vios vs. city

[niky]

18 in city driving? Unless he was doing an Eco-run by cruising on EDSA at 50 km/h on a Saturday (got 23 km/l out of a City on one of Honda's runs... ), I highly doubt it.

In real life, the Vios 1.5 and Honda 1.5 have about the same fuel economy... (in fact, the Vios 1.5 AT I'm testing now is slightly worse than the Mazda2 1.5 I tested a few months ago). I expect the 1.3s to be similar as well... expect around 10 km/l in traffic, and about 7-8 km/l in rush-hour traffic.

Toyota maintenance costs are cheaper per service, but that doesn't change the fact that you only have to go to the dealership every 10,000 kilometers in the Honda versus 5,000 for the Toyota. That means for every day you have to go to Honda (which costs gas money, toll money (depending on where you service), lunch money, commuting and hours of your time), you spend double that to go to another dealership with another car. After experiencing the convenience of 10,000 km servicing with our CR-V, I don't think I ever want to go back to the 5,000 km interval... especially since with our usage, we hit 5,000 kms in just one month.

If you opt for the extended oil change with the Vios, you'll have to buy the synthetic oil, and the price difference goes away.

One good thing now is that the Honda 1.3 is no longer-dual spark. You don't have to spend as much on spark plug changes as before.

Take a look at the Ford Fiesta 1.4 and the Mazda2 1.5 also... the lower end Fiesta is in the same price range and shares the Honda 10,000 km service intervals but with lower cost. The Mazda2 1.5 is a bit of a stretch, but it's fun to drive and fuel economy is pretty decent, even if it is a 1.5.