Hello, All!
I know it may sound strange, but i have a question about subj.
May be there are some people out there who have some experience with both
Nissan and Toyota?
I am so tired of my Nissan max 02 and thinking to replace it with RX. Is it
worth the money? I only would do it if Lexus is not that much trouble and
their reliability is what Toyota and all those consumer reports claim. My
Max is only 5 years old but it already started falling apart. I looked at
the bottom it's all rusty , i just don't believe it will survive another
couple of years. So if anyone can advise, how much is it possible to compare
?
Thanks
D.

You're posting in a Nissan group. I imagine most people here will tell
you the Max is a well built car. I have an '01 in New England (lots of
salt and snow) with 113K on it. It's never been in the shop. Sometimes
you just get a bad one I guess. You could get a bad troublesome Lexus too.

It all depends on what you want from the car. I see them both as great
cars, but Toyota sacrifices a lot of performance and sportiness
(handling, performance features) for reliability. Nissan makes the
opposite sacrifice. The Max is quite reliable, much more so than the
typical competing American cars (and way more enjoyable to drive), but
not as reliable as Toyota. And, given that the Max has quite a few
intricate, technological features (Nissan doesn't do things the simple
way) there are more things to break, and when they do, they can be
expensive to fix.

-mike w

Get a Diesel Toyota pickup. They are the favoured vehicle for all war
zone militia and terrorists for good reason. Top Gear TV in UK put
one on top of a 15 story building and them blew the building out from
under it. With a new battery, patch on fuel tank and plastic
temporary windscreen it drove away. Petrol engine one would just
explode and burn.
--
Peter Hill
Spamtrap reply domain as per NNTP-Posting-Host in header
Can of worms - what every fisherman wants.
Can of worms - what every PC owner gets!

Hi JimV


Yeah, i live in NE(NH) too and have been in the shop numerous times already.
Driver's window motor broke, muffler broke(rusted), middle pipe broke, now
leak in coolant tank somewhere. EVAP tank replaced 'cause EVAP valve was
broken... duh! the car is 02 74K miles only!
Even if i got bad one, i'm just scared to buy another nissan...
D

:-) Heh, if i wanted one of those diesels i'd be driving russian BTR-90.
Not only reliable but also fun to drive. besides not every direct stinger's
shot can get it.
http://www.milrus.com/sv/btr90/img/img8.shtml
D

Amazing! I just watched it on youtube - Wow!

Btw, I really envy the UK for *this* programme - Top Gear is just great!

Kind regards

robert

--
Regards,

Ed White
http://home.mindspring.com/~ed_white/ - my automotive opinions
http://home.mindspring.com/~ed_white/id7.html - my oil filter comparison

Why do you say that a Maxima is much more reliable than the typical American
car? The JD Powers long term reliability study doesn't support this
conclusion at all. My families and close friends experience doesn't support
it either. If anything, the exact opposite is true. I currently have a 2006
Nissan Frontier. In 9 months it has been back to the dealer 4 times. Nothing
major, but still inconvenient. My father owned Ford Rangers from the early
80 until today. All of his Rangers combined were not back to the dealer 4
times. I just bought my Mom's 7 year old Grand Marquis to use as a commuter
car. It has never been back to the dealer. It has never needed a single
repair of any kind. My Son has a 2006 Mustang. So far, zero problems. My
younger sister has a 6 years old Escape. She has needed two repairs - a
coolant level sensor handled under warranty and a cruise control cable that
I installed ($12). Over the past 10 years I owned two Ford Expedition that I
drove for a total of 240,000 miles. I had a few problems (1 power window, 1
alternator, a couple of recalls) but they were mostly trouble free. The list
could go on. The worst vehicle I ever owned was a Toyota Cressida. I also
owned a Datsun Z car. It was not as bad as the Cressida, but it was worse
than any Ford I ever owned.

But back to your original question - If you trust the JD Powers
Dependability Study, then yes Toyotas are more reliable than Nissans. In the
2006 Study three year old Toyotas were found to have 179 problems per 100
vehicles (1.79 problems per vehicle on average) and three year old Nissans
were found to have 242 problems per 100 vehicles (2.42 problems per vehicle
on average). So, the average Nissan owner can expect to have 0.63 more
problems per vehicle than the average Toyota owner. This study was based on
a survey of owners of 2003 vehicles in 2006 (i.e., they were surveying three
year old cars). See
http://www.jdpower.com/global/press-...p?StudyID=1160
(the 2005 study is at
http://www.jdpower.com/global/press-...sp?StudyID=996 ).

In terms of initial quality, Toyota and Nissan were even closer. Toyota had
106 problems per 100 cars (1.06 per car on average) and Nissan had 121
problems per 100 cars (1.21 per car average). Not much difference there. See
http://www.jdpower.com/global/press-...p?StudyID=1132 .

Ed

I saw that episode. It was totally silly. They did a lot of stupid things to
the truck, but I'll wager any other vehicle could have been made to run with
the proper off camera repairs. And although it "drove" away, even Top Gear
admitted the frame was broken in two.

A local farmer had one of the Toyota diesel trucks. He still loves to talk
about how great it was. He just usually doesn't mention that he rebuilt the
engine once, the transmission twice and that the bed rotted out in less than
10 years. Yeah, a really great truck.

And at least for now, Toyota doesn't sell diesels in the US.

Ed

To each his own, but they don't call Toyotas "Japanese Buicks" for nothing.

The underbody of a car isn't going to stay rust-free unless you keep it in
the garage and never drive it in the snow. It's just not possible. I have
an '03 that is about to celebrate its 4th birthday on the road, and with the
exception of a string of crappy Bose head units, it's been perfect (FWIW I
live in the Michigan "rust belt").

Most of the rust you're seeing is simply "surface rust", and won't affect
anything. Sure, some components such as the exhaust will need to be
replaced sooner or later, but that's normal.

Sounds to me like you're trying to justify the purchase of a new car, and
hey, that's cool. Just don't knock Nissan for something that ALL cars do.