Best and Worst Cars of 2023 | Talking Cars with Consumer Reports #434
Hi everybody welcome to another episode I’m Mike monacello I’m Jennifer stockberger I’m Michael Crossing and today isn’t just another episode this is our endof year 2023 wrap-up Extravaganza where we take a look back at the bigger moments that happened here at the consumer ports auto test center as well
As uh give picks for our favorite Vehicles we tested this year and our least favorite Vehicles oh yeah we tested this year so let’s start Mike Crossing with just some stats I mean what we do here is we test Vehicles right that’s our main thing so let’s
Give us some stats on how many vehicles we test of the different types the variety ABS so I’ll start off by saying right now we actually have more test cars than I think we’ve ever had in history we have 94 cars in total on on hand at the site on hand and that
Includes Tire test cars and some down in child seats as well so it’s a ton of cars um the breakout on that if my math here is correct we have 27 EVS we have 12 plug-in hybrid vehicles we have 18 just regular standard hybrids and then the remainder which should be 27 cars
Are just gasoline you know powered vehicles right kind break gasoline cars back in the day and I did the math on this one too for all 94 cars the total Fleet mileage as of yesterday is 73222 MIL right on all those cars so a bunch of Miles um some sort of high of
Those 94 cars I picked this one for you Mike we have five cars with manual transmissions thank you I appreciate that I so I knew you were the host so I wanted to to throw that one in make sure that was there um but for 2023 you know
The new cars let’s talk about that we bought 39 cars at least as of today when we’re filming this we maybe might be able to squeak one more car in this year um but the breakout of that is we bought 10 EVS 11 plug-in hybrids 10 regular
Hybrids and eight gas cars and out of those 39 cars as of yesterday we have 16,25 miles w you know this year yeah plus we’re still driving some of the stuff that we’ve had before so I was unable to put together a number for actual total miles driven this year um I
Thought about it for a minute but made my head explode well we don’t want that that’s just too much math and then just some sort of um additional numbers here we rented 30 cars for manufacturers so cars we didn’t buy but you we brought in and got to experience some different
Trim levels and May first drive or something exactly and then lastly um with those 39 cars we’ve done approximately 2,000 individual tests you know over the course of the of all the different things that we test and evaluate um so you know bunch of numbers
Bunch of math and a lot of work you know um kind of to your to your manual transmission point there uh by my math at various points throughout 2023 these weren’t all tested in 2023 but we had actually seven Vehicles that’s including the 2024 Mustang of course that we
Haven’t even tested yet and that’s like more than I can ever remember since I’ve been here and you know what we may never have that again because quite Poss right so I just wanted to bring that up but thanks for all those great stats so with that
Let’s move on to our favorite and least favorite vehicles that we tested this year this should be fun cuz we don’t know our picks corre so uh Mike I’m going to start with you what was your and and the caveat being that had to be
A vehicle that not that we had on site in 2023 but that was physically tested went through our program in 2023 so uh that cut out one of my favorite cars I so we’re spoiled Mike let’s start with you your favorite vehicle we tested in 2023 I’m going to go with the Honda
Accord Hybrid sport I I probably wouldn’t buy the sport version of it I would pick one of the other trim levels of the hybrid um but it’s an excellent powertrain Excellent Car tell us why you wouldn’t pick the sport is it because of the wheels yeah basically the wheel and
Tire it’s a little harsh um I would even maybe pick a sport and go down the road of finding another set of wheels something a little smaller um but you run into other issues when you start modifying the car and Honda does make the hybrid in other trim levels they’ve
Kind of done that work for you so I would pick maybe like an ex or an LX just hybrid tell us a little bit about because that Honda two motor hybrid system is just kick and butt I don’t know if we’re allowed to say that on
This family show but it’s just such a great hybrid system just tell us a little bit about that versus say a vehicle that doesn’t have that twoot system yeah absolutely it’s super smooth um when you’re riding around we’ll call it EV mode just on electric power absolutely silent plenty of power for
That vehicle when the gasoline motor does kick on it’s seamless you almost don’t even know it you know if you had the radio on or you’re having a conversation you probably wouldn’t know what happened it gets awesome gas mileage yeah it’s great on the highway uh and it’s just overall it’s a really
