Stuff I noticed on our 4600 mile vaca out west

The other thread got me thinking about what we witnessed over the last 7 days and 4600 miles. Wife and I left sat the 19 and got home sat the 26th. Spent that time in our 06 crew cab GMC starting out headed to Tucson to visit with the inlaws then weds headed north and eventually back east to Indy.

What I noticed was:

1.) Not a single Hyundai broken down on the side of the road or on a wrecker being towed.

2.) The #1 car brand we saw dead on the roadside was Nissan. Murano's led the list with about 9 iirc.

3.) I've never seen so many people on the road side with flat tires. Maybe what I'm seeing locally (people ignoring the fact that their tires are bald and dry rotted) is actually not a local phenomenon but a national issue.

4.) 4.8L crew cab 2wd trucks LOVE mountains. to the tune of 21mpg while we were climbing 10% grades. Even down shifting to 2nd to hold 60mph, she sipped away at the fuel.

5.) 4.8L crew cab 2wd trucks HATE flat ground at 80mph with 20mph headwinds. Friggin 20mpg average. I was more than a little unhappy, but all we could find was E10, so I expected to be a little lower on our economy.

6.) Texans do 2 things right: Steaks and sweat tea.

7.) Hawk LTS truck pads on 13" rotors are friggin AWESOME. 11" rear drums on a 5000+lb truck going down 10% grades are not so awesome. Time to find some better rear shoes.

8.) GMT800 2wd trucks have less body roll than any of my auto-x cars.

9.) a 19' long truck CAN be fun on mountain twisties. Rack and Pinion steering + wider than stock tires on light aluminum wheels and Magnaflow catback = Awesomeness.

10.) Kumho KL51 tires are amazing for something this large. Super grip, no noise and smooth as butter at stupid speeds.

I think that's about it.

I just drove to Indy and back from vermont. One really strange car related observation. I think every Pontiac Bonneville has gone to Ohio to retire. I swear I saw dozen's of them, and I can't remember seeing one in Vermont in the last 5 years.

Did see a Cobra car meet in Ohio on our way back, that was cool to see.

wifer than stock?

Does that mean they've stopped putting out and complain a lot more?

Wifey and I spent the same time in Yuma, Az; then up to Kingman, toured Rt. 66 a bit and saw Vegas.

Gas is cheaper.

It's hot, dry and flat until you get in the mountains then it gets hot, dry and rocky.

Forget Italian food or pizza.

Dust devils.

Cobalt rent a cars suck.

Antiques out west are WW II and later.

Sometimes at night it's so quiet that yor ears ring.

PHeller wrote: wifer than stock? Does that mean they've stopped putting out and complain a lot more?

d'oh! Fixed that!

I love a good road trip. Did you see anything truly crazy? People are weird, and seem to get weirder as I get further from home. Maybe it's just me...

Later this summer, my wife and I are about to lay down a 4300+ mile (I'm trying to squeeze in a stop at Pikes Peak after seeing Rupert's pics from the hillclimb) road trip.

We're doing it in the turbo Miata.

We WERE going to go to pikes peak. Wife had a serious issue with altitude at 11,700 feet.

Believe it or not, about the craziest thing we saw was an 04-06 Acura MDX with a monster roof box, tow hitch flat carrier with stuff piled to the bottom of the rear window, the rear hatch area packed to the cieling and 4 people in it riding hte rear bumpstops tryting to climb the Berthound Pass outside of Granby.

We had 0 traffic. It was like the early Reagan years on the roads where no one was out. Not a single traffic jam. In fact, on our first day we AVERAGED 67.9mph from the time we left until we stopped in amarillo 1016 miles later.

Bobzilla wrote:

PHeller wrote: wifer than stock? Does that mean they've stopped putting out and complain a lot more?

d'oh! Fixed that!

You might want to reconsider raving about "sweat tea", too. I doubt Texans would like that much.

Sounds like a good trip!

sounds like fun.

i've been told that the cvt's on the muranos like to take a dump just outside of the powertrain warranty and are non-serviceable, ie. remove & replace is the only option.

20mpg into a 20mph headwinds is damn impressive. on a trip to big bend in my xterra with a 30ish mph crosswind i got around 15mpg on one tank at 75-80mph

^ if our truck got 15 while TOWING I would be upset. Our worst tank was 18.9, but the one following was 20.9, so I figured that is was a poor fill from the previous fillup (19.9 on that one).