Of all the things we want our cars to be, “reliable” is always way up at the top of the list. No matter how narrowly focused a car may otherwise be as an off-roader or street carver or luxurious cruiser or something else, the one thing we’d all like the machine to do is start, run, and return us home (or to the finish line or trailhead) without breaking down or failing to start in the first place.
And when it comes to daily drivers and work vehicles, nothing trumps reliability. No one can afford to be late or miss a job with any regularity. Everyone needs reliable transportation, and a reputation for reliability can only be earned. No amount of marketing can spin a car that lets customers down into one they can count on.
For a lot of buyers, that means Honda and Toyota top their preferred brands list, though they aren’t the only reliability stars. Getting more granular, specific models like Civic, Corolla, Accord, and Camry are singled out for bulletproofness. More knowledgeable car buyers might advise budget-conscious shoppers to look for anything with a Buick 3800 V6 for day-in, day-out infallible transpo.
No matter what advice you’ve gotten or like to give about which cars can be counted on and which to avoid, there are always surprises. A low-mile Corolla that somehow becomes the bane of your motoring existence. The high-mileage luxury European car everyone told you not to buy has, incredibly, never let you down. And so, today we’re asking What Supposedly Super-Reliable Car Was A Lemon For You (And Vice Versa)?
Says Matt,
People always complain about old German luxury cars, but my 240k-mile BMW is great. I treat it like a Honda Civic and, other than a flare up here or there, it acts like a Honda Civic. I realize by saying this I’m dooming myself.
I fully expect that Matt’s BMW, now jinxed, will strand him within a fortnight. (Yeah, I say “fortnight” now.)
David, meanwhile, had a terrible experience with what shoulda been a no-worries ride:
I bought a 1995 Honda Accord; it was, to this day, the biggest piece of shit I’ve ever owned. Everything broke at once, and it wasn’t that easy to fix. I loathed it. And the fifth gear synchro didn’t work. Could it have been abused? Sure. But that doesn’t excuse it abusing me.
Matt piped in:
Between a Honda Accord and Saturn Vue, I would not have picked the Vue as the reliable daily. Who would?
Stephen also hated an Accord. Am I taking crazy pills?
One of my most-difficult to own/fix was one that ha sa reputation for not breaking. ’08 Honda Accord Sedan, I bought it off of a local door guy that had just gotten in a RF fender-bender (with accompanying DUI) and hit the local Pick n Pull to piece it back together. Fender, headlight, bumper cover, fender skirt, brackets, etc. Once it was back together and painted, I kept getting an transmission shifting issue that pointed towards the speed sensor. Popped a new one in, same issue. The part I purchased had the same dimensions and connections as the one it replaced, so I figured there must be some other internal issue with that transmission. Sold the car for cheap with the concern. Later, I learned that Honda uses both an input and output speed sensor on that transmission that both use the exact-same pigtail connector and are identical! Of course the sensor that I had swapped out was The Good One (Input) and all the next owner had to do was swap out the Output sensor. A solid learning experience.
Your turn! What Supposedly Super-Reliable Car Was A Lemon For You (And Vice Versa)?
Top graphic: Toyota
Two Audi’s. A 17 and an 18 both with about 60k mi, so pretty low for their age.
The S5 has needed an oil filter housing gasket ($50) in the 3 years I’ve had it.
The Q7 has needed an air suspension valve block ($300), an LED DRL ($40), a keyless entry antenna ($25) and there’s an incredibly small coolant leak. Like the reservoir drops half an inch a year. It’s probably the SC crossover tube but I haven’t had a chance to investigate. Either way I don’t think that’s bad for a 9 year old car from Germany or any other country.
To be fair none of these things are things that don’t often fail on cars we would typically call reliabe, they’ve been cheap to repair, and they’re both tuned amongst other modifications which adds stress to everything. They’ve never done anything stupid or left us stranded, so I think they’re pretty reliable. Preventative maintenance is expensive, though. Parts alone to do pads and rotors on the Q7 was about $2k.
I daily drive a 26yr old German car that has given me zero issues. It took a lot of money to get it there but it’s reliable.
Some reason i decided a 1999 Mercedes CLK430 is a perfectly reasonable daily driver. In order to get there i replaced every single bit of the suspension and bushing. Then replaced every vacuum hose under the hood. Car is solid, maintenance costs more than what i paid for the car. And now it’s for sale.
The CLK430 is a beautiful car.
