|
About Me
Isn't this meadow soothing? Let's pave a road through it! I'm James Riswick and these are my random thoughts published daily. Recent Posts
Categories
Links
CarSpace Thoughts from the CurbCar Reviews, News and Random Thoughts from Edmunds.com Automotive Editor James Riswick Dec 29, 2008 - Thanks Mom and Dad!
After posting the Top 10 Cars I Want for Christmas, I went down to the garage on December 25 to discover this little beauty. I jumped for joy, I praised several dieties, I may have kissed it a couple times. Sure, it was the No. 2 choice, but I suppose the Aston DBS was too tall an order. But good criminy my parents know me. It was my favorite color combination and for better or worse I love the Targa. And I guessed Dad figured I'd want that new fangled Doppleganger transmission or whatever (I wouldn't, but that's OK). When I went back upstairs I gave Mom and Dad a huge hug and said thank you 23 times. I then exclaimed jubilently, "You read my blog!" "What?" Dad said. "You own a log?" Mom countered. No, sadly this was not my Christmas present. Though I did get the super edition DVDs of Casino Royale and The Dark Knight (the latter co-labeled Le Chevelier Noir in Canada). I guess that's still pretty cool. -James Riswick
Dec 22, 2008 - 2009 Ford Escape in Canada
Greetings from Mississauga, Ontario. The hometown of one James D. Riswick. I'm up here on Christmas vacation and to get around this frozen tundra, I enlisted some help from my friends at Ford Canada who set me up with a 2009 Ford Escape XLT 4WD with the 2.5-liter four-cylinder. Other than being a way to get around, this is my first time experiencing the Escape's new four-cylinder. It's now enough to move the thing, but it's constantly moany and unhappy sounding. There'll be more Escape thoughts as the week goes on, though. To pick up the Escape, I went through what I figure to be a true Canadian right of passage. Getting the keys from the confused Sunday morning security guard at Ford Canada HQ, I marched out into the uncleared parking lot (there was about 20 cm of snow on the ground) to find the Escape covered in powder. There was a good 50 cm of snow built up in between the Escape and the Flexes beside it. With the ice scraper and brush Ford was kind enough to provide, I cleared off as much of the car as I could -- including the roof -- to avoid being one of those jerks who drives down the road providing an extra dose of blizzard to those driving behind. It took about 10 minutes, but I finally got the car cleared. Some would consider this a pain in the ass, but I live where it's 72 degrees and sunny during the 51 other weeks of the year. I can clear off one Ford Escape on week 52. But holy crap was it cold. The in-car thermometer read -14 C last night (do your own conversion) -- and to think we were just shivering in L.A.'s record-low 48 degrees Fahrenheit. Wimps. -James Riswick
Nov 13, 2008 - Where's the skill?Where's the pride in driving? It seems that there's only a few of us left who regard driving as a persuit worthy of perfecting. It's not about clipping apexes or maintaining a dramatic slip angle; it's about care and dedication and, to a certain extent, ego. How many times in the last week have you seen something stupid on the road? Either a botched lane-change, rash indecision or a paniced and needless brake application. My guess is so frequently that you've lost count. I know I have. It's rare these days to see a confident paralell parking job. A smooth acceleration. A decisive lane-change. Things that require thought, skill and execution. It's rarer still to see any of these things come from a driver who isn't obviously one of us. Sure, there's nothing to be gained from driving well. And even your passengers may not notice that you've perfected downshifting and braking to a level where the water won't spill from a full cup sitting on the dash. But we'll notice, and most importantly you'll notice, and you'll know that you've done something because anything worth doing is worth doing well. -mike magrath
Oct 16, 2008 - Behind the Scenes: Surprising Success at Edmunds Track Day
For insurance reasons, the Edmunds family takes a day out of every year to complete drivers' training. This year as last, we went to Willow Springs Raceway to complete our training requirement with Danny McKeever's Fast Lane driving school. Naturally, our enormous editorial team differs in its driver skill level, with some benefiting from more basic car control training, while others being capable of teaching the darn class. With that as a scale, those in the upper half deemed "more advanced" drivers spent most of the day on the Big Track at Willow Springs in McKeever's fleet of Celica GT-S retired race cars from the annual Toyota celebrity race at Long Beach. I was in that group, however, unlike most of the other editors, I had never been on the Big Track and my track time in general was quite low. Needless to