Rav4 Petrol Or Diesel?

[graham63]

Hi, looking to purchase a rav4,5 door, up to £4500ish, I know the obvious is the diesel but the flywheel issue is a bit worrying, not going to do lots of mileage thats why I thought on petrol and pay less for one, £3500ish, but is the petrol a thirsty motor? or should i just pay the extra abd go for the diesel?

[MarsKy]

Long journeys/ high annual mileage go diesel.

Shortish journeys/ low mileage go petrol.

[Davrav]

Hi, looking to purchase a rav4,5 door, up to £4500ish, I know the obvious is the diesel but the flywheel issue is a bit worrying, not going to do lots of mileage thats why I thought on petrol and pay less for one, £3500ish, but is the petrol a thirsty motor? or should i just pay the extra abd go for the diesel?

If you're not planning to do many miles Graham, go for the petrol - even with prices today you can still buy a lot of petrol for 1K.

Diesel here is currently 7p/litre more than petrol at the moment. Apparently you need to be doing at least 15K miles/year to benefit from the diesel option.

No DMF, cheaper servicing, quieter etc.

Only issue seems to be O2 sensors but they're well documented

[graham63]

Thanks for the replies, going to start looking at the petrol option, only going to do probably 5000 miles a year max, so yes petrol seems the right option, thanks again, Graham.

[matt@theforce]

When SWMBO was looking for a RAV4 a couple of years ago we worked out that upto 10k per year it was still cheaper togo for the Petrol over the Diesel in our situation. SWMBO's driving was 50% motorway and the rest mixed country road/town driving, the Diesel wouldn't give a significantly increase mpg over the shorter runs, the only expense on the petrol which is higher is the RoadTax/Fuel Costs but this for us is offset by the cheaper purchasing costs/cheaper servicing/lower depreciation

[firemac]

When SWMBO was looking for a RAV4 a couple of years ago we worked out that upto 10k per year it was still cheaper togo for the Petrol over the Diesel in our situation. SWMBO's driving was 50% motorway and the rest mixed country road/town driving, the Diesel wouldn't give a significantly increase mpg over the shorter runs, the only expense on the petrol which is higher is the RoadTax/Fuel Costs but this for us is offset by the cheaper purchasing costs/cheaper servicing/lower depreciation

Agree with all the above. We have 2 petrol 4.2's. The 5-dr is thirstier than the 3-dr but the latter does a lot of long m-way, A-road stuff and the 5-dr does all the locals & school runs. If a lot of your running is short or local then diesel isn't as good as petrol for all the reasons mentioned above as well as the DPF not getting up to operating temp and eventually clogging up (so I'm told). The EMS sensors can be an issue on the petrol cars; our 5-dr has gone through quite a few but we've always had warranty & ext'd warranty, so not a problem. For that reason make sure that the warranty you get covers them.

Otherwise, they have been cracking cars; we've had the 5-dr since new in 2002 and I can't prise my better half out of it.

Good luck with your search.

[HEMI]

Hi, looking to purchase a rav4,5 door, up to £4500ish, I know the obvious is the diesel but the flywheel issue is a bit worrying, not going to do lots of mileage thats why I thought on petrol and pay less for one, £3500ish, but is the petrol a thirsty motor? or should i just pay the extra abd go for the diesel?

Hi,I am selling our RAV diesel NRG 52 plate with 80k on the clock and I fitted (personally) a SMF 20k ago and have had no problems whatsoever,I#ve spent loads on that car like cambelt kit,calipers,SMF,never let me down,if you're interested....??

[graham63]

Hi Hemi, thanks for the offer but really after a 5 door petrol, theres a few about but always miles from me!

[graham63]

Thanks for all the advice, we've now purchased a petrol, 2003 Rav4,67,000 miles,in silver, just put a witter fixed tow bar on today (good old fleabay £111.00 with twin electrics)and the rear door still opens, about 20mm clearance, done about 200 miles and very well pleased with the rav up to now, thanks again, Graham.

[Davrav]

Thanks for all the advice, we've now purchased a petrol, 2003 Rav4,67,000 miles,in silver, just put a witter fixed tow bar on today (good old fleabay £111.00 with twin electrics)and the rear door still opens, about 20mm clearance, done about 200 miles and very well pleased with the rav up to now, thanks again, Graham.

Nice one Graham

Photos?

[firemac]

Thanks for all the advice, we've now purchased a petrol, 2003 Rav4,67,000 miles,in silver, just put a witter fixed tow bar on today (good old fleabay £111.00 with twin electrics)and the rear door still opens, about 20mm clearance, done about 200 miles and very well pleased with the rav up to now, thanks again, Graham.

Good luck. Enjoy.

ATB,

Jim