It really is!
Maybe it’s me but that first paragraph seems contradictory to me. It cost me a lot to make it reliable? Isn’t that the antithesis of reliable?
German cars tend to get a bad rep for being unreliable due to owners skipping required maintenance due to cost.
If you do the required maintenance and the car still breaks, that’s an unreliable car to me.
Lots of people associate being able to skip maintenance and the car still works, as being reliable. Sure that car is reliable, and probably can to to hell and back
I’ve owned and currently own a handful of cars that people would associate with being unreliable, they’ve been fine for me, but i also don’t skip or put off maintenance.
My first new car was a first generation Honda Prelude, which I got because of Honda’s reputation for reliability. I was so excited to have a new car, I babied that thing, but within the first 3000 miles the hydraulic clutch master cylinder failed while I was making a left turn in the middle of a busy intersection. At about 7000 miles the carburetor failed leaving me stranded on the side of the interstate. I don’t remember what was wrong, but it was replaced rather than repaired. Both failures came without any warning. I will say, that after the carb got replaced, I got a solid 80,000 miles of trouble-free driving out of it.
Not a specific car, a specific motor… the Chevy 350. “It’ll run on water, it’s unkillable, most reliable motor ever made.” Bullshit. Literally never owned one that functioned correctly. After the 3rd vehicle with that “perfect” motor I essentially swore off anything Chevy with the exception of a work truck I didn’t pay for (that also could have easily killed me). Fuck GM.
Here I dont see much Rams in Qatar at high mileage…you happened to get lemons. Same with any manufacturer…
On the lemon side, no personal experience, but I remember my parents knew some people in the late ’80s who had all sorts of reliability issues with a series of Hondas (or maybe Toyotas?) that made me seriously doubt their reputation well into the ’90s. Obviously, faulty anecdata (although let’s be real: a modern Chevy is as far ahead of a ’90 Lexus as that Lexus was ahead of a ’90 Chevy, reliability-wise).
On the reverse-lemon side, my ’05 Passat went 15 years and 123k mostly-city miles with 2 problems: an electronics bug that was covered under warranty (and never recurred), and the infamous engine sludge (50% covered under recall warranty). Given all of the “I’d only tell my worst enemy to buy a modern VW” comments I see around here, I’d say that’s a solid outcome.
Finally, on a not-surprising note, my first car, a hand-me-down ’87 Grand Am, the soft, shitty brakes were a significant culprit in its demise. I had to panic-brake in the rain, and the brakes were so bad that I was barely able to pump before impact (hardly anything happened in the first ~60% of pedal movement).
It’s not really GM’s fault that you never changed the old brake fluid. That’s like complaining that Goodyear tires suck in the rain when they’re bald.
It wasn’t old brake fluid. We* took that thing to the dealer a half dozen times trying to get better performance out of them. New fluid, new pads, didn’t matter.
*mostly my mom, whose daily driver it was. She was a veteran wrench who could swap out a transmission solo in her youth..
I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions. Sorry for unfairly impugning your mom’s diagnostic skills.
1993 Saab 900NG, I think the first year of GM-based Saabs. Granted, it was getting old when I got it around 2009-10 and it was a hand-me-down.
Basically everything broke on it, and things just kept on breaking continuously during the 2 years I’ve had it.
Central locks, power windows, door cards flopping, clutch, synchro rings in the manual transmission.
The front suspension wore out super quickly with all the bushings, balljoints, control arms. And some parts were starting to get expensive after Saab went out of business.
I dropped the front subframe on that thing at least 2-3 times.
But it did not stop there. I should have stopped fixing it way sooner.
But sunk-cost fallacy.
I replaced the exhaust, power steering pump, alternator. Then the A/C stopped working, dash was intermittent.
The final straw was when the fuel pump and the central lock died at the same time. I had to climb in through the hatch door and then and it got me stranded at an expensive airport parking lot.
2019 Honda Civic. Ate batteries for breakfast, lunch and dinner (possibly related to some of the weird electrical gremlins popping up) and was starting to suffer from oil dilution because my most common drive was only two miles. I’d stretch its legs every weekend but didn’t really seem to help.. The seats were worn and coming apart and the drivers headrest was bubbled and gross-looking before I slapped some expensive custom seat covers on it. Car had 63k miles on it.
I bought a used 2002 Olds Intrigue with 26K miles. My co-workers laughed at me for buying another ‘orphan’ car, my family disowned me and old ladies spat on me as i walked down the street.
