Curmudgeons Unite!!!!

[François Pugh]

Stupid modern car mechanical designs!
It used to be you could change the fuel filter in two minutes, because it was outside on the fuel line where you could get at it. Now it's in the fuel tank. If you're lucky there is an access panel to open to reach where it exited the top of the fuel tank; if not you have to drop the fuel tank. It's bad enough they stuck the fuel pump in there.

And while we're at it, who's the car dealers' sycophant who decided cars needed electric parking brakes? Let's add 4 electric motors and the electric controls to all the other things that can, and eventually will, break down! Used to be a simple effective cable was sufficient. If you had a standard, you used it all the time and lubricated it once in a while. If you never used it because you had an automatic and putting it in park was good enough for you, you never used it and had it repaired when you sold the car so it could pass a safety.

 

[Delicious]

Stupid modern car mechanical designs!
It used to be you could change the fuel filter in two minutes, because it was outside on the fuel line where you could get at it. Now it's in the fuel tank. If you're lucky there is an access panel to open to reach where it exited the top of the fuel tank; if not you have to drop the fuel tank. It's bad enough they stuck the fuel pump in there.

And while we're at it, who's the car dealers' sycophant who decided cars needed electric parking brakes? Let's add 4 electric motors and the electric controls to all the other things that can, and eventually will, break down! Used to be a simple effective cable was sufficient. If you had a standard, you used it all the time and lubricated it once in a while. If you never used it because you had an automatic and putting it in park was good enough for you, you never used it and had it repaired when you sold the car so it could pass a safety.

And where's the damn CD player?

 

[Don in Morrison]

Stupid modern car mechanical designs!
It used to be you could change the fuel filter in two minutes, because it was outside on the fuel line where you could get at it. Now it's in the fuel tank. If you're lucky there is an access panel to open to reach where it exited the top of the fuel tank; if not you have to drop the fuel tank. It's bad enough they stuck the fuel pump in there.

And while we're at it, who's the car dealers' sycophant who decided cars needed electric parking brakes? Let's add 4 electric motors and the electric controls to all the other things that can, and eventually will, break down! Used to be a simple effective cable was sufficient. If you had a standard, you used it all the time and lubricated it once in a while. If you never used it because you had an automatic and putting it in park was good enough for you, you never used it and had it repaired when you sold the car so it could pass a safety.

Modern cars are one of the most extreme violations of the KISS principle I've ever encountered

 

[crgildart]

Stupid modern car mechanical designs!
It used to be you could change the fuel filter in two minutes, because it was outside on the fuel line where you could get at it. Now it's in the fuel tank. If you're lucky there is an access panel to open to reach where it exited the top of the fuel tank; if not you have to drop the fuel tank. It's bad enough they stuck the fuel pump in there.

And while we're at it, who's the car dealers' sycophant who decided cars needed electric parking brakes? Let's add 4 electric motors and the electric controls to all the other things that can, and eventually will, break down! Used to be a simple effective cable was sufficient. If you had a standard, you used it all the time and lubricated it once in a while. If you never used it because you had an automatic and putting it in park was good enough for you, you never used it and had it repaired when you sold the car so it could pass a safety.

Mine's just inside the fuel pump itself and not replacable. New fuel pump or GTFO..

 

[Don in Morrison]

I had to remove the fuel tank to replace a fuel pump once. After I was done, the gas gauge didn't work any more. I didn't feel like going through all that headache again, so I just started resetting the trip odometer every time I bought gas and always filled it up at around 200 miles. I did that for a couple more years before getting rid of the thing at around 150 K miles due to a dead transmission. I really missed having a car with the fuel pump stuck on the side of the block where it was easy to get to.

 

[Uncle-A]

I had to remove the fuel tank to replace a fuel pump once. After I was done, the gas gauge didn't work any more. I didn't feel like going through all that headache again, so I just started resetting the trip odometer every time I bought gas and always filled it up at around 200 miles. I did that for a couple more years before getting rid of the thing at around 150 K miles due to a dead transmission. I really missed having a car with the fuel pump stuck on the side of the block where it was easy to get to.

The worst I have run into was a leaking freeze out plug in between the block and the transmission. You had to pull the transmission to replace a $2.50 freeze out plug. I didn't do the work on that one myself it was because I was working 6 days a week at the time.

 

[dbostedo]

I miss getting out to turn the crank and get the engine going. Now you have this fancy electric starter gizmo that's just bound to break. And it's SO hard on the batteries!! Why don't they just keep things simple?!?

 

[mdf]

I miss getting out to turn the crank and get the engine going. Now you have this fancy electric starter gizmo that's just bound to break. And it's SO hard on the batteries!! Why don't they just keep things simple?!?

During the years Iived on a farm, we had an old hand-crank John Deere tractor. But instead of a crank, it had an exposed flywheel with ripples around the edge so you could get a good grip. Prime the engine and then give the top of the flywheel a good pull. Jump back on the seat and start feathering the choke.

(I never did get it started -- got a couple of coughs at most. One of my brothers could usually get it within three tries.)

 

[DanoT]

My 2019 Tacoma has a key ignition as the manual transmission trucks do not have push button start, but the key fob does have push button lock/unlock. I unlock the truck with the button, walk to the back of the truck, use the key to unlock, open, close, lock the tailgate. I then walk past the passenger door, with the key in my pocket, and as I do so the truck locks the door on its own. I DO NOT UNDERSTAND OR TRUST MODERN AUTO ELECTRONICS.

