:yikes: OOOO
Are you suggesting that myself and those of us with blue landrover freelander 2s are really driving girly cars?!
:BlueTeamE
I wont stand for it I tell you. :AR15firin
I call my Toyota FJ Cruiser "the girly truck" because my grand-daughters like driving it so much, and because every other one I've seen around has a female driver.. And it has a fuel gauge which gives low fuel warnings with 100km to go.. Nevertheless it would give any other 4x4 I've driven a run for its money both on and off highway. It's actually comfortable for four adults and a kid in a baby seat for extended periods as I know from sitting in the back while my grand-daughters drove. Mine is a 2007 which I got over four years ago when it came off lease, and it's been incredibly dependable. Having driven the original FJ40 extensively, I'm not seeing ANY resemblance..
When I downsized I wanted something small which would work well for extended highway and which would get me anywhere I choose to go now and through our deep winter snow in town and on cleared logging roads - and the cruiser fits the bill. It's heavy so that it gets through snow, and so I live with the mileage which is about 24mpg highway, only a bit better than my old 3/4 ton. It'll handily cruise along way beyond any highway limit, and has lots of power for the bush. Visibility is pretty awful and turning one around on a narrow logging road with a huge drop off gets to be a real adventure.
Before the Cruiser I owned a 1990 Ford HD 3/4 ton with a 5L V8 for 21 years. I paid $20,000 base price for it and luckily an extra $1200 6 year extended warranty. Ford paid $27,000 to fix it on that warranty over the six years, so I didn't exactly have full use of my new vehicle. It also almost killed me twice in the first few months, the first time when I was coming back down a mountain with my friend and luckily the brakes didn't totally fail until we were on the highway. Whatever brake fluid they were using absorbed water which vaporized and caused air locks. The front brake issues caused by the callipers being held in place by hollow pins filled with rubber were something to experience. The thing is, once all the original cheaped out parts were replaced, the truck then worked darned well and I got to really like it. Good thing, too, as you'd know if you've ever tried to sell a 1990 Ford..
This little section of dirt road is the 1999
highway hill going into Bella Coola, and the bit of snowbank on the right is all that's between the truck and a 100M drop. I was on my way in to collect my ex-wife and head to Calgary for the kid's wedding. Unfortunately a big storm came in and I had to drive back up that in snow that night in order to get out before the road was closed - so a trip out to Williams Lake in a white-out.
When my grand-daughter first decided to come live with me and go to school here, she chose the worst ever year where it only stopped raining when the rain turned to snow in November. I guess the rain jacket is a clue.The only things to do outside were shooting from a shooting shed and driving. The bush was flooded and so were the rivers. Here she is driving around an old building and learning to use a manual gear shift. An hour of that and we were off on the logging roads. Luckily she never tired of driving so we had lots to do in the evenings and weekends. She never had any serious issues in a lot of driving.
That Christmas I drove her to Prince George for a flight to Calgary and returned home. At the end of the Xmas vacation I drove back to Prince George to pick her up and bring her back here as flights from this place went through Vancouver and were astronomically priced. 27 people died just on the piece of that road at this end during that time. So a big 4x4 with good visibility and tires is a good thing to have.
I gave the Ford to a friend for parts although except for a clutch it was working well. I figured it wasn't trustworthy for long trips with younger grand-kids.
I guess I'll finish later.
4x4 is inferior, but of the amount I use it it's good enough.
