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Sedans Luxury Lounge
21518 messages, Last post on Dec 05, 2009 at 10:07 AM
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Replying to: lexusguy (Jul 05, 2009 8:27 am) I went over to Infiniti website to check the specs on the EX. I liked every thing I read except for the ladder style option package pricing i.e. to get one package require another. |
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Replying to: lexusguy (Jul 05, 2009 6:44 am) The obvious one is the Honda CR-V... but after the whipping Honda took with their Accord hybrid, they are probably a little timid... although I really expect we will see a hybrid or diesel version of the CR-V at some point in the near future. Toyota's original Highlander could have evolved in that direction, as it was a reasonable size, IMO, but they decided to make it much bigger. I still think the Highlander is a very good choice, however. When it comes to larger vehicles, like SUVs, I question the Honda IMA system... I suspect that Toyota's system is more capable and better engineered. The Honda IMA system just assists the engine, and the engine never completely disengages, while the Toyota system is a more genuine hybrid in that the engine completely disengages and the vehicle is more capable of running on electric alone. The differences in the systems is quite possibly the reason that Toyota has been building the Lexus RX hybrid and the Highlander hybrid for quite some time now while Honda is still trying to figure out how to play catch up. If I was going to buy a hybrid SUV again, I would have to say that the Ford Escape hybrid is pretty good, but I bought it due to my daughter's desires. I personally might be more inclined to consider the Toyota Highlander hybrid. TM |
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Replying to: lexusguy (Jul 04, 2009 7:43 pm) I think I'm gonna have to say that you're biased. The RX450 has the fuel economy, the AWD (kind of) and the space, but that's it. Every review I've read has described it as the Blandtastic 4(50). 0-60 in less than 7? Nope. Nimble, IS style handling? Uh, no. The A4 Avant can blow through the cones at 70mph, and hold .86g on the skidpad. The RX450 trundles through at 58mph, and can hold .76g. I'm sure feedback, on-center feel, and proper weighting in cornering from the wheel is also el-zilcho. It may be more exciting than the last one, but that's like saying that French Vanilla ice cream is more exciting than Vanilla icre cream. LG, have you test driven the RH450h yet? After you do so, I will welcome your honest opinion. Given the criteria that 2001gs430 has stipulated, I do not believe there is a car out there that would be a better fit for this criteria. I am not sure that the RX450h can go from 0-60 in less than 7 seconds (I think it is rated at 7.2, but I could be wrong). If not, who cares? The acceleration is more than good enough. Also, I think that the styling is nice. It does have some subtle differences from that of the RX350. For example, the front grill is wavy and looks sharper. The handling is much better than the previous generation, it is very quiet, very comfortable, and the steering smooth. Here is something else to chew on. We just flew back from Seattle a few hours ago. I could not resist. I took it for a nice test drive of about 30 miles around the city. The environmental conditions were ideal with temperatures in the mid to high 70's and fairly low humidity for this area this time of year. The AC was off. Guess what I got for gas mileage? You will not, so I will tell you....46.4 mpg. I was traveling at between 30 and 50 mph most of the time, but I did have to stop at numerous traffic lights. I'm sure that in the real world, (turning the power off for stops to grocery store, etc., very hot or very cold) the mileage will not be this awesome, but I am very impressed with what I have seen on this test. I had it on the ECO mode and I tried to follow the common sense rules of driving to save fuel. BTW, the HUD (Heads Up Display) is fantastic now that I know how it operates. I love the navigation guidance on the HUD. Also, there is NO doubt about it. The voice recognition system on this new generation is SO much better than the previous one. I paired my G1 phone on the system quickly. While I was driving I thought I would try to place a call to my son in Seattle solely by voice recognition. I went through the process and said "dial by number". I announced the number rather quickly and it worked flawlessly. There was no way I could have done this with the previous system on the first try. Sometimes, I could not do this at all on the RX400h. Everything about the RX450h is far superior to the RX400h.