Nice car the infotainment is great it has real buttons that we love um has a couple downsides the seats aren’t the best you know some of our testers felt the seats you left a little B desired but um overall I just think it’s an awesome Choice yeah I I think you’re
Right Jen what do you got for us so just to qualify when I pick my favorite cards when we do these segments I pick one that is right for me and that I could actually afford like what what would be in my cards if I had to pick a car say
We lose our jobs tomorrow and what would I consider and for me that is kind of in line with what Mike’s saying the the Honda CRV hybrid yeah so 35 miles per gallon there’s just not a lot that this car doesn’t do well 26 mil per gallon
Was the regular CRV so 9 miles per gallon more a boost in power over the regular CRV and it’s to me it’s like a no-brainer car recommend it out of the gate you know because it’s a Honda reliability wise yeah reliability wise and it’s not just going to I mean the
CRV already is a super high volume selling vehicle I will not be alone but that car to me again I look at like big Reach vehicles like did I enjoy driving the BMW oh yeah I did but I can’t afford an $888,000 car so that car to me one of
The best cars we had this year it just does everything well yeah I think it’s it’s funny you guys both picked the Honda hybrids it has to do with so much I think with just the way the powertrain Works those simulated upshifts um to keep the you know a CVT or ecvt whatever
The vehicle has from going doing the high revving thing this the Honda hybrids do a much better job driving more like a nor a normal car right I think that’s a big part of it I have always said I love hybrids but I don’t
Want to know I’m in one I don’t want to be reminded all the time that I’m in one I I got to be honest I’m surprised you even I thought you’d be thrown off because the Ford Flex hasn’t been in production for a while and we didn’t
Test the Kia surr so I’m like how’s she going to pick the car those are her two favorite cars I know I know so along the lines with what you guys I pretty much mimicked what you guys did I also went with a very um practical choice and that
Is the Nissan Z yeah surprise surprise yeah so uh is it practical heck no Y is itun is it comfortable not so much does it have a c not really is it easy to get in and out of I going to say but it’s so darn fun to drive it’s got that manual
Transmission manual transmission six-speed manual and uh you know this is the kind of car that you you’ll make up a reason to go for a drive right and hopefully the reason is to go drive a really curvy Road or you’ll seek out a curvy road because we’re talking about
It’s really all about the engine 400 horsepower 3 l twin turbo V6 it’s just so awesome and when you look at kind of bang for the buck when you look at the fact that this the base Nissan Z comes in not just below the Toyota Supra and
It’s turbo 6 but it comes in it’s even costs less than the Supra with the turbo 4 Cy fun yeah so look it’s not perfect um you know it’s the ride is pretty stiff and that’s not even what bothers me what bothers me is the boomy cabin
The cabin is just really loud um and the seats don’t aren’t great for me but I love driving it and to me that’s what it’s all about if I also love looking at it I think it’s a pretty it has to be your second your weekend car yeah yeah
You can buy one yeah okay so uh now Jen let’s go to you least favorite vehicle of 2023 okay this was easy for me in that you know what car do I just I don’t really want it and that’s to me Nissan Z no not the Nissan Z I actually would so
For me the rivan r1s um just so much money for not a very satisfying car for me very low overall score oddly owner satisfaction for this car is very high it’s like a five out of five like people who have it love it but it is not a car
For me the regen and that whole operation it’s just undrivable for for me for comfort sort of nauseating almost it’s sort of nauseating as a driver never experienced because you have to be so careful with the acceler right you’re coming back off yes you cannot come off or you’re lurching forward you’re inside
Are unsettled to Mike’s Point and even worse than the r1t which I actually found some surprise and Delight in and that it was a pickup it had that cool tunnel it had the power tunnel cover like things like that that made it a cool pickup you don’t get that
In the r1s it’s to me even lesser than the r1t um not particularly reliable though that hopefully will change over time but for me this year the r1s I I totally agree that you know the pickup seemed like just offered more neat features um but also and and you
