Elemental

As promised here's my impressions so far of the Element. First off I should say that when they first came out I thought Honda made a huge mistake. It's kind of ugly and what the hell was it supposed to be? Station wagon, SUV, minivan, Jeepish thing, VW Thing thing? Who the fuck knows. What I do know is that I immediately liked it first time I actually sat in one a couple years back.

When we got up here and I started looking for a vehicle to replace my pickup I had a couple very simple criteria, 4wd/awd, 4 cyl, manual transmission, decent fuel economy, and plenty of room for tools and toys. Most construction companies require employees to drive pickups and when I found out that wasn't the case where I now work I immediately thought of the Element.

So far it's worked out quite nicely. It's a little louder than I expected on the freeway, but no worse that the 14 year old truck that it replaces. The fuel economy has been decent, I got 27 mpg on the drive up from Portland and I've been getting 23 around town. It's plenty comfortable and has lots of room for everyone inside. The stereo is surprisingly good with a small but quite effective sub directly below the shifter. I really like the fact that the rear seats fold up making enough room in the back for bikes with the wheels on. Rubber floors mean I won't be ruining any carpets with Pac-NW mud and any that makes it into the car is easily cleaned out.

As far as using the Element for work, so far it's working out quite well. There's enough room behind the rear seats for the majority of the tools I use in a given day and with the seats up I can easily get a six foot ladder back there. The best work related thing I discovered is that I've got a ton of room to stretch out in the back and eat lunch or do all that paperwork that must be done at the end of every day.

Staged photo, not at work or doing actual paperwork.