Besides American and European cars, Japanese automakers know what they are doing. My family has a Toyota Sienna 2004 and just recently it just clocked in at 445k kilometers and not once was it ever in a shop. Only things done to it where the oil changes and tire replacements. It still runs like new and has no signs of failure. Same as our Lexus rx350 2010 it has around 120k kilometers and absolutely nothing bad happened yet. I cannot say the same about Chrysler. I had a dodge ram 1500 2004 and when it was around 1 year old the axle completely twisted and started to rattle like crazy. This was just on the highway! There where constant electrical issues as well such as the wires would disintegrate in the casing. Same as our Chrysler town and country. The thing just rusts like there is no tomorrow and constant electrical issues. Never buy Chrysler if you are going to buy American
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Anyway, we have an 01 highlander with something like 140k miles on it, and we've never had any issues. Still runs like a charm. But a few years ago, we had to replace an O2 censor (Ya know. Automatic chokes). Other than that its been great.
Take a look at the Chevy Cruze Diesel. Its a cracking little car, and beats Jetta TDi in most categories, and has standard leather/heated seats, mylink infotainment and over 700 miles out of a tank of the dirty stuff. Plus its quicker, has tons of torque, and has high quality materials inside and out. Check out the soft contrast leatherette on the dashboard and its quiet on the inside and has plenty of pull, it happily goes 40mpt to 90 mph with no drama, and still has a 6 speed auto. No manual however, which is a big deterrent from me buying one. But its def a great car. Its either that, Audi A3 tdi or jetta/golf tdi (if there even IS a Golf tdi right now) very slim small car diesel choice here.
i stand corrected. forgot about the cruz. but that exception just confirms the rule. and if you get a diesel, never get a manual. get one with a double clutch autostick. much nicer to drive than a manual and much better at optimizing economy.
Agreed, about the tranny, that's the reason why a lot of people now don't really even ASK for a stick, no one can be bothered. I feel like one of the only few people around my area that really loves and wants to own stick cars. Its more fun to drive for me, but having a slick automatic with a bunch of cogs is (nowadays) a much better alternative, both from an economy standpoint, and from a desireability/reliability standpoint. Our trannys in GM cars (like the cruze for example) is sealed, theres no routine fluid changes at all. The tranny has 150,000mile oil, so rarely will that have to be done. Im sure in 20 years, stick cars are going to have to be special ordered, especially if autos gain any more cogs (Jeep has a 9 speed auto now. tsssssss.)
I don't hate American cars at all. I love the simplicity of most of them. I don't think there's any pre-1989 American car(like, proper car) that I genuinly don't like, including AMC Pacer and all those econoboxes. All the cars most American car nuts think are poor build quality etc... I think they have a certain... appeal to me, for some reason. Was actually looking at a 1979 Oldsmobile Custom, Chevy Monte carlo and Buick Regal a while ago, cars that American car guys usually consider as "Ew", but I like their look, however I don't think I can afford one just yet. Gonna stick with something European for now, which will be fun as well. In all honesty, the only cars I genuinly hate from factory(and not due to the people that drive them) are modern French cars... EDIT: oh, and Veyrons. I hate them, too. With their... stupid ugly faces...
Check out the new accords they are solid cars. Friend has sport sedan 6 speed and he averages 38.2mpg. Extremely comfortable cars and built extremely well. Plenty of power lots of features and I think they look beautiful.
Haha, seeing that the Veyron is made by a company that was founded by an Italian, in a French/german town, so it was considered a French car after the town went from german to French-owned. - - - Updated - - - My mom has a 2013 Accord V6 sport. definitely a great car. no where near 38mpg, prolly more like 30 - 32mpg. She likes to drive like me though. with a purpose lol
That's with the k24w engine or whatever the name is. 189/181 plenty of power and gets you around. The v6 is a nasty ride. Guy on YouTube with a 6 speed sedan smoking everyone.
yea she got rid of her 2009 4cyl ex-l nav for this car, that car had only 19k miles on it. she got a boat load of money for it as a tade, she pays less per month for her new V6 than she was with her 4 cyl haha go figure - - - Updated - - - yea she got rid of her 2009 4cyl ex-l nav for this car, that car had only 19k miles on it. she got a boat load of money for it as a trade, she pays less per month for her new V6 than she was with her 4 cyl haha go figure
Just on the topic of not liking car companies, one I really starting to dislike is mazda. It's like it's been poisoned with a little bit of american car. Apparently they used to work real close with ford, but for some reason they went separate ways. I just don't like them. A few years back, my mom got a used Cx-9. It was only like a year old and had like 20 something thousand miles, so it was basically new. Things i don't like about it: 1) it's got a v6 and it's a big heavy.....thing 2) it's not an suv but it's not really a crossover in my eyes either. I wants to be too many things 3) because of this it is shaped like a turd 4) No awd. big heavy turds need awd.