 

[SpikeDog]

I miss those triangular windows on the driver's doors. You could spin them almost 180 degrees to provide a blast of incoming air. Quite useful for cooling off or to dissipate a Schlitz beer fart. My old man would flick his cigarette ash out that little window, which would then reenter the car through the back window where I was sitting in the choice seat directly behind Dad where he couldn't easily hit you. Sometimes that hot ash would go down my shirt collar or up my sleeve if I was hanging my arm out. Sure it burned, but we were tough then, not like these little snowflakes today.

 

[scott43]

Phil needs to be sending you a Ski Talk hat for working in the words "Schlitz beer fart" into a thread..

 

[Posaune]

I miss those triangular windows on the driver's doors.

We called them wing windows. About 12 years ago I was paid to fly to Kansas City to drive an old pickup truck back to Bellingham for a friend's friend. It was summer and there was no AC in the truck, but it had wing windows. I was able to find a way to open a wing window in concert with the driver's window which made the wind blow right across the top of my bald pate. It saved me from dying of the heat. All I had to do was make sure I drank enough water to keep hydrated and, while not entirely comfortable, it made the trip bearable. I miss those things.

 

[Ogg]

We called them wing windows. About 12 years ago I was paid to fly to Kansas City to drive an old pickup truck back to Bellingham for a friend's friend. It was summer and there was no AC in the truck, but it had wing windows. I was able to find a way to open a wing window in concert with the driver's window which made the wind blow right across the top of my bald pate. It saved me from dying of the heat. All I had to do was make sure I drank enough water to keep hydrated and, while not entirely comfortable, it made the trip bearable. I miss those things.

The only vehicle I ever owned with those was a 1982 Toyota 4x4 pickup that I paid way too much money for without test driving it and it turned out to have a ton of mechanical problems for which I paid an overpriced shop to do half assed work on. I was young and stupid. My wife had tried to talk me out of it and it is why I will to this day take her with me to look at any used vehicle. The bright side is I got back most of the money I spent on it initially when I sold it, the downside is I paid 4x that much in repairs in the 2 years I owned it.
Picture of similar truck in the same color I found online:

ETA: I should note that despite being a complete POS it served me well in a few ski adventures that involved driving in some ridiculous conditions that I now would consider out of the question in the risk/reward balance.

 

[François Pugh]

I miss getting out to turn the crank and get the engine going. Now you have this fancy electric starter gizmo that's just bound to break. And it's SO hard on the batteries!! Why don't they just keep things simple?!?

I guess I'm not as old as you are; all my cars had electric starter motors, However, I want to know where they hid the kick-starter on my murder cycle.

 

[tch]

My 2019 Tacoma has a key ignition as the manual transmission trucks do not have push button start, but the key fob does have push button lock/unlock. I unlock the truck with the button, walk to the back of the truck, use the key to unlock, open, close, lock the tailgate. I then walk past the passenger door, with the key in my pocket, and as I do so the truck locks the door on its own. I DO NOT UNDERSTAND OR TRUST MODERN AUTO ELECTRONICS.

Yeah, and in my VW, there is NO exterior key slot, so when the fob battery dies or misfires, there's no place to put the key and open the door. Try coming back from an extended outdoor trip with a dead key fob and no way to get inside the car.

 

[crgildart]

And where's the damn CD player?

Oh man that 10 disk CD changer in the back or trunk was da bomb until MP3/iPod players arrived.

 

[dbostedo]

Yeah, and in my VW, there is NO exterior key slot, so when the fob battery dies or misfires, there's no place to put the key and open the door. Try coming back from an extended outdoor trip with a dead key fob and no way to get inside the car.

I'm willing to bet there's a hidden one somewhere for that very reason. Usually they are under part of the door handle that's removeable.

 

[Posaune]

All this newfangled high tech crap can just go away. I have a 2015 Subaru with a way to plug in an iPod for sound. So far, so good. But the damned system takes a long time to load up every time you start the car, and then to play random tunes from the iPod you have to push four buttons, three on the touch screen and one real one on the face of the sound system. The touch screen buttons are small and difficult to hit just right to make them work. Since it takes so damned long for the system to load up I'm always driving by the time I can turn on the tunes, so I have to take my eyes off the road a bunch to get the thing to work the way I want it to. Every time you turn the key it goes all the way back to square one, even when you have it working while the engine is off and you turn the key to start it. It's a PITA and dangerous.

I also have a 2000 Toyota Tacoma and it doesn't have a key fob, just a key, old fashioned locks with a button you push down, and a CD player plus a tape player. I'm in heaven with that vehicle. (However, it doesn't have wing windows.)

 

[mdf]

I'm willing to bet there's a hidden one somewhere for that very reason. Usually they are under part of the door handle that's removeable.

I had to help one of our friends figure out how to unlock her Volvo when the fob was dead. The key is hidden inside the fob and the slot is hidden in the trim.
My Subaru car battery died in these rarely-driving covid days. Fortunately it was unlocked, so I could open the hood to hook up the charger. But before my excursion to the garage I figured out how to get the mini-key out of the fob. It's obvious once you know, but a bit mysterious the first time.

 

[Joby Graham]

Yeah, and in my VW, there is NO exterior key slot, so when the fob battery dies or misfires, there's no place to put the key and open the door. Try coming back from an extended outdoor trip with a dead key fob and no way to get inside the car.

On my 2013 GTI there's a plastic cover over the lock cylinder on the driver's door (cover snd door are painted body color).. There's a slot on the underside of the cover that is the width of the key blade, so the key can be used to pop the cover off. Still a PITA, tho.