Thursday, August 30, 2007

Car Shopping

Just call me the Jeep Slayer.

I'm in the market for buying a new car. I think, living in the city, fuel economy and reliability (especially in a car-centric city like L.A.) are paramount.

I've been thinking about the Toyota Yaris. I took a test drive the other day and it wasn't bad; the worst thing I could tell was that the engine doesn't seem to like accelerating at low speeds. From a full stop it really groans to get to 25 MPH. Maybe I'm exaggerating, but that's what it seemed like to me. Since I'm not a speed demon (usually) I don't think that would be a problem for me.

My favorite feature of the Yaris is all the little hiding spots it has. My inner spy just loves the idea that I could have 'secret' hiding places for things like maps, spare keys, etc. Toyota must have had some usability engineers design the interior. While I didn't really care for the climate controls too much, I like that they're designed so if the driver is wearing gloves he or she doesn't have to take the gloves off to fuss with them.

If you're a Yaris owner, I'd love to hear if you've had any problems with your Yaris, or if you think it's the best car you've ever owned, or anything in between. I'd also consider other car recommendations.

1 comment:

don said...

None of those little cars have a lot of horsepower, and that's one of the biggest drawbacks to them. I'm guessing the Yaris has around 100-110 hp. But the gas savings is something you can really get used to. My Tiburon has 145 hp(they say) I think it's a little less. It's not slow, but it's not exactly fast either. It's 4 cyl. I get 28 to 30 or so around town and 34 to 38 on the highway, usually around 34.

The more horsepower the faster you can go but the more gas you use. If you can get used to not having as much power, you will certainly get used to not using so much gas. It's really nice not going to the gas station all of the time.