Fat people? Less gas!

Richard Evans wrote:

I didn't say it was rock bottom, I said it was conservative. Of course
some can get lower payments, especially if they stretch to 60-month
financing. If you had a $300/month payment with zero interest you'd be
paying $18k. The same for 48 months is $375. Are you trying to tell me
that $18k is not at the lower spectrum of new car prices?

A year ago, I was shopping for a car. The finalists were two new
models and one no-longer-made model.

One of the finalists was the Suzuki Swift+. It doesn't get the gas
mileage I wanted, but the price difference could buy a lot of gas.

If you were willing to self-finance, the car was available for under
$12K plus taxes. And that was at a time when C$12K was worth about
US$11.

And I'm a lousy negotiator. If they were offering it to me for
$11,998, I'm sure someone else could have got it for $10,500.
--
Tomorrow is today already.
Greg Goss, 1989-01-27

On Nov 11, 10:51 am, Boron Elgar wrote:

Lesson - you can get a good car or lemon from any manufacturer and in
any model line.

The most unreliable cars ever owned in this household are a Toyota
Camry, followed by a Honda Accord.

Most reliable have been a Mercury Grand Marquis, two Ford Expeditions,
A Chevy Silverado and a Nissan Murano.

But it does not follow that you should choose your car model at
random, without regard to reliability records. That would be like
saying "some people have fallen great heights and lived, so I'm going
skydiving without a parachute." It's smart to pay attention to
reliability data.

Again, I've found Consumer Reports survey data to be pretty
accurate.

- Frank Krygowski

On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 00:06:55 -0000, wrote:

On Nov 11, 10:51 am, Boron Elgar wrote:

Lesson - you can get a good car or lemon from any manufacturer and in
any model line.

The most unreliable cars ever owned in this household are a Toyota
Camry, followed by a Honda Accord.

Most reliable have been a Mercury Grand Marquis, two Ford Expeditions,
A Chevy Silverado and a Nissan Murano.

But it does not follow that you should choose your car model at
random, without regard to reliability records. That would be like
saying "some people have fallen great heights and lived, so I'm going
skydiving without a parachute." It's smart to pay attention to
reliability data.

Again, I've found Consumer Reports survey data to be pretty
accurate.

- Frank Krygowski



.... or not... Suzuki Samurai was a hatchet job.

On Sun, 11 Nov 2007 15:11:27 -0700, Greg Goss wrote:


If you were willing to self-finance, the car was available for under
$12K plus taxes. And that was at a time when C$12K was worth about
US$11.

I knew the ratio was bad at one time - but had no idea it was THAT
bad.

Boron Elgar ) wrote:

Lesson - you can get a good car or lemon from any manufacturer and
in any model line.

The most unreliable cars ever owned in this household are a Toyota
Camry, followed by a Honda Accord.

Most reliable have been a Mercury Grand Marquis, two Ford
Expeditions, A Chevy Silverado and a Nissan Murano.

Gee, go figure.

That does seem to run counter to many people's experience--at least
on the Toyota and Honda being unreliable.

Our most unreliable car was my '79 Honda Accord. I should've check
Consumer Reports. They would've warned me about the brakes and the
possibility of blowing a head gasket.

Second most unreliable was an '87 Toyota Corolla, but it wasn't
particularly unreliable. It just had that problem with the cooling
system where the mechanics could never locate the leak. So we
replaced the thermostat, the radiator, hoses, you name it. It was one
of those infuriating single problems that we seemed to keep having
the car into the shop for.

The '86 Chevy Sprint was middling reliable. So was the '89 Ford
Escort. (Hand-me-down from Grandma. I wouldn't have bought it.)

The '86 Toyota Tercel was very reliable. The only time it ever
stranded anyone was when the timing belt broke at 100+k miles. (I
ended up doing something ethically questionable about that and I will
herewith confess. I picked up the stranded Mrs. Penguin and drove us
straight to AAA. I did not clarify with the agent whether the policy
covered pre-existing conditions. I suspect I would have been told
yes, but I decided to play it sneaky and not ask. I just drove to a
pay phone near our broken down car and called AAA for a tow truck. So
now my conscience nags me every so often when the weather changes.)

The '99 Altima has been quite reliable for the year and half we've
had it (from 125k to 145k miles).

The '94 Honda Civic has been super reliable for the three years we've
had it (from 65k to 120k miles). Not a problem to speak of except
what arose from hitting the deer, and you can hardly blame a car for
that.

Anecdotal though this all is, our experience has been basically what
Consumer Reports readers predicted. Except for the '87 Corolla and
the nagging unfixable problem.

--
Opus the Penguin
I'm not a lurker, but if I were, I would support you in email. -
Hactar

Greg Goss ) wrote:

Tom Sherman wrote:

Greg Goss wrote:
Lesson - do not buy from manufacturers that make unreliable
vehicles?

The Metro has the initials "GM" and a Chev logo buried in the
Geo planet logo. Wouldn't that advice chase me away from a GM?

The Geo Metro is a re-badged Suzuki.

Which is why I bought it in the first place. It's a bit more
complex than merely "rebadged". Su designed the car and the
factory for them, but I think it was managed as a routine GM
factory in Ontario in operation. And, according to a local Su
dealer, Suzuki never used the 1 litre engine that most of these
were built with. Obviously, since GM cannot build a reliable
small engine to save their company, the 1 litre engine must be a
Suzuki design, but if it was never used in the Swift or the Forsa,
it's not quite right to call it a "rebadged Suzuki".

But the manufacturer was still GM, once Suzuki had built the
factory for them.

You're from the other side of this two-newsgroup discussion. AFCA
is proud of its nitpicking.

I wouldn't say we're "proud" exactly. But we are competitive. Other
than that, you've made a fine post. Well, maybe not fine, but....

--
Opus the Penguin
I have to say, the combination of firearms, homemade booze, and Billy
Ray playing the bagpipes spells "fun" to me - Richard R. Hershberger

On Nov 11, 7:14 pm, Bob Ward wrote:
On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 00:06:55 -0000, wrote:


Again, I've found Consumer Reports survey data to be pretty
accurate.

- Frank Krygowski

... or not... Suzuki Samurai was a hatchet job.

You misread. I said their _survey_ data, not their editorializing.

Over the years, I've found many problems with their editorial
judgments. But the annual car issue reports the results of subscriber
surveys, with hundreds of thousands of people saying what's gone wrong
with their cars in the previous year. I find the data from those
surveys to be good information. It matched my experience, down to
specifying the parts of the car that would have trouble.

- Frank Krygowski