Hacker News Reader

Comment by esotericn | Hacker News Reader

As a Japanese car owner I'm a fan, but a list of 'cars people keep forever' has a huge amount of selection bias, no?

The sort of person who buys a new Merc probably doesn't _want_ to keep the car for 15 years. The interior is going to be shabby regardless of what you do, and the car will be out of date / an old style.

Japanese cars (at least in standard trim) are the stereotypical low TCO keep it until it stops working car; you've already accepted that you want utilitarian transport by buying one.

View on HN

In Michigan at least a Merc was always short hand for Mercury. Now I realize they no longer make them but this is the first time I've ever heard a Mercedes referred to as a Merc. They will forever be a Mercury to me - and there were some sweet Mercury's as well ;<).

I owned a brown LN7 with a moonroof and got more requests for rides from pretty girls than any car I've ever owned.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/52345709@N02/10682156066

Well, from across the pond, this is the first I've ever heard of Mercury at all.

You learn something every day!

(and the link you posted is a beauty.)

My friend, you've missed out on a lot of early American rock 'n' roll history.

Mercuries were the hot-rods of the early 50s. There are quite a few early songs that feature Mercurys.

Its definitely a regional thing. I never heard merc used for anything other than mercedes until i lived in missouri.

Not necessarily. I know people who kept older German cars forever. It’s not very possible anymore. They fall apart and parts aren’t available.

My 2003 Pilot was not a utilitarian transport. It was a well equipped car with 80% of the doodads of an equivalent Benz at half the cost. I got rid of it last year, because it had hit 300k miles and key suspension parts were worn out.

> Not necessarily. I know people who kept older German cars forever. It’s not very possible anymore. They fall apart and parts aren’t available.

In what sense? Japanese automakers are notorious for discontinuing model-specific parts after a few years (e.g. look at the Jalopnik blurb about the guy restoring a CRX).

Meanwhile you can get nearly any part from nearly any model Mercedes has ever manufactured. More esoteric stuff will cost you, but you can still do it. The other German manufacturers are somewhere in between. I currently have a few twenty year old BMWs and haven't run into any availability issues yet.

> Japanese automakers are notorious for discontinuing model-specific parts after a few years (e.g. look at the Jalopnik blurb about the guy restoring a CRX).

They stopped making CR-X in 1991. It is not "few years". 3 years ago I retired a 1994 Rover 600 series, which is basically a Honda Accord -- sans few body panels, trim and lights. It was still possible to get the spares for the Honda version, but not the Rover specific ones (got a headlights cracked). Otherwise a solid car after 21 years... Currently happy with Honda Insight.

A few decades would be accurate. The model from the Jalopnik story was 1984. The article came out in late 2018.

Were Honda to have just discontinued parts that would be one thing. Honda discontinued making parts available for the CRX well before the Jalopnik article. After the Jalopnik article came out I took a look at the situation for the early 90s Accord and it was pretty damn bleak. Aside from some fasteners not much was listed.

> They stopped making CR-X in 1991. It is not "few years".

Depends on when Honda stopped making parts, no? Also, I was replying to this tidbit:

> Not necessarily. I know people who kept older German cars forever. It’s not very possible anymore. They fall apart and parts aren’t available.

Mercedes maintains a heritage program that makes parts available for models going back to their pre-war models (maybe beyond). You will pay dearly for those parts, but they are still available. Parts for newer models are even easier and often available both from Mercedes and aftermarket companies.

My friend was quoted $1,500 to fix an ignition problem on his 15y Mercedes. You can buy an entire 15yo Honda for that much :)

My friend was quoted about $1,200 to replace the plugs and coil packs on his 2004 Fit at an independent shop. He ended up paying about $600 for them to replace one or two packs (forget which). Paying people to work on your car is expensive. vOv

Manufactures might stop, but aftermarket will pick up. It makes sense for aftermarket because Hondas there’s demand. While luxury vehicles are sold in lesser numbers and less demand for repair because of the type of target market who’d rather discard than fix.

My daily driver is a 1994 BMW 525i; 253,000 miles. My dad bought it new. Parts are very easy to come by. It is not fun to drive, but serves its purpose. I vastly prefer our 2007 Mercury Mariner (all wheel drive). I'll never sell either. Just park it in the field for when the kids get older.

I wrote that awkwardly.

I meant that that older cars are more maintainable. IMO it’s more likely that your 1994 is on the road in 2044 than a 2019 model year.

Why is it not fun to drive? I know a lifelong BMW driver and he pines for the days when they made sporting saloons like the E28 and E39 instead of today's bloated barges.

His last one, an E46, had steer-by-wire! That's the antonym of a driver's car.

Are you sure about "steer-by-wire"? The only instance of that I've heard of on a production car is a recent Infiniti.

Perhaps you are thinking of electrically assisted power steering, which is not steer-by-wire - it has a physical steering column like most cars.

But then again, doesn't the E46 have hydraulic assist, not electric?

I'd recommend new shocks on the 525i, I just changed mine on a 2004 330i for a part cost of $725 and about 4 hours of labor.

Should make it fun to drive again.

Makes sense for luxury/sports cars, but I doubt there's a huge difference between American and Japanese minivans, there.

Honda Odyssey is way better than anything American made.

That makes sense, though the Acura MDX is on the list.

That still doesn't come close to a Merc or BMW. At least by European standards.

It’s just an upgraded Honda CRV.

You must be thinking about RDX not MDX. Also latest RDX is not built on the same platform as CRV

The car on the list would be a 2004 model.

No, I'm talking about the MDX that was on the list.

You're correct that it's not based on the CRV; it's based on the Pilot. So I should have said, "It’s just an upgraded Honda Pilot."

Some of the older mercs are super sweet.

German cars, Mercs especially, seem to have a desirability curve that bottoms out and then skyrockets later. Few people are going to hold a car that looks dated long enough for it to start looking awesome

Reply on news.ycombinator.com