25th Nov 2016, 08:35

Constant buyers of a certain brand have their bias towards it often because of the feel of the car. Some like the handling, or the compliant ride. Maybe the seats over long distances, or the lack of noise in the cabin. Whatever. But even with today's legislative demands, a car of any type owes its owner REASONABLE reliability.

I'd tend to believe older cars were better and more reliable, until I remember that older cars were usually too rusty and got junked after maybe 10-12 years on average. Cars of past decades also were prone to have starting problems especially in cold weather - Japanese included. Not uncommon to see a 1992 Corolla running around - and that's 24 years old. In 1980 that would've been a 1956 car. Very rarely do you have a car within 10-15 years old fail to start these days, and not many need piston rings replaced or heads de-coked. Cars in the old days used to break down for two reasons - it wasn't put together right (or the components were not built right), or the owner didn't maintain the car. These days, no maintenance will predict a camshaft position sensor failure, and no amount of care will prevent an expensive ABS modulator fault.

Small and inexpensive cars aren't necessarily cheaper to run either - they also have the same features and components of dearer cars, like airbag seat sensors, ABS, traction control, high-pressure direct injection, turbos, climate control, etc.