I've been thinking lately about selling my 88 Celica and getting something else. My stepfather has said he wants to buy it, so I really have to stop beating on it now. I've got a 1990 Olds Ciera wagon in my yard right now that I want to put on the road but I've been thinking about ditching this one too and getting something else. See, the wagon is a fairly big car, weighs over 3000 lbs and has a big 6 cylinder engine. Not the best choice for fuel economy, and that leads me to the next part of this little rant of mine. See, I like to do a lot of driving and I usually don't have a lot of cash for fuel, and with gas prices likely to hit 1 dollar per liter in a few days, and possibly going higher (1.029 per LITER today), it would be hard to keep fuel in the tank of that wagon. I'm very conflicted, on the one hand the Celica is a sporty car and it's pretty good on fuel, but on the other hand it's kinda small for myself, and it's longterm reliability is questionable, given it's current mechanical shape. The wagon is a nice roomy car and would move nicely once I get the repairs done to it, but it is a big car, fuel mileage wouldn't be very good. This all got me to thinking to myself that maybe I should dump both those cars and get myself a 3 banger 5 speed Geo Metro again. I had one last summer that I bought from an older guy for 500 bucks. I was ripped off on that thing. He told me it was just inspected, but I am led to believe he 'bought' the sticker. Handbrake was not working, and the right rear shock was obviously leaking, which even a half-assed mechanic would have noticed if he/she removed the wheel to inspect the brakes like they're supposed to do during a legal inspection. He also told me the motor was rebuilt which is complete BS. Exhaust valve on the 3rd cylinder was burning up, all three cylinders had compression loss (15 percent for 1 and 2, about 50 percent on number 3) amd a lot of cam noise. Even with the worn engine, I was still getting about 36-38 mpg around town, mid 40's on the highway at 110 km/h. It was surprisingly peppy around town. No problem keeping up with traffic, and would chirp the 12 inch tires occasionally. Now I know for certain fuel economy would have been better if the motor was in better shape. I could have had a complete running motor from a nearby junkyard for 100 bucks. I sold the Geo only a few months after I bought it to a young guy, about 19 for 300 bucks. I really hope it worked good for him, I haven't seen it around for quite a while. Ever since I sold it, I've been kicking my own *** for doing it. If I would have put just a few hundred bucks into it, I would have had a real nice little car. Come full circle, and now I want one again. I'll be looking for an 89-94 3 cylinder car with a 5 speed as they provide the best fuel economy. I'd like to find another 4 door hatchback like my last one. Although I never did any major repairs to my Geo, I hear they're very easy to do. An engine swap can be done in 6-8 hours, cylinder head in 2, cam sprocket (with timing belt) in 30 minutes, tranny swap in 2 days, etc. I did some looking when I had the 93, and performance parts are easy to come by, and pretty cheap too. 3tech performance can supply just about anything you'd need to upgrade the little 3 banger, and prices are good. 160 for a performance cam, 30 for the cam sprocket, 450 for a completely rebuilt head, including the cam, so on so forth. If and when I pick up another Geo, I don't think I'll do much to it. maybe a cam sprocket and a highflow muffler. Those 2 things shouldn't cost more than a hundred bucks. So by the looks of things, around the middle-end of next month I'm gonna be hitting the papers in search of my next Geo. Has anyone else here ever owned one of these cars? I'm just curious as to what other people think of them. I cursed my 93 many times when things broke, but overall I loved that car. Check out this review I wrote about it at carsurvey.org .
I want another Geo!
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I've driven them (unfortunately) and they don't fit my tastes. I'd rather spend a bit more in gas, and get there faster than I could walk.
I kid! seriously though, you guys have decent summers, why not pick up a smaller motorcycle for commuting in the summer months?
A nice ninja 250 can be picked up for between $1200-2k and will net 50-70mpg depending on how much you like to get on it.
On the other hand, if you could swing payments (or find one used) and can get diesel, I would seriously look at a VW TDI (or older jetta/golf diesel). I have a friend who has a newer Jetta wagon, and @ 60mph he can average over 50mpg which is nothing to sneeze at. It's a great little car.
A nice ninja 250 can be picked up for between $1200-2k and will net 50-70mpg depending on how much you like to get on it.
On the other hand, if you could swing payments (or find one used) and can get diesel, I would seriously look at a VW TDI (or older jetta/golf diesel). I have a friend who has a newer Jetta wagon, and @ 60mph he can average over 50mpg which is nothing to sneeze at. It's a great little car.
A woman my brother works with has a 93 Firefly with the 3 speed slushbox, and she's had hers over 100 mph! Poor little 3 banger musta been wailing for its life
. Fastest I had mine was a bit over 80, I know it had more, I used to cruise on the highway at 75 and it still had some power left. One of the main reasons I want one again is because things are so darn cheap for it! ****, last year I was offered a running 87 turbo Sprint, and a rebuilt cylinder head. Yeah, for free! Not gonna find people giving away heads for a Civic for free too often eh? Tires at Walmart are 24 bucks a piece. At that price I could afford to replace them every season. Good winter tires aren't a whole lot more expensive.
