Ask The Guide

While the sedan sold alongside the hatchback version of the Corolla in Australia, the hatchback easily outsold the sedan. And that’s pretty much the reason you still see a lot of hatchbacks getting around, but sedans are thin on the ground. They just didn’t sell in the same numbers back in the day. Fundamentally, buyers were much more likely to go for the extra practicality of the hatchback layout.

Of course, that’s in Australia. In some other markets (China, for example) the sedan version of a particular make and model is often more popular than the hatchback variant. It’s a cultural thing, in essence.

It’s nice to see that some of us are still recycling and keeping old cars on the road. Your question was a hot topic back in the mid-1980s when unleaded petrol (ULP) was being mandated for all new cars. The issue was that older car engines were designed to run on fuel with a small amount of lead in it to help protect (mainly) the valve seats (hence, leaded petrol). The lead also helped prevent detonation inside the engine by raising the petrol’s octane rating. Without this lead, the engine could wear out prematurely, and it was something that owners of existing cars were very worried about.

The ultimate solution for older engine was the installation of what’s called hardened valve seats which, as the name suggests are valve seats in the cylinder head that were physically harder and would cope with the lack of lead. Since your car is older than most people reading this, you may find that it’s on its second, third or even fourth engine and, in that time, may have been fitted with hardened valve seats. Knowing the history of the engine would be very helpful.

But if you don’t have that information, the best advice is to run it on 95-octane fuel (for the octane rating to prevent detonation) as well as a lead-replacement additive to protect the valve seats. This additive can be added to the tank when you fill up, or as a permanent kit fitted under the bonnet that drips a small amount of additive into the engine as it runs. The Valve-Saver brand was a popular make of this type of kit back in the day.

When the time comes to perform work on the cylinder head, think about having the valve seats replaced with hardened ones, at which point you can forget about the lead-replacement additive.

Most cars have two published figures for their maximum braked towing capacity. The first is the lowest and refers to the heaviest load that can be legally towed by that vehicle (including the trailer) on a trailer with no brakes of its own. The second figure is a much higher one and refers to the legal maximum mass of a trailer with at least one braked axle.

If, say, your vehicle has a braked towing limit of 2000kg, then the mass of the trailer and its load may not exceed that 2000kg.

Engine longevity is closely linked to how well maintained it’s been. As such, there’s no definitive lifespan for a specific make and model. An engine that has been treated well and maintained correctly will easily outlast the same make and model engine that has been driven hard and missed critical servicing and upkeep.

That said, 260,000km seems like a lot of kilometres for this vehicle. Which is not to suggest it’s necessarily ready to explode, rather that you’d have to know for sure it was a pampered car with an impeccable service record for it to be a reasonable bet. But a gamble of some sort it would definitely be.

Yes, it is. For the record, this engine is a double-overhead camshaft design with four valves per cylinder, and produces 165kW of power and 510Nm of torque. It’s known amongst diesels for its smoothness and good fuel economy.

This could be a differential problem or even something like a collapsed wheel bearing. But it’s most likely to be a seized brake or parking brake that is causing this problem. Has the vehicle been sitting around for a long time without moving? That’s a common way for brakes to seize and lock the wheel, preventing it from turning.

You might be able to knock the park brake free with a bit of persuasion, or maybe crack the bleed nipple on the brake itself to let the pressure off the brake and free it. But if the brake is rusted on, then you’ll need to disassemble it to bring it back to a condition where the vehicle is safe to drive again. Even if you get it moving again, a thorough disassembly and inspection is warranted to make sure it’s 100 per cent safe to go back on the road.

On most cars, you can disable beeps and buzzers that tell you the car has locked or unlocked. Many people choose to do so, too, out of consideration for their neighbours who don’t appreciate even a small toot of a car’s horn when you leave for work at 5am.

On newer LDVs, you can go to the touchscreen and hit Settings. Then touch 'Car' and then 'Comfort' and 'Convenience'. That will then offer a list of features, but the one you want to touch on is 'Locking Feedback'. That will then give you the choice of 'Lights and Horn', 'Lights Only' or 'Horn Only'. By touching on 'Lights Only', you should have disabled the horn beep when locking and unlocking. Your neighbours will thank you.

You could certainly have the vehicle’s battery packs tested for efficiency by an independent test centre. But why not keep that option up your sleeve and let the dealership test it initially? I would imagine the battery’s performance and efficiency test would involve a written report which is much more difficult to fudge than a verbal report. If the dealership can’t provide this written proof on the battery’s condition and you still believe you have a problem, that’s when you play the independent-test card.

What’s probably happened is that the battery of the vehicle has been disconnected as part of the repair process (perhaps there was some welding done, or the workshop disconnected the battery while waiting for parts to arrive). In the process, the radio’s stored stations have been lost.

This is a pretty common problem in most cars that have had their battery disconnected for any length of time, and it requires you to retune the radio to store your favourite stations. If the stereo unit is the one that came with the car from the factory, the owner’s manual should detail how to store your stations, but if the stereo is an aftermarket one, you’ll need to find the instruction sheet, or just wing it until you work out the process.

In some vehicles, you’ll also need to find the radio’s security code and key that in before the unit will even switch on.

Basically, the light is telling you that there’s something wrong with the car’s driveline and that you need to have it checked out before the problem does any permanent damage. This can be taken care of at a workshop that has the correct scanning tools.

Possible causes are numerous, but can include a dud sensor, a bad earth, wiring problems, damaged exhaust or any one of about a thousand engine or transmission glitches. Don’t bother trying to guess the reason, have the car electronically scanned and home in on the actual problem that way.