i do not want to own any VW except for a golf r or a gsw awd from after 2014. they started making models with bloat and features i have no interest in haha. after dieselgate, essentially, ive been very unimpressed for the most part with their entire line up. things that would get me excited with VAG cars as a whole - a wagon golf r; a hatchback rs3, some sort of non-lifted a4 estate, etc. things that we don't get in NA basically.
mostly because i daily a 4runner and she loves the size and feel of her little focus. so something similar makes her happy. small, peppy, hatchback, easy to park literally anywhere. ill be the first to admit that shes a better city driver than me. im too ohio and used to big honking space.
If you can find a gen3 Mazda3 hatchback with the 2.5/6MT, they're great cars. Depending on how much 'pep' she's after, DRTuned has given my wife's the little extra it needed, and it's actually a fairly fun car up through highway speeds. It's not straightline fast like my GTI is, but it's a suprisingly engaging car. I don't know much about the 4th gen, I've
heard good things but generally from older guys looking for a little more comfort, though I hear the torsion beam in the back isn't as bad as it sounds. Either way, I've been turned into a pretty big Mazda fan. The early 2.5Ts seemed to have some head issues, but it sounds like in the later iterations they've been resolved.
this.....mine was my DD for 10 yrs, then it semi-retired when I bought my Mustang. Now it only gets used about 2-3K year. I am thinking it will be the last truck I own unless weirdness happens. New frame, <150K miles on a quality era Toyota, I'm old.
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I keep thinking about an S550 with the ecoboost for an AX car, I'm just not sure how I'll do with the size overall. But I've got a bit of a soft spot for Mustangs, my best friend of many years used to have a 2.3T swapped foxbody that was an absolute riot til it picked up the front end and twisted the floor pan. Now he's got a procharged 5.0 with a bunch of chassis and suspension goodies to hopefully make it autocross-worthy, though the procharger might be coming off in order to make more usable power.
