How long are 914s supposed to last?, Sorting through the myths Options

[JeffBowlsby]

We like these old cars for our own reasons, but we often hear:

"...remember, these cars [or their parts] were not built to last more than ___ years, they are commodities with a limited useful life." "we live in a throw-away society"...but our cars are not generally disposables with a short time line or priced as such.

I recently saw a Model A with 20K original miles, original paint. At 90-some years old it was a great car for its time and for what it is today. I think the draw is more than just nostalgia, its respect for good design, engineering and an owners regular maintenance.

Todays cars are generally not made from water soluble materials or short life span elements (other than disposable maintenance items) - they have steel not wood chassis, glass not plastic windows, durable leather/fabric not paper seats, etc. With exceptions, generally capable of lasting more than a few years and they cost enough to justify the durability.

Todays manufacturers give warranties of X years, Y miles. All that seems to mean is that they won't pay for maintenance or service after that limited time is up which is just a limitation of liability for those costs, not that the car is only expected to function that long. Not an unreasonable condition of sale, and most cars won't explode when the warranty expires.

Seems counter to the disposable argument that 50-ish years later the original manufacturer still supports these old cars with many factory OEM new parts (albeit of limited selection) and many 914s are still thriving. If it were true that they were only intended to last a certain short period of time, then the mfr. would not be obligated to continue to support them. But they do.

[Beeliner]

When I was growing up in the 1950's the rule of thumb was you kept a car for 50,000 miles and you got rid of it because maintenance was going to eat up your budget.

My 914s started rusting in a year or so, but New York's salt was why.

If you kept your garage clear enough to park your car in, that helped.

Our firm owned a fleet of Plymouth Valiants with the slant six engines. 400,000 on the engines and then done.

We had over 100 GM transit buses, kept them ten years even though they went 30,000 plus a year... We were a testing company for Mobil oil, so that helped.

So... Maintainence and salt seem to be the big two factors around NYC...

[Tom_T]

When I was growing up in the 1950's the rule of thumb was you kept a car for 50,000 miles and you got rid of it because maintenance was going to eat up your budget.

My 914s started rusting in a year or so, but New York's salt was why.

If you kept your garage clear enough to park your car in, that helped.

Our firm owned a fleet of Plymouth Valiants with the slant six engines. 400,000 on the engines and then done.

We had over 100 GM transit buses, kept them ten years even though they went 30,000 plus a year... We were a testing company for Mobil oil, so that helped.

So... Maintainence and salt seem to be the big two factors around NYC...

My Dad had the same rule except 60K.

However, that was before the prices for new & 1-3 year old cars went up so high.

Now I think you can be ahead or at least breakeven with maintaining & repairing a car well into the 100-300+K miles range keeping a car - vs buying a new one.

And if you're lucky - they turn out to be collectable classics that eventually go up in value, like are 914s in recent years.

Of course you never recoup decades of maintenance costs from use, but then you're getting the use & utility - and then you'll have the same or pricier maintenance on anything new anyway.

But NO salty roads cars for me! (IMG:style_emoticons/default/dry.gif)
... including the upcoming Cayenne.

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/beerchug.gif)
Tom
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