Mentioned the reliability the predicted reliability is low but the owners apparently don’t care no they love them so much they love and and again I didn’t even get into the screen and the controls and all of that to me it’s really the driving that’s a that bothers
You bothers me okay uh what about you Mike so this is uh this was a difficult one for me there’s a few cars in our Fleet that I don’t really love um but I picked this particular one because I spent a rough a couple of days in a row
With it you know in some of our testing okay and um this is the Alpha Romeo tanal okay and um I I don’t even know where to begin there’s not a lot of positives I can personally say about it um it’s definitely a little stylish and things like that but
Um you you can get the Hornet for a whole lot less very similar so I think you’re overpaying for you know something else that exists somewhere else at a much better price um granted you can get different driv trains between the two as well but um it’s not a particularly great at
Anything and you know riding around eveve mode is okay but then the gas motor sometimes Cuts in for a couple of seconds and if that happens mid corner you go from rear wheel drive to front-wheel drive and it upsets the vehicle yeah um not awesome in the
Highway it’s loud it’s kind of rough and um you know it’s got a lot of modes that they don’t really tell you what they do when you put in sport mode it will sort of recharge itself so it’s in a charging mode and you can recharge sort of of
That EV portion of the battery yeah did you mention that it’s a plugin hybrid I can’t remember so I don’t think I did but it is a plug in hybrid which you know on the surface is kind of cool you know that’s kind of become the new thing
And we’re learning about those um and that’s actually one of the reasons why I to spend a couple of days in this we were sort of doing some experimental testing trying to figure out exactly what we needed to test on these plug-in cars these plug-in hybrids and um so I
Had to kind of go through a couple of Tanks of fuel and go through all the modes and driving it in its charging mode where it will charge itself the fuel economy is atrocious um I don’t want to put like real numbers out there in the world but it’s a huge percentage
Less than what it is just driving it like in regular hybrid mode right so I just sort of question as to why you know why does the ve vehicle exist it’s kind of pricey there’s a very similar vehicle out there on the road with it and just functionally in the interior it’s just
Sort of worse overall than the Hornet and both the Hornet and the tanal are based on a very old platform so I think that’s part of the problem right there and you see it yeah you feel the only thing I will add you know we talk about
Reliability um um our mechanic here so I deal with a lot of that stuff they know me by name at the local Maserati and Alpha dealership I walk in they’re just like hey Mike how you doing there’s there’s Mike go and we only have one of
Each and we have some brands with eight and nine and they don’t know me by name there so right I see what you’re saiding yeah it’s a great reliability verdict the mic cross and reliability verdict I I think your point too of you had to
Live with it for a while cuz you were evaluating it I do think once the shiny wears off the newness wears off and I think the same about the r1s though that’s not what our members are telling us but once you live with something a for a while though things can become
More disappointing than if you’re just a oneoff so familiarity breeds contempt with some vehicles with some and sometimes familiarity brings great joy but it can work both ways yeah yeah y um so for me my least favorite vehicle and this actually ties in with your favorite Vehicles you guys are proving my point
With your favorite vehicles to my least favorite which is my least favorite driving vehicle was the toy Prius yeah and there’s numerous reasons for that but uh basically I don’t like driving it I mean I just don’t enjoy driving it at all Yes it gets fantastic fuel economy actually pretty amazing fuel economy
Considering that this one we bought is all-wheel drive uh and it and it was almost matched the previous one with front-wheel drive and it weighs like 230 lbs more right 75 more horsepower than before it’s like uh considerably quicker than the last Prius uh it handles better
No question it handles better but it’s just not enjoyable to drive and it’s really because it has an electronic continuously variable transmission it doesn’t operate the way that the Hondas do and so you get you know we talk about this this drone or whatever it’s basically it allows the High Rev so even
Moderate acceleration and this is not a kind sounding engine at all right it’s like a raspy Gro it doesn’t do the simulated upshifts uh it it sounds like it’s working hard even when it isn’t working hard which is annoying I my girlfriend was like you know this thing