Okay, so maybe the last two examples are stretching the truth a little, but I did get a lot of grief about the fact that Oldsmobile was no more and everyone warned me about the 3.5L ‘Shortstar’ V6 under the hood.
10 years and 200,000 miles later, i sold the car for $900 to the son of the lady who cleaned our office; he got another 80K miles out of it.
Meanwhile, one of the co-workers who laughed at my purchase had gone through THREE Volvos in those same 10 years.
Similar Intrigue story, had a 2001 GLS I got with 7,800mi on it (used GM company car, had oil change records, knew the driver). My office bros I worked with made fun of my car as they drove various Audis and German whatnot that were constantly in the shop. Drove that car a few years without issue, sold it to my mom at about 40,000mi. She drove it to about 80,000mi other than some random electrical issues with the dome light not going off no notable issues in its first 10 years on the road. She sold it to my brother in laws neighbor who got another 100,000mi out of it, was still running and going down the road with not a lot of issues he said, same guy then gave it to a nephew who needed a car and last I heard it’s still going down the road as of 2023, probably past 200,000mi now…
I had the world’s worst Volvo 245 Turbo. It broke ALL the time, the best being an engine fire due to the biodegradable wiring harness at rush hour on Rt 128 around Boston. I should have let it burn to the ground, but dummy me put the fire out and had it towed home to Maine. It was just too far gone when I bought the thing.
I also had a P38a Range Rover. It gave me a nervous twitch for four years with all the stuff that COULD expensively go wrong with it, but it never really actually broke. The worst was a seized idler pulley for the serpentine belt, which it was nice enough to do in the garage. Started it, huge screech, immediately saw what the problem was, went and bought one and fixed it in about 20 minutes.
Those are definitely my two. That Volvo is really the only truly unreliable car I have ever had, and thankfully I still had my other Volvo – an absolutely bulletproof ’87 740GLE that ultimately went over 400K miles, and then served as a parts donor for other Volvos for another decade or more.
My Cruze Eco was reliable in that it never left me stranded from a sudden breakdown. Aside from the battery dying a few times. But manual, so pop starting it worked.
That car ate water pumps like candy. Just a bad design. Thankfully they’d fail gradually. Also, that engine needed German car maintenance since everything in the engine bay was Bosch from Germany. Staying on top of the cooling system was necessary. Same with the transmission fluid. Change it once shifting got notchy. Good car, otherwise. I understand my experience was a bit unusual given the reputation of the 1.4T.
I am at a loss as to all these stories about reliable German cars that seem to require replacing anything that moves every 10K miles. That’s kind of like dropping the serious violent crime rate by making murder legal.
Similar experience with my Cruze. GM eventually released a bulletin saying seepage from the water pump is normal which… I can’t say is totally wrong.
But I had to replace one pump because it was definitely leaking too much and then dealers did two more while doing other maintenance because of (I suspect) the seepage. Otherwise it’s just bad about holding in oil because I suspect all the seals were spec’ by Opel (zee Germans).
Honda Prelude….back in the Vacuum line days. it was also older by then, so not completely fair to say, but it was definitely not as reliable as i expected it to be. I had a 2003 Ford Escape. 4wd drive 3.0 v6. it was reliable and I would have never guessed it would be when I offered to pay my mom more than trade in value to help her out. I think that thing was finally sent to the junk heap with almost 400,000 miles.
I’ve owned four Mercedes – W124, W202, C209, and C219. They have all been extremely reliable and are super easy to work on compared to literally every other car brand.
Anyone who complains about Mercedes reliability either didn’t do their research or doesn’t repair their cars until something breaks. They are fantastic vehicles.
My E46 has been great too, although that required a lot of preventative maintenance.
I did have a 1990 Honda Civic that was quite problematic, but back then I didn’t know much about cars. It was just neglected and if I owned it now, I would probably be able to get it running well.
VERY much agree, having owned w123, w124, and now an s212 wagons. My BMWs have also been extremely reliable cars. The w123 I even pulled out of a barn after sitting for 15 years and it was still reliable right from the get-go. Had plenty wrong that I needed to sort out, but it never stranded me anywhere.
My experience with my various friends who owned Hondas back in the day was that they were GREAT until they weren’t. It was like the perfectly engineered them to have EVERYTHING crap out at the same time, unlike European cars where it’s this and that over time.
