What makes this your car?
1997 Mazda Miata. Simple, reliable, easy to repair, incredible aftermarket support, huge community with a ton of knowledge, and an absolute joy to drive.
Plus the headlights go up and down.
I’m daily driving a '92! ☺️
Subaru forester and I’m not a lesbian. It’s just a solid if boring car.
You’re not a lesbian yet
That joke never gets old …… when I first got mine, I happened to be wearing flannel and drove to Maine with my wife. So many lesbian jokes, but my beard was a bit more literal
Toyota Hilux. A nice blend of not too uncomfortable but will carry me anywhere I choose to go. Seen a lot of places that thing.
Wish they were still sold in the US. I spent so much time trying to figure out how to import one from Mexico and get it on the road. Quite possibly the toughest consumer vehicle of all time
I drive a 2018 Subaru Forester. I got it because I wanted a SUV with AWD and a turbo charger. My previous vehicle was a Camaro, and while I loved driving it, having a RWD car in the winter sucks, and I had recently bought a house, so having a vehicle that can carry more than just groceries made sense.
I was driving the Camaro around Xmas time and there was a light dusting of snow on the highway. I hit a patch of it and started to fish tail, and that scared the hell out of me, so I traded it for the Forester the following fall. The Forester has handled any conditions I’ve come across so far like a champ, including heavy rain, snow, ice, and muddy hillsides.
Trading the Camaro in and getting the Forester marked the transition (in my mind) from being a young adult, to becoming an older, more sensible one. I was driving home from work one day, and a Camaro passed me on the highway. I couldn’t help but sigh and ask myself why I had to get old. The Forester is a good vehicle and very nice (got the XT Touring package), but the Camaro was way more fun to drive, and I still miss it. I’d like to get another sports car in the future, but we’ll see if that happens.
Tires make all the difference. Both the size/proportion and materials.
I’ve had RWD cars that were beasts in the snow (East Coast ice no less) because they were near perfect weight distribution and had the best winter tires on the market (Nokian).
I’ve had AWD cars that sucked, because the car was poorly balanced, the tire sidewall was too small (so the tire can’t flex much), entry level winter tires (rubber was harder), and stupid electronic traction control that tried to out think the driver but just got in the way.
RWD will still usually be more challenging to drive than AWD (I think even more so with RWD cars post 2000), though some AWD systems can be unpredictable. Part of the issue with newer RWD cars is the tire sizes - it can be hard to get proper winter tires (plus they cost a lot). I’ve seen some cars for which winter tires didn’t exist, or were exorbitantly expensive to get (it’s assumed by both car and tire manufacturers that these cars won’t be driven in snow).
Fortunately Subaru uses a dead simple AWD system (basically open diffs at each end) - the most complex thing they do is use the brakes for traction control/torque distribution, which is less likely (In my experience) to get in the way than things like electronic diffs (can you tell I’m a fan of Subaru AWD?).
2001 Toyota MR2 Spyder. Bone stock except for a LSD I dropped in when a bearing grenaded in the transaxle. It was my daily driver for a long time.
2003 Subaru WRX. It was my daily before the MR2, but I blew the head gaskets around 200k miles and got the MR2 while I rebuilt it. It’s now lifted, running a 2.5l ej25 with the stock 2.0l heads. It’s become my fun car that I use to tow stuff with and take out when the snow makes the 2-seater convertible impractical.
But now we mostly drive my girlfriends 2022 Honda Accord Hybrid. It’s bare bones low end model, but she likes it.
Excellent taste. I had a silver bugeye, one of the prettiest cars ever in my opinion. Was my first actually fast car. Those MR2s are rad as well, poor man’s Elise. I’m a Miata driver, they feel like kin.
Honda Fit. It’s tiny but mighty. I call it a bisexual car because it fills all the holes when looking for parking. City car, but it gets around.