I got by my college days with a 1-litre Geo (86 model carbed) and it was downright wonderful:
Started right up @ -38C in PG w/o heater block/hose, gets me back and forth on hiway 900kms for about1.4 tankfuls of gas (best record kept 12CAD @0.59/L for the entire trip!). 0~100kms/hr takes more than a min....constantly revving over 4500rpms and overpassing big rigs took, well, forever...
sold that care to my good college friend and he wrecked it over 1 winter.
*sigh*
it was also my SCCA stock "D" class car durint that time, constantly beating some older Beams in the first 3 gear in slalom race....
Started right up @ -38C in PG w/o heater block/hose, gets me back and forth on hiway 900kms for about1.4 tankfuls of gas (best record kept 12CAD @0.59/L for the entire trip!). 0~100kms/hr takes more than a min....constantly revving over 4500rpms and overpassing big rigs took, well, forever...
sold that care to my good college friend and he wrecked it over 1 winter.
*sigh*
it was also my SCCA stock "D" class car durint that time, constantly beating some older Beams in the first 3 gear in slalom race....
I've felt your pain. Every time i've sold my festiva's i've kicked myself for doing it. I always get another it seems. So far i've had a 90, 88, 91, and a 94 Aspire, I still have the last two and 91 parts car. If you go to small town or go down old biways you'll see old cars in fields, if you get lucky and they have titles if you can find the owners you may even get'em for free. Anyways small towns in Missouri seem to collect old cars and every other piece of junk imaginable. Good luck on your search.
Memorable in a good way or a bad way?
I thought they had a big sticker on the dash saying, "Not for highway use." Seriously, I heard there was a small car like the Firefly that had such a sticker.
I wish my 52 crank horsepower Golf said that today...I nearly had to sideswipe my way back into my lane when the dork I was passing decided to speed up and I could get past him. I nearly ripped our bumpers off when I made my move back and the woman's facial expression clearly showed she didn't know I was beside her the whole time. hehehehe
Steve
I wish my 52 crank horsepower Golf said that today...I nearly had to sideswipe my way back into my lane when the dork I was passing decided to speed up and I could get past him. I nearly ripped our bumpers off when I made my move back and the woman's facial expression clearly showed she didn't know I was beside her the whole time. hehehehe
Steve
When we got back to the airport (home) the first thing I did was kiss the hood of my wife's Escort and apologized for all unkind things I had ever said about that car. Driving home the Escort seemed to accelerate like an Indy car with the comfort of a European Luxury Sedan.quote:
Originally posted by 55:
Memorable in a good way or a bad way?
55, your taste in cars flutters like the breeze. You've also had a ciera sedan, an altima, etc., over the last year. Though you are fickle, you don't pay much for your cars, so you're not in the hole too bad when you get mad and trade which is good. (Some guy here on BITOG traded an eight-month old RAM Hemi truck on a new Japanese sedan
) If the Celica is too small and the olds too big and thirsty... won't the geo be too slow? I don't know what fees and taxes you pay when you sell/buy a car where you're at, but the fixed fees must be a sizeable portion of $300-$500.
Stop, breathe, and appreciate what you have. Maybe you'll get lucky but I bet most gas-saving econoboxes are driven by cheap people who do the bare minimum maintenance and know how and when to sell the things right before they fall apart. Especially now with high gas prices.
I like the motorcycle idea too.
Stop, breathe, and appreciate what you have. Maybe you'll get lucky but I bet most gas-saving econoboxes are driven by cheap people who do the bare minimum maintenance and know how and when to sell the things right before they fall apart. Especially now with high gas prices.
I like the motorcycle idea too.
Yeah, I think I have a touch of attention defecit disorder or something, I do things like that a lot. A motorcycle would be nice, but I prefer to have a roof over my head when I'm driving. Bikes aren't too good in bad weather. Yes, a Geo would be very slow compared to my Celica but I wouldn't mind too much. I want one for the fuel economy. I don't feel like donating so much money to OPEC so by driving a Geo it's like a silent, 3 cylinder protest. Consider this, when I had my Geo last summer, the most fuel I could pump into the tank was 33 liters, and that was with the fuel gauge below the empty mark. At $1.029 per liter, a full tank right now would cost 34 bucks. I could get 400 miles out of that tank of fuel. My Celica would take a bit over 50 liters when on the empty gauge, and that would cost me 51 bucks. Right away with a Geo, I'm saving 17 bucks a tankfull and that's not counting if gas prices increase, which they most likely will before the summer is over. I can get about 420 miles out of a tankfull in the Celica, and probably that much from a tankfull in the Geo.
Re: quick cars.
I see little point in ownng fast cars. As long as the car is capable of doing 80 mph, I am happy with the speed. The speed highest speed limit I've seen has been 70 mph. Up to 10 mph over that is my limit. I have no need for anything faster than that.
Even our 95 Civic with AT and 1.5 l engine can enter a busy highway. All you need is to squeeze the accelerator a little harder. There's no need to have a 5 liter engine to have normal transportation.
I see little point in ownng fast cars. As long as the car is capable of doing 80 mph, I am happy with the speed. The speed highest speed limit I've seen has been 70 mph. Up to 10 mph over that is my limit. I have no need for anything faster than that.
Even our 95 Civic with AT and 1.5 l engine can enter a busy highway. All you need is to squeeze the accelerator a little harder. There's no need to have a 5 liter engine to have normal transportation.
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