Least reliable and most reliable cars

[maz0]

Honda Civics, I've had a few that refused to die. I left one in my field for a year to rot, was supposed to scrap it but then my dad phoned up and asked if he could use it for getting to his work and back. New brake disks and its been doing the job another 8 months. They just wont give up.

 

[TechnicAl]

Over the past 10 years Ive had a Merc E Class Estate, a BMW 530d Estate, a Merc E Class saloon, a VW Tiguan and currently a Ford Kuga.......not spent a penny on any of them......all been leased

 

[bigegg]

Lexus Soarers were still Toyota in Japan. The whole marque was an exercise when Toyota realised there was a ceiling for what Americans will pay for a Toyota but not an Exclusive Brand. The rebadges Toyota soarers where the "GPS" shows 500 miles off Japan are the ones no one sprung for the GPS upgrade for and are still trying to use the fixed transmitters in Japan.

Yep - but you missed the bit where they renamed the Lexus models as Toyota in japan, because the Japanese prefer the Toyota brand.
Not exactly the same though- the Lexus gs300 is badged as an aristo in japan, but also available with a turbo charged engine (as in a supra(?)) and cloth seats.

 

[Monkey Harris]

WarrantyWise (as reported by the lovely daily mail ) have listed their top ten least and most reliable cars.

Least reliable:

1. Range Rover Sport, problems start to pile up at 8 years
2. Vauxhall Zafira, at 10 years
3. Vauxhall Isignia, 7 years
4. Peugeot 207, 10 years
5. Vauxhall Astra, 9 years
6. Mercedes C Class, 9 years
7. Mini Cooper, 1 year 6 months
8. Seat Ibiza, 9 years
9. Fiat 500, 9 years
10. Renault Clio, 10 years

So it looks like the danger zone is around 9-10 year old cars (with the exception of the Mini which seems to kick off the fun from almost new!)

Most reliable:

1. Volkswagen Polo
2. Ford Fiesta
3. Ford Focus
4. Ford Transit
5. Audi A3
6. Audi A4
7. Vauxhall Corsa
8. BMW 3 Series
9. Nissan Qashqai
10. BMW 1 Series

Lol...8 years ..

A rangy won't go 8 months without a problem...

 

[mr haynes]

Lol...8 years ..

A rangy won't go 8 months without a problem...

Yes they can.....when they're drug dealer owners are banged up

 

[ronan]

When companies like Kahn re-do range rovers, do they do anything to make them more reliable or is it all big wheels and new seats ?

 

[premmington]

I own a garage

The worst - any Land Rover/Range Rover

The best - Nissan Micra K11

 

[fizzy]

Are half of the least reliable British built?

Yes because everyone loves their German cars and will forgive them every fault.
Merc ML - rubbish loads of trouble
Audi 2L tfsi engine - used in about 300,000 cars - faulty piston rings - audi refused a recall
Mates niece as an Audi A1 - been off the road last 2 months - even tje dealers cant fix it. I tried finding the problem online - there are too many to list!
But of course only British cars are rubbish..............

 

[james butler]

Interesting how people mention what car they have, list everything they've replaced on it and say how reliable its been.
.

i think reliability is a very subjective thing when it comes to cars and there uses in different walks of life.
listing the things that they have changed can give an indication of how reliable or not a car has been.
if its a list of normal wear and tear items then its still a reliable car and in my opinion shows the owner actually cares to be able to tell you what it had.
the concerning thing is when people say "its very reliable" yet its on its second engine
one of the most reliable cars ive come across is the Toyota corolla, we had a 1.4 2001 corolla and that thing went on forever and a day, other than consumables it wanted for nothing. sold it with over 170,000 miles albeit a rather bland 170,000 miles

 

[daleyd]

Reading the first post it is apparent the stats only include cars their owners were sufficiently afraid of to have a warranty. Kind of flawed.

