I suspect that nearly everyone reading right now has been in this situation before: you’re talking amicably about car and car-adjacent things with people, and it’s all going great, a vibrant exchange of ideas and thoughts. Then it happens: someone says something that you know to be factually wrong. You can feel the inaccuracy in your gut. Do you derail the flow of the conversation to correct it, or just let it go? I was just in this situation recently, so it’s fresh in my mind.
I was taking the $500 Toyota Sienna David so kindly gifted me/ditched here over to a shop to get it properly aligned. The Sienna is fantastic, by the way, way better than a $500 car has any right to be, but it still needed an alignment. While talking to the guy at the desk about the Sienna and other car stuff, he said something that stopped my brain like holding down the reset button on a game console: he told me that things were worse in the car-servicing biz now that BMW owns Ford.
Uhh. Buddy. BMW doesn’t own Ford. BMW owns Mini and Rolls-Royce, sure, but Ford? No. I couldn’t even think of where he may have gotten that idea; it’s not like, say, Toyota and BMW, who collaborated on the new Supra, so you may see BMW-stamped parts in a Supra. I can’t think of any BMW/Ford collaboration other than the recent EV charging network thing.
Confused, I asked, “Wait. You said BMW owns Ford?” just to be sure I heard right. And, yes, that’s what he said, and elaborated on that a bit, noting that there were BMW parts in Fords now.
So, at this point I’m wondering should I correct him? And if I do, will I need to state my status as a Bigshot Professional Automotive Writer Person-Human to give my correction the required gravitas? Or will that make me just look like a jerk? And will my correcting this guy make him feel demeaned and embarrassed in his own shop?
I mean, some things you have to correct – safety stuff, of course, if someone says you can use old pie tins as cheap brake rotor replacements, that you should correct. But if someone is talking and says that the Pontiac Tempest’s Rope Drive was licensed from Saab, do you need to correct them?
Oh, and I didn’t correct the BMW-owns-Ford guy. It just didn’t seem right to do that to him at the moment? Besides, I don’t think him thinking that will really hurt anybody.
I mean, I sure as hell would want to, and if it was someone I knew pretty well, I would. I think in most situations I would, but there are times where correcting a minor inaccuracy maybe just doesn’t feel worth it? Or is truth the only real arbiter? I mean, when I am wrong about something, I want to know! Correct away!
What do you think? Do you correct every wrong thing you hear, or should you just let some things go? Tell us what you think in the comments! Hell, correct people with the wrong opinions if you want! Have at it!
Can’t be bothered anymore. They will argue with you, get annoyed, give you the look that implies that they think you are an idiot. Used to try to correct people, but life is just too short. I’ve lost count of how many 289 or 440 Corvettes, 302 or 427 Dodges, 454 Fords, and 455 Chevelles that have crossed my path. There are dozens of other examples, but life is still too short.
If at a car show and they seem to be unarmed, and receptive to possibly unlearning a wrong. So pretty much never.
On this website I will wait approximately .1 seconds to correct someone whether I know what I’m talking about or not.
Otherwise, I will correct people if I think they’ll actually care. Most people don’t so I keep it to myself.
In Jason’s example I would bait the guy into making more statements and entertain myself by hearing what else he has to say. Then laugh about it later while telling my wife who will care even less and just ignore me for the most part.
I think you might be married to my wife.
I’m a little scared by how many of the comments on this piece give “haha wife bad” energy
A friend of mine had to correct someone on car things once. It was a salesperson, and he was in the middle of a test drive of an SVT Focus. The salesperson kept talking about “the supercharger this, the supercharger that.” Until he finally said “uh, this car has no supercharger” and went on to explain what was done to the engine to raise the power levels.
I always correct the salesperson when I know better. Their willingness to get the right answer tells me a lot about them. Plus it’s my own little Ron Swanson “I know more that you” moment.
When you hear this again and again and again.
“I don’t need winter tires because:
-I have AWD/4WD
-I have all seasons tires
-I have offroad tires, look at that tread pattern!
