1987 Nissan Stanza Reviews

Valve stem seals degraded, caused blue smoke from exhaust.

A/C hose became porous and leaked out R12. Just needed rubber hose from compressor.

I replaced the cracked valve seals myself in about an hour and a half. Cost: $45 NOTE: Buy seals from Nissan ONLY. First ones I bought lasted a month; Nissan seals never failed, even with the car now over 300,000 KMS.

Awesome, comfortable car, trouble free, rides like a much larger car.

As with all other cars, keep up with oil changes and maintenance.

Power is adequate for an economy car. Manual trans axle would help there.

Automatic transmission is the best I have seen out of any 4 cylinder car; Shifts flawlessly, overdrive button works. Never required any work since new.

Ball joints had to be replaced at 210,000 miles.

A check valve in the intake have to be bypassed at 220,000 miles.

There was a lot of rust developing, but I forgot to wax it for over a year.

Fuel tank rusted out at 223,000 miles.

Replaced the thermostat and alternator at 215,000 miles.

I totaled the car in an accident at 125,000 miles, and repaired the front end. Drove it for an additional 100,000 miles after that.

The car handled really well, never had any serious problems.

Most of the problems I had were after it reached the 200,000 mile mark, which was still 80,000 miles after I totaled it by hitting a stopped car on the expressway at 70 mph.

The only reason I sold it was because the fuel tank rusted out, and it was going to cost $700 for a new one. It also needed a new radiator by this point, and it seemed more economical to replace the car. It was a mistake I won't repeat. I went back and recently bought a 1990 Stanza, after going through 3 other cars trying to find one I liked.

The first major thing to actual go bad was the clutch at 150,000 miles. I consider it more of a maintenance thing especially when my sister had been taught on the Stanza and driven it for a while. Women love to ride the clutch.

The only other major thing replaced was the fuel pump, it went bad at about 160,000 miles and cost 500 dollars to fix including labor.

The only true annoying thing about the car was the crazy electrical system for all the power windows. The driver window switch had to be replaced three times. Luckily the part was cheap. Eventually the driver window motor went dead at about 165,000 miles.

For the how small the car looks on the outside compared to larger sedans like the piece of crap Ford Taurus it had just as much room in both the front and back seats. Good for trips with 4 people or less.

Gas mileage was alright in the city, about 24 mpg if you babied it, but on the freeway it was crazy. Even though it was rated 28 mpg, I could manage to get 500 miles on a 12 gallon tank (about 42 miles to gallon) even at 70 mph hour.

My only regrets would be that this car was not lighter. For a smaller sized sedan it weighed 2800 lbs when most similar sized sedans weighed around 2500 lbs or less. It would have been a little faster and gotten better gas mileage.

The best thing is that even before I sold it, it still got the same or better gas mileage (especially on the freeway) than it was rated at and never burnt oil; a good sign that the engine was stilling running strong.