MPV/Station Wagons in NZ

[jubjub]

OK, a question for anyone in NZ with an MPV or station wagon/estate car.

We need to replace my car, its a fortune to maintain, we thought as a Jap import it would be fine, but nope , its a Daihatsu Pyzar (dont laugh!)

What I need to know is what have you got, is it reliable, have you had any probs getting parts for it, would you recommend it to your best mate?

I am not fussy, only requirements are that the dog can jump into the boot, and there are four passenger doors, oh and its preferably cheap to buy!

[Moorf]

We've got a '96 Subaru Legacy Grand Wagon Auto and we're really pleased with it - so much so that we're sticking the same make/model when we upgrade - seems a common "workhorse" round here - does everything we need including shipping the dog around, the bikes, huge boot, lovely to drive, fast/nippy (2.5ltr) when needed, permanent 4x4, cheap to buy, parts and repair shops are common, some of the replacement parts can be costly, but to date no probs with ours. Can pick up a 95/96 for around $10k. Friends recently bought a newer model (2003 I think) for $18,500 having negotiated the price down from $24,000.

We used to have a Rav4 but that was nowhere near as good in terms of boot size and handling off the main roads, speed etc.

Sorry, both of the above are Jap imports.

[StevieD]

Ditto on that Sal, the Subaru is a fantastic car, and i looking to get one of those when we get there. Marie P has one too, so give her a pm to ask her advice too!!

I have driven Subaru/Isuzu within my jobs for a long time and they are very good cars, if not a tad expensive to maintain sometimes. But when they company cars you don't worry about that. But I wouldn't hesitate to get one.

Steve

[jubjub]

Ditto on that Sal, the Subaru is a fantastic car, and i looking to get one of those when we get there. Marie P has one too, so give her a pm to ask her advice too!!

Could not remember what she had, will have a nosey at it when I see her...

[clg]

Chalk me up as another happy subaru owner

[wanderingoregonian]

We're on our second Subaru Loyale - its a 91 and doing GREAT... we drove the last one into the ground, and this one should last awile but we'll be selling it to move to NZ. The perfect size, optional 4WD, and gets good gas milage. Plus I never worry when it gets hit - fender benders are very common in Boston.

How hard do you all think it would be to find a decent used subaru wagon down in NZ? I know I will have deal with the fact that I probably the days of finding a great Loyale wagon in good condition with low milesl is slim.. particularly since they stopped making them in 94...

[Moorf]

Sizz.. I'll stick my neck out here and say I think it's the most common car on the road here - at least it is round this neck of the woods. Tons for sale too.

[sizzlingbadger]

It seems we the odd ones out We've got a Mitsubishi Delica '95. Jap import but it's been fantastic. We've got 3 kids, 2 dogs and managed easily to get a weeks worth of luggage in as well. We've even managed to put a bath in the back with all the seats down or moved Easy to maintain and reasonable on diesel, although added extra with road user charges. Quite a few around, we've got the Space Gear which is 7 seats, the ones with 8 seats seem to have quite a few broken or bent 8th seat on the row behind the driver. Ours has two seats behind the driver instead and are independant of each other so you can swivel them around and move them up or down.

One thing to watch with some of the Suburau estates is the back seat clips (don't know technical word for them, where you put the seat belt to do it up :-)). We had major problems getting my youngest's car seat to fit in and buckle up as you can't move the clip up or down it was fixed. The other problem was the amount of space once he was in we could only just get a second car seat in, no room for a 3rd person to squash in.

Take your car seat with you and test it out, also your pushchair as well. We found with the Prados and other 4x4s that we couldn't get a pushchair in the boot let alone shopping once all 7 seats were in use. That's why we ended up with the Delica despite my husband wanting a Prado

[Park City Partner]

We bought a 2000 Subaru Legacy at the end of Jan. from a dealer with a warranty for about $18k. We went through a dealer just in case there were any problems so we probably paid a bit more. We looked at Toyotas as well but as we are both tall there was not much headroom so we went with the Subaru. We have been very happy with it. We have loaded heaps of stuff in it including a washer and dryer we bought at a yard sale. One items to note is that it came from Japan and the radio doesn't have frequencies above 90.0. So we don't get much on the raido but we use our iPod in the car for the time being.

[Moorf]

Hey Park City, did you know you can get an adaptor that sits between the radio and the aerial that shifts the frequency band so you can get all the NZ broadcasts? We had the same problem with us and I can't drive with Rock FM .