First off, I am coming from a 2011 Infiniti G37x AWD Sedan with Premium/Navigation packages. What I was looking for in my next car was to lower my overall debt and monthly payment without sacrificing too much in the way of features. As I commute roughly 50 miles or more a day, bonuses would be an increase in gas mileage and ride quality.
I also wanted to get away from Infiniti's god-awful 7AT transmission which has been noted by numerous reviewers as well as Infiniti themselves in a public statement. It tries to mesh luxury journey shift timings with high-performance sport timings, and fails miserably. You're in 4th at 35mph, so stop-and-go traffic and city cruising are non-stop lurches and shifts. At around 23mph, the car does some weird things where it engine brakes when you hit the gas or lags for a little over a full second and does nothing. Really awkward when accelerating out of corners or in stop-and-go traffic. I had it serviced for the above 3 times and wrote a letter to Infiniti corporate, the response was always something akin to "it is what it is" and "that's just how the 7AT works". Keep in mind that a high-gear transmission doesn't have to suck - Chrysler has an 8AT with a 9AT on the way, and its smooth as butter. A web search for Infiniti 7AT issues will yield multiple forums with hundreds and hundreds of posts with users complaining of the same thing. It isn't just me.
I paid around $41,000 for my fully equipped G37x brand new pretty much when they first came out. Not the best deal, but I was rolling some negative equity which offset any savings on the car's actual price. My credit was not the greatest at the time and I was financed for 72 months at 5.49% to net a payment of about $670/month. I was also paying roughly $60/week in Premium gas and getting an average 19.2mpg mixed city/hwy. Range was roughly 360 miles on a 20 gallon tank.
Features I really wanted to keep:
- Heated seats
- Leather seats
- Turn by turn navigation
- Dual climate control
- Good sound system
Other cars I considered and why I didn't go with them:
- Lexus IS250 AWD
- What I liked:
- Ventilated seats!
- Turning circle of 34.8 ft. Better than the roughly 36 ft of my G37x.
- Lexus brand reputation which thus far in my experience has been a reputation of reliability and stability.
- What I disliked:
- Price. For safety and handling, and not sportiness, I would have wanted either FWD or AWD. In general, I dislike FWD, but it was a sacrifice I was willing to make. The Lexus IS line does not offer a FWD model, thus I only felt comfortable with AWD and going with AWD and the features I wanted I was already north of $42,000.
- The size of the left/right control parts of the steering wheel. Because of how I sometimes hold the steering wheel, I like to curl my index/middle finger and thumb around that part. However, the Lexus is fat in that area and it was uncomfortable to do that.
- 22mpg combined fuel economy.
- Lexus reliability was lower than Buick/Jaguar. What? Yes. I learned that Buick and even Jaguar in a lot of reliability ratings scored higher than Lexus over the last couple of years. I am still unsure what I think about this, honestly, but it was definitely interesting to hear.
- Infiniti G25x AWD
- What I liked:
- Pretty much the exact same car if I wanted it to be.
- What I disliked:
- Little to no gain in gas mileage (only 1mpg more). In loaner G25x's I'd driven, I was getting a combined 20.4mpg.
- Price approaching $40,000.
- Infiniti's god-awful 7AT transmission.
- 2012 Camry Hybrid XLE
- What I liked:
- Better road noise and wind noise versus prior Camry's.
- Technology dream, it made driving a fun game.
- Amazing fuel economy. I got a combined 38mpg in my test drive. Reviewers have noted getting as much as 48mpg.
- Price fully-equipped ~$33,500 with discounts dealers were willing to give me.
- Blind-spot monitor.
- What I disliked:
- Sound system was just mediocre.
- Premium navigation is impossible to find (then again, so is a fully equipped Verano, right now).
- Wheel well road noise was weird. Ride was generally pleasant, but when I would drive over water or a puddle I could hear it splashing as if my window was rolled down. It was odd.
- 2012 Kia Optima SX Turbo
- What I liked:
- Feature rich. Everything I wanted and more.
- Fully-equipped with dealer discounts and manufacturer rebates, I could get it fully-equipped for around $30,000.
- Gas mileage was nice, despite very little sacrifice in Horsepower/Torque.
- Styling. I really like the new Kia.
- What I disliked:
- Steering wheel was plastic and super slippery. On the test drive, I messed up a couple turns because it flat out slipped out of my hands.
- Head room is oddly off. I'm short, 5'4, and my head hit the ceiling if I was sitting up extra straight while parallel parking or something. I felt cramped in the driver seat despite my tiny stature.
