my mini cruiser sailboat on a 3000 mile round trip to a Rendezvous north of Toronto. Have to admit, I wasn't sad when the three year lease was up and I'm sure the wife was overjoyed. Especially when the last couple of model years dropped almost $10K in MSL price. According to the Ford news release the new Ranger will be a "mid sized" pickup. What is mid sized and full sized these days. Rented a full size car at Alamo in San Jose Cabo. Camry. I know. I get a kick out of it. My Altima is considered to be a "full sized" car. It's size used to be considered a "compact". |
Why am I still here?
Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 1/9/2017 12:48 PM, Califbill wrote: Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/9/2017 11:25 AM, True North wrote: On Monday, 9 January 2017 11:38:38 UTC-4, Mr. Luddite wrote: On 1/9/2017 10:25 AM, True North wrote: Keyser Sozo says.. "The latest Honda Ridgeline is available with AWD, but I don't believe it has the towing capacity you might want, and it is not a separate frame/body pickup. But it is very comfy and carlike on the interior and in the ride." A 5k tow rating should be just enough to tow a 4000 lb trailer.....especially if it's only occasionally tows like we'd do up here. As far as the Tacoma....it would be my choice of truck if only the cab was higher. From what Consumer Reports used to say...it has the same low seat design as the old Ford Ranger. Maybe a good design to help with gas mileage but I'd want to sit up in a seat not inches off the floor and I don't have long legs. Timely discussion. I just saw on the news that Ford is going to start producing a Ranger again, along with a Bronco. Both will be built in the good ol' USA. :-) I may wait and see what the new design Ranger and it's specs are. It was dropped because it's design and engines had become outdated (basically it was a Mazda B-2000). I'll bet with the more powerful and advanced 4 and 6 cylinder engines available today it could be a serious contender again. I've owned three of them in the past, one in Florida and two up here. The last one I had was the "Level 3" version (or something like that). It was a 4x4, had larger tires and sat higher than a standard Ranger. All of them were great little trucks and the only reason I traded in the Level 3 was that I needed more towing capacity at the time. Otherwise, I would have kept it. When they were getting rid of the Ranger there was talk of a new smaller pickup...mayte a F100 or something that Ford was developing. Always wondered what happened to it. Assumed it couldn't compete with the Tacoma. I like the looks of the Nissan Frontier with it's boxier cab. Almost bought one from a military family who were renting next door from another military family. The Frontier owners had been assigned to NATO in Brussels so wanted to get rid of the black Frontier with it's matching cap. Only trouble is...it had the four cylinder engine, manual transmission (not good for wife) and a low tow rating. I had leased the auto 6 cyl 2006 Ranger to tow my sailboat. Man, those hard foam low seats were hard to get used to. I remember calling my salesman and asking if I could upgrade to the F150. He said to hang on and the foam would soon conform to me. He was partially right and I actually used the Ranger to tow my mini cruiser sailboat on a 3000 mile round trip to a Rendezvous north of Toronto. Have to admit, I wasn't sad when the three year lease was up and I'm sure the wife was overjoyed. Especially when the last couple of model years dropped almost $10K in MSL price. According to the Ford news release the new Ranger will be a "mid sized" pickup. What is mid sized and full sized these days. Rented a full size car at Alamo in San Jose Cabo. Camry. I know. I get a kick out of it. My Altima is considered to be a "full sized" car. It's size used to be considered a "compact". I shake the head over the names. My wife's Venza is called an SUV. Is 2 wheel drive, small station wagon. But according to the media, is a deadly, accident prone SUV. Notice when there is an accident involving an SUV, is always pointed out. Forget the fact the 'SUV' was stooped at a red light and a Prius nailed it, etc. and Prius will be insinuated as the injured party. |
Why am I still here?
On Mon, 09 Jan 2017 11:48:38 -0600, Califbill
wrote: According to the Ford news release the new Ranger will be a "mid sized" pickup. What is mid sized and full sized these days. Rented a full size car at Alamo in San Jose Cabo. Camry. I suppose the mid size will be the Sport Trak rebadged with a larger bed and 2 seats. Mine is still a "truck" if that means body on frame. It seems to do OK. They rate it 1/2 ton and I did bring a pallet of tile home from the tile store OK. (probably more like 1500 pounds) I haven't tried a pallet of sod yet but that is coming up when it starts raining again here. I know the F150 was OK with that. |
Why am I still here?
On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 13:51:10 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote:
Bankster A portmanteau of the words "banker" and "gangster." These are intergral to the capitalist system. OK Harry now define plagiarist http://www.urbandictionary.com/author.php?author=Dano2 |
Why am I still here?
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Why am I still here?
On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 10:54:49 -0800 (PST), Tim
wrote: steal your posessions with a knife or a gun, a bankster will steal your possesiions with a pen, paper and "legal" (read "unjust") mumbo-jumbo snakeoil bull****. .... Is that what happened to you? Harry is that why you're so bitter? I am not sure what happened to Harry, I am not that interested in pursuing public records but I will say I have been in the data centers of banks and the people there are no different than the data people at NIH or National Geographic. |
Why am I still here?
On 1/9/17 4:30 PM, wrote:
On Mon, 9 Jan 2017 13:51:10 -0500, Keyser Soze wrote: Bankster A portmanteau of the words "banker" and "gangster." These are intergral to the capitalist system. OK Harry now define plagiarist http://www.urbandictionary.com/author.php?author=Dano2 Really? No effort was made to claim authorship. In fact, it was obvious several sources were cited. |
Why am I still here?
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Why am I still here?
wrote:
On Mon, 09 Jan 2017 11:48:38 -0600, Califbill wrote: According to the Ford news release the new Ranger will be a "mid sized" pickup. What is mid sized and full sized these days. Rented a full size car at Alamo in San Jose Cabo. Camry. I suppose the mid size will be the Sport Trak rebadged with a larger bed and 2 seats. Mine is still a "truck" if that means body on frame. It seems to do OK. They rate it 1/2 ton and I did bring a pallet of tile home from the tile store OK. (probably more like 1500 pounds) I haven't tried a pallet of sod yet but that is coming up when it starts raining again here. I know the F150 was OK with that. And sometimes you overload accidentally. Bought a pallet of pavers. Was dark when Homedespot loaded the truck. Handled very light in the front end. Looked out in the morning and was almost doing a wheelie. Sign said 2000# per pallet. They said a pallet was 2 deep, not 5 deep like had. Figured 4500#. S-10 4x4 was rated a 3/4 ton. Had helper springs on rear. Heck that lad would have made my 3/4 ton full size Chevy squat. |
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