Feels really slow and it’s like no it’s just revving really high for no reason right ride significantly firmer than before yeah okay our XLE 19in wheels and tires why would a Prius no Prius should have 19in wheels and tires actually only the L the base Le you can get 17s on the
Two higher trims you have to get the 19s our last Prius had 15s yes so so this that’s really hurting the ride uh the cabin is noisier outward visibility is terrible it looks better it looks looks way better look I think it looks fantastic uh but it has these long
Sloping windshield pillars that you’re constantly constantly you want to talk about a safety issue that’s a safety issue I’m sorry it’s super low to the ground it’s hard to get in and out uh rear seat is less comfortable and there’s less cargo room and to prove the
Point it actually lost several points in its radest score over the last PR so overall it’s a worse car than before and and like I said I just basically I don’t enjoy driving it at all okay so that’s enough about our least favorite stuff let’s talk about more positive things uh
And Mike I’m going to go to you first what are you looking forward to Automotive wise for 2024 sure um I mean obviously EVS were a big thing in 2023 and I’m curious to see what happens there there was a massive push all these autom manufacturers rolled out a bunch
Of cars some are pretty good some are you know course and things like that um we have all the infrastructure issues but then there’s things happening right like most of these manufacturers are going to move over to the Tesla plug that’s going to be super interesting so
I want to see what happens there um plus we have all these plugin hybrids that are coming out so I just want to see if that really really heavy EV push continues and just sort of what happens with their sales um beginning of the year I would go to a lot of dealerships
For whatever reasons and there weren’t a lot of cars at all on the lot now there’s a bunch of cars on the lot particularly EVs and you know I don’t know if they’re just showing up or if they are not really selling them as fast as they thought or some combination
Thereof so really I just want to see what happens with the EVS yeah totally agree that’s a great Point what about you Jen well I’m going to read you verbatim I am interested in how the addition of so many EVs and pH EVS play out in the market you know that’s called
Plagiarism you’re not supposed to copy what becomes their normal usage what happen are they really only a viable really good car for where it’s warm um what happens to components like tires absolutely and has this combination of speed torque and mass what’s that mean from a safety
Perspective have have those EVS gone too far in terms of the safety realm so different aspects but yes and reliabil out there on these too just general you know there’s a lot of software stuff um I’ll throw this one out there we’ve had a bunch of EVS we have 27 now I forgot
The number of total EVS we’ve had ever I did count that out I just forgot to add it here going all the way back to the original Leaf but we just had to have our first battery work done on an EV ah um it’s like a three and a half year old
Vehicle it’s got 20 something thousand miles on it but we did have to have a battery taken out and some cells in it replaced now granted we’ve had a pretty good run there but as these cars age you know is this a one-off or is this going
To be more indicative of what we see so I think reliability is going to be a big question mark which we might not answer next year but we might get a better picture we’re going to have an interesting picture though because we’ve held them for a lot of these new tests
What happens when we sell them what is the market going to Bear when we get rid of some of these there’s new models of basically the same thing on the lot so y yeah uh yeah all great points and shocker uh I’m also I mean I want it to
Be can we beat you know this past Year’s total of manual transmission vehicles for 2024 but I’m pretty sure that’s not going to happen uh so I’m interested as well and I mean look EES are coming it looks like whether you want them to or
Not uh at least for now anyway we we don’t know what’s going to happen down the road uh but because they’re coming and that’s we’re going to test what people you know what the manufacturers are putting out there we need to tell people whether they’re good to drive or
Not there’s a truckload of EVS coming and guess what a lot of them are trucks yeah I mean we’re we’re going to have a Tesla cyber truck soon I don’t want to look at it but I really want to drive it yeah um people around you will want to
Look at it the Ram 1500 rev the Chevy uh Silverado EV and then there’s also just Vehicles like the Kia ev9 SUV I’m curious to drive that the Fisker ocean uh the vinfast you know the the vf8 and the vf9 there’s a lot of cool vehicles
