Ignorance is Scary

[ExFlyBoy5]

The Prius is SOOO 2007. The new rage in these parts is the Nissan Leaf. I used to see lots of Prius's's but the Leafs have definitely taken over. With the incredible incentives that the feds give you *and* the VERY generous incentives from the state of Georgia, it's almost *stupid* to not buy one (notice I said ALMOST).


Although, you had better like it because I don't think the used car market for them will be very good since you can get them so cheap brand new.


My first car was an '81 Toyota Starlet hatchback. Quite similar to a Corolla but it was rear wheel drive and although I don't remember what the mileage was, I do know I could drop $5 in the tank (gas was about 80 cents a gallon in 91/92) and drive for several days...which when you are 16-17 years old could be many miles a day! When gas was approaching $5 a gallon, I start to hunt for another one...and guess what? Good luck finding one...they have quite the cult following and finding one in good shape is going to cost a pretty penny.

 

[Nunthewiser]

I have never been a big fan of the VW bug, though they were well made back in the day. They just never got impressive fuel economy.

Now, the VW diesel is another story. I have been driving one (at first a Rabbit diesel pickup, later a 91 Jetta diesel) for the last 20 years of my wretched commute. They are simple as dirt to work on and get close to 50 mpg.

I would put the Jetta up against a Geo/Chevy Metro any day in a demolition derby, There's just no "there" there in a Metro...

 

[MRG]

One of my family members is lbym on everything except autos. Mid price not luxury, but every 2 years there's a brand new vehicle.

They said they were done with new cars but 6 months later there's a new vehicle to replace the 1.5 yo car. A great explanation, the other one had an issue that the dealership couldn't fix, what else could we do? I thought what they described was an inconvenience, but wasn't listening very well. I asked about lemon laws then just shut up.

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[winger]

That's not just ignorance; it's stupidity, and love of complaining for its own sake. I have a lot to say against condo board members, but wanting high dues (which they also pay) is not among them.

Amethyst

I read this quote this morning. You reminded me.

Ignorance is the lack of knowledge. Stupidity is the lack of thought.
Unknown

 

[travelover]

...........Although, you had better like it because I don't think the used car market for them will be very good since you can get them so cheap brand new..........

Electric cars depreciate by the amount of the rebate when you drive it off the lot.

 

[ExFlyBoy5]

Sent from my mobile device so please excuse grammatical errors.

 

[NW-Bound]

Ignorance is only scary from the viewpoint of an informed observer. To the perp, ignorance is still bliss.

So, avert your eyes. Do not look.

 

[TuffNuts]

Years ago a (thrifty) co-worker shared this story with me. His new bride had an excess mileage fee of several thousand dollars when she turned in the vehicle she had leased prior to meeting my co-worker. He said she had "no idea" of the mileage limitation and he had to show her and explain what the vehicle odometer was!

I know a young lady that took her car into the dealer ship for a minor repair and they asked if she would like to do an oil change. It was due. She replied, "no thanks, my car runs on gas!" You can't make this stuff up!

 

[Andre1969]

I know a young lady that took her car into the dealer ship for a minor repair and they asked if she would like to do an oil change. It was due. She replied, "no thanks, my car runs on gas!" You can't make this stuff up!

Lord help her if she ever replaces her oil cap...she'll be at the parts counter asking them to order her a new "710"!

 

[Choices]

First car was 62 bug convertible. In central FL the top had a tendency to mildew. All in all, I have owned 3 bugs and a VW Thing. Loved them all.

 

[Rick_Head]

I know a young lady that took her car into the dealer ship for a minor repair and they asked if she would like to do an oil change. It was due. She replied, "no thanks, my car runs on gas!" You can't make this stuff up!

A friend is the service manager at a Toyota dealership. A customer had their car towed in when the oil pressure light came on. Very little oil in the crankcase and 100K miles on the odometer. She was asked "when did you last change the oil?". Response "Change oil?". Apparently they changed oil, did a few basic tests (like compression) and told her to come back in 500 miles for a further look. Never saw her again. He says his retirement project will be to find that car, tear the engine down and see what it's like inside.

 

[Gumby]

I have a colleague who took her monster luxury SUV to the dealer to get the clock reset when we switched to daylight savings time.

 

[Walt34]

A friend is the service manager at a Toyota dealership. A customer had their car towed in when the oil pressure light came on. Very little oil in the crankcase and 100K miles on the odometer. She was asked "when did you last change the oil?". Response "Change oil?".

That's a pretty good testament to the quality of Toyota engines. It is amazing that it ran that long.

 

[Al in Ohio]

Wow. I condider a three year car loan long term and two year or less term a short term loan. I have had four car loans in my lifetime (Im 54) and the longest was based on three years but I paid it off in 2.5. A three year loan term on a depreciating asset just scares the hell out of me.


