5 ms·

SUVs are getting ridiculous. They are too wide and long for narrower UK roads and parking spaces but I keep seeing more and more, and they are getting wider.

LightG 5y ago
Cybertruck has entered the chat.
- MiddleEndian 5y ago
  Shaped like a wedge so it can not only slice through pedestrians, but also boxier cars like the Scion xB!
JumpCrisscross 5y ago
Why are SUVs so much more profitable than cars?
- akmarinov 5y ago
  You can charge disproportionately more than the resources you put in, since it’s bigger.
- colinmhayes 5y ago
  They cost more?
- gabereiser 5y ago
  marketing to suburban mothers. It started with "SUV's are safer" which then led to "SUV's can carry more" and the other option of "SUV's aren't minivans" to woo over the dads. Eventually it became the question of "can I afford to put gas in it?" as well as "do I ever want to go offroad?" (even if they never plan to). Car Talk gave an interesting history here: https://www.cartalk.com/blogs/jim-motavalli/how-we-got-here-history-suv-mania https://www.cartalk.com/blogs/jim-motavalli/how-we-got-here-...
  - bagacrap 5y ago
    My anecdata says women are as self conscious as men, if not more, about driving minivans. I've heard numerous women say they want/"need" to sit up high when driving but that's never been a reason quoted to me by a man. My sister chose an SUV because she was averse to the equivalent minivan (no reason given other than "it's a minivan"). Generally speaking if a car comes in coupe and hatchback form factors, the hatchback is more popular among men and the coupe among women (in the USA). Since hatchbacks are unequivocally more practical, the only explanation I can see for preferring the coupe is aesthetics. This would imply that statistically, women make car buying decisions more heavily weighted by aesthetics as compared to men.
    - gabereiser 5y ago
      Yeah. Now. Rewind back to the 90s, the soccer moms all had minivans. I’m not saying I’m right and you’re wrong per se, I don’t have the marketing data the car companies do to justify the positioning. I only know when I was growing up, all my friends’ mothers were driving the vans and their fathers drove the sedan to work. It’s a really weird juxtaposition that SUV’s have brought.
- Gunax 5y ago
  I think it's just the type of consumer. People purchasing non-sporty sedans are just plain, practical, price-conscious consumers. Perhaps a second factor is that Japanese cars dominate the market, and American manufacturers can only compete via competitive pricing (eg. compare the price of a Ford Focus and a Corolla).
  - bagacrap 5y ago
    how is a sedan practical? a wagon or hatchback is practical. It also happens to be the type of car used by 90%+ of the population in certain European cities.
- asdff 5y ago
  The ones that are based on truck platforms are probably super cheap for the manufacturer to produce. Then they throw on a leather package and let you connect your iPhone and they can get another 10k out of you.
- jahnu 5y ago
  Did there used to be a lower tax rate on vehicles over a certain weight because then they were classified as "working" vehicles or something like that?
  - rdtwo 5y ago
    Still true a F250 is cheaper to own in Seattle than a F150 due to over 6k lb exception for commercial vehicles
    - jahnu 5y ago
      A perverse incentive :(
- jxidjhdhdhdhfhf 5y ago
  From what I've heard, cost of building a smaller vehicle isn't that much less than a larger one since they tend to have a similar number of parts. So you may save some material costs but the cost of putting it together is similar. And the margins on a larger vehicle tend to be higher because people are willing to pay more for it.
bob1029 5y ago
Modern SUVs are increasingly scaring the shit out of me. I have driven a 2020 Lincoln Navigator and all the drive by wire nonsense completely removes any sensation from the driver that they are in this poorly-balanced 2+ ton death machine. At least in the 90s you could feel that the Ford Excursion had an 8.1L engine sitting right above of the steering rack. It gave you this visceral sense of the size and heft of the machine. For me, this made me respect the physics a hell of a lot more. Obviously, fly by wire is kind of mandatory once you get to a certain scale, but that is the entire point of my argument. If cars are getting so big that we have to add the equivalent of MCAS to make them feel more "driveable", then perhaps we are going in the wrong direction in a lot of ways...
- jahnu 5y ago
  I think it was Jennifer Ouellette who once remarked that "cars increasingly look like they want to murder me", or something along those lines. I think of that every time I see one of these huge things looming at me.

