I found out yesterday that my strut is broken on my 98 sunfire and has been for a while now. So, who knows when the rest of it will shatter and I'll fly off the road at 75 miles an hour. Plus, the car needs a new battery, an oil change, and at least two new tires. So, I think I'll be getting a new car.

I am looking at a ford focus ZX3. I took it for a test drive today and it was pretty sporty (sunfire is a 3 speed auto), looked pretty decent and sounded decent (it has a 6 cd/mp3 audiophile system with an 8" sub, not GREAT, but not bad).

It should get around 35-37 mpg and is going to cost a bit under 14k. Any reason I should stay away from this car?

A battery (~$50), new strut (~$100 installed), two new tires (~$80), and oil change (~$20) are all hell of a lot cheaper than a $14,000 new car. Not that I'm a huge fan of Sunfires (I think they are crappy cars), but if buying the ZX3 is going to break your bank account, you might want to consider fixing your current car.

I thought struts (you are supposed to get two) were closer to $500ish installed for the pair. The new car would be MUCH nicer than what I have right now and would help insure my sanity as I drive to work each day (45 minute commute and my CD player sucks balls, plus no cruise control in the sunfire). I'd also trust the new car a lot more than the sunfire. I just really don't want to put $300-700 into the sunfire since it probably is hardly worth $700 even with all that stuff.


Buying a new car isn't going to kill me, it will just delay me buying a house (which pisses me off). I was planning on getting a house after a year but now it'll probably have to be after two years.

Struts? Hell no. I bought a new strut for my Saturn for $45. Its actually not that hard to do yourself, all you need is a large Torx head bit for the top of the strut and a coil spring compressor, which you can rent for free at Autozone. Along with some standard sockets, its easy to get it done in an hour or so. I think the usual shop rate is around $60 for an hour of labor, and a stut usually runs an hour.

You should get two, or four, if replacing 1, but I replaced just one on my car (the other struts were fine) and that was over a year ago and it is still going. I had to replace just one because while I was removing the strut to replace the strut bearing, the top broke at the Torx socket and I had to cut the strut in half to salvage the coil spring.

You poor thing. I haven't driven a vehicle that was post-1970's since I was in high school. When I came to UMR as a freshman I had no money and a 1973 Galaxie, so when everything started breaking on it one by one, I slowly bought tools and learned on my own. I rebuilt my first carburetor in my room in TJ. So for $50 and a Saturday, I saved a car that most people would have thrown out.

Lukecp knows what I'm talking about too; the truck he drove as a freshman was even older than my Galaxie. There is no sense in getting rid of a vehicle and springing for a new one just because a few things go wrong. You can change your oil yourself for under $20 with an engine that small, and a battery will run you $40.

I don't mean to sound sarcastic and probably came off a little harsh, but it makes the most sense to know your vehicle inside and out and do as much as you can yourself. That's why I swear by carbureted vehicles. I just agree with lucas and don't think you should get rid of a car just because a few things go wrong. A '98 Sunfire is probably worth more than the $700 you threw out.

My parents have a 2000 Ford Focus....the thing is a piece of shit. It shakes pretty bad at anything above 60mph, the interior is cheap and feels like it's going to fall apart, and now at 60,000 miles, it's throwing CELs.

I'm not going to tell you to not get a new car, because my car is only 2 and a half years old with 25,000 miles, and I'd love to upgrade to something that's nicer and faster, and probably will when I graduate, so I'm the last person to be lecturing on why you shouldn't buy a new car, but for the love of god, don't get a Focus. Maybe they've improved over 6 years, but seeing their car has turned me off of Focuses, and Fords for that matter. If I were you, I'd probably get a Civic or a Corolla or something. Cheap, economical, and without a doubt, reliable.

Ok, first reason why you shouldn't buy the focus is that like everyone else is saying, it's a crazy amount cheaper to just fix your car. Second and the most important reason, it is a Ford. Ford is horrible, they don't call it Found On Roadside Dead for the heck of it. You're better off with your sunfire. Also the focus is very underpowered. I'm sad to say that I've driven all three models and they are all weak even for a 4-cylinder engine.

