By Chris Chase Despite their long history in the sector, Japanese automakers have less experience building upscale vehicles than European or American manufacturers. However, that hasn’t stopped Japan’s car companies from staking their claim in the profitable luxury vehicle segments. Honda established its Acura brand in 1986, while Nissan and Toyota rolled out their Infiniti
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Old vs New, Toyota, Ford, BMW
Here’s the latest instalment in our “old versus new” series of used-vehicle articles, where we compare the reliability of two subsequent generations of popular car and truck models. In this article, we look at three vehicles aimed at different audiences. The Toyota Corolla is a compact economy car known for its reliability and fuel efficiency.
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Most Fuel Efficient Used 5 Seat SUVs
by Chris Chase The mid-size crossover segment is one of the most varied vehicle categories in the marketplace. It starts with five-seat models about the size of a family sedan and stretches to seven- and eight-seaters that approach full-size territory. That makes a lot of sense: Families come in a lot of different sizes, so
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Compact Hatchbacks with the Lowest Maintenance Costs
By Chris Chase Some of today’s best-known small cars, like the Honda Civic and Volkswagen Rabbit, first came to North America as hatchbacks. These cleverly designed cars helped establish a market for modern compact vehicles on this continent, after the rudimentary VW Beetle paved the way. After automakers expanded their small-car offerings with sedans, hatchbacks
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Which Generation Should you Buy?
by Chris Chase Perhaps you’ve heard it suggested that you should never buy a car in its first year after a major redesign. This common maxim seems counterintuitive: A new design should be more reliable, thanks to the ever-improving precision that goes into the manufacturing process. It’s not a universal truth, but it is common
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5 Things to Consider When Financing a New Car
by Lori Straus Financing a new car can get you behind the wheel years before you’ve saved up enough to pay for one outright. For some, that’s a luxury: they’d rather drive now and pay later. For others, it’s reality: to earn money, they have to drive now and pay later. Whatever your situation, though,
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Used Retro Inspired Wagons
by Chris Chase The 1990s and 2000s saw automakers embrace retro vehicle designs in a bid to attract buyers with fond memories of cars they had owned decades earlier. Among the results of that trend were the Volkswagen New Beetle of the late 90s and the fifth-generation Ford Mustang introduced for 2005. But not all
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Most Fuel Efficient 5 Year Old V8 SUVs
by Chris Chase Eight-cylinder engines are out of fashion in many vehicle segments, thanks to modern technology that allows six-cylinder motors — and even some four-cylinders — to make as much power as V8s used to be known for. Still, a V8 remains one of the most straightforward ways to generate the power needed for
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Most Fuel Efficient 5 Year Old Cars
In the last decade, the auto industry has responded to consumer demands for more fuel-efficient vehicles with a variety of technological solutions. These have included innovations like direct fuel injection, turbocharging, and engines and transmissions with low-friction internal components. And then, of course, there are hybrid drive systems, which save fuel by relying partly on
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Same Car Different Name
by Chris Chase Using one vehicle platform to underpin different models is not a new practice in the auto industry. It gives a car maker a common starting point for a variety of vehicles and reduces R&D costs. A single platform might be used by different brands owned by the same parent company. Sometimes, companies
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