2002 Toyota Tundra SR5 from North America - Off Topic Comments

Toyota does not outclass in full size trucks vs. domestics. Limited lineup, towing capability, load carrying, people carrying, ride, comfort and handling. Are we talking about empty or pulling and towing ever? And the warranty is weak.

Go to consumeraffairs.com and read on late model Toyotas/Hondas. The older ones (cars) were durable, but not newer ones we have owned.

I guess 22:02 hasn't read the CAMRY reviews!!

The truest measure of a car or truck is long term resale value.

Short term resale value is an unreliable indicator because of the whims and vagaries of the marketplace. Find an old car price guide (such as NADA) and compare prices of ANY American car from the 60's, and compare it to ANY Japanese car from the same era, and you will see that over time, American cars and trucks are a better value and investment than any of the Japanese rivals!!!

I agree the right classic domestic musclecars are better than chancing the stock market, real estate market, and are always there any time you want to drive on a nice day. And classic insurance is low. Other than a very few Toyotas, and keeping in mind their original sale price, what appreciates? Just the appliance picture comes to mind again. It's all just MPG. I liked the 70's Celicas and later Supras, but overpriced in my opinion.

As we've had pointed out before, the higher resale value of a car is pretty much offset by the much higher price paid up front to purchase it. Besides, the Chevy Silverado HAS a higher resale than the Tundra, so I really don't see the argument on that point on a Tundra review. It is pretty much an accepted fact that Tundra does not compete with domestic trucks, or that is as reliable.

"Domestics do not have any thought put in their engines. They just put a big V8 and make it fast and suck gas."

Really? Well you better tell the EPA that they made a mistake on their new fuel economy ratings, because the V8 powered Corvette gets better mileage (26 vs. 23 respectively) than your beloved 4 cylinder compact Subaru Impreza.

http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/calculatorCompareSideBySide.jsp?Column=1&id=23469

http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/calculatorCompareSideBySide.jsp?column=1&id=23151

I would say in response to your argument that anyone can arbitrarily put a turbo or supercharger on a small engine and have it make power, but it is much more of an engineering accomplishment to design a torquey V8 in a large performance car and have it get better fuel economy than a 4 cylinder compact. Wouldn't you?

Comment 09:18 is correct. It takes much more in the way of efficient design and engineering to get a high powered V-8 to deliver the same mileage as the Subaru (or Camry) 4 than it does to just stick a basic, underpowered engine in a small car and call economical. The Corvette (whose sales have increased 300% in Europe since 2000) is a great example. However, since this is a Tundra review we might also point out that the Tundra mileage is not as good as its domestic competition either, so obviously someone dropped the ball on engineering its engine too.

A big V-8 does not get better mileage than any 4 cylinder compact car. Period. First, if you do anything other than baby it (which means NOT driving it like a V-8, and making any horsepower), it's going to suck gas just like all v-8's do.

Second, show me one that gets 38 mpg (or even CLOSE to that), under any driving conditions, like my 1.6 liter Hyundai does. You can't, because there aren't any. V-8's are a waste of money and material in a car. Period. If you NEED a truck with towing capacity, buy one if you must. Otherwise, exercise common sense and buy a 4-cylinder. It'll go anywhere a car with a V-8 will, and will get you close to if not double the gas mileage doing so.

Sure, I'd love 8 cylinders and 300 horsepower all the time too. I just don't think it's a good idea to buy one.

Even a mid-1990's Cadillac Northstar V-8 gets 28 mpg, and the variable displacement V-8 used by Chrysler gets up to 30 mpg.

Although it is possible with good engineering and very conservative driving to get pretty good mileage out of a V-8 (the Corvette being an excellent example), it is true that a basic 4-cylinder will generally get way better mileage under nearly all conditions.

If one drives aggressively with a 4-cylinder, however, their gas mileage will suffer just as much as an aggressively driven V-8. If I hot-dog my 4-cylinder compact my mileage quickly drops from 30 to about 21mpg.

With the ever-shrinking supply of oil and the massive damage to the environment, I've long advocated that people switch to more fuel-efficient 4 (or 6) cylinder cars. I have owned my last V-8, and it will be a great day when the last V-8 is built.

