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Comment by WarOnPrivacy | Hacker News Reader

> 89 BMW ... and an 83 Land Cruiser

I'm with you. Our daily drivers are 2011 Mitsu, 96 Toyota, 92 Buick and a 63 Dart. Also a 61 Sunliner for when it's not-summer.

The Mitsu is unfortunately drive-by-wire; I mostly avoid it.

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The Cybertruck is the only vehicle on the market that has drive-by wire. There was previously an Infiniti model that was partially drive by wire.

I'm guessing that car is "drive-by-wire" via the throttle, which has not been an actual cable in most cars for decades at this point. Steer-by-wire is indeed just the cybertruck at this point afaik.

electronic throttle body controls are extremely common, yes. but they don’t have any downside to driving feel, so i don’t think it would fit what the GP was referring to.

Parent nailed it. I feel lag every time I hit the pedal and it messes with me.

It's cables for me but I'll settle for linkage.

Almost every early electronic throttle like that drives like pure ass, and newer ones are hit or miss at best. Toyota seems have done a decent job with it, but everyone else kind of keeps pooching it.

That falls in with a lot of stuff that felt like it might have made sense on race cars that I don't understand why people keep asking for on street vehicles (drive by wire throttle, CVTs, huge wheels with rubber band tires, certain kinds of traction and stability control, viscous coupled or electronic "all wheel drive" (not 4WD), along with the Subaru boxer 4 people get Stockholm syndrome over); all I can figure is that people are just OK driving stuff that drives and behaves like total shit.

How large is your family? Why do you need so many cars?

People who have many cars usually don't do it because of necessity, but because they love tinkering with the old automobiles.

At peak teenager/young adult time my family owned six cars. That's for two adults and three driving-age kids. The sixth car was something my dad, who was an old-school motor head of the sort who grew up using feeler gauges, just kept around for no obvious reason but to tinker now and then.

Bingo.

> How large is your family? Why do you need so many cars?

I live with my 5 adult sons.

We also buy cars when deals show up. The Toyota had 41k for $500 and the Buick had 31k for $1300.

We're working on a cheap 88 Dodge P/U; my son converted it to points and carburetor.

We also have a 69 XL that seriously needs to go away. It does 130 at what feels like high idle.

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