2021 Chevy Bolt. Traded in a 1999 beater for it during the gas pipeline crisis. It’s a wonderful, simple, cheap car. I haven’t had any issues with it - it just gets the job done. I charge it for free at work every week or two, so I don’t even have to pay for fuel. I figure I’m gonna drive it til the bottom rusts through or the batteries die.
Good luck on both. My 2017 bolt has 321,000kms on it, driven in very rough winters and charged every day in cold weather, every other day in summer. Still gets 450kms in the summer. Still doesn’t have rust anywhere on it. No repairs, just maintenance (minus one front spring). My daughter’s likely taking it once she gets her license in 2 years.
2022 Polestar 2 with all the options. I think the Polestar is super cool, and I didn’t want to replace my Tesla with another Tesla. I got it used last August for $36k, because used rentals were flooding the market. This car goes for $70k new, but it is not worth anywhere near that
Daily: 2011 Subaru STi wagon. It’s fun, speedy, has excellent traction for the mountains and snow where I live, and can transport 4 people with snowboarding gear.
Fun: 1955 Caddie. My great uncle bought it new so this is nostalgic.
Moto: 1982 Yamaha XS650. I use this for joy rides in the mountains and to save on gas
I have a 2021 Seat Leon FR PHEV Hatchback.
It is basically a Spanish VW Golf.
I got it one and a half years ago as my first car after getting my license at 35.
As a first car it is very luxurious, as a daily driver at 35 it is comfortable but highly annoying (every cabin control is either in the infotainment, or on touch surfaces (some without lighting) which forces you to take you eyes off the road to set cabin temp, Turn on heated rear window, turn on heated seats and more).
It is mine because I bought and paid for it.
Bicycle, because fuck traffic.
I haven’t driven in over 20 years—my current personal transportation is a pair of freeskates.
2015 Honda Civic SI - best sports car I could get for the price. Great value car; still running perfectly almost 10 yrs later (afai
kct). The interior was also much better compared to others.Probably not getting a new car ever due to all the “smart” features cars come with that I really don’t like.
When I was stationed in Germany with the US military in 2010, I wrecked my car in a blizzard. It was totaled; I couldn’t drive it anymore and I needed to get to work every day, so I dropped cash on a used 2006 Mazda 3. It was a 5-speed manual and was in immaculate condition. The former owner had detailed journal entries and receipts for every bit of maintenance they’d ever done. They were only selling it because they had more cars than they needed at the time and they needed some quick cash.
Fast forward to 2020… I was stationed in Nebraska and my Mazda 3 was finally showing its age. I had driven it across most of Europe and half of the US, and its mileage was approaching 200K. I was in the market for a new car.
I found myself “deployed” to South Carolina for 4 months during the pandemic, and while I was there, my wife called me up and asked if I wanted her to buy a new car for me. Apparently, some married friends of hers bought a brand-new 6-speed 2017 Mazda 3 Touring Edition as their daily driver to college classes. But their entry to college was delayed a few years, then the pandemic hit and all classes moved online. So it was just cluttering up their garage. They had 5 cars and hardly drove any of them, so they decided to sell 4 of them during the pandemic.
The 2017 Mazda 3 had only 7,000 miles on it. And they sold it to me for $17K cash. It was a helluva deal! I sold my 2006 Mazda 3 to a coworker and my wife bought the 2017 version for me. And I’ve been driving it since. It’s way nicer than my older version, and the previous owners had even paid for some upgrades to the base car.
I’m retired now, since 2022, and I don’t need to drive as much as I used to, but I always take my 2017 Mazda 3 when I leave the house. I enjoy cruising around in that car. It’s not a super fancy luxury car, but it’s the nicest car I’ve ever owned. I’m hoping I can get a solid decade or more out of this car before I need another one.
Toyata Matrix. It gets me around. Keeps me out of trouble.
I sold my matrix recently, nice car, good gas Mileage, plenty of space to haul stuff when the seats fold down (I somehow hauled a 53” tool box in it once). Little weird the trunk is plastic, but has tie down rails. I miss the car a lot, but I moved out of state and could only drive one car.