-It never really snows around here that much*
…”
*even though we get freezing temperatures and cold pavement
Don’t a good number of A/T and M/T tires are rated for mud and snow? Does that make those tires winter tires?
Are A/T or M/T tires with the three-peak mountain snowflake rating considered winter tires?
If so, would someone saying they have off-road tires and don’t need winter tires be automatically wrong? Or is it more of a *needs more information* type of thing?
What do I know?
Not much. We don’t get much winter weather around these parts. I’m really asking, because I don’t really know.
You are correct, three peak are winter rated, whether they be road or offroad, but not all off road tires are three peak. People make the assumption that aggressive tread pattern makes them good in snow, and it can help, but winter driving is much more than snow. Winter rated tires are formulated to stay pliable at much lower temperatures, which aids in traction (and more important, braking) even on dry roads when it’s cold. Ice is also a condition to consider.
The main reasons people run two sets in places with more than one season is the winter rubber will wear faster in warmer temperatures and not last as long. It also has poorer warm handling characteristics as the treads will squirm. Interestingly good summer rubber often performs better in the rain. Something that I’ve really never had explained to me why.
The one that really irks me is the “I have AWD/4WD so I don’t need winter rubber”.
My answer to that is “so you have 8 wheel brakes?”. Collisions rarely involve not being able to move. Not being able to stop is definitely a bigger factor. Stopping distance can be the difference between a hit and a miss.
At a guess, summer tires can have larger tread gaps that allow better water clearance and can be optimized to prevent hydroplaning. That definitely does not optimize for winter. Winter tires typically want to grip snow, so the features are smaller and less straight lines (think winter sipes)
Generally only on dangerous things will I correct, even then I try to do it in private.
Car company ownership incorrect, meh.
Rarely, if ever. It’s not my job to disabuse people of their stupidity and it often leads to conversations I’d rather not be having.
Kind of like trying to tell someone that Jethro Tull is not a real person. And he does not play the flute. Not worth the effort most of the time.
Man, I wish he’d worked with Pink Floyd & Led Zeppelin. What an amazing trio that would have been!
Well done Jason!!!!
https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/01/electric-cars-cheaper-china-than-america/677290/
Generally speaking, I will correct people, as a public service feature sort of thing. There are some people though, when they say something as totally outre as said alignment dude above, I will pause, and reflect on the direction of their vibe, and then give them some rope, asking for elaborations, to tease out the extent of their apparent batty misapprehensions.
I say “apparent”, because occasionally, I will learn something which expands my consciousness, and puts the seemingly false statement into a perspective where it, in actuality, is not exactly wrong.
My only caveat here, is never take advice from Mike Tyson on licking toads.
Even if he seems convincing.
Correcting people is pretty much clinically involuntary. I’m sorry. My wife knows I’m sorry. At least one of my friends does it too, so we end up fun facting each other, and at least we’re content to learn stuff and are reasonably aware of our own blind spots.
Everything about that topshot just rocks, from the kidney grills to the generational hilarity of the thought that a man would be in the passenger seat consulting a map.
Depends on who it is and how off it is. If a customer calls a wheel a “rim,” my eye will twitch slightly, but I’ll let it go. If it gets much more egregious than that, I’ll make a gentle correction because sharing automotive knowledge is literally part of my job. Emphasis on gentle. If it’s a friend or family member, I will correct them with a good natured ribbing on top. If it’s my husband, I will enjoy a good moment of smugness with the correction because I am truly insufferable.
My fiancee calls wheels “rims” and it drives me insane. I’ve tried explaining why the correct term is “wheels” but it just makes him frustrated, so I’ve given up. I guess in his circle growing up people called them “rims,” something I never encountered.
“Rims” is slang that was very common during my younger years. At least when I was growing up the word rims usually referred to basic steel wheels and was meant in some manner to distinguish from fancy or specialty wheels (think Cragars, Campagnolos, BBS, etc.). Usage of the term, and I’ve been guilty more than a time or two, is more an indication of being from an older generation than it is a display of automotive ignorance. In the modern day I might still call plain old steelies like you’d find on a base Maverick “rims” but I’d never use the term for most wheels on today’s cars.