- Brakes felt like stepping on a balloon. Way too squishy. I had a few super sudden stops on the test drive because I couldn't for the life of me gauge the brake feedback, and had to slam them to avoid slamming the car in front of me.
- Learning Kia is owned by the same company as Hyundai. I have a visceral dislike of Hyundai. It's probably entirely unfounded, but every recent-year Hyundai I've driven has been a bad experience and every Hyundai dealer I've dealt with has been blatantly unprofessional.
- Other cars in similar class: Probably not even given a thorough consideration due to dislike of brand or overall car styling. More than happy to provide feedback on a particular Make/Model if someone asks.
Now, the 2012 Buick Verano. New model for the 2012 model year for Buick.
What I got: Fully-loaded 2012 Buick Verano with a Diamond White Tricoat exterior and Coccachino 2-tone interior.
What I like:
- Price. Fully equipped I was looking at about $30,000 MSRP.
- Requires only regular gas, instead of Premium like the G37x.
- Range better than the G37x on only a 15.6 gallon tank (versus 20 gallons). Not bad!
- Styling (except for one piece), not too shabby. Hood scoop things are a little cheesy.
- Brakes seemed to provide feedback on-par with my Infiniti and leagues ahead of the Kia Optima. Other reviewers have mentioned the brakes feel mushy, but at least for the two Verano's I've driven I have not noticed this at all.
- 15.6 cu-ft trunk space. Up from 13.5 cu-ft. I can fit my golf clubs and then some quite easily.
- 18" factory Continental ExtremeContact DWS tires with the packages I chose. Up from the Eagle RSA 17's on my Infiniti which looked too small and offered a terrible ride (again, any forum search will yield how much people hate those tires), the Buick's fit the car nicely and offer a nice blend of grip and quiet ride.
- Ride quality. So quiet. So smooth (except for speeding over speed bumps...). Granted, I'm coming from a car meant to offer sporty performance.
- Let me elaborate on this a little. It's not just the pure decibel rating of the noise or the "quietness" of the noise that sets the Verano apart. Because, you can still hear things. What's interesting, but hard for me to explain, is that the noise you hear is easy to ignore. It's...muffled, but not gone. Audible, but not always quiet. But seems to only ever be in a frequency range that you just easily drown out, ignore, or don't care about. It's like they took the jarring highs and lows and compressed them down to a low quality MP3, then played it back under water.
- Auxiliary port. For some reason most cars these days that offer Bluetooth and/or USB connectivity, disregard the auxiliary port entirely. The Buick doesn't. Good.
- Gas mileage. So far I am getting a combined 26mpg up from 19.2mpg. Not too shabby.
- Remote start via keyfob up to 200ft away or cellphone even farther. Very cool.
- Bose sound system seems to be on-par with the sound system I had in the Infiniti. With the addition of a Mid-range tone adjustment.
- The chrome-ish things that extend out PAST the tail lights and onto the trunk. They look weird. Also, the trunk doesn't really shut or sit perfectly (depending on the weather I guess, because of the padding inside). Thus, where the chrome piece goes from the left/right rear of the car and out over the trunk doesn't always line up perfectly. And it is noticeable (to me).
- No brightness adjustment for the screen independent from the interior lighting. The screen is the right brightness to me when at its lowest setting. But at its lowest setting, the backlights for the console keys go off completely and then I can't see those.
- Due to my short stature, if I sit comfortably, I can't use the center console storage as an arm-rest because it is too far behind me. Darn.
- You can't adjust when the heated seats/steering wheel turn on via remote start. It appears to only be sub 45F degree temperatures, when I would probably prefer to set it at sub-60. Personal preference.
- Noise from the trunk area of the car seems louder than the rest of the car. I may look into Dynamat-ing it to see if it reduces that. It isn't bad by any means, but seems oddly inconsistent with the sound-dampening of the rest of the car.
- No lumbar adjustment. This is actually killing me. After a 70 mile drive yesterday my lower back hurt like crazy. I'm going to experiment with height/angle/steering wheel adjustments and see if I can lessen or eliminate this without needing to go buy something like a pillow to keep in the car.
- The left A-pillar is an incredibly terrible blind spot. It's thick, large, and always in your face. I find myself leaning left and leaning forward and to the right to constantly look around it. It seems for most of the places I go, it is in the perfectly wrong spot to block exactly the things or places I need to see. Aside from the non-existence of a lumbar adjustment, this is probably my biggest gripe with the car.
- No back-up camera. This seems like it would have been an easy thing to add and would not have cost *that* much extra. It is one of the bigger things I miss from the Infiniti. I am going to look into possible aftermarket solutions (anyone have recommendations?)
And there we have it so far. I will report more as time goes on.
No comments:
Post a Comment