And a lot of them we’re going to buy and test so we’ve got a lot of interesting stuff coming all right well let’s move now to audience questions of the week uh don’t forget to send those questions comments 30 second video clip to talking cars at icloud.com but we do have a question
From stevenh from Bristo Virginia after listening to your recent episode on the TOA Prius Prime and thinking about your previous all things about ev’s show I observed you never mentioned anything about whether plugin hybrid electric vehicles can take advantage of regen or braking to extend
Range like hybrids so do they so uh I’m going to throw this to you Professor Mike crosson I say that because for one thing you are a wealth of information but also you used to teach shop was it shop in high school I taught High School
Automotive shop for a while yes so okay so you are now Professor crosson we got it so talk to us about phvs and regen breaking sure I mean they absolutely do right that’s just a thing um Regular hybrids have it for that matter too that’s one of the ways that they can
Just recharge that battery pack um they’re all a little bit different though at least in the cars that we’ve purchased so far some of them it is adjustable some of them kind of have paddles the way we’ve seen in EVs and things like that some of them don’t it
Just is what it is one thing to keep in mind on these plug-in hybrid electric vehicles is that you have one big battery for the high voltage stuff but they you almost want to think of it as two batteries they partition it so part of it is purely for just EV operation
The other part is for like regular hybrid operation once you’ve you know used up the 20 or 30 Mi of EV range that you get you know maybe at the start um that that regenerative braking is really more so going to be useful for when you’re in hybrid mode just you know
Bringing that battery back up a few more percent so you get that extra boost um I was in a couple of our vehicles yesterday out on the track and yes you can regen break them down you know I was doing a maybe breaking half the distance of our straightaway and yeah you you
Might see a mile go put back on even in EV mode but it goes away instantly as soon as you get back on the throttle so that big portion of the battery is still big enough that you need to plug it in to utilize that portion but under regular kind of hybrid operation
Absolutely they have regen and it does help you know kind of extend that hybrid operation and this is why we call him the professor yes the professor and Jen just since we’re talking about phvs and we’ve recently started really uh going deep on the phvs which we weren’t before
But we kind of switch things around we like we need to know more about these vehicles because maybe people should be buying these there’s some really neat stuff with them complicated but tell us about what the different things you can do with and again it it’s it’s about the
Charging and how you can tailor select maybe that’s the right word to do different modes so charge sustaining mode where you can say I don’t want to use my battery right now because I I can’t imagine the scenario but you’re on the highway for example and you know
You’re not going to have a charger but you want to use electric the next day or you’re on the highway and you’re going to end up in a city right absolutely so you want so you can pick to say don’t use my electric the electric portion of that battery right now or charge
Depleting mode you know which is use that up as it will and I I’ve become a bit of a this is a tremendous Bridge phv uh plug-in hybrids are a great bridge to the EV world I think of somebody like my mom who doesn’t really go very far she
She’s decided she goes to the supermarket every day what a great option for them be it charge depleting charge sustaining but I just think there’s a lot we’re still learning about PHS right and to regen breaking though it’s not it’s not gamechanging in the way that you’re going to be like seeing
Your your you know you’re using a re aggressive regener breaking mode you’re going to be seeing all this mileage you know your predictor range go up it’s not that’s not going to happen you’re just not wasting energy you’re you’re sending some energy you’re optimizing rather than not using you know uh any recoup
Any of that energy with regular friction braks so there is some benefits to them for sure but it’s not like you’re going to like be suddenly super efficient not to mention the fact slowing down is inefficient right any anytime you slow down right you are that is inefficiency
So there there’s a time and a place for regen bre keep going fast is that but I oh go ahead M I would say I’m a gauge Watcher I drive cars and I like in the Fords they have that Brak coach now I don’t feel as though I need it but I