This one is hard for me, because in Swedish fälg means wheel and hjul means wheel+tire. And those two words are always translated as rim and wheel, which makes this change in meaning hard for my brain to wrap itself around. Not helped by the fact that such a sizable proportion of Americans use “rim” to refer to the entire metal part of the wheel assembly.
What you call rim would be fälgkant, or “rim edge” whether translated by me or by Google translate.
Same distinction applies in Dutch (velg), German (Felge), whereas Rad or Wiel includes the tire. In Italian, cerchi and cerchione and ruota seem to translate to wheel, rim, and the entire assembly in a slightly different manner. Never realized before how differently various languages define these concepts!
Yeah you’re going to have to help me with this one. I’ve always understood wheel to be (metal) rim + (rubber) tire. If you’re calling the metal part a wheel how do you differentiate between the component and the assembly?
Edit: obviously the rim is only the outer edge of the metal piece that connects rubber to hub. But for >99% of vehicles the edge cannot be separated from the spokes, so it’s not likely to cause confusion.
Well, the rim is the actual rim of the wheel, as opposed to the spokes or the barrel for example. That still applies for single piece wheels
This doesn’t really bother me. And this is surprising, because I am autistic and have ADHD, which basically means I am a card carrying pedant.
While being a teenager in the 1990s, the term “rims” was super common slang for fancy wheels, such as the oversized chromed out spinning car jewelry popular in hip-hop videos. At least in my area. It eventually became common parlance to refer to any wheels as rims.
Personally, I say wheels and tires to refer to those two respectively. However, if someone says rims instead of wheels, I don’t bat an eye. Interchangeable terms to me.
Does serve as a signifier the person might not know a ton about cars, so I tread carefully. I’d rather not alienate someone by making them feel small for not knowing, because I’d love for them to become interested and want learn all about it some day.
None of this is a critique. Just sharing my perspective to add to the conversation.
I’d correct him, but I’d do it in lol, that’s not how it works, but sure.
At that point, if I’ve hooked them, they can ask and we can proceed with the the lemonade stand or flower shop as an actual business conversation.
Or if they don’t care, we just drop it.
It’s like arguing Trump vs Biden in Utah. If they want to engage in an intellectually honest conversation, sure I have a few minutes. If not, we don’t have to talk.
However, there is one topic where we should correct everyone on.
Automatic HVAC controls and menu embedded controls vs physical control switches.
AC on 24/7, fan speed set on automatic, and recirculate turned on to save fuel f***ing sucks.
The 5 most important ventilation controls
should all be manual controls all the time, no exception. more often than not, people don’t need AC on esp when recirculating works just fine. That alone will save lots of fuel in day to day driving.
I despise that auto climate control always sets my fan to gale force as soon as I start the car. I rarely run the fan above half speed by choice unless I need it for heavy defrost/defog. I always leave my system set to manual.
It’s infuriating in the winter when it tries to run the heater full blast while the engine is at least 5 full minutes away from offering any warmth at all. It’s as if the car doesn’t know itself.
So on my newer Venza (2021) the fan doesn’t turn on until the heat pump has had a chance to catchup.
In the meantime, the heated steering wheel and seat heaters in below freezing weather is really nice. Once the interior temp rises above 40°F on the interior, there’s no issue.
I think the issue you’re describing is more of first generation automatic HVAC. My mom’s 2007 ES350 does what you’re describing to a T and that’s incredibly frustrating. (*cough* it’s also evident in the 2016-2021 Land Cruiser)
With that said, I can feel some warmth emanating from the vents on low after a couple minutes.
I’d recommend trying out a newer model and reserving your judgement until after the test drive in the weather extremes you’re most likely to encounter or be concerned about, the newer models might be better in some ways in terms of behavior vs the older ones.
Where I live, we need a/c 90% of the year, because it gets into the triple digits on the regular. Recirculating helps cool the vehicle faster, but it doesn’t really cause the compressor to cycle off in the summer, which is March 1-October 31. And we need to blast the fans, often constantly to just stay comfortable. Then in not-summer we might notice a difference. Sometimes we even use the heater. Like 5 times a year.