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[ls99]

I have a colleague who took her monster luxury SUV to the dealer to get the clock reset when we switched to daylight savings time.

Hopefully her legal skills are better. Just curious, did the dealer charge her 15 minutes for the job?

 

[Chuckanut]

Wow. I condider a three year car loan long term and two year or less term a short term loan. I have had four car loans in my lifetime (Im 54) and the longest was based on three years but I paid it off in 2.5. A three year loan term on a depreciating asset just scares the hell out of me.


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I've had two five year loans. One was for 0.9% and the other was for 0%.

You will understand if I didn't pay them off early.

 

[MooreBonds]

I've had two five year loans. One was for 0.9% and the other was for 0%.

You will understand if I didn't pay them off early.

I completely understand.....but my dad kept after me to hurry up and pay off my 0.0% 3 year loan when I bought my Kia. Now, I have an aversion to debt as much as he does - but when it's literally "free money", why the hurry to pay it off?

 

[growing_older]

An old truck that runs is still a truck that can haul things. One of the reasons many people pay for furniture delivery, landscaping services, etc... is because they don't have a way to haul the materials. If I had a truck...

If I had a truck (or rather when I did have a truck) all my friends and neighbors are really really friendly, and want to talk to me about borrowing it whenever they need to haul something big from here to there. Worked better than anything for keeping in touch with everyone I ever met.

 

[SteveNU]

My son is a mechanic at a Kia dealership and he always has a good story to tell. Tonight it was about a guy who hadn't changed his oil in 16000 miles and had only changed it 3 times since he bought the car 60,000 miles ago! He was complaining about it running poorly so they checked it out and found low compression in one cylinder. He wanted them to cover it under warranty. Needless to say they wouldn't cover the repair under warranty so he traded it in on a new $35,000 car!

 

[timo2]

An old truck that runs is still a truck that can haul things. One of the reasons many people pay for furniture delivery, landscaping services, etc... is because they don't have a way to haul the materials..

I used to use my pickup to avoid all delivery charges, haul dirt, everything I could. I first started questioning this one day when I was picking up a new washer and driver at the warehouse of a store. They had me sign for delivery at the dock, meaning any damage I did hauling and installing the items was on me. When they deliver, you don't sign for delivery until they have hauled and installed everything. Additionally, the warehouse for pickup always seemed to be on the far side of town. Then some of the stores started providing free hauling when big items were purchased. And I got older. Eventually, I felt like the expensive of an extra vehicle wasn't worth it any longer. so it was donated to a local charity.

 

[5j404]

Over the last year I've replaced tow 2001 vehicles. DW's Accord has turned into a Highlander and I got rid of a Chevy 1500 and have a Tacoma. Both were new. The older vehicles went to CarMax. Both older vehicles needed repairs or maintenace that was about the same amount as their CarMax price. Doing the work would have had minimal impact on their value. I feel sorry for whomever gets either of these rolling disasters.

I typically keep my cars until the maintenace needs approach their value. It's unusual for us to not keep cars for over a decade and put well over 100,000 miles on them. My Chevy P/U had 220,000 miles but just had so much wrong with it that I should have gotten rid of it a year earlier.

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[Andre1969]

That's a pretty good testament to the quality of Toyota engines. It is amazing that it ran that long.

I've heard a few other stories like this, but have trouble believing them. My ex-wife, for instance, had bought an Olds Calais, before I had met her. It was an '88 I think. She said she never had the oil changed, and never had any problems with the car in the time she had it. I think she got it to around 80,000 miles over the course of about 3 years, and then it got repossessed.

The other was the father of a friend of mine in high school and college. They had a '72 Dodge Dart with a slant six, bought new. Supposedly, never changed the oil. Around 100,000 miles, the car was looking pretty ratty, and they had newer cars, so they just let it sit at the curb. Eventually it wouldn't start anymore, so they took the tags off of it. The county found out, and it was scheduled to get towed off to its final resting place. I asked them about it, if I could have it, and they said if I could get it started, I could have it. Well, I did get it started, but then it started spraying fuel from a rotted rubber hose, and my friends panicked. My attitude was hey, it's just a cheap rubber hose, but their attitude was that they didn't want to give me anything so "dangerous". So, it got towed off.

Now, I'm sure these people neglected and abused that Dart, but I'm sure its oil had to have been changed at some point in those intervening 18 years. Or at least added to. FWIW, these people also had a 1983 Datsun Stanza that was pretty much reduced to junk by the fall of 1988, so that's a pretty good indication that these people neglected and abused their cars. But I'm sure oil got changed, or added at least, on some occasions.

