L300; petrol or Diesel

Vidula Adikari · January 16, 2022

I have an idea of buying Delica L300 van. So I'm kinda confused about going to a petrol or diesel. Also in a doubt about the power of petrol 1400 cc version can handle the weight of the vehicle. If it's not the petrol consumption may cost more than a car. Also talking about the diesel version. I want to know about the maintenance cost and the common problems with the age. Any l300 owners or experienced people.. plz tell me which one is the ideal.

Twin Turbo · January 19, 2022

1. Budget?

matroska · January 19, 2022

On 1/16/2022 at 1:35 PM, Vidula Adikari said:

I have an idea of buying Delica L300 van. So I'm kinda confused about going to a petrol or diesel. Also in a doubt about the power of petrol 1400 cc version can handle the weight of the vehicle. If it's not the petrol consumption may cost more than a car. Also talking about the diesel version. I want to know about the maintenance cost and the common problems with the age. Any l300 owners or experienced people.. plz tell me which one is the ideal.

Hi - there is a considerable price difference between the petrol and diesel versions. There are different price brackets for the models and the numbers. The most desired and expensive ones are the Diesels with Light vehicle numbers. 51/52 etc. Then again there are also petrols that were swapped with Toyota 1C engines instead of the 4D55 these tend to be underpowered. Petrol's registered as light vehicles (20-) are not as expensive and are widely available. Vans registered as 'motor lorry' (35,38 Petrol and numbers starting with 40) require a heavy vehicle license to drive.

Petrol vs Diesel - the van itself is quite light (weighs a little more than the lancer box) so the 1.4 Petrol won't be too underpowered. However petrol's are carbureted and due to the makabasses fiddling around with the carbs many petrol vans have ruined carbs. The diesel will not have that issue. Diesels below 1M are usually crappy. So if you have a healthy budget go for a diesel. (avoid ones with 1C swaps) But a well maintained petrol isn't a bad choice either. These vans are dead simple to repair, parts are available and cheap. A good petrol (20-) can be bought for just a tad below 1M.

Watch out for body condition and corrosions specially the railings (peeli ) if they're corroded it's a nightmare to sort. Floorboard corrosions etc can be sorted out. Its difficult to find a van with original seats but if you do that's going to hold some retro-value as well.

Twin Turbo · January 23, 2022

the gear inmost petrol models is on the steering column

Vidula Adikari · January 25, 2022

On 1/19/2022 at 3:29 PM, matroska said:

Hi - there is a considerable price difference between the petrol and diesel versions. There are different price brackets for the models and the numbers. The most desired and expensive ones are the Diesels with Light vehicle numbers. 51/52 etc. Then again there are also petrols that were swapped with Toyota 1C engines instead of the 4D55 these tend to be underpowered. Petrol's registered as light vehicles (20-) are not as expensive and are widely available. Vans registered as 'motor lorry' (35,38 Petrol and numbers starting with 40) require a heavy vehicle license to drive.

Petrol vs Diesel - the van itself is quite light (weighs a little more than the lancer box) so the 1.4 Petrol won't be too underpowered. However petrol's are carbureted and due to the makabasses fiddling around with the carbs many petrol vans have ruined carbs. The diesel will not have that issue. Diesels below 1M are usually crappy. So if you have a healthy budget go for a diesel. (avoid ones with 1C swaps) But a well maintained petrol isn't a bad choice either. These vans are dead simple to repair, parts are available and cheap. A good petrol (20-) can be bought for just a tad below 1M.

Watch out for body condition and corrosions specially the railings (peeli ) if they're corroded it's a nightmare to sort. Floorboard corrosions etc can be sorted out. Its difficult to find a van with original seats but if you do that's going to hold some retro-value as well.

Thank you very much. Could you pls tell about the petrol consumption too.

Vidula Adikari · January 25, 2022

On 1/23/2022 at 2:52 PM, Twin Turbo said:

the gear inmost petrol models is on the steering column

Yes.. I have seen some Delicas which were converted to floor board gear. Do you know about the average cost to do that.

matroska · January 25, 2022

1 hour ago, Vidula Adikari said:

Thank you very much. Could you pls tell about the petrol consumption too.

Difficult to tell on a 40 year old vehicle - two L300's will give you vastly different fuel figures depending on how they have been used, maintained etc. (think the two parrots in the sattigumba jataka). It's a fairly light van - my uncle's van used to get 10-12 KMPL on average, Depends a lot on your driving style, how well the carbs tuned and so on.

1 hour ago, Vidula Adikari said:

Yes.. I have seen some Delicas which were converted to floor board gear. Do you know about the average cost to do that.

Not sure - but imo the steering gears aren't that difficult to master actually it would retain the retro-value of the van too. If I were you I'd just get used to the steering gears.