Today we’ve got a list of the 20 most enduring vehicles on the road, a big move from BYD, a bad update from Renault-Nissan, and reasonable news about the chip shortage.
Welcome to The Morning Dump, bite-sized stories corralled into a single article for your morning perusal. If your morning coffee’s working a little too well, pull up a throne and have a gander at the best of the rest of yesterday.
The Toyota Sequoia Is Reportedly The King of Lifespan
The prevailing wisdom around The Autopian is that the most reliable car is the one built with cheap, easy-to-source parts that you can work on yourself. Still, not everyone wants to spend every waking minute wrestling bolts under a Chevy Tracker. A new study from iSeeCars, the used car/VIN check site, shows what analysts at the site think are the most durable cars sold within the last 20 years.
Up top is the Toyota Sequoia at 296,509 miles of “potential lifespan,” followed closely behind by the Toyota Land Cruiser and Chevy Suburban. What’s conspicuous on this list are the numerous Toyotas, though there are a decent number of GM and Honda products on here. There are two Fords (Expedition and F-150) and one Nissan (Titan).
A lot of these “studies” from car websites are questionable, but well-known analyst Karl Brauer put this one together and the methodology seems sound. Here’s how iSeeCars made the determination:
iSeeCars analyzed over two million cars produced and sold for at least 10 of the past 20 model years, ranking each model by its highest mileage-achieving cars. All 20 models had at least 2.5 percent of the top-ranking 20 models clear 200,000 miles, and the top 1 percent of these vehicles delivered between 230,000 and 297,000 miles over the last two decades. For example, 1% of Toyota Sequoias on the road have at least 296,509 miles on the odometer.
I’m curious what the corpus is, but with all the data that iSeeCars has at its fingertips this isn’t a difficult study for them to produce, and the concept of “lifespan” being determined by having at least 1% of these higher mileage cars on the road is interesting.
“What we see is a list of highly-durable vehicles, capable of more than a quarter-million miles of use if properly maintained,” said Brauer. “And to be clear, this study isn’t reporting the maximum lifespan of these vehicles. This is simply a measure of current odometer readings. Most of these cars are still in use and going strong.”
That’s right, if you’re at 252,360 miles on your GMC Yukon XL, keep on truckin’ baby.
Big trucks and SUVs make sense, both because they’re engineered to be durable and because their value as second- and third-hand work or adventure vehicles (hello Landcruiser) makes it profitable keep these on the road. It’s possible that you can keep a Honda Fit on the road for this long, but the residual value likely drops to the point where there’s less economic incentive to keep those on the road.
The Sequoia is mostly a Tundra underneath, so the durability makes sense, but they don’t seem to be as popular as the LC as an off-road rig. It’s worth noting that the analysis excluded heavy duty vehicles, which are designed for higher mileage.
[Editor’s Note: It seems that, based on how this data set was produced (basically, iSeeCars figured out which cars had the highest percentage of registered vehicles above a certain odometer reading), we can’t really conclude that these cars are the best built (though there’s likely some truth to it), since there are many factors that might lead a vehicle to keep going longer than other vehicles. The way a vehicle is driven and the way it’s maintained play big roles; an expensive car may get better treatment than a cheap one. A work-vehicle (like Matt mentioned) may stay on the road longer since its ability to perform its intended function doesn’t diminish as much as, say, a minivan (which after 10 years isn’t as safe or efficient as its competitors — and these are super important traits to shoppers in this segment).Â
I myself have owned a 265,000 mile Toyota Land Cruiser and a 265,000 Jeep Grand Cherokee. The former was still worth a lot, since these vehicles are known to last this long with few issues. A 265,000 mile Jeep, though, is worth very little, as people are suspicious that it won’t last much longer. Is it because the 4.7-liter V8 in the Toyota is better than the Jeep’s 4.0? No. I think serviceability plays a big role (the Toyota is a little easier to fix and maintain, in my experience), and so does initial value. The Land Cruiser is an expensive machine, so it tends to be treated better. Jeeps get beaten on.
Unrelated: I welcome you enginerds discussing the technical definition of “durability” in the comments. -DT]
Renault And Nissan Still Haven’t Figured It Out
Last week I mentioned that those lovable scamps at Nissan and Renault were trying to repair their troubled alliance and even had a planned announcement to explain how they were going to fix it all.