A 201 is my affordable dream car. Whenever I mention one to my German friends it starts an hourslong love fest because you can’t kill them.
I bet I can
I left a more detailed account elsewhere in this thread, but I’m gonna have to disagree with you at least where 124s are concerned. And this is coming from someone who’s owned, dailied, and wrenched on a bunch of 123s, as well as a veritable smorgasbord of Euro shitboxes (BMW, Volvo, VW, Alfa, etc.) over the years.
Yep. My W124 was not reliable at all, it’s a pain to work on, and some simple things (alignment) were dealer only, and the closest dealer was 100 miles away.
My E46 had no issues, except for the needle-nose pliers someone left in the road which ended up in my tire – which brings me to me one complaint – the jack in the BMW E46 3-series sucks. I was on a (frozen) dirt surface, but damnit I couldn’t get the car to stay up and the jacked dropped the car a few times, so we got the jack out of the trunk of my buddies Buick, which worked great.
Need more info
You have had 4 Mercedes all extremely reliable? Then why did you need 4 of them?
The two least reliable vehicles I’ve ever owned were a Ford F250 with the 7.3 Powerstroke and a manual, and a VW Mk IV with the ALH 1.9 TDI.
Both were trash by ~125,000 miles.
For the last 20 years I’ve had to hear people on the internet talk about these as “million mile engines” or some such nonsense. Perhaps that’s true if you budget for AMG S65 levels of repair costs every year.
Meanwhile, my FCA/Stellantis product has given me a decade of faithful service without a single dollar of out-of-warranty expense apart from routine maintenance.
I’ve had similar luck with Dodge products. They always seemed the catch the badmouthing of product quality but I’ve personally never had a Dodge leave me stranded.. Ford and Chevy on the other hand..
Hear plenty bad things about Ram trucks in Qatar….not so much for Chevrolet/GMC and Ford….I have no idea why.
Of course the guys from Qatar hate Rams, they don’t like the competition for their girlfriends.
That concept is forbidden in Islam and in eastern culture, and most people who have RAMs here are fairly religious…so…
I’ve not been quite so lucky with Dodge, but I wouldn’t say my experience has been as bad as their reputation.
I had a Charger with a Pentastar v6 drop a valve at about 60k (thankfully it just needed a head repair and didn’t destroy the engine), then a different Charger ate a torque converter at ~1,000 mi outside of powertrain warranty. To Dodge’s credit, when I told them this was my third Charger, they covered 50% of the torque converter replacement cost.
That’s out of four Dodges, one of which my wife is still driving daily. Sounds rough, and I’ll admit – those are non-trivial issues. But after more than 300k miles across the four? I’ve spent way more money repairing smaller issues on other makes.
My 2001 Jetta TDI made it ~170,000 miles until the “sovereign citizen” nutjob I sold it to (at 165K miles) got pulled over by police for not having valid license plates. (They were paper hand-lettered with “sovereign citizen.”) He refused to get out of the car and they ended up breaking windows to pull him out. The cost of replacing the windows was more than the car was worth.
During the time I had it, I had to replace the injection pump twice and have intake manifold de-carbonized. A window dropped inside the door, but I think it was fixed as part of service campaign. The base of the antenna corroded which severely affected radio reception.
Not the worst, but not great either. We bought a ’94 Jeep GC V-8 and chose the bumper to bumper 3-year/36K bumper to bumper warranty. Good thing too, because it was at the dealership at least once a month for brake, transmission, a/c and on and on. I told my wife it was going to eat us alive financially when the warranty expired. But surprisingly, it settled down in the third year and was pretty solid until we sold it with 115,000 miles on it. At that point, the water pump was weeping. But otherwise, it held together pretty well.
Many moons ago my mom had an ‘84 Accord sedan that was miserable. Even the rack and pinion steering unit broke. Around the same time my now-wife had an ‘85 Accord sedan that was bulletproof. Go figure.
This has got me wondering if driver competency is involved.
Every time I drive into a curb the damn tires go flat.
1992 Mercedes 190E 2.6 (W201 chassis W103 I6 engine) they had a reputation for bad reliability. Mine was absolutely flawless for 200,000 miles. Rust finally did it in after over 20 years
Big bird is not going to agree with me but my 2017 Subaru forester had 50000kms when I bought it in 2019(was most likely a rental car) and I drove it for 5 years and put 180000kms on it. I replaced 2 bearings under warranty and one other. Got the condenser replaced from a recall. This was basically all that happened to it. Other than pads and disks every other year. I sold it last June and it had 235000kms on it. I never touched the CVT but did oil changes every 8000kms.
