I know it's off topic, but I'm sure we all have something to supplement our trucks with on a daily basis. My little Mitsubishi mirage had a water pump failure that fried the engine. It's love/hate driving my truck 500 miles a week. I'm happy to be in it, but it's pricey, and more to maintain.

I'm all for paying cash and no car loans. So I'd like to keep it to around 2 grand. Also I don't care what it looks like as long as it gets good mileage. Anyone have good reliable beaters to recommend that get 30 plus? I was going to get an old saturn SL2 but was told to stay away. I'd really want an old VW rabbit diesel! Anyone have experience with them? Thinking of bringing the trailer to look at a 1981 with 200K miles. Any other suggestions? I hear 3 cylinder geo metro's get 40 plus too!

 

I would stay away from ANY saturn. they burn oil and BAD

 

yeah she said it burned 2 quarts between oil changes. But for 600 dollars I was willing to entertain it. Was talked out of it however.

 

well. I don't get 30 but I do get about 26 in my nissan maxima 1998 with 240k miles.
She is losing a little oil about 1 qt per oil change but I've put 40k on this car in 3 years with very little trouble. Got a knock sensor that needs replacing right now.

 

Yaaa... We had a 99 saturn that burned about 2 qt's per oil change. It was a great car other than that .

Got 37 mpg going to down I5. Just had to watch that oil level. I was looking for a beater car a few months back. Hondas are starting to come into that price range.

 

Personally, I like the toyotas. My brother just sold a 98 camry (which was previously mine, and was my sisters before that) with about 120K on it for a little over $2,000. It was a good little car, and right in your price range. The only time it let us down was when the ignitions coils (has 2) went out. Other than that, it was a good little car. Burned some oil, but it seems as though the older hondas and toyotas do that. My family has just about all toyotas, and they have always been good, reliable, long lasting cars for us. We have a 2003 camry now that has about 120K on it. They don't get 30 MPG though...we got about 24 in the 98 when we had it, and probably about 28 in this 2003.

The ford festivas/aspires and geo metros do get over 40 MPG. They are awesome little cars. I'd like to have one just because. That's almost as good as my 50 MPG motorcycle I used to have!

 

Yeah - I hear the saturns do pretty well on fuel which is why I was entertaining it. I forgot about the ford festiva's. I will have to do some craigs listing for that. The uglier the better!

 

My gas saver for about 3 years was a 01 s10 2wd. Made the 70 mile round trip and only let me down cause of joint failed from laziness on my part. And the timing chain and sprocket broke. It has 290k on it now but it is parked. It did get 22mpg though My brother got a job where I work at so we ride together and there just wasn't enough room in the s10. So we went together and bought a 02 jeep liberty not the best mpg but it suits us better.

 

I'm on my second Honda Accord and have no complaints. 25-28mpg and when that VTEC kicks in, you better be hanging on!
The Civics are capable of higher mpg but I didn't want a car that small. If you look around enough you can get early to mid 90's models of both within your budget. I paid $2800 OTD for my 99 Accord with 180k miles, brand new snow tires in good condition. It had a CEL and wouldn't rev above 4k rpm which I fixed with about an hour of garage time, runs perfect now.

 

I like Honda's but people are pretty proud of them, tough to find one in my budget. I'm keeping my eye open

 

I reduced the oil burning in my Saturn from 1qt/500 miles to 1qt/2000 miles just by soaking the pistons in Marvel Mystery Oil. Both our PSDs burn that much. The oil consumption also has ZERO effect on the engine or its performance otherwise, provided you top it up. Saturns are cheaper to operate, safer, easier to work on and better on gas than anything else of that size/vintage. But they're not for "drive it and forget it" crowd; they do require DIY maintenance. Parts are still readily available. Massive forum support; one "friendly" site like us, one "surly" site like you-know-who, mostly tuners and performance geeks. 30 MPG would be considered "fail"; 40 isn't hard. Stay away from the '91-'94 SOHCs; they're SLOOOW. Manuals are more reliable and not prone to PCM/sensor issues like the automatics (ring any bells?...).

VW diesels run forever and can get >50 MPG. The pizza and other delivery joints (Mexican, etc) around here have bought up a gazillion of them, and run them on their kitchen grease. So evidently they're pretty easy to retrofit. AFAIK, 200,000 miles on a VW diesel is like 200,000 on a PSD - "middle age".

Metro == death trap. Don't count on surviving a crash with anything bigger than a dog. On the plus side, if you blow a tire, you can steal one from a golf cart (okay, I made that part up....).

 

get you a diesel jetta! Then you can blow smoke in your car too!

 

I appreciate the input. If the VW rabbit does not work out this week, I may take another look at the saturn. I will of course be sending you information and pricing to see what I should offer! I know it's a 98 with 165K. 1 owner since new. $1200 is what she was going to let it go for (was thinking i could talk her down since she is moving Friday and not taking the car). All maintenance records no accidents. Didn't seem too bad to me...It is an auto.

 

I know this may not be a popular one, but we bought a little 2000 Lexus ES300 for my wifes 180 mile daily commute 3 years back, put 220k on that car in 3.8 years and all I ever did was change the oil and filters, did not have one mechanical in the lifetime we owned it. Tire and a belt was all that was replaced, AC crapped out but that was it. I was just waiting for it to die and it never did.

Paid $1400 for it since it needed new valve cover gaskets, and 139$ later after new VC and plugs it was the best glorified Camry we ever had. 3.0l v6 would get up and go when it needed to. She put the cruise on at 80-85 mph and got 28-30 mpg hand calced all year. Finally was totaled into a honda civic with it at 380,000 miles. Best bang for the buck car we have ever owned, and leather heated seats and projector headlights were two things I ripped out before the wrecker stole it.

My injectors and hpop were more than the vehicle cost and maintenance on that car :-)

Lexus= toyota...yotas run for a long *** time!

 

I like it, never would have thought of that. I will check some of them out and see what I can find.