2004 Volvo on 2040-cars

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Best cars for snow and ice in 2023 and 2024

What's the best car for snow? The real answer is "the one with winter tires." What do we mean by that? You could have the finest, most advanced all-wheel-drive system or four-wheel drive in the world, but if you're running all-seasons (the spork of tires), your fancy four-wheeler won't matter much. The odds are, any vehicle on the road running good winter tires will probably perform adequately in slippery, slushy and/or snowy road conditions. (Here's a more complete explanation of why winter tires are totally worth it). In other words, you don't really need any of the cars on this list. With a set of winter tires, countless others will do the job, and even these will be at their best with proper rubber. You can find a variety of winter tires for your car here at Tire Rack. Keep in mind that you will need a full set of four snow tires for safety and performance, no matter what you're driving. The days of your dad putting just two snows on the family truckster to get it moving in a straight line are long gone. Don't get us wrong, getting a car that performs well in snow and ice is still a worthy criteria for car buyers. According to the U.S. Transportation Department, 70% of Americans live in places that get snow and ice. And much of the country has been blasted with arctic air for much of the new year. So let's look at the cars. First, we're highlighting choices for a variety of buyers and price points. Second, we're not just considering snow; we're considering general wintery conditions people will experience driving to work or school. As such, these are all choices with advanced all-wheel-drive systems, usually with "torque-vectoring" systems that not only automatically shunt power front and back, but side to side between the rear axles. Most have extra ground clearance for getting through deep snow, and we prefer those vehicles with more responsive steering, throttles and transmissions that provide a greater sense of vehicle control in slippery conditions.    Acura RDX Read our Acura RDX Review Acura's Super-Handling All-Wheel Drive system was one of the first to offer torque-vectoring, and besides often being touted for its ability to greatly enhanced dry-road handling, its benefits in the slick stuff can be profound. It's actually surprising that Acura hasn't leaned into this capability further by offering more rugged versions of its vehicles.

Junkyard Gem: 1973 Volvo 1800ES

Volvo began selling cars in the United States with the 1956 PV444, a sturdy unibody machine that looked quite a bit like the 1946 Ford from some angles. Reliable, sensible — maybe stodgy is a better word — PV544s, Amazons and 140s followed the 444s across the Atlantic as the 1950s became the 1960s. Starting in 1961, though, a genuinely sporty Volvo arrived here: the P1800. Members of the P1800 family were sold here through 1973, and I've found one of those final-model-year cars in a Northern California self-service wrecking yard. The P1800 (later named the 1800S and then the 1800E) was based on the chassis of the Amazon and was available only as a coupe from 1961 through 1971. The 1800ES shooting brake version with its all-glass hatch debuted as a 1972 model, and just under 9,000 were built before production ended the following year. The U.S.-market 1800ES got a 2.0-liter pushrod straight-four engine with Bosch fuel injection, rated at 112 horsepower. Its dirtier-running European counterparts got more power. This engine was known as the B20F. First-year Volvo 240s got the B20F as well, before moving up to the SOHC "Red Block" engine for 1976. A 1966 P1800 holds the world record for most mileage on a street car: more than 3.2 million miles. That car has a B18 engine that was rebuilt twice. The highest-mile junkyard car I've found was a Volvo as well, though it only had 626,476 miles. Does the credit go to the cars or to their owners? Yes! This car appears to have sat outside near the Pacific for too many decades; it has the top-down rust associated with living in the salt spray and fog near beaches in NorCal. This is pretty bad, but I've seen worse. This Volvo's final parking spot is just about a mile from crashing ocean waves. Worth restoring? No way, not when much nicer examples sell for a few grand. All the chawed-up seat foam suggests that raccoons and other Golden State wildlife lived inside for quite a while. The good news is that many of this crusty old Swede's components will live on in other Volvos. In fact, one of my regular readers scored a junkyard bonanza when he found this car (and several other vintage Volvos) not long before I arrived. Northern California car graveyards still offer plenty of old Scandinavian steel. This content is hosted by a third party. To view it, please update your privacy preferences. Manage Settings. You tell 'em, Christina!

Comparison test: 2019 Acura RDX vs. compact luxury SUV competitors

Truth be told, if we were to compare the all-new 2019 Acura RDX with those compact luxury crossover SUVs it would most likely be cross-shopped against, you'd be looking at a different list. Even Acura admits that Lexus and Infiniti are the most likely bogies, but with the 2019 RDX, Honda's luxury brand is attempting to attract those customers who think as much with their hearts as with their heads. And for the most part, those folks have been buying from German brands: the Audi Q5, BMW X3 and Mercedes-Benz GLC-Class. So, to show how the new RDX compares to them, Acura actually provided examples of each during the recent press drive along with a Volvo XC60. All were determined to have greater emotional appeal than the last RDX, and we would certainly agree. For, as much as the previous-generation RDX made sense on paper, it was really hard to get excited about it. And when you're paying extra for a luxury vehicle, shouldn't you get a little excited? Well, as luck would have it, Consumer Editor Jeremy Korzeniewski and I were on hand in Whistler, British Columbia, for the press launch. We didn't have an abundance of time in each RDX competitor, but in conjunction with our usual comparison chart, our impressions should provide a good first taste of how the new RDX compares. Performance and fuel economy Contributing Editor James Riswick: On paper at least, the RDX is gutsier than its comparably powered European rivals. It also weighs the same or less, which logically should mean it'll be the quickest in a straight line. During my brief drives, though, I'm not sure it really stood taller than the three Germans. It at least matches them for smoothness, which is something that can't be said about the Volvo. Fuel economy is lower than them all when you consider all but the Mercedes come standard with all-wheel drive. It's also worth noting that all the competitors are available with engine upgrades, and unless Acura's forthcoming resurrection of Type S models includes the RDX, it should stay that way. Consumer Editor Jeremy Korzeniewski: Line 'em all up in a drag race, and I have a feeling the Acura would squirt away to victory. A good bit of that, though, would be due to its 10-speed automatic transmission, which offers a huge spread of ratios and fires off extremely quick shifts. In the real world, I'd guess fuel economy will be similar across the board, so I'm willing to call that category a draw.