Hacker News Reader

Comment by p2t2p | Hacker News Reader

Ford said that they stop producing cars for US market some time ago meaning that they’ll produce SUVs and trucks only.

As a family person that runs to fruit market every several weeks and brings back a boot load of fruits in boxes it is hard to understand how a sedan can suffice.

Having said that huge SUVs are overkill too, something like Subaru Forester/Outback or RAV-4 seems to be the sweet spot for people with less than 3 children. With 3 children you start looking at something with 3rd row of seats.

View on HN

> boot load of fruits in boxes

Hard to believe that the 100 gallon boot volumes of a small sedan are insufficient for a weekly fruit&veg shop - let alone the 300 gallon boot of an estate car or the 400 gallon boot that a compact car has if you take the 30 seconds to lay down the rear seats before you load it...

And being a bit older, I do remember being driven into summer holidays with a family with 3 children, luggage and an inflatable rubber boat - in a Fiat 126 (half the length, half the width, and a quarter of the weight of today's giant pick-ups and Escalades...

https://photos.app.goo.gl/NkXauuz2vUALRafq6 this is what my wife goes through in two weeks.

That's boot of my Subi Forester and that is not the fullest it is ever been. During mango season we even take a bit of passenger space. That box of oranges is was 5 AUDs btw.

In the rest of the world you just fold your seats or stack your stuff better?

“Stack your stuff better” doesn’t sit well with soft mangoes and “just fold your seats” doesn’t sit well with children in child seats in the second row.

Practice is often different from theory.

Now having written that and looking at you user handle I realise that you might think that mangoes are firm and you can stack it.

Well, those firm mangoes you see in super markets are not ripe, they are green. Ripe mangoes we buy here in Australia are soft, you can damage them with you fingers and I would like to keep them for at least couple weeks.

My mom would haul enough mulch for our entire garden in a Taurus wagon, which was built on a midsize chassis

I fit 8 dining room chairs and accessories in my Leaf.

https://i.imgur.com/TzYt8Qi.jpg

I fit 4 chairs and a dining table in a Jetta. Only took the legs off the table.

It can be done, and it is done all the time all around the world. People just want to use their extreme case to justify both ways. We are saying “I fit my whole house in a fiat 500” and they are saying “I eat for 25 people every week so others must need it to”.

The reality is that people drive suburbans and Tahoes and they don’t even have kids just because they can. I hate to say it but the best thing that can happen to the US culture is expensive fuel. And I say this as someone who races cars as a hobby and would like cheap fuel.

> It can be done, and it is done all the time all around the world. People just want to use their extreme case to justify both ways. We are saying “I fit my whole house in a fiat 500” and they are saying “I eat for 25 people every week so others must need it to”.

I agree with everything you wrote in this paragraph in terms of SUV vs. compact hatchbacks, but I stand by the fact that if all large crossovers and small SUVs were replaced by midsized station-wagons the roads would be a better place and the drivers would lose no utility.

Then we both agree

Leaf is a hatch back, a good alternative if you want to down size and not ready to go to SUV. For electric stuff I'm waiting Tesla to start delivering Model Y in Australia.

Hatches are considered cars. Fords most liked car options were the sporty hatch versions of the fiesta and focus.

Hatches are essentially a downsized SUV. They are very different from sedan's when it comes to storage of goods. The positive is they generally can hold more stuff. The downside is that it is easier to access that stuff by unknown 3rd parties (break and enter).

The Leaf is a hatch back but it's very shallow. The total volume isn't that different than the Model 3 we have or an Accord I had in the past. The main difference is the configuration with the Leaf being shallow but tall.

To be fair most modern small & mid-size SUVs are the sizes of wagons with similar fuel consumption

I don't know about US but in Australia all SUVs are marked as "Wagon" in registration papers.

Just to be clear, they aren't stopping sports car production. They did end all sedans though.

They sure ramped it down though. No more Focus/Fiesta RS or ST stateside.

I’m guessing we’ll see ev equivalents for that soon enough.

Given that Ford gave its classic sportscar "Mustang" badge to an EV SUV rather than anything resembling a classic Mustang, Ford seems to be putting a lot of work into avoiding sedans/coupes even in EVs.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com