We’ve got an update from Automotive News Europe this morning on how that’s going:
Oh well.
BYD Is Coming To Japan Next Year
If I haven’t already made it abundantly clear: I think BYD is the most interesting carmaker to watch over the next five years. The Shenzen-based carmaker is, first and foremost, a battery maker (the company rose to prominence making the batteries that might have powered one of your cellphones). BYD has managed to keep costs in China lower than the competition while also building cars capable of getting five stars in crash test ratings from EuroNCAP.
The company has been running a pilot sales program in Norway and they’re going to be for sale across the continent over the next few months.
Now we have a new story from Reuters that says BYD is going to enter the Japanese market in early 2023.
The Shenzhen-based auto and battery producer, which includes Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway as an investor, held a brand conference in Tokyo and announced plans to start selling a small all-electric battery car called the ATTO 3 at the start of next year, followed by two additional EV models later in 2023.
Japan’s market has not, historically, been a great place for foreign automakers to sell cars. It’ll be interesting to see how BYD manages.
No North American Car Plants Are Cutting Production Due To Microchips
Here’s a little bit of sunshine on your Monday morning from Automotive News, which is reporting that automakers are not cutting any vehicle production at North American plants this week because of chip shortages.
That doesn’t mean there are no cuts anywhere, however:
While more modest than many other production schedule modifications this year, the latest cuts bring the global industry to a loss of nearly 4.2 million cars and trucks in 2022 to date, according to AutoForecast Solutions.
That’s a lot of cars, but the story goes on to note that the original forecast of vehicles delayed this year dropped by more than 90,000 vehicles. Does this mean we’ve reached the bottom? I’m cautiously optimistic, even with disruptions from COVID and the global economy, as well as war in Europe.
The Flush
What’s the highest mileage vehicle you’ve ever had? How many miles do you have on your daily?
Photos: BYD, Toyota, Ford, iSeeCars, Renault
Regarding vehicle durability… anyone remember that idiotic CNW Marketing “study” that came to the bogus conclusion that a Hummer was more ‘green’ than a Prius because the Prius “would have to be scrapped at 100,000 miles” while the Hummer “will last over 400,000 miles” (or some ridiculous mileage that is completely disconnected from reality)?
I feel like I want to print copies of that durability report, find the dipshits at CNW marketing and stick this report in their faces and noting where the Prius is on that list and how the Hummer isn’t on the list.
Oh and he highest mileage car I’ve had was a 2000 Saab 9-3 that had 397,000km on it when I got rid of it. I bought it for $2500 and 294,000km on it.
And currently, my 2008 Honda Fit has about 257,000km on it. I bought it 4 years ago with about 145,000km on it for CAD$4000 plus tax.
The other assumption that went into that was that R&D costs should be considered environmental costs (which is not a terrible proxy metric, to be fair), and the Prius would be discontinued after a couple years so Toyota’s entire hybrid R&D costs would be amortized across a couple model years of one car.
I noticed that more than half of the lifespan list consisted of Body-On-Frame vehicles, and the top five are Body-On-Frame. Coincidence or just my imagination? Must be my imagination.
My dad’s GMT-800 Suburban had the highest miles at 275k before it met it’s untimely demise.
Their Lexus ES330 had around 230k before lack of maintenance did it in.
My highest mileage was my 1st car, Pontiac Bonneville SSEi at around 150k before a family member needed it and I got something else.
Since we’re playing the high mile game, my daily driver land cruiser 80 series is about to turn over 340,000 miles. My low mile gx470 is at roughly 220,000. The 80 needs a little love but continues to be dead reliable. The gx is damn near perfect.
My high mileage champ was a 2000 Jetta TDI 5spd. Bought it at 190k miles, then beat the crap out of it to 293k.
Lost 5th gear at about 260k due to a trans leak, filled the fluid and kept on going. Only repairs I ever did was to replace all the dry rotted vacuum hoses and change the shocks/struts shortly after purchase.
“What’s conspicuous on this list are the numerous Toyotas”
Matt, I don’t think Toyota reliability is a hoax. There’s got to be some substance to the fact that they always top these lists.