Never trust a person who measured reliability in km. Like 235,000 km it’s like what 500 miles?
Really??? Wtf man
I had a 2006.5 VW GTi, which was the first year model with the 2.0T engine that replaced the 1.8T.
Bought it new and kept it for over nine years. Had one incident where a cylinder was misfiring and had it towed to the dealer for a $600 repair. I would eventually get that back due to a recall but I don’t remember what the recall covered.
Other than that the car was solid without any issue. I know a lot of folks here pan VW reliability, and my annecdote doesn’t negate the overall trend, but mine was dead reliable in the time I had it.
Where I work, my company has gone through a series of Nissan Versas (5) with CVT and Chevrolet Sparks (2). And we have had amazingly reliable service with them. (About 20,00 miles a year with pretty good preventive maintenance)
Much more reliable than the Fords we had that had automatic shifting manual transmissions and the Ford automatics (all Focus’)
Is that 20 miles a year?
20,000
We had a 2011 Honda Insight, and while not a lemon, it definitely wasn’t as reliable as it should have been. It fried its own ABS computer (how does that even happen?), which disabled all brake regeneration and of course ABS braking until we had it replaced. The worst part? The car was just barely out of the factory powertrain warranty and a new one was $3800.
Thankfully, that was the only car I’ve ever paid for one of those ripoff extended warranties as it cost me $1000 when I bought the car, but fully covered the new ABS computer.
Most reliable? Our Leaf hasn’t had a single issue in the 68k miles we’ve put on it, it still gets its 150miles of EPA-rated range despite sitting outside in all weather and only getting charged as needed. Say what you will about Nissan, that Leaf has been rock solid. Time will tell how long the battery ultimately lasts, but 7 years in, it’s doing great.
After a trouble free ten years in an Accord, then 5 years in a Civic, we bought a 97 Prelude, brand new. At 30K, it started drinking oil. No abuse, just commuting and some longer trips.
Honda admitted there was a problem with rings in some early ones like ours and tried to screw us on the warranty. An oil burning Honda with less than 35K miles was not what we expected after a couple decades of trouble free cars AND motorcycles.
We got rid of it and bought a Miata. That was it for us and Honda automobiles.
I still have a Honda VFR, which also has a reputation for reliability. Except for the regulator rectifier. They updated it three times and I got to try all of them when every one of them left me stranded, one time in downtown San Francisco. At least the passerby I flagged down helped me load it when my wife showed up with the truck and a ramp. The last r/r worked and is still working.
May I use this time to tell everyone I bought a rebuilt motor from AZ for $3,600 rebuilt by Nutec. The motor arrived defective because a part inserted backwards which damaged it so losing oil so fast I noticed it under 100 miles. Took it to my shop they required a shit load of tests. Agreed it was damaged but said their warranty would only cover x amount so I needed to pay the remainder. Well my mechanic is great and charged the $50 an hour Nutec paid. And AutoZone agreed to pickup the difference between cost and warranty pay. But I think if you pay $3,600 for a rebuilt motor it should arrive in working condition. Apparently Nutec believes differently. The cost difference wasn’t bad since AZ picked it up but an additional 2 weeks needed for transportation in hard winter weather adder over $300 to an already expensive repair.
Never use Nutec or their subsidiaries
2009 Mini Cooper Clubman. Gremlin free car. Never had to do anything other than put oil in it for five years.
My understanding is that this is incredibly uncommon.
My parents have an ’09 Clubman S bought used, and it has been pretty good.
Wow, congrats! I’m not sure I’ve ever heard of one of these being trouble free. A relative had one that thought it was entitled to be driven around on a flatbed.
So I can chime in with the SAME car being both!
My dad bought my sister a 1994 Honda Accord that would be passed to me once I got my license, since at that point she would be off to college where at the time she couldnt have a car. Reliable, right? We bought it with 94k on the clock, and it needed tires and a new exhaust from the cat back.