How often do I see something older than my 23 year old 328, or even built prior to 2000 broken down on the motorway? Never
How often do I see cars built after that broken down? Almost exclusively newer, over complicated feature rich, when you should be looking out the windscreen, rubbish​

Without comparative numbers this is almost meaningless - how many 23 year old cars do you actually see on the motorway?

 

[chris pruteanu]

I have had mainly german cars, only had one ford, one peugeot, one fiat and one renault ! Never again ! I had no issues with older b5 audi a4 tdi, had a string of v6 tdi's and 1.9 tdi's and apart from modding they never get wrong. I now drive a seat exeo 2.0 Tdi which is a re badged audi a4 b7 with a modern CR engine. A vw up which is my shopping cart/comuter and a vw transporter 2.5 tdi inline 5, one of the best engines vag group ever built.
Over here in Romania there are loads of renaults, Dacia's with 1.5 dci engines and loads of vw golfs mk4/5 with the legendary 1.9 tdi PD engine. They do go forever, 500 k easily in germany before they turn up as low mileage motors freshly brought in the country by rogue dealers !
If you want reliable car just buy vag motor from about year 2000 to 2005 on some models and be prepared to change a few shocks and bushes and be done with it. Most people fix cars only when they are broken down, thing is most cars do give loads of signs to their oblivious owners and if everyone would do a check under the bonnet and not look for cheapest quote first then we all be driving reliable motors ! Very few folk pay for quality parts nowadays...and it shows !

 

[owas]

Depends what reliable means to the person surely?

Or I just make a lot of excuses to drive old British crap

 

[8ob]

Depends what reliable means to the person surely?

Or I just make a lot of excuses to drive old British crap

I was thinking the same, you rarely/never see a RR or LR being towed off a motorway so I assume its crap like the dvd in the headrest has packed up and Tarquin cant possibly be taken to the school 500mts away from home in a car like that.

Bob

 

[Rig Pig]

Reading the first post it is apparent the stats only include cars their owners were sufficiently afraid of to have a warranty. Kind of flawed.

How often do I see something older than my 23 year old 328, or even built prior to 2000 broken down on the motorway? Never
How often do I see cars built after that broken down? Almost exclusively newer, over complicated feature rich, when you should be looking out the windscreen, rubbish​

I think that's a little skewed as the bulk of cars on the road are newer than 23 years old so it's not surprising that you don't see many old cars broken down.

 

[Kayos]

Depends what reliable means to the person surely?

Or I just make a lot of excuses to drive old British crap

Exactly, and it comes down to maintenance as well. I’ve done 30k in my Discovery last year and other than a wheel bearing (I knew I was pushing my luck) and the steering box it’s only needed service items, but the other 2 are moving parts that won’t be a surprise failure

I service the engine every 6k and I’ve just done a full fluid change on it

 

[Robotstar5]

I was thinking the same, you rarely/never see a RR or LR being towed off a motorway so I assume its crap like the dvd in the headrest has packed up and Tarquin cant possibly be taken to the school 500mts away from home in a car like that.

Bob

I saw a warranty jobsheet for a 3 month old Velar recently, "one of the speakers doesn't sound quite right"

 

[TechnicAl]

Being a caravanner for over 30 years Ive seen lots of Recovery Trucks on caravan sites. Every broken down tow car Ive seen has been a Land Rover, Discovery or Freelander and I mean every one. Having said that 4x4s are very common and the most common is (or was) the Discovery....they are being overtaken recently by the more affordable Fords, VW, Honds, Toyota and Nissan.
Once on the IoW there were 5 Discoverys on site, out of maybe 20 others, every one broke down in the fortnight........the owners were whinging about the high prices of repairs on the Island.

 

[owas]

Being a caravanner for over 30 years Ive seen lots of Recovery Trucks on caravan sites. Every broken down tow car Ive seen has been a Land Rover, Discovery or Freelander and I mean every one. Having said that 4x4s are very common and the most common is (or was) the Discovery....they are being overtaken recently by the more affordable Fords, VW, Honds, Toyota and Nissan.
Once on the IoW there were 5 Discoverys on site, out of maybe 20 others, every one broke down in the fortnight........the owners were whinging about the high prices of repairs on the Island.

