New Prado Grande suitability for off road vs LC100

I been trying to ascertain a 'real' price for a new 100 TD GXL auto for awhile - its in my sights (or a late, used one) - that $ figure is quite a departure from the list price - could that be the figure your mate gave his missus ? :-0) Confirmation would be valuable here !

Hi there Darian, just spoke to him 10 mins ago and he got it from Warrick Farm here in Sydney and was actually $68,500 GXL Auto current model with the 5 speed auto, alloy wheels, dual air front and back,leather steering wheel etc and had a Hayman Reese (Genuine Toyota) thrown in as well. He rang a Toyota dealership in Melbourne as well and was flicking between the two trying to get the best deal. Bloke at Melbourne would match the price but wouldnt do any better so wasnt worth the air flight down there or to get it transported up here with out him knocking at least another grand off it which they obviously couldnt do. He has just been up to Queensland, down south and running around town and got 10.2 Ltrs per 100klms. He said the 5 speed auto is brilliant compared to the old 4 speed he said you cannot feel the gear change. He is absolutly rapped with it and said he reckons he will keep for the next 10 years at least. Best cruiser he has ever owned.He had the 80 series before and while he said that was a brilliant vehicle as well and never had any trouble with it in 12 years it was a bit more robust where this one he said is like driving a sedan smooth, direct steering, just raves about it. My wifes uncle bought as well but has the earlier model with the 4 speed auto but stll loves it just as much, he bought his in 05 and paid $74 for his with the towbar the only toyota option he added to it. He has since put a lot of after market stuff on it bull bar etc and tows a 20/22 foot van behind it and is auto and gets 13/15 per 100 on the open roads where his previous 80 series was petrol and was sucking around the 25L per 100klms and said the 100 series would eat the old 4.5 petrol pulling up hills with the caravan on the back but we all know the diesels have more torque then the petrol so cant really compare the two totally different engines. My mate also likes the fact that his new cruiser has dual batterys standard as well. Hope this helps in some way. Regards Steve M

or go the Prado in GXL or VX build... I had the same dilemma, but went the 100 because of the three growing (way too fast) kids in the back seat - the difference in the back is considerable

What is the safest upper limit on raising the IFS front end on the 100 series? I have read only 1", so would I do that for trips along with the back and put 285/75/16's on it? We are doing the Simpson in September.

Appreciate your responses guys, awsome.

Cheers,

Eric

315s look nicer on those 100 series Eric. Have seen a nice look on a friends car he uses for work - Cooper STT though, look real boys tyres. Give a lot better clearance. Might be the beam front axle though to get sufficient clearance.

Robin..

Where did you hear the price of $56k for the new V8 cruiser? I heard there will be two V8 motors offered in the new cruiser...one being the twin turbo beast and the other I'm not sure about...What have you heard?

Cheers

Andrew I said 2006 plated cruiser I.E. current model run out special

Robin Miller

The petrol 06 GXL is indeed a bargain Robin but who wants that fuel economy ? My rough calcs suggested that the thirst of the petrol model (towing anything) stacked against the high price of the TD was about line-ball economically (over quite some years and many km's) - the difference was the much shorter range of the petrol model ! No ?

Fuel consumption figures quoted by people are highly variable , even more so when towing.

Use the ticketed figures as a common baseline and you find that V8 cruiser is years of use cheaper than diesel and this extends when true depreciated life cycle cost is taken into account, as many car organization sites show.

I put it at 5 years mimimum and it can go up down depending on usage patterns.

Range is a valid weakness but V8 cruiser as standard can do 1000km touring as ticketed and if this is insufficent then its easily solved.

Robin Miller

for some reason people get obsesed about the price of petrol vs disal and the economy of both to work out which is better value taking into account the 12 k purchase price difference.
The 12k putchase price difference is pretty much irelevent when you take into account resale.
To put it into perspective redbook puts the upper price of an 80gxl TD disal at $9000 more than the equivelent petrol model. Given that most are buying the v8 hundreds and the TD is so damn good there is no reason to believe down the track the resale difference will not be the same or much larger as the price of fuel climbs.
In 5 years time you would be alot happier trying to get top dollar for your diesal than hoping you may get an anquiry or 2 on the v8

Davoe

The facts and figures are out there and done by various
motoring organisations ,not by me.

They show that 100series TD is poorest value big wagon out there
bar none, and costs more to run in total than V8 over a 5 year life cycle.

These figures include all costs including re-sale.