If you are going to end up buying a new car i would highly suggest a focus. they are a reliable car that gets good gas mileage, I have a good friend that had two Focuses, a 2000 and a 2002, both ran great, the first had over 130,000 miles on it and had no problems at all, and they are extremely safe vehicles, he ended up wrecking both of them in 60+ mph collissions and he walked away from the car. always got 30+ mpg and drove like a bat out of hell all the time. but again your car is new enough it is prob worth fixing up.

My fiance had a 2002 Focus, and personally, I thought it was a good car. It never had anything go wrong with it (until she drove it off a bridge in an ice storm) and was certainly safe, as she survived that one without a scratch. I believe it got mid-30's on MPG.
Don't believe the hype about foreign cars being sooo much more reliable, they really aren't, even statistically, modern domestics are very close to any foreign car. My family has had nothing but trouble with Toyotas and Mazdas, so thats why we buy GM or Ford now, and every one we have has 130,000-235,000 miles on them now.
Maintenance, and how you drive will make a huge difference on any vehicle though. A guy I know had a Ford Expedition that he took in for a checkup, turned out it needed $700 worth of maintenance done. He pissed and moaned about that big of a bill, and swore he'd never buy Ford again to me. When we asked him about it, it turns out, it had 135,000 miles on it, and he'd never spent any money on it. That 700 covered spark plugs, wires, tire rotation and balance, transmission fluid change, oil change, radiator flush, air filter, brake pads, and new shocks- everything that should have been done on a regular basis that wasn't.
I would recommend giving all cars you are interested in a test drive. There is nothing wrong with Ford's cars.
One thing you may want to consider though, Ford is now offering a 5 yr/60,000 mile warranty, and GM will be offering a standard 5 year/100,000 mile warranty on its 2007 vehicles, AND its fully transferrable, unlike others. The Cobalt would be a good choice as well, but I think the Fusion looks better, and its gotten some pretty good reviews.

And our family's 3 Hyundais have a 10/100,000 warranty and have been more reliable than any domestic we've ever owned. Only problem we've had across those 3 cars, was the power window motor in my Tiburon died. I believe the hype, as you call it, about foreign cars, because I've seen how much better they are. Besides, they're not really foreign....pretty much all of them build their cars over here.

I think different people have different luck with different auto manufacturers. One family will swear by one make, while another family swears against it, and both sides will have logical reasons for their decisions.

Driving habits, climate, and area of the country all have an effect which suit some vehicles and don't suit others. It's not really correct to generally say that all Fords suck or all GMs suck or all X brand sucks because each company has several plants, and while the company's goal is to maintain the same level of quality control, that never happens, in any corporation, auto maker or not.

And devil is right; most "import" cars are manufactured in the United States anyways

Actually, I think Toyota is the only "foreign" car company that has manufacturing plants in the US. The rest still ship overseas, that is why they still have the shipping hooks on the bottoms of opposite corners with removable bumper plates.

Honda's got a plant here I believe, and I know for a fact Nissan has at least 1 plant in Mississippi because I drove past it. Hyundai recentely opened a plant in Alabama. And I believe many of the German auto manufacturers are starting to build their cars here.

Lets not get into the retarded domestic vs foreign arguement...

Everyone should bear in mind that it isn't a great idea to take ones bad experiance as being a fact of life. Just because once someone had a Ford that was shitty, doesn't mean ALL Fords are shitty. Same as just because you have 2 or 3 great hyundais, doesn't mean that they are all great. I don't know whether non-biased surveys exist, but I think it would be interesting to see, over a representative sample, if the differences are as drastic as people try to say.

Plus devil, were the domestic cars of similar year and class? It really isn't fair to try comparing apples and oranges....

screw the general public's opinion. If you really want to know what to avoid and what to chase, look at a consumer report magazine. They will tell you everything you ever wanted to know in an unbiased format. I think they have some copies for those waiting in the student death building and some are in the Library. If you are seriously considering a car, then do some serious research, otherwise expect this biased, loyalist, BS from everyone.