Any tools still made in the USA?

[Mark & Juanita]

nice attempt at condescension. Funny thing is AWD minivans aren't built on a truck body. I live off of an unimproved road -- it gets graded twice a year whether it needs it or not. When we looked to replace our Ford Explorer, we considered a minivan, but after having driven a minivan owned by a friend, we determined that there was no way such a vehicle would hold up for the long haul on our roads. On the other hand, since SUV's are built on a truck chassis, they are more likely to provide long-term service in this kind of environment.

It amazes me the vehemence some people have over what other people choose to drive.

[Charles Spitzer]

only some suv's are made on a truck chassis. a lot of the newer ones are built on car frames.

[mrdancer]

Maybe because some vehicles raise insurance rates and fuel prices for everyone?

Growing up with 13 siblings, I'm amazed at how my parents were able to get us around to everything in a station wagon. Our farm was five miles from the highway, subject to South Dakota winters. These days, it seems like most folks can't get their two kids across town on paved streets without an SUV.

SUV = Slow Unwieldy Vehicle :þ

[Mark]

Your the exception.

Maybe it's because you live in the sticks that you don't get to see how many SUVs are sold to people who would think your unimproved road an extreme off road experience.

[Mark Jerde]

East or west river? ;-) My brother & family are south of Reva, 6 miles from their next-door neighbor.

-- Mark

[Brian Henderson]

We do that constantly, thanks to the asshole in the oval office.

[Mark & Juanita]

yeah, right.

Funny thing is, the same people who are trying to kill SUV's are responsible for the rise of the SUV and the death of the station wagon. Station wagons died because the car mfg's couldn't meet average fleet mileage standards if they kept station wagons in their product offerings. However, people still had things they needed to haul that required more than an econobox.

[Michael Daly]

Interesting hypothesis. Problem is that vans used to be a fad and have always been outside the CAFE standards that you cite. They could have bought vans instead of SUVs or station wagons.

The real reason is that SUVs are a fad. Nothing more, nothing less. People buy them, so they make them. Utility, practicality, safety etc have nothing to do with it. Just like pet rocks, frisbees, hula-hoops etc. They will go away when the next fad kicks in. Only those who need them will continue to buy them.

Mike

[Charlie Self]

Mike Daly responds:

And minivans were always a perfect replacement for station wagons with more space, more easily rearranged.

I have trouble imagining what can be hauled in a station wagon that can't be hauled as easily in a minivan: I'm sure there's something, but I jsut can't think of what it might be offhand.

Yeah, well...almost everyone I know with a SUV bought it because it's "cool," which is probably one of the stupidest reasons (and one we all fall for) to buy anything other than an air conditioner.

Charlie Self

"Criticism may not be agreeable, but it is necessary. It fulfils the same function as pain in the human body. It calls attention to an unhealthy state of things." Sir Winston Churchill

[B a r r y B u r k e J r .]

You have exactly the right vehicle. I'm not talking about you.

My point was that the "soccer mom" market is driving the SUV designers to make them more and more car-like. Oddly enough, this makes the SUV less usable to people like you, who WANT the truck features. I also own an SUV that goes off-road, as well as an AWD car that stays on the road.

The soccer mom buys an SUV to appear outdoorsy, rugged, non-soccer momish. Why else would someone install "appearance only" bash guards all over the vehicle. The bash guards are right up there with the fake roll bars on the pickups of the 70's and 80's. It's all about apperances to them. Obviously, that's not you.

Barry

[Juergen Hannappel]

[...]

It's because the typical SUV convez the message (especially if equipped with "reinforcement bars" at the front): "I dont't care what happens to the people that i crash my extra heavy car into, as long as my laquer doesn't get scratched" Especially if the SUV's aggessive apearance is heightened by black paint or military background (like a hummer or jeep) it makes people want to fire a bozooka at it.

[George]

"Brush Guards" have saved my life, and the lives of a couple of my co-workers by taking the impact of a deer, and, as the upper bar projects outward beyond the lower, pushing the corpse underneath the ambulance rather than allowing it to join me in the seat. I have also entered vehicles where the former operator and the unwanted passenger were virtually indistinguishable bloody parts.

Oh yes - one was a Volkswagen.

[Mark]

Ass. My first car was a Ford Custom wagon with a 427, that bad boy would fly.

I think it has less to do with what a vehicle will carry and more what the driver/ owner is willing to carry.

[Doug Winterburn]

Howdja get 16 people safely in a station wagon?

-Doug

[A Dog Named Stain]

3 in the front, 3 in the middle, 3 in the back and 4 to push it through the snow.

[A Dog Named Stain]

through

As you can tell, math's not my strong suit.

[Silvan]

Personally, I can't stand them because most people who drive them are grossly unqualified to handle a vehicle that large and unwieldy. They also tend to bring out the worst in people, and I see people taking foolish, dangerous chances all the time.

In my opinion, formulated by years of driving thousands of miles every week, SUVs are in a class by themselves in terms of the danger they present to themselves, to other SUVs, and to everyone else on the road. They're followed closely by those little asshole generation X hotrods, and then by crotch rockets. Ironically, some of the very safest, most conservative and courteous drivers on the road are piloting Corvettes and Vipers.

[mrdancer]

West River. Gregory County - pheasant capital of the world. ;-)

Here's a funny true story. When I was going to college at SDSU, I had a classmate from Minnesota. One day he asked me where the town of West River was. I said 'huh?'. He said that a lot of people he has asked where they are from, reply 'West River'. He'd spent all night looking at a map of South Dakota trying to find the town of 'West River'!

[mrdancer]

Well, since there was 23 years span among us 14 kids, there usually wasn't more than a half dozen of us that needed to be anywhere off the farm at one time.

Besides, we didn't worry about safety (we grew up on a farm, one of the most dangerous occupations in the world). We didn't really know or care what seatbelts were. In 1978 my Dad got a 'town' truck that we could drive into town. He put a topper on it and hauled a bunch of us in the back of that when we went to town.

Living in muddy hilly river country, we got our first 4wd truck in 1984, although we never had much problem getting around in the snow with 2wd. That's kinda why I laugh at what so many people 'think' they need. They too often confuse want with need.

Btw, I wear my seatbelt religiously these days. I don't even think about it when I put it on - it's pure habit. I just feel naked without it.

[B a r r y B u r k e J r .]

Of course, your ambulance has REAL brush guards not the non-protective bling-bling pop riveted to a typical SUV.

My Jeep has REAL push bars and nerf bars. They attach to the frame and do their job very well.

Barry