say, I was the Milka Dunno of this Indy 500. Quite to my surprise, though, I managed to keep up with the pack quite well. Sure, Josh Jacquot and a few others blew past me at points, but they should. Most of the time, Mike Magrath and I kept pace with each other -- him pulling away from me at certain tighter portions of the track and me catching up on faster, bigger turns. When editorial newbie Mark Takahashi passed us both, we managed to pick up the pace even more as we started to learn from the lines of a more experienced driver. That's certainly a good plan of attack, although tips from Chris Walton and the McKeever driving instructors helped as well. After our Big Track time, we followed up with some laps on the slower, but more technical Streets of Willow and several turns on the skidpad in a rear-drive car. Go to the below blog entry to see what we did next. -James Riswick
Oct 16, 2008 - Behind the Scenes: Monumental Failure at Edmunds Track Day
We later wrapped the day with three driving competitions. I was placed into the Champagne Driving course (pictured) where a tethered tennis ball is placed in a Champagne-glass-like saucer atop the hood of a car. The goal is for a two-person team to smoothly go through the course quicker than everyone else without the ball coming out and each driver taking a turn at the course. Accepting the fact that we had no shot against driving pro Josh Jacquot (who ended up not winning), photographer Scott Jacobs and I decided to adopt an opposite approach: If we're not going to win, we might as well monumentally fail. I brake-torqued the car on launch, but the Altima 2.5's CVT acceleration was so sluggish a beach ball wouldn't have rolled out. I then braked late into the first curve and chucked the car ever-so-not-smoothly into the first corner. No luck. A quick left followed by an abrupt right finally got the ball out of its perch. I then had to jump out of the car to replace the ball (hurt by the Altima's auto-locking doors), got back in and "tore" off for the end where I performed a late full-ABS stop to no tennis-ball avail. Jacobs basically duplicated my run to equal (non) success. We finished the course together with a time of 74.69 -- the next worst team was 60.09. I'd say that was monumental failure. So mission accomplished for the day. Both in terms of actual driving training and experience, as well as purposely driving like crap. -James Riswick
Oct 6, 2008 - Nissan GT-R to Vegas: Avoiding the Stupid Agricultural Checkpoint
As I described over on the Long-Term Blog, I took our 2009 Nissan GT-R to Las Vegas this weekend. Yes, I was there only three weeks ago, but when a GT-R presents itself, you gotta go somewhere. Speaking of which, last time when I was in the Dodge Journey, I ended up in about 40 minutes of stop-and-go traffic in the absolute mid-point of desert nowhere. Was it an accident? No, it's the stupid California agricultural check-point in the absolute mid-point of desert nowhere near Yermo, Calif. Mike Schmidt ran into this in the R8, where they basically slow down the entire highway for no reason at all. Well, there's supposed to be a reason: preventing foreign agricultural diseases, bugs, etc. from infiltrating California's crops. Except I have never been stopped at either the Arizona or Nevada stops -- and I've crossed upwards of 40 times. All they do is just wave you through since checking every car for rogue celery and oranges would make the highway back up to Salt Lake City. So if you can't really inspect, and you don't really inspect, then why have the damn inspection thing in the first place? I actually had an apple in the car when I went through in the Journey -- I nearly rolled down my window and threw it at the guy waving us through. So anyway, after last time, I vowed to never sit in that stupid traffic ever again. I noticed on the map and when sitting in traffic Yermo Road sitting a good 200 yards away from the highway. So I got off at Harvard Road and turned right onto Yermo. After about 1/4 mile, my thought was, "Riswick, you're a moron." The pavement on Yermo Road was only slightly smoother than the Rubicon trail, it looked like something Nissan had on their proving grounds. With the GT-R's hyper-stiff suspension, my girlfriend and I were basically in a paint can shaker and the "road" noise was deafening. Given this and the fact I had to slalom pot holes, I was restricted to about 60 mph and even that was an adventure. I looked over at I-15 and it was still moving...and faster than me. Moron. But then the road improved dramatically about 3 miles in and I-15 came to a screeching halt for the agricultural checkpoint. Now I was flying past everyone and everything. The moral of the story? Agricultural checkpoints are ultimately stupid. Yermo Road is a lifesaver -- just pick something other than a GT-R if you don't want to be shaken to bits. -James Riswick
Sep 29, 2008 - My Very Own Jack-O-Lantern!
