Tag: jalopnik.com

Folks, the cars are too expensive. The average new vehicle transaction price hit nearly $52,000 recently, and average payments are up to lucky number $777. It gets even worse from there, though, as those high payments are paired with ever-increasing loan terms: 23.9% of new-car buyers are now opting for loans of 84 months or more. …

Design is my favorite aspect of the automotive world. As a little kid it was how they looked that got me into cars, which led to me pursuing a degree in car design. Since I decided to become a writer instead, design is still the thing I love to talk about the most. Interviewing actual…

Mazda built around 1500 of today’s Nice Price or No Dice Miata ‘Shinsen’ special editions for the 2003 model year. Let’s decide if that makes this one’s asking price a special bargain. For more than half of the automotive era, the ability to operate a manual transmission was an expected skill of drivers, as that’s…

Only one major international rally raid has risen to the standard of household name. Even people who don’t know very much about racing have heard of the grueling Dakar. The first one kicked off the day after Christmas in 1978, with some 182 vehicles convening at the start line in Paris. Only 74 of them made…

Surveillance resources like automated license plate readers (ALPRs) in the right hands with the proper authorities should be used for catching real criminals of real or heinous crimes, not personal “shiny” new interests. But without proper guidance or laws to keep unlawful surveillance from happening, we end up with situations like this former Florida deputy who used…

There are many components underneath the hood of a car that can make a bit of a racket, groan, or vibration when they either need servicing or full-on replacement. Rod knock is a catastrophically bad issue that creates a horrendous noise, and is caused by one or more of the piston connecting rods making hard…

Even with all the power and modern technology available in modern supercars, 269 miles per hour is an almost-impossible speed to reach in an automobile on public roads today. And nearly ninety years ago, it was an engineering feat of astonishing proportions.  In 1938, Mercedes-Benz built an enclosed streamlined version of its Grand Prix racing car,…

The short answer is, yes, you can buy retired road signs — and if you’re lucky, you’ll find a pink one. The long answer is you’d better be darned sure they’re retired. And the even longer answer is that it’s a bit messy in how signs get retired in the first place, and who then…

For many folks across the United States, now sure would be a great time to have a brand new car for around $300 per month. Buying a new car is a more expensive prospect than ever before in human history (again), and dealers are combating this trend with predatory loans that lock buyers into exceedingly…

Car radiators are differentiated primarily by the number of rows. Each row has a cooling tube where hot coolant flows. Meanwhile, each row has fins to absorb and dissipate heat via airflow. More rows mean more tubes, and more tubes mean stronger cooling since more hot coolant can flow into the radiator core. More rows…