C6 Z06, C7 Z51 or Shelby GT350? or may be something else altogether?

Opti said:

In reply to ea_sport :

doubt it. I work with an ex Jag tech and he said they kept him in the money for a long time. Dont have any specific experience with that model but he was their pretty recently and said nothing modern from this is reliable or inexpensive to repair. He really likes them to, but he doesnt own one.

And I know an ex-Toyota tech that think FJ cruisers and Camry's are unreliable. I think he, like most techs, job is to fix cars with problems so their only experience with said cars....are problems. Has he owned one though? Because ownership experience is a different perspective. And all the cars in this thread are expensive to repair when you're taking it to a dealer or specialist to fix them. 

yupididit said:

In reply to ea_sport :

and the other lives in Italy so he probably never seen a reliable car before. 

That made me laugh!!!!

Jags of that generation have a bunch of Ford in them. They are as reliable as any other car on the list.  A lot has to do with owners care and feeding of cars like this. 

In reply to yupididit :

I wouldnt disagree with him. I was in the repair industry for a long time and we repaired camrys just as much as anything else. I would say they are as unreliable as anything else in its class minus the crazy outliers. Not that they are a bad car but i dont believe what most people do that they are some crazy reliable car. All normal everyday cars have their problems, I think you get into another class though when you are talking about smaller/luxury/performance manufactures.

I would rather have info from someone in the service industry than an owner. A single ownership experience could be an outlier in either direction, but the people fixing them everyday will see the pattern failures and no about the things that are more likely to pop up.

Example: A Chevy Tahoe owner may tell you they have never had a problem and its been reliable as gravity, a chevy tech will tell you the lifters fail at a higher rate than normal and you should probably be ready for it. Also with an ownership experience you have no context for their threshold of pain. Somone who drives mclarens and is used to crazy repair and maintenance bills, may think something catastrophic on a normal car is no big deal.

In reply to Opti :

And that is why I noted their ownership experiences. I know one of the F type owners had an issue with the dash display or something. But, their biggest complaints are tires and gas. The guy with the most exotics say his NSX and F-type are the more reliable cars he own and he's very transparent on his cars on his social media. Plus, his F-type is his daily drive (any type of weather). 

Techs only see the bad so yes they can only speak on the patterns of failure. But, if they experience fixing the bad things and never see the other 85% of the same cars that aren't seen for anything than routine then they're going to be able to speak from a position of negative interactions. 

I do however, take a techs word when they tell me about cost or how difficult a repair is. But, I'm not going to take their opinion on reliability of a particular car and overall ownership experience with as much weight because their perspective is from simply fixing said car.

It's like when a 30 year police officer in a high crime area says something like "_____ people are terrible. I am always arresting them etc etc". 

Olemiss540 said:

goingnowherefast said:

Snrub said:

It seems like the reliability of regular vehicles has become incredible. It seems like performance/fun oriented cars may still lag behind by more than one might think. Or are we just too cynical?

Common wisdom on this forum/this thread is:

....

How do you write off all modernish BMW's and then toss in the dinosaur 944 as "solid"? BMW made a namesake building sport sedans that were fully capable of heading to the track after a round of golf at the country club with your family of 4 (as long as there were no infants in rear facing seats but why would infants be golfing anyhow). 

Granted they have lost most of there credibility over the last 10 years but there are still a serious contingent of cars that can smack down hundreds of HPDE laps without a sweat passing automobiles with MUCH higher power numbers in the process.

I was trying to stimulate discussion. Is common wisdom on the forum wrong, too negative, or are all of these things really so unreliable, etc? I'm really not certain of the "right" answer. The 944 example was mentioned because people in here talk about how this 30-40 year old car is reliable, but not 5-15 year old p-cars. Possible logic issue?

In reply to Snrub :

The main unreliability on the 944 is the timing belt, which can get loose and whack itself after a couple years, so it has a rather short maintenance schedule.

