Heavy but they can be seriously modified. That Mitsu V6 can get 400hp to the wheels rather easily. It's a fucking week for 90's Jap supercars as I saw a forest green Supra on the highway yesterday. Damn I love those cars. Your 4W steering still works? Must have never seen any salt then.
My Honda Ridgeline's light for A12 (oil and oil filter) is lit but my current oil is only 2500 miles old. Are the notifications for this on an overall time or mile interval? Or is the light actually detecting something?
First of all, physically check your oil. Dipstick, rag, see if it's full or not. If it is... Does Honda have an oil life % display? Not sure if they actually monitor the oil or just use a mileage conversion against the time between oil changes. My girl friend had a Honda Accord that's check engine light would come on at around 5000 miles even if she had an oil change done that day by a non-Honda lube place. There's some type of reset that the dealership will do that many lube places didn't do. She learned to ignore it, or to at least remind the tech to reset it.
A lot of Hondas and other imports will light up the check oil light to remind you to change the oil based on mileage, even if they don't have an actual oil life % display. Usually (but not always) the manual will give you the procedure for resetting it. If the manual doesn't have it, find an auto forum specific to your vehicle and somebody there should be able to help. It's another way for them to persuade you to use the dealers for your oil changes.
There is an indicator in a lot of them that turns from green to yellow to red over a certain number of mileage to remind you to change your oil. I had a Civic that you could reset by pressing a little notch on the dash with your key, but your Ridgeline might not be that way. I know that my fiance's new Accord puts you through an act of congress to reset it.
I'm in the market for a new car, and I'm not really a car guy. Figured this is as good a place as any to ask for some opinions on where I should start looking. I have some background and preferences below. Want: large/large-ish suv. Priorities are safety, comfort, and interior room. I live on a ranch and it must be able to go light off-road, so 4-wheel drive is mandatory. I have to cart around a lot of crap with work, so if it has a third row seat (perfectly fine, if not preferred), it needs to fold flat or relatively flat. Obviously the lower price the better, but I'm willing to go up to about 45-50k. I expect probably somewhere around 45ish after tt&l. I have an in-law who basically builds engines for a living, and I'd like it if the vehicle was easier to work on, so we could do it ourselves vs. having to take it in, but this is a really minor thing. Currently have: Land rover LR3. Love the fact that it is heavy, responsive (handling-wise), safe, and an absolute fucking tank. Interior space-wise it's good; I usually drive around with both rows of seats folded down (so it's just us in the front), and I've filled it to the brim a few times. I'd like to not do that in the future. Hate the fact that it's very heavy on electronics -- my emergency break is a fucking button. Something's always going wrong with the electrics, and that shit is fucking expensive to replace. This is the only reason I will never own another rover. Used to drive: ram pickup quad cab. Loved this thing, was fine with the size, but unfortunately it became less practical with the open bed and once I met my wife and she started puking in it from getting car sick (it drove like a real truck), then it was game over for the old dodge. Looking at right now: Tahoe (I would go suburban, but for the price I'd rather have a decked-out tahoe than a middle-of-the-line suburban), toyota sequoia, nissan armada.
The Armadas are niiiiiiice but have fun working on a (newer) Nissan. No fucking thanks. Same thing with the Sequoia. New Toyotas are a pain in the ass. Since you've had and enjoyed a Dodge before I'd toss the Jeep Commander into the mix. The thing is a brick but man does it handle itself on rough roads. I had one as a loaner while my Wrangler was being fixed and it was a blast to drive. Just make sure you get the big motor in it. Also I'm partial to the Ford Expedition. You could get a very nice Limited model with leather and all the options for very close to $45k as a less than a year old certified pre-owned.
For those of you who helped me out when I posted about the problems with my truck a while ago, I thought you all might like an update. It turned out to be a multitude of problems, which was what made it hard to diagnose. Fuel injectors/filter needed to be cleaned/replaced, IAC valve was bad and the fuel pump in the front tank was at almost half of the psi it should have been. Needless to say, all of this did no good to the O2 sensors. My best guess is that I got a bad tank of gas at some point and it fucked everything up that it came in contact with. Thanks to everyone who rep'd and PM'd with advice.