Love it when it says 100% feel so good yeah it’s just a game basically I like the accolades even when theum cluster is giving them to me so so is regenerative breaking a convenience feature more for one pedal driving to me but also and you’re the mechanic
Professor uh it has the benefit of potentially uh uh saving some wear and tear on your Brak pads and R correct yeah you’re definitely going to use less brakes um but especially where we live and anybody who lives places where it snows and there salt so the salt belt
You still might have to replace those brakes even before you theal start to separate calipers freeze up so it’s not uh maybe you know you’re going to have to do breaks at some point I guess is what I’m saying you know you’re not going to go forever on your
Original set of brake pads unless maybe you live somewhere with awesome weather but it’s like your manual do you downshift or do you break I downshift well there you go so do I but do you regen or do you break yeah okay let’s move on to another question this comes
From Bob from Buffalo New York uh that’s where my mom was uh born and raised ah over the years CR has tested and discussed the differences in how various all-wheel drive systems perform in ice snow and wet conditions I recall there are differences in various mechanically connected all-wheel drive systems and
There is usually an even greater difference with some hybrids for example a TOA ra 4 where rear wheels are independently driven with an electric motor could you please comment on EV all-wheel drive systems where the rear and front wheels are independently driven with two Motors sometimes three or four since electric motors have
Instant torque does that create an additional problem relative to gas powerered vehicles living in Buffalo and winter handling is important to me so we’re going to throw it back to the professor yeah um so Bob thank you for the question and that’s a really well thought out question um and you know
Certainly we get snow here at least sometimes we get snow here last winter we didn’t really get any we wish for snow here yeah so we’re actually hoping this winter um some of us were talking about it earlier today that even if we have to come in at like midnight we want
To line up all these cars and really experience them in some snow last winter I did get to drive a couple of the EVS in some snow when I was up in Massachusetts um regenerative braking you know you usually have it on it to some degree cuz a lot of times you’re
Doing the one pedal drive all the owner’s manuals tell you not to use strong regen in Slippery conditions so snow and even down terrain um I did try stopping the ev6 basically full regen down a a moderate Hill and it sort of Locked Up and slid a little bit but then
It sorted itself out right so basically I equated it to if you just stomped on the brake pedal you’re going to slide a little bit and then the ABS system is going to sort it out and kind of keep the tires rolling a little bit um but as
Far as you know one motor two motor however many Motors you have each motor isn’t out there on their own kind of running their own program doing their own thing there is a module that is is kind of overwatching all of those so it’s going to only apply power and do
Regen in such ways that um traction basically allows you know these vehicles are heavy which in some cases helps with traction right you sort of have more pulling down a little more contact patch things like that you might be able to cut through the snow A little better so
You’re not like up floating on that crusty snow layer you can actually get down to the pavement that could be helpful but um you know if you’re stuck or trying to go up a hill that’s icy and snowy you also now have all that weight like holding you back so again it’s it’s
Sort of like a seesaw right you get a benefit on one side and you know maybe it hurts you on a little bit on the other side um you know the rav four the hybrids and obviously these plugin hybrids um Toyota is basically doing gas motor up front electric motor back um
Like the alpha that I was hating on a few minutes ago um we have we have a plug-in hybrid Volvo that does the same kind of setup and it’s a really good way to do it engineering wise and packaging Wise It’s really smart IT utilizes a lot
Of space and things like that helps the weight distribution of the vehicle you get to throw some extra weight out back um for people who like to go you know take an SUV through some corners and stuff like that looking at you Mike um looking at you Mike you know as far as
Inent Toros yeah I suppose you have the ability to obliterate you know the tires off this thing in any sort of condition but they seem to do a decent job in the dry and the wet traction control and stability control and everything you know rains that in um but certainly if
