Changed the oil on the Panda, the Yaris and tonight we'll be doing the Bora. Not the first times for any.. But one thing sprang to mind, how user friendly the Toyota was to do that job on.

• It has helpful stickers / pointers about the place (under the bonnet, inside the glove box).
  
• It has an under guard try, but there's little cut outs to reach in for the filter and oil sump plug....
  
• It has a little indicator tab and dot to show when the filter is tightened right...
  
• Changing the cabin pollen filter and air filter took less than 5 minutes!

The VW needs the whole under guard removed for an oil change. I really don't see how it competes to the Toyota?

The Toyota now has 120,000+ miles on it since 2013. The VW had bushings and bearings needing replaced (and regularly ever since) since 78,000 miles inside two years.

I think it's probably just biased media keeping this notion of German engineering alive to be honest. Over-Engineering is the term, but in terms of small practical solutions in the mechanical parts to make life easier, I just don't see how it competes with the really helpful little design features about the Toyota.

I think the one thing the VW has going for it is the gas strut bonnet lift, I suppose with the amount of time needed to reach under it it's more appropriate!


The Panda is easy because there's no real equipment in and around the engine. It's bare, so I've excluded it really. The Toyota is a 1.4 diesel and packed to the brim with equipment to fit inside the small package it is. I'm told it's a hell of a lot quicker than the 1.9 TDI in the Bora too.


Marketing. A powerful thing. But I don't see where the chrome and sound insulation comes into the notion of how well these cars were 'engineered'.

If Suzuki is half as well built around the engine as the Toyota (albeit being a little bland), due to being Japanese, that's where my money should go. Seen a video about them today where they said Suzuki's are like "inside out Audi's", with all the money in engineering going to the mechanical parts and not the interior, to a shocking degree!


Does anybody else agree with this? I'm a bit biased against VW and that, maybe I'm being too sore on them, but what do you think?

That's just how the Japanese tend to build ordinary cars. Although some of the more high performance ones can be ridiculous due to packaging.

They actually consider at some point you might need to change a bulb, at the roadside, in the dark, or that you might want to change the oil filter without dropping half the under side. That an air filter is a service part..so probably shouldn't be a 2 day job. As well as 1000 other little things.. that aren't soft touch plastic or chrome rings but are good ideas that make a car much more liveable.

It's not something you tend to appreciate in the showroom but it's certainly handy if you're in a car for the long haul. I've always valued actual quality over stick on perceived quality so I like them.

So you've not yet had the Fiat Panda headlight adjuster jump off it's ball joint? Head light has to come out (so the bumper has to come off) and the light itself cannot be opened up.

PS Most of the Panda is well thought through but the apprentice designed the headlights.

Hang on.....

You are comparing a VW Bora (not one of VW's finest) That they stopped making in 2006 in europe, and is now several generations old in VW terms, Versus a 2013 Yaris..

I agree that A Yaris is very easy to work on but also designed to be cheap to buy and cheap to service this is the very notion of the Yaris, cheap motoring. The Yaris was never meant to turn heads to the look and design is not the most important thing either which means they can afford to spend more time and effort on engineering useful solutions in to help with servicing. Remember most people take their new car to the dealer for the first few years to be serviced, so the easier it is to service the more money the dealers/Toyota can make from servicing the car.

The Bora was never designed to be a cheap car to own or run and as a general rule is not in the same ball park as a yaris. Maybe would have been better to compare like for like cars from the same period.

I was never a fan of the Bora it was an ugly car at best, but is was also deigned to plug a very specific hole in the market and so the design was a mash up of bits from different cars, and if you have ever seen a VW service price list, you'll understand why they don't care if its more difficult to change the oil, because they will more than recoup their losses.

I love the Yaris its always been a great little car but they can get unreliable with age and as much as the engineering on the mechanical parts can be good, they can have very cheap materials in the fabrics and trims which again may last but don't look or feel very nice. Its all a game of swings and roundabouts, what does the customer want.

The Comment about the Engine under tray is a common problem on many cars, as matter of fact I have to take half my punto evo apart just to change/get to the oil filter, wheel off, under tray off, extra plastic panels in the wheel well, and then the oil pours out all over the sub frame because of the way its designed.


the 1.9 PDI is rediculously reliable, its the engine fitted to VW vans for years doing millions of miles, its the engine that was fitted to countless Skoda taxis which did hundreads of thousands of miles a year, it is solid and bomb proof. It might not be the fastest but people don't buy a 1.9 TDI to break land speed records. The Yaris is smaller, more highly tuned and considerably newer in design and development. My brother builds camper vans and has taken an old 88hp VW 1.9 TDI PDI van over to the tuning place next to his work shop on a customers request and with a remap had it producing 160hp (tested on a rolling road) in under 5 minutes. So the PDI is often horribly detuned just to keep it reliable for hundreds of thousands of miles. You only need to go and watch the Car Throttle Videos on youtube of their 1.9 pdi Skoda with 430k miles on the clock to appreciate how strong this engine is.

I genuinely can't say anything bad about the Yaris, I like them, and I have nothing nice to say about the Bora, but in this instances you have truly compared apples to oranges and have nothing really to make a judgement about either car, in my opinion.
Some of the problems you highlight even fiat are guilty of, and despite all the Yaris's good points they can still feel very boring, very bland and very cheap.

The Bora was just a MkIV Golf with a boot and different front lights.

They're bomb proof. Yes, one or two known issues, but they were probably when VW were building their best quality cars. Interiors, in particular, matched those of cars several classes above them. I had a similar era Passat (B5 platform) - even with 180k miles on it, it was like a new car inside. Didn't even need an air-con regas.

I'm not convinced a Yaris would be feeling anywhere near as fresh once you've got it to 15 years and 200k miles old!

Schumi2001 said:

The Bora was just a MkIV Golf with a boot and different front lights.

Click to expand...

Not quite, it was essentially a re-badged mk1 octavia/Seat Toledo With parts from both, build on the same platform as a mk4 golf but a very different car in the design of the body. Where as it was essentially the same body as the Seat/Skoda. The only reason for the Bora was to replace the aging Jetta which the americans love.

It probably had as much in common with the Golf as the Beetle which also shared the same platform but was a very different car.

I totally agree about the interior quality, the VW will still be intact for far longer than a yaris which usually show their age very quickly with holes in carpets, tired seats and finishes coming off plastics, colour bleaching or yellowing.