There are 2 enemies with regard to vehicle longevity. The most obvious is mileage. But the less obvious to many is time, especially if a vehicle is not garaged.

The car I drove all through my college years was a family hand me down; a 1986 Merc Topaz. I still have it and drive it regularly. It is my beater. It runs fairly well. It neds an O2 sensor, allignment and a look see about the master cylinder. It has never been in a wreck and is basically a solid car. The problem is that the finish is shot, highly oxidized and the plastic trim is looking long in the tooth. The engine compartment is not all that clean and there is no way of getting it cleaner than it is right now. It has 107,000 miles on it. The enemy with regard to that car has been time, not mileage.

Some claim that you can engineer obsolescence. That may be true, but that doesn't sound like Toyota.

 

It just goes to show that vehicles of all makes and models and years can behave differently. My own experience with our Toyota ('92 Corolla) is the major repair we've done to it was a new alternator around 60k miles and 8 years' time. Of course, it's got low mileage for its age (90k miles), which may be a contributing factor.

I'm still a huge fan of Toyota, and recommend them highly to friends/family (brother-in-law bought a used Tacoma Pre-Runner after his Explorer started becoming a money and time-sink). I don't think you can go wrong with a 'yota, and especially not the Prius.

 

I took my Beetle Turbo on a trip across hwy 50 in Nevada, through Utah to I-70, south to Moab and east to New Mexico. I was driving on very lightly travelled two lane roads (hwy 50 is especially deserted) at speeds of 80 -90. I was getting around 430 miles to each tank of gas, and the Beetle holds about 15. But driving around locally in the Bay Area I can't muster much better than about 360 to a tank. It could have been that I had the wind behind me much of the time, and that could explain the efficiency as well.

 

If you were doing highway at a STEADY 80-90 MPH, try slowing to 65 MPH and see if fuel consumption goes down. It should. Takes less energy to keep a speed than it does to accellerate up to that speed. But sustaining steady high speeds still requires more energy than sustaining steady low speeds...that's a product of more air resistance to overcome the faster you go...

Now, the local Bay Area driving is different altogether. Starts and stops consume more fuel than steady speeds. Definitely slower speeds (I hope!) but all the starts and stops require more energy to get the car moving every time it comes to a stop.


I hope I'm making sense here.

cheers,

Curt.