Advice Needed By A Prospective Owner.

[Craig P]

Hi all,

I have never owned a Toyota in any guise and have always run old bangers into the ground, changing them as soon as they suffered any mechanical failure that would cost more than a couple of hundred pounds.

Recently though my wife has managed to convince me that we should invest in a new car and we have found an avensis tourer business near us for 15000 on a 64 plate.

What I'd like to know is some real world info on these cars rather than dealer spiel. Are they easy to live with, what are servicing costs like, is there anything in particular I should be looking for. We travel all over the country camping and would be pulling a small trailer when we do this, so it needs to be able to eat the miles up with minimal effort.

Think that's all for now, thanks for reading and I look forward to your replies.

Craig

[FROSTYBALLS]

Hello Craig - welcome to Toyota Owners Club.

Is the Avensis petrol or diesel? Manual or CVT?

Details on Toyota's Fixed Price Servicing can be found on the following - https://www.toyota.co.uk/caring-for-your-toyota/service-and-maintenance/car-servicing.json

[allanicars]

I have a 2012 Tourer Diesel... great car... decent MPG.

one thing i found is that its impossible to see the front end when parking.. so I had the front parking sensors fitted (rear were already there)

Electronic parking brake takes a bit of getting used to... and can be annoying if you want a quick getaway at a junction or roundabout

Servicing is not too bad... pretty much what Toyota say.. and its worth doing until the 5 year warranty runs out.. then you can go anywhere or do it yourself if you are handy with a spanner

[Craig P]

Thanks to both, I should have said its the 2.0 diesel manual that I'm most interested in.

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[Duggerz]

Hello Craig,

I have an 56 plate 2.0 diesel that has covered over 200k miles without major work, and the 64 plate you're considering uses an updated version of that engine with much better about 10, mpg potential. The earlier problems with head gasket failure have been addressed and mainly affected the 2.2 anyway. Other than that there were cracks on the pillars but the door check straps on earlier t27 cars but I understand that was addressed too. There are many, many worse cars out there of similar age to choose from.

[Craig P]

Thanks Duggerz, do you know what was changed on the latest facelift this year?

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[alan333]

New design inside and out, new BMW diesel engines.

[Duggerz]

I don't know the whole story but I do know that at some point this year they moved to bmw diesels, there are also cosmetic changes which you're already aware of. Someone else here may be able to shed more light.

[Heidfirst]

There is a thread on the changes to the Avensis summer 2015> they are quite significant but you can only get those by buying new so will pay a lot more for a car than a 1-2 year old car.

Imo the Avensis is a much under-rated car. Again imo they are reliable, easy to live with & cheap to run by comparison with similar cars if you pick them up after the initial big depreciation has already been taken by somebody else :P

You will get a 5-year/100000 mile warranty from it's first registration. Imo Toyota dealers are better than Ford, Vauxhall etc. (admittedly there will be some that aren't as good as others so find a good one even if you have to drive a bit further) & Toyota does seem to stand behind it's warranty better than pretty much any other volume manufacturer.

EPB actuator is a potential (& expensive outside warranty) failure point but it is on all cars that use them & it's the way that the industry is going.

You can extend the warranty up until 11 years old but obviously for a fee & within certain constraints.

The 6-speed manual gearbox usually has a notchy/obstructive change into 2nd until it has warmed up.

The 2.0 D4D obviously doesn't have massive performance & a diesel Avensis estate isn't going to have sports car handling.

The estate will have a bit more road noise than a saloon & tbh the Avensis probably has a bit more to start with than e.g. a Peugeot 508 - I believe that it is 1 area that they supposedly have improved on the latest facelift.

Load space is very good, seats fold properly flat & 1 of the nice things about the Avensis is that there is no transmission tunnel hump in the middle of the back seats.

Check if that car comes with a spare (space-saver) or a tyre repair kit. If a tyre repair kit allow £ to buy a spare for peace of mind.

Any other specific questions fire away :)

[Craig P]

Thanks for all the info, tbh I like the 64 plate we are looking at and am happy with Toyotas reliability reputation so the BMW lump doesn't hold much attraction for me. Other changes I've found seem to be mainly cosmetic so think I'll stick with the pre facelift version.

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[Heidfirst]

what kind of mileage are you doing? All modern diesels have Diesel Particulate Filters & if you aren't doing the mileage (10-12,000+ p.a.) with enough fast motorway work to allow them to regenerate then they can be another expensive point of failure no matter the manufacturer & perhaps a petrol may be better for you (the Avensis 1.8 petrol is very good).

[Craig P]

Currently we cover around 10000 a year with plenty of motorway work so the filter should be OK. Haven't really considered the petrol as everything I've read proclaims the 2.0 diesel as the one to have.

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[dew66]

Craig ,

You might be interested in Honest John's comments about handling and steering comparisons between the 2012 diesel and petrol models.

http://www.honestjohn.co.uk/road-tests/toyota/toyota-avensis-2012-road-test/