Mazda worked with ford. Ford produced a truck in the US known as the ranger (we all know it). Mazda had a very very similar truck sold outside of the US known as the B series. In the US mazda started rebadging ranger's as B series and globally ford started rebadging B series as rangers (until 2011 when ford australia designed their own similar truck which gained the ranger name badge and was then introduced as the global ranger). Toyota have an awful reputation here. Not other japanese companies, just toyota. Also only new toyotas. Their product recalls officially didnt include the UK, but its still damaged their reputation here.
Oh yeah. Nissan also worked with some american car company. Got hella mixed up. The Ford Escape and Mazda Tribute are the same car, just rebadged. Anyway, I don't like mazda.
In my opinion its all to do with geography, Oh and also stereo types . Since im in the UK i am going to compare that with the US. Uk = Small more twisty badly maintained roads US = wider smoother roads UK = Very very expensive fuel, therefore a lot of cars can get 50mpg+ US = Cheaper fuel, hence people don't care as much UK = Very expensive land = Incredibly small housing/gardens/driveways/garages US = Lots of land, cheaper = Driveways actually big enough to fit more than a hot wheels or matchbox car on Which is why people in the UK think that American cars seem stupid, they don't make much sense here. The ridiculous rear over hang on the grand marshal would be an issue in the UK, also American cars tend to use very cheap plastics. In my opinion Japanese and Korean cars have a lot going for them, they are cheap, well built and have a decent basic trim level.
Nissan Quest (90's model) was shared with the Mercury Villager (Nissan/Ford worked together on that one) The Chrysler/Mitsubishi venture (3000GT/Stealth, several other cars) Chrysler/Maserati joint venture (Chrysler TC by Maserati, anyone?) Chrysler/Fiat (current cars) Ford/Volvo (Ford Five Hundred/Mercury Montego/Volvo S80) Isuzu Rodeo/Honda Passport same ol shitty car Ford/Toyota are working together on new hybrid technology together. Theres a lot of joint ventures, its just so they can produce more and charge more. Its all around us. Pretty soon, Burger King and McDonalds will be hand in hand making guap.
When it comes to the looks of cars I always thought that alpha romeo makes some really ugly cars. I am just not a big fan of that triangle grill and strange lights. - - - Updated - - - Another thing i will compare between Europe and NA are the Police cars. Where I live currently (Poland) they mostly use a KIA police car. I visited my home town recently(Hamilton, Ontario, Canada) and they got some new police cars! very nice looking. American police cars look far more aggressive. Even the colors. I don't really understand using white and light blue as police colors. It looks a bit silly.
I really do agree. I'll often flick through the TV guide and see that there might be 2 police chase programs on at once, one will be american and one british. You look at the british one and it will pretty much consist of "hey this dudes doing 50 in a 30 zone, lets chase him in a vauxhall astra, we've reached a motorway, oh we lost him", there is police interceptors which is a much more interesting british police show where they have police cars that don't suck, but american police seem far more capable with their dodges bombing down a motorway British police have a huge range of cars. My local force run the ford focus around for general usage, we have some 2.4 litre turbo volvo V70's, unmarked BMW 530d's and ford mondeos (there was a huge uproar recently because someone living in the house opposite the police car park entrance/exit started observing the plates and leaked the numbers for 2 of the beemers thinking it would assist speeding drivers in avoiding them, the 2 leaked plates were not traffic vehicles and were surveillance vehicles, the cases both vehicles were working on were considered compromised although for obvious reasons it was never stated what the cases were). We also have a range rover for which I had a huge argument with a driver of, 2 BMW X5's (or I have seen at least 2 at a time in their vehicle area), 3 police transits for which 1 is the high roof model kitted for riot operations (the high roof doesnt go anywhere often, again I have seen 2 smaller transits in there at one time) and I have seen a subaru impreza driving around and an evo although I have never seen them near the station so I dont know if they are actually based at my towns station or somehow ended up here from the next town over. My local force do not have a single firearm. British police officers do not carry firearms unless specifically trained as firearms officers which is highly rare, london metropolitan have the highest ratio of firearms officers to regular officers in england with just 7% of officers having any form of formal training at all and most of those still only acting as non firearms officers (I think the resultant figure is meant to be about 2-3% of london police carrying firearms). My nearest firearms team is at least 20 minutes drive away and that excludes time assembling the team for deployment (as they are supposedly not on 24/7 standby). I find this stupid. There is no other word for it suitable for usage on this forum. Absolutely stupid. Hell, we have a riot van yet we don't have any big scary men with guns to jump out of it, just plastic shields and batons.
