USED Toyota Avensis Hatchback (97 - 04)

My car

I have the 51 plate Auto version. Good practical car, no real costs incurred apart from servicing and tyres. It does drink oil though, unsure as to why. MPG overall is around 30, not great, but ok I guess. Owned a Carina E 1.6 manual before this & the MPG was nearer 45, so feel the pinch at the pump a little.

Got 105K on the clock, drives like new, everything works.

My car

i have drove this car for a year and had no major problems, it was serviced regularily.I bought it second hand from an elderly man who never abused it there was 57000 miles on it , at 79000 miles the crank shaft went leaving me to try and find a replacement engine.Apparently there is 9 variations on the engine leaving me having tried three different types to date with out success!! I have contacted all the salvage yards in N.Ireland and after 2-3mths still havent found a replacement!! apart from the crank shaft breaking for no apparent reason it also blows its turbo fairly regularily! I have been advised by professionals the d4d engine is one of the most unreliable on the market.I previously owned a toyota corolla which was basically indistructable but those days are apparently over!! beware dont buy toyotas are not what they were to be ie; reliable

My car

I have owned a 2002 1.8 Vermont manual from 2005 until the current date. Now at 80,000 miles, its an adequate if un-interesting car to drive. Very easy to live with apart from parking. The fuel consumption is c. 27MPG around town stretching to 34 ish on a long run. The car has a real problem with road holding - spinning the front wheels is hard to avoid in poor conditions.

The Good It was cheap to buy, though that is reflected in the residual value. Its never actually let me down, the interior is fine for 5 and the boot is a decent size. Very easy to drive if this is important to you.

The bad The steering rack required a re-build and the engine was eventually replaced under warranty due to excessive oil consumption. (Well at least Toyota cared enough to do it). More recently the air conditioning has failed due to leaky pipes (cost to fix roughly 50% of the cars value). Also there is a leak into the boot - probably from the tailgate seals. The fuel consumption is poor for a 1.8 manual car.

Overall Owning this Avensis has not been a very Toyota like experience. I think this model was built in the UK and it shows. Get it cheap and don’t expect too much from it .

My car

As usual your model list does not include my actual car which is a 2000 "W" 1.8SE Automatic - presumably the list came from Toyota. Always a nightmare with limited edition models. It is very similar to the GS though. It has been a reliable car generally (I've had it from new - 70K miles) but I have been plagued by expensive Toyota dealers who think everyone can afford a Lexus. When things do go wrong they cost a bomb. It replaced an underpowered Cavalier 1.8 so for some time I thought it was the best car I had driven. Now, eight years on, it is a bit noisy and rattles a bit. Roadholding is steadily worse as it gets older. Great mpg on motorways, but very poor when my wife drives it around town. Boot space brilliant. I do like it though, generally it not cost me much and I would have given it 4 stars but for a persistent problem with the airbag light coming on that the useless dealer cannot fix. Apparently it does not record any errors codes after it comes on so there's nothing they can do. They won't admit this is something they have ever seen before - which I don't believe.