I do know of two people, interestingly enough, with Toyotas, who tried that "never change the oil" stunt. One was our IT guy at work back in the 1990's. He had a Tercel, maybe a 1995 or so. Engine seized up, around 60,000 miles, when it ran dry. The other was an assistant manager at Little Caesar's, where I worked in the evenings when I was recovering from my divorce. He and his wife had a Corolla, again around a 1995 or so. Seized up around the 30,000 mile mark.

Oh, now that I think about it, another one of my high school/college buddies got his parents Tercel back in the early 1990's when his '85 Cavalier finally bit the dust. It was a late 80's model, I think. I hadn't seen him for awhile, but then one day we run across each other, and he has this brand new Trans Am. I asked him about the Tercel. Sludged up by 60,000 miles...and this was before "sludge" became associated with "Toyota".

Now, I'm not trying to slam Toyota...I think they build decent cars. My uncle had an '03 Corolla that got to around 250,000 miles, before he traded it in for a new Camry in 2013. Original engine and transmission, although the engine was sounding a little rough. I know its weakest points had been the catalytic converter and the water pump. Catalytic converter didn't start going out until after 100,000 miles though, and the water pump went around 150,000. My uncle was pretty good about keeping up on maintenance, though.

I just have a problem believing that an engine could go 100,000 miles without needed an oil change. Unless they start leaking it to the point where you're adding oil...which technically, isn't "changing" it I guess.

 

[athena53]

I remember an episode of Click and Clack in which they mentioned someone who thought that when the oil pressure light went on, that meant that you should get your oil levels checked next time you filled your tank. The car did not make it to the next fill-up before the engine seized.


Closer to home, I had my car maintained by a wonderful place with real mechanics, who proudly posted pictures of their customers' cars that had turned over 100,000 and 200,000 miles. My kind of guys. At one point they explained that the timing belt needed to be replaced because of the number of miles on the car. I'd never heard of the timing belt (guess I should read the manual) but they explained that if it fails, the car will need extensive and expensive repairs. So, I had the work done.


They were right, of course. A friend who was in far shakier financial condition had no idea the timing belt needed to be replaced and it failed while she was driving it. I felt really bad for her.

 

[Andre1969]

The main factor with timing belts is whether the engine is an "interference" engine or "non-interference" engine. In an interference engine, when the belt breaks, the valves stop moving, but the pistons keep moving, and will smash whatever valves that are in their path. Sometimes you get lucky and the damage isn't too bad, but sometimes it's enough to ruin the engine. With a non-interference engine, the pistons can't reach the valves, not even the fully-opened ones, so there's no real damage done. With the exception of needing a tow truck!

Back in the old days, they used to say timing chains were better, but that was a different era where belts usually needed replacing every 20-30,000 miles, while a chain was good for the "life of the car". That was also an era where "life of the car" usually meant it was junked by around 100,000 miles.

Nowadays though, with overhead cams, dual overhead cams, etc, chains, and belts, have to extend a lot further than back in the day. Belts are usually better for going the long distances, as chains tend to stretch. Although I'd think a belt, being made of rubber, would be more likely to stretch out than a metal chain? Anyway, timing belts these days are often good for 105,000 miles or more, and the engines are usually designed to make it easy to replace them. With chains, they're often buried deeper in the engine, and when they need replacing, it's a lot more money.

 

[panhead]

It was called the Chevy Sprint when it came out for 1985. That first year, I think it was only offered in the Western US. At some point, they added a 4-door hatchback, and there was even a turbocharged model offered for a couple years. I think it was 1989 when the car was redesigned, and no called the Geo Metro. The 4-door hatchback was dropped, but a 4-door sedan was added.

Around 1997 or 1998, I think GM dropped the Geo brand and these cars reverted back to being Chevies. At least, one of my friends had a 1998 Tracker and it was a Chevy, not a Geo, so I think they did that with all their "captive imports".

In 2000 they stopped selling Metros to private customers, but continued selling to rental fleets through 2001.

Oh, looking around on Wikipedia, they mention Car and Driver did a comparison test of a used 1998 Metro, pitting it against a new 2009 Prius and Insight. Naturally, it came in last place overall, because the newer cars were simply newer, better-engineered, etc. Not to mention, coming in at a higher price point. Nonetheless. the Metro managed to tie the Prius in fuel economy...42 mpg on their test average.

Yup, I had the turbo model! To about 40mph it would light up the tires and haul a*s! After that it was pretty doggy, needed constant boost to maintain highway speeds. Had it in school and even after I started my first job. $500 car when I bought it. Got backed into in a parking lot and made me $300. Kept driving it until the gas tank rusted out and started leaking and a branch fell through the windshield. Repairs were more than the little car was worth.