2001 Dodge Dakota Slt Crew Cab Pickup 4-door 4.7 V8 on 2040-cars

Auto blog

Here are a few of our automotive guilty pleasures

It goes without saying, but I'll say it anyway. The world is full of cars, and just about as many of them are bad as are good. It's pretty easy to pick which fall into each category after giving them a thorough walkaround and, more important, driving them. But every once in a while, an automobile straddles the line somehow between good and bad — it may be hideously overpriced and therefore a marketplace failure, it may be stupid quick in a straight line but handles like a drunken noodle, or it may have an interior that looks like it was made of a mess of injection-molded Legos. Heck, maybe all three. Yet there's something special about some bad cars that actually makes them likable. The idea for this list came to me while I was browsing classified ads for cars within a few hundred miles of my house. I ran across a few oddballs and shared them with the rest of the team in our online chat room. It turns out several of us have a few automotive guilty pleasures that we're willing to admit to. We'll call a few of 'em out here. Feel free to share some of your own in the comments below. Dodge Neon SRT4 and Caliber SRT4: The Neon was a passably good and plucky little city car when it debuted for the 1995 model year. The Caliber, which replaced the aging Neon and sought to replace its friendly marketing campaign with something more sinister, was panned from the very outset for its cheap interior furnishings, but at least offered some decent utility with its hatchback shape. What the two little front-wheel-drive Dodge models have in common are their rip-roarin' SRT variants, each powered by turbocharged 2.4-liter four-cylinder engines. Known for their propensity to light up their front tires under hard acceleration, the duo were legitimately quick and fun to drive with a fantastic turbo whoosh that called to mind the early days of turbo technology. — Consumer Editor Jeremy Korzeniewski  Chevrolet HHR SS: Chevy's HHR SS came out early in my automotive journalism career, and I have fond memories of the press launch (and having dinner with Bob Lutz) that included plenty of tire-smoking hard launches and demonstrations of the manual transmission's no-lift shift feature. The 260-horsepower turbocharged four-cylinder was and still is a spunky little engine that makes the retro-inspired HHR a fun little hot rod that works quite well as a fun little daily driver.

Cruiser's close call caught on camera

A new recruit to the Kansas Highway Patrol experienced his first brush with danger on his first day when a semi truck clipped his cruiser during a traffic stop last week. Public relations officer Tod Hileman said in a Facebook post that the incident occurred when an officer and his brand-new trainee pulled over a black Dodge Charger on I-70 in Trego County, Kansas. Hileman said in the comments that the cruiser was parked two feet away from the white line on the shoulder. Not only did the driver not get over a lane when he saw the stopped cruiser per Kansas law, he seemed to have moved closer to the side of the road. The big rig managed to send the cruiser's side mirror and spotlight flying across the road. The truck could have easily injured one of the officers, perhaps fatally. The truck driver ignored Kansas' Move Over law, which requires "drivers approaching a stationary emergency vehicle displaying flashing lights, including towing and recovery vehicles, traveling in the same direction, to vacate the lane closest if safe and possible to do so, or slow to a speed safe for road, weather, and traffic conditions." With a clear lane to his left the trucker in this case had no excuse. He stopped after the crash and was cited by the officers for failing to change lanes when he saw the stopped vehicles. Being a cop is a risky job. So far this year, 28 officers have lost their lives in the line of duty due to car accidents, according to the Officer Down Memorial Page. News Source: Facebook Government/Legal Dodge Videos traffic traffic stop traffic tickets move over law

2013 Dodge Dart GT

My younger brother bought a Dodge Dart earlier this summer. It's a basic SXT, in Maximum Steel Metallic, with the 2.0-liter engine, a six-speed automatic transmission and not a whole lot else. Unfortunately, at the time, the Dart was one of the few cars in the compact class I'd never driven. I didn't know a lot about it, and therefore, didn't have a lot to say when he bought it. I think the words "based on an Alfa," popped out when I first saw it.
As it turns out, he's grown quite fond of the dark gray sedan, so it was with some degree of enthusiasm that I paid him a visit in this bright-orange Dart GT. I was excited to see what it was about the Dart that he enjoyed so much, despite my tester featuring a different engine, transmission and a lot more tech. After a week with the car, though, I must say: I don't quite see what all the fuss is about.
Driving Notes