Car Help

[terpkristin]

I've come to the opinion that my car sucks. For those who don't know, I drive a 2003 Mazda Protege5 (the small hatchback that looks a lot like the current Mazda 3 hatch). I bought it in February 2003 and have since put 41k miles on it. Over the last half a year or so, I've noticed that my gas mileage has gone to hell. I'm averaging 17-19 city right now and 23 highway. I used to get about 23-24 city and about 27-29 highway. I'd blame it on the cold weather recently if it were just a recent problem, but this has been consistent with performance over the last ~8 months.

I recently took it to the dealer for its 30k service and to have them take a look at it to figure out why my mileage had gone to heck and then some. They found nothing "wrong" with it per se, but did notice that the engine had a lot of carbon buildup. A grand later, I had my 30k service, new spark plugs, a new brake shim, and an injection cleanup and induction cleanup. Guess what? My gas mileage didn't get any better, and may have gotten worse. Yep, I dropped a grand on a 4 year old car to improve the gas mileage and it did NOTHING or made it worse.

Alas. I think I might be in the market for a new car. I say might because I really love the way my car handles and how it feels when I drive, I just really really really hate how often I need to fill it up. I do mostly city driving, so something that gets good mileage would be nice. I've thought about the Prius or the Camry or the Matrix but I absolutely abhor the way that Toyota does their options packages (to get the one option I want, I have to spend a bit over 3 grand extra and get about 10 options I don't want). Plus, the Camry was redesigned for 07 so I'm not touching that with a 10 foot pole. Similarly, the small and medium-size Nissan sedans were 07 redesigns (and after driving one Nissan small sedan as a rental, I'm not sure I like 'em anyway). The 06 Mazda 3 hatch has gotten good reviews on Consumer Reports (from 04-06, the ratings have steadily improved), and I can get an 07 with the options I want for a price I'm willing to pay, but then I have to wonder if the Mazda will have the same issues my current one does in about 4 years...

Anybody have any thoughts on any of the cars I've listed or have ideas about new cars? I really like my hatchback, I'm not sure I could go back to a sedan, but at this point, something needs to happen...

/tk

[terpkristin]

Dola,
Forgot I had one question to ask...for a given weight, a bigger engine is more powerful, right?

For example, the Matrix is 2840 lbs with a 1.8 L/4 cyl engine. The Mazda 3 I'm looking at is 3060 lbs with a 2.0 L/4 cyl engine. Would simply doing a engine size to car weight ratio give me a good indication of which was more powerful?


/tk

[FrogMan]

Dola,
Forgot I had one question to ask...for a given weight, a bigger engine is more powerful, right?

For example, the Matrix is 2840 lbs with a 1.8 L/4 cyl engine. The Mazda 3 I'm looking at is 3060 lbs with a 2.0 L/4 cyl engine. Would simply doing a engine size to car weight ratio give me a good indication of which was more powerful?


/tk


I'd go much more with the HP ratio of the engine than the size per se, although both are usually related.

The Matrix gives you 126 HP as per toyota.com (I'm pretty sure ours was rated at 130 HP though) and the Mazda rates at 148 HP as per mazda.com (at least their 2.0L engine seems to be). So yeah, the Mazda would be more powerful. Having driven the Matrix quite a few times, I can tell you that it is not very powerful. It drives nicely around curves and on startups, but it feels kind of lazy in 3rd and 4th gear, say between 35 and 55 MPH...

FM

[cougarfreak]

Take a look at Hyundai's. Good mileage, good reviews, good warranties.

[stevew]

You might do a lot of stop and start driving and theoretically get better mileage, but the Prius my parents have had for a year doesn't get anything close to what you think it would. You basically have to drive it a certain type of way, or you're looking at getting like 35ish mpg. At least in our case anyways.

[Grammaticus]

Try a Subaru, the outback sport is a hatchback and gets decent gas milage. If you have snow, it is all wheel drive too.

[CU Tiger]

To address your current car, there are probably no less than 30 independent factors you could look at for your mileage drop. Losing 8-10% is not a fluke, something is going on. After an initial break in (5-15K depending on vehicle and driving style) your mileage should IMPROVE, the fact that yours went the other way, I would either investigate or dump it.

Engine size is barely relevant anymore to power output, read the hp/torque (lb. ft. is what you will actually feel while driving hp is just a fun brag number for 90% of drivers) ratings and compare from there. Although transmission and axle gear ratio will have much more influenece on MPG than motor output numbers.

[Craptacular]

Take a look at Hyundai's. Good mileage, good reviews, good warranties.

I second that. I have an '03 Elantra and just had my 60,000 service, which signifies the end of the bumper-to-bumper warranty. Up to that point, the only things I've paid out-of-pocket for maintenance were oil changes, tire rotations, a few other little recommended service items, and fairly recently, new tires. There have only been a few minor warranty repairs (something with the oil gasket, a headlight, a minor recall, and maybe a couple of other little things). The 60,000 mile service was fairly expensive (~$750), but a majority of that was the timing belt ... I know they are moving to timing chains on most vehicles, so hopefully that won't be an issue much longer. Now, I still have another 40,000 miles to go on the powertrain warranty. I have a manual transmission and average about 31 mpg in a mix of city and highway driving, although the newer ones likely get slightly better mileage. I believe the engine was rated at 140hp, which is enough for the necessary things (easy merging on freeways, passing, etc), but certainly won't blow the doors off anything.

I also own an '04 Mazda 6 wagon, so I hope it doesn't end up like yours. ;)