I think the problem there is with the caravaners

 

[brewdexta]

My experiences so far

• Mini Clubman, 1972 - very reliable considering it cost 300 quid, rear subframe and I put an 1100cc engine in it. Roofing felt and underseal fixed the "knee wash" feature when you went through a puddle.
• MG Midget 1972 - very reliable rot box, but then again 300 quid. When I had finished brazing on bits of old BT racking to cover holes and flapping wings it was probably the only armoured MG around
• TVR vixen S2, 1969, mainly reliable, lots of issues with disty caps 'cos I didn't fix the distributor drive when I overhauled the 1600 cross flow engine. And the gearbox died stuck in second embarrassingly while beating an 323i away from the lights
• Ford Escort mk II, slow but ultra reliable, one of my dad's damage recoverables. Eventually blew the head gasket and sold it.
• Mazda 626, damaged recoverable fixed up by my pa, no issues for ages but I eventually killed the engine through lack of maintenance
• VW camper, was always under the damn thing but I could always get it going, apart from when the regulator went while in France
• Vauxhall Astra estate, no issues but boring, kept being broken into while living in Tottenham even if I left the door open
• Vauxhall Carlton estate, one careful owner as it was ex-funeral director, it had a stain on carpet in the estate part that the dog used to bark at and my mate used to swear that fog fell out of the glove box if you were on a country road. Very reliable if spooky
• BMW 325i estate - reliable once I had it maintained by a small garage and not the main dealer who was expensive and useless. No further break-ins with this car, the theory was that people thought it was a drug dealers car so left it alone
• Subaru Forester - super reliable, only expensive item was some well known mileage related rear axle issue that is a pig to do, but i found a Subaru specialist in the village who fixed it cheap, over 100k with only a bulb and this issue.
• Landrover 90 ex-army rag top. Noisy but lovable, minor issues but easily fixable, slow as a dog but I loved it to bits. Had to get rid when the kids came along as deemed to be an unsuitable baby wagon.
• Landrover Disco 3 - had it 12 years now and bought it at a year old with 5k on it. Just hit 120K I think so not heavy mileage. Loads of issues over the years, turbo blew as I left the dealer! Most problems could have been fixed more easily at less cost. When under warranty the dealers just went through the flow chart swapping bits until I found the disco 3 forum and gave them likely cause and shouted at them for wasting my time in front of new potential customers. They then put a mechanic on it and the issue was fixed. Out of warranty it went to Landie specialist who was too keen to find issues and was no cheaper. Now using the Subaru specialist as he has a Discovery sport of his own and maintenance is manageable. Love the car when it works but the electronics and diagnostics let it down.
• Skoda Octavia estate, had it from new, about 10 years, no major issues apart from really crap air con unit that is expensive and last 10 minutes before breaking again, known issue. Just sold it.
• Nissan Leaf - had one teething issue with the inverter in the car, just coming up to a year old and its comfortable, fast, cheap to run, quiet and if the missus had seen the low wall rather than scraping 4 panels, then it would be low hassle too, no further issues.

 

[Stueeee]

Honda Civics, I've had a few that refused to die. I left one in my field for a year to rot, was supposed to scrap it but then my dad phoned up and asked if he could use it for getting to his work and back. New brake disks and its been doing the job another 8 months. They just wont give up.

Great cars until something electronic packs up and the part isn't available from the manufacturer...

My partner had a diesel Civic -the one with the Isuzu motor. The immobiliser packed in, it ended up at a Honda dealer where they quoted £750 to supply and fit the WhateverItWas control unit, although that quote was probably about the same as the car's market value, it had been dead reliable and had only 110K miles on the clock, so we said fix it. Next morning got a phone call from the service manager, the part is no longer available; no, they couldn't install a secondhand part if I could find one, and BTW, this part needs programming to the car with Honda proprietary software, so you can't DIY the repair either. So the result was that the Civic joined thousands of other mechanically perfect older cars in the fragger.