kush

In UK pickup trucks are used for the purpose they are built in the first palace like farms, construction sites. In winter they are exposed to salt, they are usually parked outside exposed to the elements which explain rust on a five year old vehicle. In Japan they are mostly used as recreational vehicles and are cared better than in UK. These are general conditions and there will always be exceptions, best is to do a thorough inspection prior to the purchase.

Depends on your requirement, good old technology, thai built quality, ride and comfort of a pickup truck, for the price of a premium German with all technology not to mention the safty. As I heard there is 2000 on the way not good for resale value, and with that waiting list and uncertainity of JPY exchange rate I take my chances else where.

To add to Saturn’s list Check the Certificate of Registration, is the seller the registered owner if not you want know how many people have used the vehicle, personally I want touch anything not with the registered owner. Best is to buy from the first owner, as he had paid the hefty price most probably the guy would have looked after his precious possession. Check for proper maintenance records, if it is serviced by the agent they will have records in the system. While having a chat with the owner find out why he is selling the vehicle, upgrade, company car. (you might not get the truth).

Foreget it, even if you get the permit free there is no "Toyota" that you could get down for 2 million.

Suddenly everyone is in love with Prius and giving valuable info/ thought, and then I checked to see who started the topic. Conclusion: Prius is defiantly a ladies car/ appliance.

As far as i know the E46 320d offered for the permit in 2000-2002 came from Germany and some where else. There was a substantial price diffrence in the two version.

Or may be the model offered for the permit is not German asembled which would explain the diffrence in trim due to local content.

Guys I'm taking about the new car F30 and hopefully a 318d or 320d with 141 of 181 bhp, with 8 speed auto. According to the info the built quality is far superior to the current E90 and some of the materials and technology in the new 5 series are offered. I hope the agent will be able to get down the car for US$ 25K. And as far as I know VW/Audi do not fair well in the secondhand market because of the crap service offered by the agent.

You are absolutely right however I'm looking at a daily runner and most probably a 3-4 year horizon. This Audi will be an excellent secondhand pick after few years. And for sexy looks I would rather go with a classic or a semi classic Alfa with the money saved.

Would love to go for the Audi, need to think about the investment hopefully BMW will retain value better than the Audi due to better service of the agent. It is pitty though cos Audi has better build quality.

Why not totally ban used car imports, then you get rid of all these underhand business and manipulations. If one is concern about the livelihood of the used car importers they can become used car traders.

If you want to swap your teak interior to standard there will be enough takers. People here prefer plastic looking fake wood finish.

Any idea about the Sri Lanka launch

Best is to buy from the registered owner. You can make resonable assumptions regarding the milage based on the age and the condition of the car.

I had a SNB-14 (Diesel) long time back it was a wonderful car. Unlike the standard car this independent rear suspension and better weight distribution. Unfortunately being a diesel it was seriously underpowered so i was not able to take the full advantage of AWD. It was not so bad on fuel though I used to get 12-14 km/l average on diesel (my car was a manual) However word of caution no one will want to buy a AWD, I had a terrible time getting rid of the thing.

Fuel consumption will be around 9-10 Colombo hevy traffic. 12-15 outstation. Even the basic comes with intelegent key, climate control. Higher grade will have winker mirror, alloy wheels, front fog lights and audio controls in the steering wheel which will add value to the car and in my openion is worth 100-150k. Most of the Navi/DVD finctions are useless in SL you are better off fixing an after market good unit

Swift has better performance, handling, smoother engine (dual VVTi) 4 insted of 3 cylinders, climate control A/C, Vitz will be more expensive to buy but will have better resale value as it is a TOYOTA

If you happen to have a user manual just go by it. Both Mobil and Caltex recommends 5W-30 @ 12 months/15000 km intervals. for the 1.8 model Mobil 1 ESP formula (Fully synthetic) Castrol EDGE (Fully synthetic) Castrol Magnatec (Semi Synthetic) Even Toyota USA site recommends 0W-20 Toyota synthetic for 2010-2011 models very 10,000 miles (I dont think T****A L***A has this) Your fuel saving could be put to good use by going for synthetic I suppose.

It is no worse than any other JDM of similar size, main issue is the wind deflector below the front bumper which gets scraped easily. Fortunately this is not visible unless you peek under the bumper. Due to the short wheel base and the overhands this will not be much of an issue in day to day running. Best way to increase the height would be to replace the coils and shocks from Indian version which has little more ground clearance. However you will ruin the ride comfort. If you want high ground clearance go for a small SUV

Wow both the used cars have done magic 60K (i hope the Allion figure you have given is a typo mistake) If the condition is alright I would go for the Allion even paying 200-300k more as it is a class over the Axio.

How about Corolla 141, you could get a excellent company maintained 2007/2008 for around 3.5 M. Fuel will be 8-9 Colombo 12-15 Outstation (personal experiance) a bit light footer might be able to get bit more. There are cars which have done around 30-50K, however most of them are with the car dealers so you have to be careful about the history. If you can find one still with the fist owner with full service history this is nice A-B ride. Upto date I have not reard of any reliability issues with 141, and I konow of few which has clocked over 100k (correct me if I'm wrong) 121 and the Allion 240 are excellent cars however they are aging around 8 years and that is the time generally they start giving trouble. (Electric/ Suspension/ Transmission/ Cooling) besides you will not know the milage it could be 60K, 160K, 260K, 360K cause they were very popular rent a car models.

318i is a 4 cylinder where as 320i and 325i are 6 cylinder units. They were the best of engines at that time and had very good reviews. 320i would be the best without much compromise on fuel bills, if can find 325i would be a real treat. However only very few were imported to SL.

I don’t think it is anything to do with fuel, there are many Vitz 1.0 running on 90 octane without issues. Since you have no unusual issues when the car is running I don’t think it is injectors of clogged fuel filter, my gut feeling is it is fuel delivery issue/ weak pressure during startup. New cars have fuel pumps located inside the tank, once you on the ignition it start pumping fuel to the injection system which usually takes couple of seconds if the car was not running for few hours due to the fuel returning back to the tank. If you listen carefully you might hear the sound of the pump working for few seconds building fuel pressure in the system. Just wait for 5 – 6 seconds with the ignition on before starting the engine and see if the problem solves. If not better take the car to an expert who had diagnostic facilities and get the car checked, believe me it will be the cheaper option. Good luck

My previous car Lancer EX 1.5 (A) came with recommended 95 Octane, however according to the user manual if not available could be run on lower octane and according to the manual a small drop in power / economy. I switched from 95 to 90 when CPC decided to increase the price difference to Rs. 18 from Rs. 5 and did not observe any significant power loss and no change in economy apart from the saving of Rs. 900 on each fill up. Same form with my current ride Swift 1.240 (CVT) even with an 11:1 compression ratio. My advice if your car doesn’t need it save the cash.