You’re driving one of these things just be aware that you do have less traction and you are going to want to be you know a little smoother on it a lot of these have modes so again you probably want to go out of sport mode right put it in
Snow mode or Comfort mode is going to help um and I’ve specifically avoided talking about tires I knew it was coming so you have to I think the last podcast I was on basically has a similar a drive question I basically just said buy good
Tires um and of course that is a big part of this too right you know if I lived in Buffalo I absolutely would buy a separate set of snow tires uh if you live somewhere with maybe a more mild winter just a really good allseason tire that’s in good shape is probably enough
But um it’s it’s everything’s a combination right there’s not just one answer for everything so right cuz cuz if you think about it uh a couple things first we’re more to come right because we’re hopefully going to do some actual EV allhe Drive testing this winter hopefully right we want some level of
Evaluation experience the we haven’t designed any tests at this point but it’s something that you know going to fiddle around with it so we can see how how different they are from each other and two uh traction forward traction is one thing stopping track you know that
Has to do with all-wheel drive systems right all-wheel drive system has nothing to do with slowing down and that’s where your tires and I know Jen you’re in charge of the tire program uh so winter tires are hugely important in terms of just slowing down if nothing else the
Other unlimit again independent of the all-wheel drive is I don’t think I have experienced wheel spin quite so often as when we’ve had these EVS in PHS even in the wet just that initial like I think we’re all going to have to learn to tickle the not gas pedal but throttle
Accelerator pedal a little more gingerly when it’s got OE tires again yep all bets are off no matter how many Independent Electric Motors you know engine all-wheel dri if there’s no traction so and that’s a good point on tires too A lot of these EVS are coming
With summer Tires on them you know sold in Connecticut an all-wheel drive vehicle with like a sumers sport tire and that’s due to Rolling resistance and the fact that these cars are really fast and they need the grip and all that kind of stuff but you could be in for a rude
Awakening you buy this car you drive it for 6 months y it snows and you might not really go anywhere right right all right well great question Bob we appreciate it scroll back to how these Eves play out in the market there you go how are they going to play out in
Buffalo yeah exactly that’s going to do for this episode if you want to learn more about the topics and the vehicles uh that we talked about you can click on the links in the show notes don’t forget to send those questions comments 30 second video clips of talking cars at
Icloud.com we want to thank all of our loyal viewers and listeners for staying with us for all these years and let you know that we are definitely going to be uh doing this all through 2024 and hopefully for years down the road so stay with us here at the podcast we love
Bringing us to you so happy new year thanks so much for watching and we’ll see all next Year
We wrap 2023 with CR experts sharing their most and least favorite cars they drove in our testing fleet. Where do cars like the Toyota Prius, Honda CR-V hybrid, Rivian R1S, and Honda Accord hybrid fall on our lists? We also share some fun statistics from our testing program from 2023, and answer questions about regenerative braking in the Toyota Prius Prime and other hybrids, as well as how AWD systems work in EVs.
00:36 – CR testing statistics from 2023
3:03 – the best cars we tested in 2023
8:06 – the worst cars we tested in 2023
18:36 – do hybrids benefit from regeneration braking like electric vehicles?
23:51 – do all-wheel drive systems in EVs work the same way as in standard vehicles?
Popular Cars to Avoid and What to Buy Instead: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/cars-popular-cars-to-avoid-and-what-to-buy-instead-a5131342215/?EXTKEY=YSOCIAL_YT
10 Most Reliable Cars: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-reliability-owner-satisfaction/10-most-reliable-cars-a6569295379/?EXTKEY=YSOCIAL_YT
Best Tires of the Year: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/tires/best-car-tires-of-the-year-a1101679070/?EXTKEY=YSOCIAL_YT
Best Car Batteries of the Year: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-batteries/best-car-batteries-of-the-year-a2280775847/?EXTKEY=YSOCIAL_YT
Which Brand Makes the Most Reliable Vehicles? https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/car-reliability-owner-satisfaction/who-makes-the-most-reliable-cars-a7824554938/?EXTKEY=YSOCIAL_YT
Ratings and test results on every car CR purchases and tests: https://www.consumerreports.org/cars/?EXTKEY=YSOCIAL_YT
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