Do you deal with mold?
In California, mildew sets in pretty fast if you don’t switch to fresh air and let the fan run for a couple of minutes before shutting everything off.
Though, one benefit of recirculation is preventing mice from traveling through the vehicle.
Absolutely. I’ll recirculate when I first get in. Then I’ll switch to fresh air. On humid days, I’ll even park with LH Front tire on the curb to make sure the condensation drains out as much as possible.
What part of California do you live in? I’ve lived in coastal SoCal all my life and we just don’t generally have the humidity for mildew to be an issue. Never in my life have I needed to dry out my vents before shutting off the car.
Northern California in the bay. We kinda have a goldilocks zone. East bay, south bay, to SF we’re near water. Samesies w/ anyone in North Bay and Monterey bay. Once you get through to the 680 valley corridoor, it gets drier.
But yeah, nearly every single Honda/Acura, Toyota/Lexus I’ve sat in that uses Auto for the climate control has dealt w/ this issue. Not a lot of experience in European cars since I simply don’t know folks that drive them.
Most of the time, the owners just live with it or they go to the dealership to do an HVAC refresh (deodorize/disinfect).
I haven’t noticed it as much in Socal cars, but for the most part, unless you’re in downtown, live in the west side, or Orange County by the water, it’s usually pretty dry.
Tustin/Irvine is usually pretty dry, obv anywhere near IE. But downtown gets incredibly humid which I always found amazing.
Excellent work on the graphic, by the way. So subtle! There is only one comment about the car, and it’s unclear if anybody got the joke or if everybody did. Props.
Well, BMW did sell Land Rover to Ford , so there are probably some examples of BMW and Ford parts cohabitating in a Land Rover.
In all ways that matter, excepting pickup trucks, BMW does own Ford.
P0wnd
Hell, BMW even knows how to get paint to stick to metal without blistering and peeling off in sheets, Ford decided that was too hard and stopping trying to learn it
I’m an engineer and the only car enthusiast amongst most of my friends, so unfortunately for them I correct them about 90% of the time
I always ask “Where did you hear that?”, because I’m curious about where misinformation comes from.
The perfect question. Have used it for decades.
and when I hear Fox News in reply, I realize what kind of person that am conversing with.
Lets hope the mechanics at the shop know more than the desk manager 🙂
It comes down to the relationship. Another writer/ commenter here? Certainly. A stranger worker on your car before repairs are done and the bill completed? NO! Of course a “I didn’t hear about that, I think you are mistaken, you want to wager the cost of an alignment on that?” Back to Certainly.
Do not correct anyone with whom you’d like to have sex.
Oh there are those that get turned on by being corrected. It can lead to some pretty bizarre conversations.
Incorrect. If my partner flexes their automotive knowledge, it’s pretty dang sexy. If they know something nerdier than I do about Italian heaps, it’s a definite panty dropper.
You’re not normal. Then again, that’s why we appreciate your presence here in the commentariat.
My wife knew a ton more about most cars than I did,
and yes it was somehow special to hear her casually expose that knowledge.
If a car mechanic told me that, I would ask for my keys back and walk out the door. If Joe Schmoe says it, then I ain’t really caring.
I think I have it in good balance.. My friends I will correct every time, the general public I’ll correct where it’s to their detriment to not correct them but my wife is always right.
“Did you know GM loses $50000 on every Volt they sell?”
Pretty sure I let that one go because I knew it wasn’t a car thing, it was a political thing and I didn’t want to get into it.
It’s bait.
It’ll just end in wanting to flatten your own head against the wall.
I’ve learned to avoid any mention of electric cars in this area…the amount of hate they generate here is surreal.
I believe it depends on each person’s personality.
If someone is more timid or just nice and doesn’t like to embarrass people, then they stay quiet.
If someone is a know-it-all type that doesn’t give a crap about someone else’s feelings then they let ‘em have it every single time.