I had a Tahoe (ca. 2005?) as a company vehicle. Worked for an oil company, drove around the mid-south (KY, TN, AL, MS). Hit 500,000k and realized the engine had never had a major overhaul. Trans had some work done but usually small stuff. Granted, it was 90+% highway, but it made it. We sold the truck and a cylinder seized a week later. It refused to go on without me! I drove 300,000 miles with the check engine light on BTW.
I find it very hard to believe that the Ford F-150 is in 19th place. Is it just me?
I’m the Man with Reliable Subaru wagons. My highest mileage and current “daily” if you can call it that (I determined to never drive my own car to work in the past 23 years, as a run/bike/or ski to work commuter) is a 1996 Legacy with 217K miles that I bought at 135K in 2000. It has the legendary EJ22 and is still on its original clutch and head gaskets. It runs like a top – the drivetrain feels no different than new. It does have oil leaks, mainly from the rear separator plate, but since you need to pull the trans or engine to access that, those leaks are not worth fixing until it needs a new clutch (which it might never, considering the rate I put in miles). It has cost peanuts per year to run and insure.
My other car is a 2003 Legacy with 156K miles that I bought sight-unseen off the internet for $2100 at 150K a few years ago. My thinking then was that it was a CA car, so it should have no rust, and that was true. This is also a car that is has excellent build quality and materials in almost every way except for one flaw – the head gaskets. The failure mode on this particular EJ251 is a slow external oil leak that is mild and can be run for 10s of thousands of miles that way without damaging anything (if you make sure it doesn’t run low on oil). If I had to replace the head gaskets (with the multi-layer steel ones from the turbo EJs that are a permanent fix – won’t need to ever replace again), I already had that built into my cost calculations. As it turned out, the head gaskets had already been replaced, as most EJ251 have by that mileage. As the car was in such good condition, no leaks at all underneath, no torn or worn bushings or boots or wheel bearings, etc., I though it worth it to make and keep it as a non-shitbox forever car, my personal holy grail. So it has new KYBs all around, new performance tires, other things brought up to essentially new condition (but with some patina on plastic side molding/mirror caps that I might fix at some point). My only necssary repair expense was a wear item, a new clutch. It’s a pleasure to drive on twisty White Mountain roads, and the sticky tires really pull Gs in one emergency stop I did. I drove it across from CA to NH a few weeks after buying it, where I use it when I’m in New England.
I plan to drive my 1996 from Alaska (where I live) across Canada to New England next year and drive the 2003 back to Alaska because I’m not willing to drive my rust-less, holy grail 2003 Legacy on salted New England winter roads.
I’m a fan of 1990-2004 Subarus as used cars. In the Legacys at least, the 1990-1994 first gen had the best quality, followed closely by the 2000-2004 third gen. The second gen has a more econocar feel on the inside. Non-rusty first gens are hard to come by now. The second gens with the 2.2 (EJ22) are good, but the twin cam EJ25Ds in the second gen are to be avoided. They were the engine to give Subaru the bad head gasket reputation. The quality drops off in the fourth gen 2005-2009. The interior of a 2005 (like I helped get for my parents) looks much more aged by this point than my 2003 due to cheaper materials. Also, Canbus makes 2005+ Subarus potentially more difficult to DIY service/repairs. I also get a call from my mom every once in a while complaining about the TPMS light coming on in the 2005, and I’m glad to avoid that in my own cars. Trying to figure out if the issue is tire pressure or TPMS failure (especially on 10+ year old cars) makes it more of a headache that its worth for someone that keeps up on monitoring things anyway.
Can confirm, had a 2001 Outback VDC. It had the 6cyl with a timing chain(!), no head gasket issues, and absolutely devoured the miles and snow alike. Only problem was the McIntosh audio system. Apparently it was supposed to be a big selling point when the car was new (I’ve heard weird rumors of the VDC trim’s soundproofing being tuned around its acoustics) but in practice it never worked terribly well for me. The speakers got buzzy and weird as they aged and it was a bear to access them so I ended up not bothering.
How are people driving all these miles? I bought my DD new in 2001. It has 150,000 miles on it. For this kind of mileage I need to drive it another 20 years. I will probably die before that.
I’ve had times where my commute has been about fifty miles one way. It was all freely flowing freeway so it didn’t take an unreasonable amount of time, but if I’d maintained that sort of arrangement that’s 26k a year at least.