My sister managed to:
Break off the muffler, multiple timesBurn through 2 sets of tires in 20,000 milesblow out every speaker, multiple timesget stranded with no start condition multiple times that was caused by 2 things: first, the distributor cap gasket was bad. So when it rained and there was a high humidity period, it was wet and wouldnt start. But when it dried out it was fine! Nobody could diagnose it, until finally her friend who was a lot boy found it. Second was the valve cover gaskets killing spark.Exhaust failed at the catheater diedpower windows diedI got it 30k later, and had to replace the speakers again and do the brakes. Ever see a rotor cracked in half from heat? I did. I drove it for 20,000 trouble free miles, never an issue! Except she backed into me (In my moms Pilot) while I was parked behind her in the driveway once. With the car running. and me on the horn. “My radio was turned up!”
I ended up getting a mustang to replace it, and she got the Honda back. The muffler fell off again on her way back to school.
What is with all of these Hondas showing up on this list? It’s giving me anxiety!
For what it’s worth, I’ve had 3 Hondas. My 77, consumed oil at about 1500 miles/qt. And blew the head gasket at least 2X. My 89 Civic SI, bought w/delivery miles on the clock got down to 1000 miles/qt, one alternator rebuild, at least 2 axles and new bushings in the rack and pinion. But it went 250k miles before an 18 wheeler swerved into it and took me out (compounded by me calling on all my knowledge & training and whacking the middle pedal and hitting the median barrier).
I replaced the 89 w/ a used 2002 SI and it consumed a qt of oil about every 1500 miles and 3 catalytic converters in 240K miles. My experiences w/ the Hondas makes more tolerant of my BMW that doesn’t burn oil (but has leaked it and also required 3 water pumps in 100K miles).
I’ve had 4 Hondas. First (early 90s Prelude) I only had for a couple of months before I sold it, but that’s what I did back then (buy cars for a quick flip.) I had a late 90s Acura CL and a early 00s Civic – both had head gasket problems. Lastly, I had a Acura RSX and it was quite reliable, only trouble was the starter went out. Sold it to my boss because he always wanted one and my knee was giving out so I needed to switch to an automatic for work. Which leads us to the most disappointing one of all:
V6 RAV4. Bought with ~116k miles. Looked great, ran great at test drive. First week I had it, Toyota battery suddenly loses a cell and won’t start car. Over the next year it loses a brake booster, the AC Compressor locks up and the VVTi system started rattling at start-up, at which point I got rid of it. Side note, the V6 (well actually the transmission) was kinda disappointing. Yes, if you nailed it at a stoplight from a complete stop, it was quite fast for the time, surprised a few sports cars. However, if you floored it while it was moving you could count on a long delay before the transmission would decide to downshift and you could actually use the power.
I had one Honda. I had an accident that rolled it over 4 times ended up in the woods. Has it yanked out started right up but need flatbed due to airless mud filled tires. Had it legal for $400. Great car.
Your sister obviously treated the brakes and gas pedals as binary inputs. On/off. You know how the radio speakers failed. She was taking deafness lessons. And, like my granddaughter, she never looked behind the car as she backed up over curbs, bushes, bollards, parking stops and boulders. And didn’t stop when she hit things, because she couldn’t hear the crunch/impact. The opposite of “mechanically sensitive”.
And you let her drive? May she back into your low miles low production Ferrari and damage parts that are NLA
That was a big standard Matrix that her parents bought. When she started working, she bought her own car, a low mileage Passat. She treats that a little nicer.
I think the driver matters more than the car. I can manage to drive Range Rovers with near perfect reliability, my kid brother could kill a Corolla in short order.
Sounds like your parents should have traded in your sister, and saved the family a ton of money in car repairs.
I think driver error on this. Let’s be honest we all know idiot drivers who just might pump diesel in the tank up to driving on sidewalks because idiots. There is no avoiding morons
The lede photo is my friend Bryan Thompson with his Toyota Camry.
Credit where credit is due.
Is he related to Elise(not her real name)? There is a strong family resemblance
I doubt it – I don’t believe he has a sister.
But he does live in LA.
He’s an actual car designer – a really interesting and sweet guy
Sadly he’s battling cancer these days.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bryan_Thompson_(designer)
Thought I recognised that photo! Bryan is a legend in the Toyota Tercel 4wd alt universe which I coexist in. The story of how he bought his families Tercel 4wd back from the dead (abandond in a ditch somewhere in a rust belt state) to better than new condition should be featured on the autopian sometime. Check out the forum post here https://tercel4wd.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=5528
Yes!
He’s also rescued a 1970’s Datsun 200SX (Nissan Sylvia), a 1980’s Toyota Celica Convertible, and he redesigned a Fiat 500 when they were new to the states.