The comments regarding classic cars as a good investment are flawed. Classics are only worth their peak once the generation who had them when they were younger reach their peak earning years and yearn for the cars of their youth. Proof is the fact that from the 80's-mid 90's, cars of the 1950's demanded large prices. Since then, muscle cars, which were beforehand almost worthless - are now selling for ridiculous sums. Meanwhile, the cost of cars from the 50's has gone down... A LOT. I have a 55' Mercury Monterey that was worth over $10,000 when I bought it 10 years ago, and now worth maybe $4,500 MAX. So it has lost more than 50% of its value. Once the old people who like these muscle cars get too old to own them, they too will be worth less.

In regards to Japanese classics, they are just now getting old enough to be classics. Look for Datsun 210's. They used to be a $500 car. Now some are going for $10,000.

21:07 too vague... depends on the car. A 4 cylinder not properly maintained, tuned, oil burner due to neglect etc can choke us all with bad emissions. In addition a big repair can crop up (drivetrains) and suck up assumed savings.

Cheap rides can come back and haunt you when they fail. There's more than MPG when a big repair comes.

I love the people with long commutes during the week, justifying it with the purchase of a 4 cylinder. Why not move closer to work and drive a shorter distance?

I maintain I burn less fuel in my under 10 minutes commute. I could ride a bike, a scooter, take a bus if I was making a stronger statement. In reality my 20-28mpg V8 overmaintained tuned vehicle fuel consumption per week is quite low compared to those I work with driving out of state to our workplace.

The reasoning of comment 17:31 is flawed. If driving a V-8 a short distance makes sense, then driving a 4-cylinder a short distance makes even MORE sense. If you live close to work and drive a 4-cylinder, you still save gas and help both the economy and the environment. Also, moving closer to work simply is not an option for 90% of Americans.

"I love the people with long commutes during the week, justifying it with the purchase of a 4 cylinder. Why not move closer to work and drive a shorter distance?"

Because sometimes the cost of doing so heavily outstrips the fuel savings by a huge margin. Me and my Wife live in the East Bay of the San Francisco Bay Area and work in Silicon Valley 45 miles away. Prices for homes in SV are often well over a million dollars. Homes in the East Bay are usually 500-550k. As a result, we rent because the cost of buying is too high. But even rent is vastly cheaper where we rent. Our house costs us $1,600 a month. The same house in SV is $2,500-$3,000. 50% more.

Additionally, we drive a 2002 Prius that gets 50MPG. We fill it up once a week. It costs us $35 to do so, so roughly $140 a month in gas. That versus paying $1,500 more in rent.

BUT... if we drove one of those massive, gas-guzzling V8 powered trucks, it would cost us $500-$600 a month in gas. So in our case, driving a small and economical car is a given. I have a small truck too, which does everything I need to do. But even it simply stays home and gets used on weekends.

If I were someone who for some reason needed some massive truck to haul whatever, I'd buy a used one now because they are losing their values to the point where I actually saw a 2003 Ford F250, fully loaded for $3,800 down the street from me. In fact, I'm seeing a LOT of large SUVs and trucks for sale going down the freeway. If you really wanted a full sized truck, NOW is the time to buy since everyone wants to get rid of theirs.

17:31 Your argument doesn't make sense. Yes, a 4 cylinder that needs a tune-up or an air filter or whatever will get worse gas mileage. Let's say 25 instead of 35 or whatever. However, it's the same for the V-8, which will get 12 instead of 20 or whatever.

There doesn't exist a V-8 engine in production that I am aware of that gets even close to as good gas mileage as any 4 cylinder engine. And regardless of the length of your drive to work, your gas mileage still isn't very good. If you had a 4 cylinder, you'd cut your gas expenses nearly in half, if not in half.

My comment wasn't vague. I suppose you could find a 4 cylinder in bad enough shape that some V-8 somewhere in the world was getting better gas mileage than it, but that's the complete exception to the rule.

My Toyota 4 cylinder's (cars) ALL got around 40 mpg, and my new Accent gets around 35 or 36 generally. There is no V-8, however well maintained that comes even close to this kind of fuel mileage.