I've been driving a Jack-o-lantern since last Wednesday. I picked it up at this pumpkin patch in Moorpark, where it was the prized choice of the bunch, bigger than anything I've ever seen before. I hollowed out the center using a Caterpillar back hoe, then adorned it with stylish red eyes and a licence plate for a mouth. I then crowbarred the Nissan badge off our GT-R and named my jumbo Jack-o-lantern after my favorite X-Men character. That Anna Paquin sure is hot. I think her nameskae pumpkin looks just as swell. -James Riswick
Sep 15, 2008 - 2009 Dodge Journey on a Journey to Las Vegas
Don't stop believin' that Chrysler can turn things around. Well, you can believe all you want but I have grave doubts after my second weekend in Dodge's new midsize family crossover, the 2009 Journey. This time I took the Journey on a journey to Las Vegas, precisely 549.2 miles there and back. On and in said Journey, things became quite clear. Like the Grand Caravan, the Journey offers the right size with a bunch of nifty features. Filling roughly the same footprint as a RAV4, there was more than enough room for three people plus some light luggage. Like the RAV, there's a third row seat, but it's useful only for children. The second row slides fore and aft, and reclines. It also features pop-up child boosters, although lacking a child, I didn't try those out. We did try out the second row under-floor cooler, though, along with the DVD entertainment system. The beverage cooler in the top glovebox didn't really cool my beverage, sadly. So, the Dodge Journey has things to offer. But like the Grand Caravan, the execution is horrible. OK, it's not as bad as the Caravan -- nothing broke or warped. But the interior is bad. The overall design looks like they gave the reigns to a car designer who had been lost on a desert island since 1991. The gauges look OK with little LED lights, but they're housed in a back to the future rectangular binnacle. The touchscreen "utunes" stereo interface is located next to your knee, below the climate controls. This is apparently because of a structural crossmember, but who cares? The placement is wrong. The materials are also wrong. Much of the dash features squishy soft plastic, but then the door tops and armrests are hard. The seats are also hard as rock and completely shapeless. And then there's the engine. My R/T tester came with the top-of-the-line, 3.5-liter V6 that produces 235 hp. The zero to 60 mph time is 9.2 seconds and it felt every bit as slow on the mountainous Vegas route. Typically, the transmission is too eager to get up to sixth gear, but at least Autostick was there to keep it in fifth. That didn't exactly help fuel economy, which is inevitably the Journey's killing blow. I averaged a mere 20.2 mpg on the journey (versus the 22.3 the trip computer was telling me), which is below the EPA estimate of 23 but I credit the difference to the terrain and traffic rather than my lead foot. However, if I'm going to get that type of fuel economy, I'd much rather drive our long-term Enclave or Flex that are much larger, much nicer and much more powerful, (Heck, I basically got the same mileage from the just-as-slow Honda Pilot, which is a helluva lot more comfortable.) Or, if I'm going to get that type of acceleration in a vehicle its size, I'd much rather drive a Honda CR-V that is more fuel efficient and better built. Needless to say, I don't like the Journey. A good idea here and there can't help sloppy execution everywhere. -James Riswick
Aug 18, 2008 - Different Ford Flex, Different Wilderness, Different Country
Hello from Canada, home of myself and the Ford Flex. I'm up here in Toronto on vacation and picked up a 2009 Ford Flex SEL AWD fresh from the Ford factory in nearby Oakville, Ontario. I grew up about 10 minutes from there and frequently drove past the sea of mostly Windstars. Today, it's a sea of Ford Edges, Flexes and Lincoln MKXs -- much better. Last month, I wrote that I thought the Flex was the best family crossover. After another weekend driving up to another cottage country (in Southern Ontario rather than Southern California), I still believe it. I actually better enjoyed the ride afforded by the SEL's smaller wheels, rather than the bigger one's in our short-term Flex tester and our new long-term Flex. Since I drove it up to Kashagawigamog Lake for a family get-together, I got a chance to get the Flex's pulse from a gathering of 16 Riswicks. The general concensus was quite positive -- everyone thought it was very cool, from my 55-year-old uncle to my 14-year-old cousin Cooper. I was most impressed by the latter, since having a kid (who is way cooler than I was at his age) thinking a mom mobile is cool is definitely a good thing for the Flex's fortunes. I also had a woman in a Jeep Patriot take a camera-pic while driving, while numerous people walked up to check it out. The only thing I've driven recently that gets this much attention is the Challenger, Smart and R8 -- and none of those are as comfy and useful as the Flex. And now for a touch of Canadiana. I give you the Flex parked in front of Canada's Smallest Jail in Coboconk, Ontario.  -James Riswick
Jul 7, 2008 - Town, Country & Proving Grounds
It seems that I keep doing goofy crap every time I set foot in our long-term Dodgey Grand Caravan. Let's see, I discovered it was a hotlap disappointment at Willow Springs, I sat backwards in the backseat for no particular reason and this past weekend, I added some patriotic flair to the craptacular cabin. So, two weeks ago when I hit Chrysler's Proving Grounds with every Chrysler vehicle at my disposal, I knew I had to do something fun with the Caravan. Well, actually it was a Chrysler Town & Country, which means it adds a dabble of light-colored wood to the cheap plastic parade. I admit, the below video isn't exactly goofy, but it does show what the proving ground's highway course is like. Notice the different surfaces from asphalt rumble strips and cracked concrete to the horrifically paved portions. The latter is particularly noticeable since the camera starts bobbing up and down like I was ridin' the high seas. For the record, this actually was accomplished on a closed course, although the professional driver bit is up for debate. Either way, don't drive and shoot video at the same time kids. -James Riswick
|