Lately he’s been doing flying car art:
http://www.bryanthompsondesign.com/bt-shop
He would make a great Autopian (hint-hint)
I had an ’84 Tercel 4×4 SR5 and it didn’t need that much rescuing. Once I had the car rebuilt, it was a fun little thing to drive around. It wasn’t fast and before the carb rebuild, would barely make it up not-horribly-steep grades over the passes.
But on level-ish ground, that thing was unstoppable in the snow. It was so light, that it just floated up on top of the snow instead of getting high-centered. It was a charmingly direct and honest car. I miss it.
Surprisingly reliable, despite what I’ve heard on the internet, my wife’s old 2008 Nissan Versa with the CVT. 155k miles, zero problems. I did change the expensive cvt fluid every 30k which probably helped. That car was boring as fuck, but super reliable, cheap to maintain and shockingly big inside.
I’d say the same about our 2018 Leaf. Boring, but zero issues, super cheap to maintain and insure, and just quietly does whatever we need it to do.
I think the Leafs are rock solid. Such simple design.
I had a 2009 versa hatch with cvt. Dead reliable for 55k Miles. Purchased at 105k. After a raccoon hit three it had some bad front end damage and I sold it at 160k. For sure fixable but I wanted and could afford a newer vehicle. I had never changed the cvt fluid but the AC went out after raccoon 1 and I replaced the damaged hose and it was fine after a recharge.
I imagine the fact the Versas have very little power helps CVT life considerably. A friend with a V6 Maxima went through FOUR transmissions before the factory extended warranty ran out, at which point he immediately got rid of the car. A friend with a recentish Pathfinder is also on number four in 100K or so. A big heavy SUV with a big engine and a tow rating has to be a worst case scenario for them. And a lead-footed wife driving the thing. What is it with women and binary pedal application? My bestie is the same. Full throttle, or full brake, very little in-between.
That is probably true. The Versa only weighed about 2,700 pounds and had a mere 122hp.
Funny enough I replaced the 2009 versa with a 2020 kicks. Which weighs the same and has the same power. And yes I know I replaced one of the blandest cars with almost the same thing, but a small hatch for under 20k out the door just wasn’t happening at any other dealership. And if I had bought a fast car I would have had many speeding tickets during COVID time.
I can’t blame you. While it’s not exciting, it’s solid transportation and a good hatch (they call it an suv, but raising a hatch 1″ does not make it a suv) is hard to find now days. That’s why when we replaced the Versa, we got an ioniq 5, which Hyundai also calls a suv (it’s not), because it’s a large hatch. The wife loves having a hatch.
I have noticed that myself… I have a friend who, when she visits, closes the silverware drawer so hard that the tray slides to the back when it reaches the end of its travel. She closes the trunk lid of my car so hard that I yell at her. And I’m surprised my kitchen faucet still works, because she slams it down like an act of outright hatred.
I do think, overall, she has some anger management issues, but she’s smart and fun to be around. I just try not to put more in the anger bank.
Anyway… Billy Joel on the topic:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xgjtm4_M20
Perfect choice! LOL!
Same experience here with fewer CVT fluid changes
I’m going to call this “reliable for what it was.” In 2012 my ex got a 2005 Passat wagon, with the 1.8t and 115k miles. Notoriously unreliable, and indeed, I did a lot of repairs and preventive maintenance on that car. But it never once broke down on us, or had any kind of failure that prevented it from being driven. A low bar, I know, but this is a 2000s VW here. We split in 2017 and he was daily driving that Passat up until last year. He told me that it had been bulletproof reliable in that time, only needing consumables, but with over 200k on the odometer it finally needed a decent amount of work, so he got a Tiguan. He still has the Passat though, apparently he wants to fix it up in time. I guess I turned him into a bit of a car guy, he had absolutely no interest in them before we met and now he wants to fix up a 20 year old German wagon…
With VWs of that era, it seems to be a combination of luck and by-the-book maintenance. My ma had an ’01 New Beetle 1.8T that made it from CPO at 20k to over 180k with very few stupid VW problems; she only traded it in 2013 or ’14 because it was rusty enough (New England, then upstate New York car) that replacing the original clutch wasn’t worth it. The windows never even fell into the doors!
Yep, I’m convinced my by-the-book maintenance is what got that car so far. And fixing things, even the little things, as they went wrong. Or before they could go wrong, if it was a common failure point.