Hi, I fnally signed up for this forum after watching it the past few months> My dads car has just about crapped out and he is going to be getting a new one in 3-6 months. My father does not like cars, so convincing him to get this is taking a lot of work from both my mother and I. So far I am working on the 18th page of my persuasive essay. We have already test driven it and he seemed to like it a lot. I have noticed in this forum however, that there seems to be a lot of complaints about rattles and handeling. After never having a nice car in his entire life getting a lemon would be a disaster, he would never buy another nice car again. I was wondering if it is worth continuing to push him for this car or to try to get him to look at other vehicles in its class IE audi A4, BMW 330xi, etc. I thought maybe this negative feedback was from 10-20 people out of the thousands who have this car. Thanks very much. BTW, we would get silver, ebony, 5at/NAV but no A-SPEC

 

Personally, after reading your response above, it might be a good idea to get your father a Lexus ES330....

ya the car has rattles, it has a few bugs here and there but still it's an incredible car...but your dad seems like the type of a guy that if he gets a lemon, he probably wouldn't trust you again lol (especially with cars) lol...bmw330xi is going to give you problems as well...bmw's are known for their bugs ( )...a lot of my friends who have bmw's go back to the dealer often to get things fixed...as far as the A4 is concerned, i have no knowledge about that...

if this is your father, i am sure the most important thing is "ride quality"...he wants to be able to drive and have as little problems as possible and he wants something that would last him a long time...the tl might be a bit "advanced" for him because of all the gizmos, so he could get irritated with that...if he uses the features then the TL is the car for him!!!

however, i still believe that you should really look at the Lexus ES330... in my opinion, it would be the most practical car for your father...

 

Thanks. I'll try to get him by the dealer. The gizmos were one of the things he really liked. He was all excited when the mirrors tilted down in reverse. I love tech too, I have a feeling I would end up using the car more then he after I get my permit. The dealer claimed he brought it up to 150 MPH, I know the Speedometer reaches 160, he said the comp cuts you off at 150. Any imput on that. I also should add we live in MA so the weather is unforgiving and driving conditions can kinda suck. We test drove in a snow storm and I could feel the VSA even though I was in the back, it didnt skid at all as far as i could tell(we were in a large parking lot making tight turns... As far as me driving it, I dont need permission cause I am bigger then he is Thanks for the help, The thing about the ES330 is my neigbor(in the mafia) just got one and they are kinda ugly. I havent looked into the specs yet though.

 

I will not try to tell you what to do. However consider my short story.

My father wants a new car. He is looking at Maxima, 300C BMW 330, and he is not really happy with them. Note that my father is 47 and he already had something like 16 cars in his life. He is very picky. Anyway, I show him the TL. With very minimal cnviencing, he get it! Now, I liked the TL in the first place. Four days after that, I could not stand it. I put up my 2000 Bonneville SSEi for sale, and GET THE SAME CAR! Now there are two silever TL s in the driveway. Neighbours are not talking to us anymore.....

 

Thanks for the advice, I am not 100% sure what you are trying to say, but seeing you got the TL i think its in that cars favor. for its cost benefit, i like the TL most. I am personally a big beamer fan, but seeing as my dad isnt gonna go fast, plus he has some whole dont want to be ostentatious thing going on, a fully loaded 330Xi was out of the question. He has gone through 4 cars so far, i think, and he is 45! To give you an idea of his taste. 1st car, 300(three hundred) doller dodge charger, not sure the year but it was probably purchased in the mid 70s. Second car, a buic lasabre, these 2 cars were in crap condition. The charger was stolen, i dunno what happend to the buic(my mom probably totaled it). Aftter that he had a 1990 dodge caravan, that actually made it about 10 or 11 years. It was totaled in a fender bender(not his fault, he goes too slow to cause accidents) He then got a used rental 1997 ford taurus for about 11K. He bought that at 40k miles, tranny redun at 65 for 2+ grand. Its now at 80K and then tranny went again(if u do that math thats after only 25k miles, thus rendering the car useless) there is well over 1k in other problems too. He has put about 10k into that car. He is now driving it into the ground or trading it. It is kinda cool cause since the tranny problem it upshifts at like 3500- 4000. Any way, he never liked cars, my mom said that he has a respectable job(lawyer, i dunno if i call that respectable) and he needs something nice. So this may be the car. Although when test driving he couldnt find the Voice Activation button, He loves all the tech. He probably wont notice any rattles since his old car makes loud cracking noises, hes cancelled out all the small stuff. Anyway, my main concern is the durability of the drive train, does the car last?

 

I don't think that anybody can really answer that. The car has been on the market for short time, so very few people put some significant milage on the car. However consider this: When I got my Bonnevilee the factory warranty was 60.000 km, extended 100.000 KM
Acura has standard 100.000 km and I got extended up to 160.000 for somthing like 1600$ CDN. Now, anybody can say what the want and even trash American (GM) cars, but abviously Acura knows something about these car to make the warranty this long. (for so little)

 

I am a proud american and like our cars. But they do have a tendency to break down. I think the performance on german cars is close to unbeatable. American cars can be considered classics, but they arent real modern day race cars. Acura to my understanding was designed and manufactured in america, but is owned by honda. All I know is my uncle has had his CL for 80k miles fromj 98 and all the trouble he has had is with a caliper. If I were to get an SUV it would definatly be american. H1 baby

 

actually, German cars fall to shit. Japanese cars (Honda/Acura Toyota/Lexus) have incredible durability. Aside from the second generation Acura TL (the new one is the third generation) Acura makes tanks that will last forever. If you're looking at something other than the TL, I'd highly suggest a Toyota/Lexus. My friend has a 94 celica with 140k miles on it, and it still drives well, those things don't die.

 

I know german cars break down. I was refering to handling etc, when they are working. I'd like a Z8, I am not a huge lexus fan, they seem sort of old people like, they arent too pretty either. Gotta give kudos to the hard top convertable though, id like to see more of those.