Author Archive
Should I Buy a Car or Crossover?
The Honda CR-V (left) costs about as much as a Honda Accord (right), and offers about as much passenger space? Which would you buy?
The sedan is dead. By now, you’ve probably heard the dire prognostications for what was once the auto industry’s most popular type of passenger vehicle. The four-door sedan—long a staple of American motoring—has given way to the crossover SUV, and it doesn’t appear that consumers are looking back.
1985 Buick Electra
Which of the following events was more jarring? The addition of Elmo to the cast of Sesame Street, or the introduction of a front-wheel-drive Buick Electra? Both events, coincidentally, took place in 1985, and both events were met with a certain amount of grumbling.
2019 Ford F-150 with a regular cab and short bed.
It took a recent conversation with an old friend to jog my memory. But the more she talked, the clearer my recollections became. There was a candy bar sold in the mid Seventies called Seven Up, and I had purchased many of them back in the day.
Review Flashback! 1980 AMC Eagle
1980 AMC Eagle Sedan
I’ve long believed that if American Motors had been able to muster the capital to fully redesign its cars sometime around 1980, the company might have lasted well into the Nineties, maybe longer. Instead, AMC management—at the time already working with the company’s soon-to-be partner, the French automaker Renault—played a hunch, and built a line of full-time AWD passenger cars off of a long-serving existing platform. The result helped buy AMC a few more years, but in the end wasn’t enough to save the company.
Police Van!
2019 Chevrolet Express Police Van
Yes, Police Van! sounds like the name of failed Eighties cop action/drama series, but to General Motors, the van depicted above is an integral part of its 2019 police and fleet-vehicle product portfolio–and much to our surprise, it hasn’t been cancelled yet.
Review Flashback! 2009 Pontiac G8
2009 Pontiac G8 GXP
We lost Pontiac sometime in 2010. A few fleet-special G6 midsize sedans were made available as ’10 models, though many of them found their way into rental fleets before the end of 2009. After that, the lights went dark at General Motors’s Performance Division.
1960 GMC Bus
Per ride-hailing giant Uber, the company’s drivers provide patrons an amazing 15 million rides daily. And that’s just Uber–similar firms, such as Lyft, Via, and Juno, are shuttling plenty of people around as well.
Our Favorite Oldsmobiles (Gallery)
1954 Oldsmobile
There are two things that the Editors of Consumer Guide respond to faster than all other things. It’s not fire, threat of personal harm, or even the promise of paid time off that elicits prompt action.
Forgotten Concept: Honda T880
Honda T880 Concept
This is an installment in a series of posts looking back on show cars that we feel deserved a little more attention than they got. If you have a suggestion for a Forgotten Concept topic, please shoot us a line or leave a comment below.
1984 Hurst/Olds
If you were looking for a diverse collection of affordable sporty cars, you’d probably want to set the time-machine dial for 1984. You would be hard pressed to find a broader collection of fun-to-drive rides at any time other than the mid Eighties.