LightG 5y ago

Cybertruck has entered the chat.

MiddleEndian 5y ago
Shaped like a wedge so it can not only slice through pedestrians, but also boxier cars like the Scion xB!

JumpCrisscross 5y ago

Why are SUVs so much more profitable than cars?

akmarinov 5y ago
You can charge disproportionately more than the resources you put in, since it’s bigger.
colinmhayes 5y ago
They cost more?
gabereiser 5y ago
marketing to suburban mothers. It started with "SUV's are safer" which then led to "SUV's can carry more" and the other option of "SUV's aren't minivans" to woo over the dads. Eventually it became the question of "can I afford to put gas in it?" as well as "do I ever want to go offroad?" (even if they never plan to). Car Talk gave an interesting history here: https://www.cartalk.com/blogs/jim-motavalli/how-we-got-here-history-suv-mania https://www.cartalk.com/blogs/jim-motavalli/how-we-got-here-...
- bagacrap 5y ago
  My anecdata says women are as self conscious as men, if not more, about driving minivans. I've heard numerous women say they want/"need" to sit up high when driving but that's never been a reason quoted to me by a man. My sister chose an SUV because she was averse to the equivalent minivan (no reason given other than "it's a minivan"). Generally speaking if a car comes in coupe and hatchback form factors, the hatchback is more popular among men and the coupe among women (in the USA). Since hatchbacks are unequivocally more practical, the only explanation I can see for preferring the coupe is aesthetics. This would imply that statistically, women make car buying decisions more heavily weighted by aesthetics as compared to men.
  - gabereiser 5y ago
    Yeah. Now. Rewind back to the 90s, the soccer moms all had minivans. I’m not saying I’m right and you’re wrong per se, I don’t have the marketing data the car companies do to justify the positioning. I only know when I was growing up, all my friends’ mothers were driving the vans and their fathers drove the sedan to work. It’s a really weird juxtaposition that SUV’s have brought.
Gunax 5y ago
I think it's just the type of consumer. People purchasing non-sporty sedans are just plain, practical, price-conscious consumers. Perhaps a second factor is that Japanese cars dominate the market, and American manufacturers can only compete via competitive pricing (eg. compare the price of a Ford Focus and a Corolla).
- bagacrap 5y ago
  how is a sedan practical? a wagon or hatchback is practical. It also happens to be the type of car used by 90%+ of the population in certain European cities.
asdff 5y ago
The ones that are based on truck platforms are probably super cheap for the manufacturer to produce. Then they throw on a leather package and let you connect your iPhone and they can get another 10k out of you.
jahnu 5y ago
Did there used to be a lower tax rate on vehicles over a certain weight because then they were classified as "working" vehicles or something like that?
- rdtwo 5y ago
  Still true a F250 is cheaper to own in Seattle than a F150 due to over 6k lb exception for commercial vehicles
  - jahnu 5y ago
    A perverse incentive :(
jxidjhdhdhdhfhf 5y ago
From what I've heard, cost of building a smaller vehicle isn't that much less than a larger one since they tend to have a similar number of parts. So you may save some material costs but the cost of putting it together is similar. And the margins on a larger vehicle tend to be higher because people are willing to pay more for it.

bob1029 5y ago

Modern SUVs are increasingly scaring the shit out of me. I have driven a 2020 Lincoln Navigator and all the drive by wire nonsense completely removes any sensation from the driver that they are in this poorly-balanced 2+ ton death machine. At least in the 90s you could feel that the Ford Excursion had an 8.1L engine sitting right above of the steering rack. It gave you this visceral sense of the size and heft of the machine. For me, this made me respect the physics a hell of a lot more. Obviously, fly by wire is kind of mandatory once you get to a certain scale, but that is the entire point of my argument. If cars are getting so big that we have to add the equivalent of MCAS to make them feel more "driveable", then perhaps we are going in the wrong direction in a lot of ways...

jahnu 5y ago
I think it was Jennifer Ouellette who once remarked that "cars increasingly look like they want to murder me", or something along those lines. I think of that every time I see one of these huge things looming at me.