Okay makes sense to me. I just never had long commutes. I have moved across the country for a job but rented or bought a place near work.
I’ve got about 260K on my 2002 Tahoe, and it’s still going strong. The other 2 cars have about 55K and 70K on them, though being the only driver now, those are getting used more and the truck less so.
I’ve always thought it’s funny how cars in general seem to improve in recent decades. All my rides have tended to be about 15-20 years old when I get them, my first car I still see as an “old” junker, even though it only had about 70K at the time. But that was a ’78 T-Bird, everything in the 90’s to 2000’s and newer I’d say is almost exponentially better.
You’d be absolutely right. The 80’s were very much transitional years for automakers. The two biggest changes were electronic fuel injection and corrosion protection. That gave us cars that were more dependable and cosmetically more attractive as they aged.
“What’s the highest mileage vehicle you’ve ever had?” My current live-aboard 2007 Express 2500 which is creeping up on 333,333 miles.
Let us know when you’re getting ready to double that so we can stand back and sniff for brimstone.
My 2004 Tundra has almost 303,000 miles on it, and has only a very minor power steering fluid leak, burns/uses no noticeable oil between changes, and Blackstone labs gave it a clean bill of health recently. It’s running strong and doesn’t show any signs of being tired other than it sometimes runs a bit hot but only when pulling my 4500 lb 5th wheel up to the Eisenhower Tunnel, going east. Going west up to that tunnel is a longer approach and it has zero problems on that side. The 4.7L 2UZ-FE is legendary for a reason.
My ’64 F100 coach-built crewcab is at 350k miles on original drivetrain, and I drive it frequently.
My ’06 Prius went 299k miles before my lack of maintenance did it in.
My ’80 VW Vanagon Westfalia was at 250k when I sold it.
Our first year Camry was sold at 250k miles.
The ’91 Previa sold at 250k miles.
Here in Dubai, I am often ferried home from the airport in a Camry or more recently and Innova with 600k+ km on the clock. The taxi driver typically drive-like-they-stole-it, so it’s not easy life. I’ve spoken many times to the drivers and they say that the engine is started once and turned off once before it’s sold (i.e. they run 24/7: and no, we keep our cars running at fuel pumps, contrary to safety signs). Oil changes are frequent and done in a pit stop fashion. They’re generally retired and sold of to other countries at 700k. It’s amazing the the standard Camry doesn’t feature in the top 20.
That’s a lot of mileage! Do those taxis stay on idling when not in use? Or are they being driven 24/7?
There are a bunch of Innova taxis here in Bahrain. They ride like a shopping cart and look like the Toyota version of a C-Max, but the bones underneath are RWD, BOF. Apparently they just do not die.
I’m pretty sure they have to turn off the engine during oil changes…
I don’t like that they used the word “durability.” I would associate that word with being overbuilt/resistant to abuse versus “reliability” or “enduring” being associated with longevity. Example: euro luxury cars. Incredibly beefy structurally (stamped steel control arms? Never heard of them) and the dead ones are usually not rotted out and have instead suffered a major mechanical failure.
Currently my dd is a 02 ody with 375k+, runs and rides perfectly, averages 20 mpg and will still hit 27 mpg on extended interstate trips. Previously have had a v70 that made 500k before being sold, a Silverado sold at 250k, 500 SEL that was totaled in an accident at 200k. Try to start with no issues, keep fluids fresh and “listen” to your vehicle and it is amazing how long most can last.
I bought my old E46 M3 with 40k miles in 07 and traded it in on a 2011 E90 M3 in 2014. It had 165k on it when I traded it and the only reason I got rid of it was the wife decided it would be better to get another car than replace the smg pump on the E46. The only major issue that car ever had besides the pump was a dead alternator. No VANOS, subframe, or cooling systems issues ever.
The highest mileage car I’ve been in was a Kia Soul Zipcar that had around 350,000 miles. It had no rear bumper and seemed to struggle to accelerate, but otherwise it was fine.
The second highest was my friend’s x5 at 260,000 miles which, wow did that car use a lot of gasoline. That’s about 49 tons of gasoline worth of driving.
My mileage champ was a Civic with 350k kms. Still running strong until the rest of the body had David Tracy levels of iron oxide.
