Auto Update

So, as of Wednesday, thanks to Obama’s brilliance, I have a new black Subaru Outback. It’s a bit sad that the Jeep had to be prematurely laid to rest. I was rather hoping to drive it until it flat out fell apart, but passing up on $4500 trade in for a vehicle worth $500 would have been foolish.

Despite knowing about the CARS bill for months, it still caught me off guard because it went into action a little more than a week earlier than expected. I thought I’d have the weekend of July 25/26 to test drive the Compass. I went to a dealer late Friday, but the one available in Grand Rapids was already sold. I called around on Saturday but could not find a manual transmission within 300 miles of Grand Rapids to test drive. This kind of helped me make the decision for the Subaru since I wasn’t going to buy a car I had never driven. I had previously driven the Subaru in both automatic and manual transmissions and knew I liked the manual.

The Subaru is a base 2.5i, with manual transmission as mentioned. The base Subaru came with a couple of the “essential” options that came with the step-up Jeep, the most notable of which is cruise control. The notable features that I would have been willing to get the step-up Subaru for are alloy wheels and fog lamps, which I may upgrade myself along with adding a class-II trailer hitch.

Over the weekend I test drove the 2010 Outback automatic transmission which, new this year, is a CVT. I’m typically not a fan of CVTs, but I’ll say that they did a very nice job with this one. There was no need to mash the throttle to the floor to get acceleration and it was overall smooth and responsive over the standard driving speeds. The problem with it is that CVT’s really aren’t meant for towing and the 2010 auto has it’s tow rating reduced to 1000 lbs., a weight that is limited by the transmission and one which I’m likely to approach when I do tow things.

One last note, it’s a change going from the Camaro to the Subaru. The Camaro has a V8 and an almost excessively hefty transmission. The Subaru has a H4 and a comparably delicate transmission. It feels much more like Josh’s civic and makes it nice for casual through town driving.