Toyota Corolla 2008 Problems

I NEVER treat the distance-to-empty readout as gospel. I use it as a basic guide, but nothing more. I don't trust them and certainly have no confidence in them, whatever the make of car. I am driving a VE Commodore SS ute that was showing an average fuel consumption of 13 litres/100km when I picked it up. It now shows 17.4 litres/100km after I reset it and have driven it for three weeks. That's a vast difference. I plan to do a fill-to-fill check and see what the correlation is. I would first determine the accuracy of your trip computer by doing a similar check and seeing what the range really is. If that backs up your belief that the range is inaccurate, you have something to talk to Toyota about.

Toyotas are generally regarded as more reliable than any other car on the market but, like any other car, they can also break down. The Astra is a good little car, but the cam belt needs to be changed about twice as often. Other than that there is not a great deal of difference in running costs. As for fitting into them, sit in each and decide.

The rotten egg smell was once a sign of a problem with the catalytic converter, but it's hard to believe that two cars would suffer the same problem at the same time. I assume you have tried different brands of fuel, as well as Premium unleaded, and even high-octane fuel. If not I would try all those things to see what affect they might have, and ask the dealer to check the cat converters.

I haven’t heard of any such policy and I haven’t seen anything written in warranties specifically about rattles and squeaks. My enquiries at Toyota have failed to get any answer that might help you. I doubt that there is such a policy; I reckon the dealer is trying to get rid of you because they don’t want to spend the time to fix your complaint. In Toyota’s defence, however, I would say that squeaks and rattles could, after a period of time, be regarded as the result of wear and tear rather than a design deficiency and hence not covered by the warranty.

IT'S certainly an option. If you bought a two or three-year-old Falcon for $15,000 and installed a gas-injection system you would have $19,000 or so invested in it, against the cost of the Corolla or Mazda. The cost of running the Falcon on gas would be a little less than the cost of running the small car so I would believe you would be in front. Think also of buying a used E-Gas Falcon, which might be an even better bet.

THE rearview mirrors you refer to are common today and, though you might feel they're dangerous, they do provide a wider view of what's behind and beside your car if you take the time to get used to them. There is no safety problem as such, as there might be if your brakes or steering were defective, so there's no need for a recall. Besides, it's something you should have picked up on when you test-drove the car before you bought it.