And there are a couple items in the drivetrain that are difficult to deal with (clutch failures, torque tube bearing).

Other than that, electronically it seems like an Audi 5000.  Not crazy out-there wild.  Heck, mechanically it has a 5000 transmission, suspension is half VW Beetle and half VW Rabbit...

Opti said:

In reply to yupididit :

I wouldnt disagree with him. I was in the repair industry for a long time and we repaired camrys just as much as anything else. I would say they are as unreliable as anything else in its class minus the crazy outliers. Not that they are a bad car but i dont believe what most people do that they are some crazy reliable car. All normal everyday cars have their problems, I think you get into another class though when you are talking about smaller/luxury/performance manufactures.

I would rather have info from someone in the service industry than an owner. A single ownership experience could be an outlier in either direction, but the people fixing them everyday will see the pattern failures and no about the things that are more likely to pop up.

Example: A Chevy Tahoe owner may tell you they have never had a problem and its been reliable as gravity, a chevy tech will tell you the lifters fail at a higher rate than normal and you should probably be ready for it. Also with an ownership experience you have no context for their threshold of pain. Somone who drives mclarens and is used to crazy repair and maintenance bills, may think something catastrophic on a normal car is no big deal.

And then there is the reputation.   Like all British cars are unreliable. Yet British cars tend to have the highest percentage of extremely long term ownership! ( I cite my MGTD owned by me for 59 years) 

      Ford model A ownership carries an expectation of frequent maintenance ( on a per mile basis) Yet ownership new was typical of any other brand at the time. 

Finally expectations.  I've friends who complain when tires wear out or regular maintenance is required. It seems like the common thought is, " For the price I paid••••". 
      

In reply to frenchyd :

Well the obvious answer to why people own british cars for so long is they're all broken down and sitting in the owners garages!  Too much effort to fix them, tow them someplace, try to sell them broken, etc.  Hahaha!

In reply to frenchyd :

I think the notion that British cars being unreliable is a well earned stereotype. Your posts about Jags are generally that they are durable but not reliable. Normally its you saying how you can revive them ( because they are broken) or once you take all the electronics off, or simplify they vacuum setup (those are parts of the car that play into reliability) or dont forget to oil your distributor. I mean if a car has a weird service item like oiling a distributor that no one knows about and it leads to a ton of them breaking down can you really consider that reliable?

I wont fight you on durable, but I would never say that british cars as a whole are reliable. The jokes about lucas electronics didnt appear from nothing, they became so prevalent because so many people could relate

I just mean the F-type R. I'm not calling anything else British reliable lol. 

I'll need to test drive them but I think I am leaning toward '16-'18 Camaro SS 1LE. It'll be nice to have something newer than my old C5 Z06 for my fun car. I will probably keep it for a couple of years unless I really fall in love with it. I also considered the 987.2 Cayman/Boxster but I feel like you get more bang for your bucks from the Camaro SS 1LE. 

Since I am looking at Camaro SS 1LE should I also look at Mustang GT PP2 or even the new Mach1 if I can get one at MSRP? These 3 are all in B Street so in theory they are in the same performance bracket stock. What are your thoughts on this guys.

Lotus Elise.  Nothing like a Mustang or Vette but a drivers car for sure.  Toyota powered, simple vehicle.  Get one now if you are going to, prices are on the rise. 

In reply to GeddesB :

I did test drive Elise about 6 years ago when I was cross shopping between Elise and C5 Z06 and ended up with the Z06 because the Elise was too small. 

In reply to ea_sport :

See which one makes you smile the most if you spin in a few examples of each. Supras have automatic transmissions, to the best of my knowledge. 

ea_sport said:

In reply to GeddesB :

I did test drive Elise about 6 years ago when I was cross shopping between Elise and C5 Z06 and ended up with the Z06 because the Elise was too small. 

Fair enough.  I love mine but certainly not a car for everyone.