Faults:

Cracked radiator from hitting a bin.

Overheated because of no water in the radiator.

General Comments:

I bought this car for $200 to take to my farm and thrash. I drove it nearly every weekend flat out, only ever needed to top up the oil once.

Very good on petrol.

Cracked the radiator by hitting a garbage bin at 120km/h, but put in another radiator from a Ford Falcon Ute and it ran the same.

Only time it overheated is when there was no water in the radiator.

It finally stopped driving when I jumped it and the front spring snapped, but it still ran so we but a rock on the accelerator and put it in neutral, and that's how it finally died.

Faults:

In nearly 4 years the only thing that had gone wrong with the car (other than tyres and rego) is one front of the suspension broke. I was not even aware till I had it in the shop getting new tyres put on, and when they took the wheel off, the strut just fell out!! It still drove fine!!

General Comments:

Engine / gearbox / clutch has never been touched. I have had 4 turbo cars since I have owned this car (I use it for daily run about to work).

And I have given this car HELL sometimes trying to thrash it to the point that it will blow up, but it does not.

I only paid $475 for it, and it has been the best car I have ever owned... other than it looks terrible and the colour is bad, and it is scratched... but it just runs so well, and has never given me one problem.

Faults:

+the horn has been replaced with an air horn which doesn't even work any more.

+rear door weather strips in the corners somehow have split making the water come into the car

+paint has started to fade away.

General Comments:

An fun car to drive and it sits on 150Km's no fuss and the little 4a motor in them are just made for them, but not in winter where the auto choke kicks a bit of power out of it, but not used to so little luxuries because my previous car being an SE was a fitted with air con, velour trim, cassette stereo, tachometer, luggage release in the cabin and lots more, but the corolla only has a luxury of the AM-FM non-cassette radio, but has 4 speakers which is great.

Faults:

Annoying carburettor problems.

Gearbox synchros wearing out. Probably due to lack of oil changes.

Starter motor bearings.

Driver side window winder mechanism.

Radio cassette didn't work.

General Comments:

I bought this as my first car. I saw it in the paper for NZ$6500 and the ad didn't show a mileage, but I went to have a look anyway. Had more k's on it than I preferred, but thought being a Corolla, it should last a while longer. After I had a pre-purchase inspection done it was obvious that it hadn't been well maintained by previous owner. I got the dealer to fit new rear muffler, re-cored radiator, oil change & new spare tyre. All up it must have cost him a packet, but I didn't really care, if he wanted me to buy the car.

It was only after I'd owned it for a few weeks when I discovered a few problems. It started fine when cold, but would take absolutely ages to start when it was hot. No amount of throttle, or no throttle, made any difference. Once I accidentally stalled it at traffic lights and was only able to get going milliseconds before I got mowed down by oncoming traffic. Not only that, when I would switch it off, the motor would stop and then 'diesel', as in it would almost start again by itself and chug a bit then stop completely. I was told both problems could be fixed by a tune up. This made no difference. Also, the starter motor would let out a loud rattle after the engine fired, but this was fixable. The gearbox was a pig to shift, worse when cold, and I was told by a mechanic that this model used the same oil supply for gearbox and engine, so when the engine oil was changed, so was the gear box oil. I now know this was probably wrong and in hindsight the gearbox oil was probably like tar which would be why it was so hopeless when cold. I was told to see Toyota about the starting and run-on problems and the guy treated me like a complete idiot and said it was a known problem and they couldn't do anything about it. This was my one and only ever encounter with a Toyota dealer. I ended up selling it after a year and 8000k's and bought a 3.9L EA Ford Falcon, which, as any Australians or New Zealanders will know, were far less reliable. In hindsight I should have spent the money I paid for the Falcon on getting the Corolla properly fixed up.