Current DD is at a mere 75,000 kms.
On this very day, my old gen-8 LeSabre will be crossing the 250,000 mile mark. Somewhere on the way home from work. And it’s never been on a tow truck.
THAT is durability.
It totally cracks me up to see the Toyota Land Cruiser as #2. In my experience, their lifespan was measured in tens of miles. When I worked for the UN in Africa, we got an endless supply of new totally tricked out ones. Unfortunately for me, they kept blowing their transmissions, monthly. Fluke, perhaps. Decade and a half later, on a project in Borneo, well funded one, we had three brand new Turbo-Diesel Land Cruisers. Much to our dismay, all three blew their transmissions during the six week period of the project. One even had one of its brake calipers fall off! That was a real first. Needless to say, while on project I try really hard to not have them supply or rent me Land Cruisers anymore. I let others follow the “Legend.”
That’s interesting. Maybe poor initial quality and the ones that survive keep kicking? There’s also a big difference in harsh usage and road usage. I can absolutely see some stuff being super reliable on the road and instantly break off road.
I am not picking on you. Logic then says instead of being an off road legend. It is rather a back country grocery hauler. BTW, I never am harsh on vehicles. It is absolutely no fun to have your Land Cruiser break down on you in really fun unstable places, like Somalia, forcing you to walk to a spot where hopefully your handy talki can reach something. So I am actually quit gentle with them, especially in active war zones. I have this incredibly low threshold of death, my doctor has warned me to never have bullets enter my body at any time. So these overpriced POS’s where increasing the likelihood of that happening.
I was commenting on the environment they were being used in rather than the driver. The ones in the US hitting 300k would probably not be hitting 300k in places with less developed infrastructure.
Just curious – what kept rolling when the Land Cruisers stopped?
Old Peugeot 505’s, Isuzu Rocky’s, Series IIa and III Land Rovers, old modeled on tanks Mercedes sedans. You just could not seem to kill them and they went everywhere. Stand on a corner in Nairobi and you would see every one of these stream by in various stages of decrepitude. You wouldn’t see very many old Land Cruisers. Lots of cars in Africa are used ones from Europe. They import them based on low taxes and what they know they can maintain running. Organizations run by essentially overeducated fools, like the UN, would get Land Cruisers. Which are donated by Japan in lieu of giving actual money. They price them at full retail for full luxury models on the donation price tag (they acquire them far cheaper). We do the same with old stored wheat and clapped out military gear.
Left out my favorite, the Combat Corolla. Right before the overthrow of the Dictator Siad Barrie, I had run through two Land Cruisers in a month. The motor pool head, Ahmed Yusuf, gave me this Toyota Corolla to use until something else came in. Coup happened before that. I ended up using the Combat Corolla to evacuate all the UN personnel from Somalia under fire, 24 people in all. Everybody was all over town, so the Toyota put in yeoman’s service. I wish I had taken a pic of it when we used it to block the gate to the courtyard to keep the looters out. My house guy was happily washing it. Kind of ironic, people could burst in an burn the place and car, yet it needed washing and he was going to do it regardless.
My dd is a 2000 Acura 3.2TL which I purchased new and sold to my Dad after five years with about 54,000 miles on it. He then used it as his daily, then as a second car, and returned it to me two years ago when he could no longer drive. It has ~240,000 miles on it … and while it’s now on its second transmission, everything still works, it runs like a top, and it looks great save some clearcoat de-lamination on the passenger door. I’m committed to keeping it on the road as long as I can.
My personal highest mileage car is my ’93 Suzuki Sidekick, which is sitting at a whopping 303,000 miles. It’s very tired. Not mine, but my work pickup, is an 07 Silverado with 356,000 miles. It is also VERY tired. Still extremely impressive both these rigs are on their original motors, though not original transmission in the case of the Chevrolet.
Highest mile cars? Tops is the Saab 9-5 Aero I bought new, drove 11 years/325k miles, then sold… and bought it back nearly 10 years later. It now has 340-something on it now. It’ll re-enter occasional daily drive duties in the next few months. Otherwise, we’ve had another Saab that we sold with 320k on it, and a couple LS400s that got sold around 300k. Current cars are all under 200k at the moment.