Before attending the forest rally this weekend I was seriously considering buying a new Subaru STi. However after seeing the awesomeness that is the "soon to hit US shores" Ford Fiesta ST Turbo (driven by Ken Block) I'm reconsidering my impending purchase. I'm going to wait and see if Ford pussies out and delivers some half ass attempt at the car. According to the rally announcer this car is supposed to land here with power to compete with the STi & Mitsubishi Evo but I'd be surprised if that was the case at least on the first release. Also the douchiness of (most) STi owners at these US rally events is unbelievable. There's never a reason to be an auto elitist and certainly not a reason to be elitist about a Subaru.
The turbo version is AWD. Considering this is the first Fiesta setup for this particular type of rally it was pretty impressive. Block flipped the car on it's side on Friday nights night stage and his crew got it "running" enough to continue to run stages on Saturday. However the back bumper ended up being so fucked up that he had to withdraw with two stages left yesterday. The car looks sick up close. Wide wheel arches on the rear that give it a nasty dirt devil stance. I'm looking forward to seeing one without all the graphics up close.
In car footage of a guy I know tracking his Gallardo @ Pocono last week. Check out the FXX, my God it is loud and glorious. And just shows the Gallardo what speed really is. And some out of car footage:
Giant pieces of shit. So far in my new job I've gotten behind the wheel of the Cadillac CTS Coupe, Lexus IS350C, driving an Infiniti M37x this week then a 5.0 Mustang in 2 weeks. Will post up reviews once I'm done with all of them.
Piss me off. Engine swap on the race car is a little stalled, as the pieces from the old lump don't all work with the new one. Had to swap over the distributor (twin rotor), only to find out that it rotates in the wrong direction. (I could have sworn both engines were 964 based). Oh well... and the new distributor is currently stuck at the border, and me with a track day on Thursday. That just ain't going to work out well. But, looks like the team owner is going to be super nice and let me do laps in one of the team cars... as in the 800HP twin turbo. The best part is that we've just got a new, custom clutch installed into the thing, so it actually hooks up now. In the past, the only clutches we could find were rated to 500HP, so we'd go through them like crazy, and it'd take a few laps to get enough heat into them before they'd stop slipping. (Custom clutches were an option, but we couldn't source anything cheaper than $3,500 each... fuck that). Found a shop that custom built us a few, rated to 1,200HP, for $400 each. Major score. Just put the car on the dyno last night, and it's a whole new beast. Can't fucking wait to get it out on the track on Thursday!
The wife and I are going to start looking at new cars this weekend, and we're leaning towards a mini-suv. This is going to be the kid car, so we don't need much in the way of performance or fancy gadgets, but we do want reliability. We test-drove the Nissan Rogue, which I wasn't crazy about, and we're also considering the RAV4 and the Hyundai Tucson. Anyone have any experience with these?
My parents have a Hyundai Santa Fe, big brother to the Tucson, and it is an absolutely great suv, if i was in a market for one, that would be my first choice. The traction and stability control in the winter are great, the 3.3L V6 has more then enough power. Really comfy, the rear seats fold down flat, which is standard, but it really helps with the cargo area. I know a lot of people with the Ford Escape and they couldn't be happier with them, should take a look at those too.
The sales guys at my company are able to order Ford Escapes as their company vehicle, and I haven't heard a single one of them complain about them. They're definitely worth checking out.
I was wondering if anyone could help me with this. My father asked me to look online for a copy of the Lexus Diagnostic System kit software for the on-board computer systems. I'm not really sure where to look, after conducting a google search, I haven't found much. My father has found copies available for roughly $4000 or $5000 through Lexus, but was wondering if there were any cheaper versions available online, like the guy at Advanced Autoparts told him. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance.