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Car Forum / Driving, Maintenance, Tuning / Maintenance and Repair / February 2006Commuter car recommendations
I drive about 18,000 miles a year for my employer and have decided my V-8 pickup needs to spend more time parked. I'm looking for an inexpensive ($4000 max) car that'll get 30+mpg. The top of my list is a late 90s Toyota Corolla, but I'd be interested in recommendations for other cars to consider. Fuel economy and reliablilty would be the most important factors to consider. Ease of maintenance would be another. Thanks for your help. In my opinion, a Toyota Camry or Corolla or a Honda Accord might be one of the better buys. I would buy, perhaps, a standard transmission. A lot of people neglect the very hell out of their automatics. There is no GM or Ford that I would buy used at this point. > I drive about 18,000 miles a year for my employer and have decided my > V-8 pickup needs to spend more time parked. I'm looking for an [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > > Thanks for your help. > In my opinion, a Toyota Camry or Corolla or a Honda Accord might be one > of the better buys. > There is no GM or Ford that I would buy used at this point. Not even a Geo/Chevy Prizm? They sell for less than Corollas since many people still don't know that the cars are actually Corollas. > I drive about 18,000 miles a year for my employer and have decided my > V-8 pickup needs to spend more time parked. I'm looking for an [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > > Thanks for your help. Buy a Corolla or Civic new for not a whole lot of money, enjoy the excellent milage, take care of it and it will last for a loong time. I would avoid used cars unless you are willing to really research the title because there are a lot of totalled cars from the hurricane damaged areas that are being peddled. I had a 1989 chrysler lebaron 2.4 l 4 cyl that got excellent milage highway. with 18,000 miles anually I would either buy or lease a newer car or find out why your employer won't buy one for you. a business would have good tax writeoffs for the vehicle. > I drive about 18,000 miles a year for my employer and have decided my > V-8 pickup needs to spend more time parked. I'm looking for an [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > > Thanks for your help. Corolla/Camry are nice cars but they do have one problem. They refuse to die...  SignatureThank you, "Then said I, Wisdom [is] better than strength: nevertheless the poor man's wisdom [is] despised, and his words are not heard." Ecclesiastes 9:16 > I drive about 18,000 miles a year for my employer and have decided my > V-8 pickup needs to spend more time parked. I'm looking for an [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > > Thanks for your help. Benefit from other's stupidity. The fact that people are willing to pay ridiculous amounts for clapped-out Hondas and Toyotas rules them out. Spend 1/3 as much for a relatively low-mileage small American car like a Neon (avoid the first-gen Neon) or Focus. Enjoy. >The top of my list is a late 90s Toyota Corolla, but I'd be interested >in recommendations for other cars to consider. Fuel economy and >reliablilty would be the most important factors to consider. Ease of >maintenance would be another. The Chevrolet or Geo Prizm is a rebadged version of the Corolla which may be less expensive as a used car due to the "domestic" badge (the Prizm and Corolla were both made in the NUMMI factory in the US). However, with fuel economy being a concern, choose a manual transmission; if you cannot find or do not want a manual transmission, choose the 4-speed automatic over the 3-speed automatic transmission that is common in the Prizm and Corolla. Don't expect handling to be anywhere near sporty, especially with low-trim 1998 cars. The Honda Civic is another car with good reliability and fuel economy; however, make note of when the timing belt was last changed, or be prepared to do that service upon buying a used car if it was not known to be done recently enough (Honda engines can suffer major damage if the timing belt fails). Signature------------------------------------------------------------------------ Timothy J. Lee Unsolicited bulk or commercial email is not welcome. No warranty of any kind is provided with this message. Frank Wrote: > I drive about 18,000 miles a year for my employer and have decided my > V-8 pickup needs to spend more time parked. I'm looking for an [quoted text clipped - 6 lines] > > Thanks for your help. Well if riding motorcycles doesnt bother you, then Geo Metro. My XFI gives 50-55mpg which gives me more money for projects ->635CSI TURBO. Dont expect a whole lotta car...last one I owned went 325K miles before she was burning oil and junked. Ciao, DieInterim SignatureDieInterim http://www.automotiveforums.com > Well if riding motorcycles doesnt bother you, then Geo Metro. My XFI > gives 50-55mpg which gives me more money for projects ->635CSI TURBO. [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > Ciao, > DieInterim I currently own three motorcycles and do about 20,000 miles a year on them ;o) It's just not practical to ride them for work, though I do sometimes. And believe it or not, it doesn't save much money -- I tend to run through a $400 set of tires in 4000 or 14,000 miles, depending on which one I'm riding. But that's way off topic. If I find a car that doesn't cause me much trouble, I can save $1000 a year on fuel. That'd pay for a $4000 car in four years, which is when I plan to retire. And the car would still have some value when sold. And -- my big incentive -- my nice V-8 pickup will have roughly 75,000 fewer miles on it, and it won't need to be replaced. I won't retire unless I'm totally out of debt, and buying a new vehicle is out of the question. All this makes a $4000 vehicle right now very attractive. Thanks for the recommendations. my work car is a 96 geo metro. i drive 90 miles two and from work,and only costs about $25/week. it has given me absolutely no trouble. downside is the shifting. with 18+ stoplights my bad knee protests the choice of vehicle, but it keeps the truck in the garage. >> Well if riding motorcycles doesnt bother you, then Geo Metro. My XFI >> gives 50-55mpg which gives me more money for projects ->635CSI TURBO. [quoted text clipped - 19 lines] > > Thanks for the recommendations. Shifting wouldn't be too big an issue -- I live in a rural area and would be traveling a mixture of 2-lane highway and expressway most of the time. I had planned to go with an automatic just to avoid clutch issues from previous owners' misuse of the clutch. But I can see it's a two-edged sword; the automatic may never have been maintained. > my work car is a 96 geo metro. i drive 90 miles two and from work,and only > costs about $25/week. it has given me absolutely no trouble. > > downside is the shifting. with 18+ stoplights my bad knee protests the > choice of vehicle, but it keeps the truck in the garage. >Shifting wouldn't be too big an issue -- I live in a rural area and >would be traveling a mixture of 2-lane highway and expressway most of >the time. I had planned to go with an automatic just to avoid clutch >issues from previous owners' misuse of the clutch. But I can see it's >a two-edged sword; the automatic may never have been maintained. Automatics also tend to cost more to repair when they do break, and they usually cause worse fuel economy. http://www.fueleconomy.gov gives US EPA fuel economy numbers for cars from 1985 to current. Signature------------------------------------------------------------------------ Timothy J. Lee Unsolicited bulk or commercial email is not welcome. No warranty of any kind is provided with this message. I was going through a bunch of rubber on my 'wing until I switched to a car tire on the rear. So far I have over 30K on the latest one and it still has a lot of life left on it. Take a look at http://lifeisaroad.com/stories/2006/02/10/darkWingdarksideGoldWingcarTireOnAGold Wing.html http://lifeisaroad.com/stories/2004/10/27/theDarkSide.html Oh an track back to Dans main site http://lifeisaroad.com if you like interesting bike stories. SignatureSteve Williams > > Well if riding motorcycles doesnt bother you, then Geo Metro. My XFI > > gives 50-55mpg which gives me more money for projects ->635CSI TURBO. [quoted text clipped - 19 lines] > > Thanks for the recommendations. : I drive about 18,000 miles a year for my employer and have decided my : V-8 pickup needs to spend more time parked. I'm looking for an : inexpensive ($4000 max) car that'll get 30+mpg. : The top of my list is a late 90s Toyota Corolla, but I'd be interested : in recommendations for other cars to consider. Fuel economy and : reliablilty would be the most important factors to consider. Ease of : maintenance would be another. : Thanks for your help. I think you made a very good choice in considering the Corolla. Additionally, a 4 cylinder Camry would provide decent gas mileage. The V6 Camrys tend to get around 25 MPG or so which wouldn't be as good. If it were me, I'd opt for a 4 cylinder Camry because of the size of the car and being a little more comfortable vs. the Corolla but both are excellent choices. b. |
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