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Replying to: cyclone4 (Jul 02, 2009 3:47 pm) Charlie, You know my position on oil.Take away a bunch of hedge funds (and CNBC cronies that support them) trying and failing to make oil a currency (which results in all of us paying artificially high prices) and oil wuld be lucky if it was at $45 a barrel right now. I'll bet you we don't consume as much oil as we did last year until 2015 or so, if then. With so many businesses switching to natural gas and more and more hybrids and efficient cars that are coming we are going to need serious economic improvement to get back to last years consumption levels. We are certainly going to need a better economy than the over-leveraged one we had in the years leading up to 2008 and with business shrinkage and the nations savings rate growing, it's going to be many years before we get there. Meanwhile hedge funds fears of inflation keep getting in the way of that with them driving us to artificially high commodity and food prices thanks to a lot of senseless speculation. The only way to get commodity prices to levels those funds want, and to keep them there is by having support from natural business fundamentals. There's been a huge draw on hedge funds already and if Obama throws some regulations there, we'll see a lot more drawing of money from the funds. That and fixing the leverage allowed in many of these small commodity markets will go a long way to correcting prices so that they are more in sync with real demand fundamentals.
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Replying to: ljflx (Jul 05, 2009 7:49 pm) Len, don't get me started on those "CNBC cronies". They are digusting. Instead of doing their job and report the business news, they constantly editorialize so that the common folks are forced to get their biased (and much of the time) wrong views. They really tick me off. Having said this, FOX News is even worse.
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Replying to: cyclone4 (Jul 05, 2009 8:04 pm) Agree. Fox news originally started out in the right direction, IMO, with good intentions... but then took a very wrong turn, and is clearly misguided. BTW, nice review of your recent 30-minute dirve. Very impressive. Oh... Regarding oil and gasoline prices, regardless of what analysis we use and blame we place, or trying to determine what the price of oil and gas should be... when it's all said and done, the bottom line is ultimately the actual real-life price itself. TM
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Replying to: cyclone4 (Jul 05, 2009 7:48 pm) No, in fact I've been so bored with Lexus as of late that it's been quite awhile since I've driven any of them. When we get closer to turning in our X3, I'll take one out and let you know. The Q5 still remains at the top of the list, but if my wife doesn't like it, I suppose another RX could be a possibility. Still, I have to wonder if the $5700 premium for the 450 over the 350 when both are equipped with the premium/NAV package could ever be made up in a reasonable amount of time and mileage. I think both versions look like a block of cheese, so I'm not particularly interested in the grille treatment. My biggest concern with the RX is on-center feel. I don't expect it to load in to corners or provide the feedback of an Audi setup. The RX300's steering was so incredibly over-boosted and so full of Aunt Jemima that you had to constantly seesaw the wheel just to keep it in a straight line. The amount of on-center slop was just atrocious. The most recent Toyota product I drove was a new Camry SE, and the steering was basically identical to our old RX300. Hopefully the new RX is a bit better than that. |
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Replying to: tagman (Jul 05, 2009 10:32 pm) You honestly believe the natural price of oil would have been in the $70's last week, $64 and change now in a natural market which showed no signs of oil consumption required to bring prices up from the high $30's and low $40's. Do you really think $147 was a natural price a year ago at this time? Just look at the timing of the Goldman report (which BTW was released a week earlier than it was supposed to be in order to offset a horrendous inventory report that would have crushed prices). These commodity markets are all small and easily manipulated thanks to 20:1 leverage ratios allowed in them vs 2:1 in the much much larger stock and bonds markets. The Goldman report was released early in order to catch a lot of shorts who bet on a bad inventory report and it came in even worse than the shorts hoped for. I have a hard time even thinking of oil as a "real" market. This market dropped 78% last year in less than 6 months. This year s/b a lot better though as the fall from the high should be a mere 40-45%. You want to make money. Just buy oil as soon as Nicaragua starts getting mentioned and note how it's never mentioned during declines. Get out of it ASAP when the ink dries up on Nicaragua terrorist news though.
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