My wife and I manage a resort in the high Sierras in California. 3 miles to a ski resort and 1 mile to an amazing lake surrounded by 160 ft trees. We are the closest ski resort and Alpine lake to all of Silicon Valley in the south part of the San Francisco Bay Area. Modesto, (the size of lansing Michigan) Monterey, and Santa Cruz, allof Silicon Valley and Livermore and Pleasanton plus Berkeley and San Francisco itself are our main feeded cities that use this area.
45 miles "up the hill" from here is a 9,650 ft pass. Very steep grades with a very very twisty roadway. The SVX is just the thing!
The nice part of my day (now that the pass just opened up after 7 months of deep snow)... is to zip up the road and fly over the pass to the Marine base on the other side of the mountain where they do mountain and snow training. The car is taxed pretty heavily, the road is between 12 and 26% grade most of the way. The brakes smoke even when I have to slow to 20-30 on many of the hairpin turns... still the car flys when it is kept in the 4-7k rpm range.. And then after the steep part is passed it settles into a graceful gliding feeling. A lot of g forces from all directions and a lot of actual flying as it lifts off the road here and there as it goes over the ups and downs of otherwise semi straight sections.
It's nice.
On the flats headed to LA or SF on the western side or Reno or Las Vegas on the eastern side... the car truely gets 28-29mpg. Overall even with beating it while going over and back over the pass, it still gets 18-19 at the worst.
I can live with that. And yes the highest octane the better.
There is one fun section of hiway near my home. It's a divided hyway 4.5 miles long, in the middle of Nat'l Forest land... normally empty except on busy weekends... its got a downhill grade of about 4% and is straight and "flat"... my 0 to 60 time on that section is 5.2 seconds, the 50 to 130mph time is 7-8 seconds. It's kind of fun.*
6,000 ft elevation.
600 inches of snow this year.
60 miles to the nearest bank.
I have a Tuxedo 92 all stock. 141k. New Goodrich top of the line, new trans 3 years ago by the 75 yr old I bought it from. Garage kept, gently driven - until now.Just picked it up a few months ago.
We've got an Exporer V8 w/ every oprtion, (to do towing and have a bit of big car luxury - got it used dirt cheap Its solid and nice but most of our driving (until now) is in our 2000 Forester and 95 2.2 Legacy wagon. Can't live w/o awd here. Seriously.
The svx was just for fun and its turning out fine. This bloated 2.2 is beginning to impress me.I love that it's non interference and has a reputation for reliability. Sounds nice above 4k rpm too!
Mywork: half the year I do work w/ hybrid design in Michigan and the Univ of Toledo where I have an office.
The hybrid of the future will be an electric hybrid, but trust me: it won't have a battery or ultra-cap. t will get 45-65 mpg and will accelerate at the rate of a Ford 5.0. Trust me the car of the future is closer than you may believe. You do not need big "cubes" for a 0-60 time of under 6 seconds. A 1 liter 3 cyl piston engine w/ v-v timing and the right "black box" is all you need, trust me.
Anyone care to guess what they think it might be?
Question for anyone with an opinion: Im picking up another svx w 114k on it. I has messed up dull white paint. Im totally open to suggestions about what color would look good. Not interested in hyper flashy (havent had a ticket in 15 years)... maybe 100% pearl white? ...can't decide
* Funny thing about Subaru: I just spent almost 2 years living in a log cabin in the forest outside Ann Arbor. Had to have my Outback and Forester there for sure. Sold the 2001 Outback to a neighbor who fell in love w/ it.
Trusted the Subi's for the ong drives in sub zero weather everyday. Never a problem. (71miles to the office at the Univ of Toledo 4 miles of dirst forest roads then interstate the rest ofthe way)... I met many Subaru owners in Ann Arbor... it turns out that the Legacy and OB is 85% American content now! Many ex GM parts makers fromthere are now making American made parts for Subaru... Funny part of the story: the Chevy and Ford Pickups are only 65% bc the engines (and more) are from Mexico and elsewhere, the Dodge PU is even lower.
soooooo. if you want to wave a red-white-and-blue over your ride... you gotta drive a Subaru! Funny stuff.