Robin Miller

If I had the $$$ it would be the diesel any day especially for towing. How can you compare 15L per 100 for the diesel compared to 25/30 for the petrol. Try punching the V8 through the sand my work mates used 30/33 while we were at stockton beach compared to 15 in the diesel and on the highway my mates diesel was using 10 per 110 whilst the V8 was up around the 18 mark all this with out towing. As far as resale goes I would not read half the crap these blokes wright. Try buying a second hand 100 series gxl turbo diesel still pulling 50/60k for a 12 month to 2 years old vehicle show me a petrol 100 series for the same age and gxl for the same dollars. Ok change the oil every 5 in a diesel I'd still be doing that in a petrol anyway the way I look after my vehicles. As far as ticketed stats go, load of crap who these days dont have air on 90% of the time, full tanks and driving stop start crap in city they are approx but often nowhere near it and obviously depends on the right foot. This is not directed at you Robin in any way just my own opinion thats all. As Davoe said we'll see in 10 years time what the resale is and who will be loosing the most $$$ in the long run, maybe by then I will be able to afford one in diesel form LOL Regards Steve M

Opinion's are fine Stephen and we all have different one's , thats why millions of people have died by ignoring those about smoking etc.

Fact's however have the atribute of being verifiable.

If you wish to see independant figures for life cycle cost of a 100 series just go to NRMA , RACV and probably every other motoring body's website.

Mind you, the fact that its poor value , has no bearing on wether or not its a wonderful car.

Robin Miller

Hi there Robin yeah I know where your coming from but I really cant see how they get all those stats correctly eg no one has ever asked my mates about there cruisers etc. Smoking yes the proofs there and one day I will take notice of them and give the filthy things up. I just had a read on some of the stats and cant understand how they reckon a diesel 100 series is dearer in the long run. I know the diesel cruiser is approximately 12k dearer to buy but going by some of the car classifieds I have just looked up you are loosing 20k in the first 2 years on a petrol and yet the diesel is only 10k roughly only going by advertised prices wether they actually sell for those $$$ is another story so you have lost already. Anyway I wont have to worry about any of it cause I wont be owning either in the near future unless I win lotto. Have a good one Regards Steve M

Robin is correct here. Most motoring organisations rate the Nissan 3.0Di as the cheapest to run and the Tojo 4.2 the dearest. Having one of each I would agree. It's the service schedule that kills the Tojo if you do it by the book. Wheel bearings, tappets and rear brake pads being the main culprits. At least they have gone to 10K oil changes this time around.

My cousin reckons it costs him more to run his Turbo Cruiser than his Cessna 172!

OT

Hi there OT, I'm not saying Robin is incorect in what he has read or disagreeing with him, just cant work out the way they get there stats thats all. I reckon the Nissan will cost you big in the long run when it goes bang and the cruisers still going. Had to say it sorry Only Kidding seems like they have righted the problem hopefully. But seriously at the end of the day it comes down to personal choice of what your requirments are and how much we can afford to spend. Every one has there own list of things they are looking for. I was working out today with my mate the fuel cost for his prado between his 3.4L V6 and what a diesel prado would be and we worked out that you were about $30 infront with the diesel version everytime you filled both tanks based on highway driving without towing or any 4wdriving as such but that did not include maintanance costs on either and basing it on todays fuel prices unleaded $1.00 diesel $1.25. I reckon the diesel prado would be in front in the long run if towing heavy load, sand/beach etc. But servicing the diesel might be a different story.Will be interesting to see what my mate says about his servicing of his new cruiser, he only has 3 1/2k on it so far he might be in for a rude shock. Regards Steve M

Ok I have done as you said because it didnt sound right............ And its not. the rac website has erred when estimating the trade in value of each vehicle after 5 years. It puts the difference at around 2k in the diesals favour. However for the 02 GXL the trade in difference is actually $8500 according to redbook. However it still doesnt take into account you would be far more likely to be able to push for top dollar with the TD rather than the ultra common v8 making the gap even wider in practice

Hi Davoe

If you provide a reference to those figures I would be
happy to look at them, I'd check that if they made a typo
that it actually was used in there calculation.

You can be near certain that Cruiser TD is poorest value
though as everybody comes up with same figures.

Here for example is another statement from RAA site

"
At the other end of the scale the Toyota Landcruiser GXL
turbo diesel tops the survey at $357.22 per week and for
this cost you can run 3 Hyundai Getz. "

(Glass’s Future Values, the industry recognised standard for estimating trade-in values.)

Robin Miller

shure
Site Link
scroll down and click on the operating cost for large suv
It claims the trade in on a 5 year old TD gxl to be $34,400 and for the Petrol $33200 making only a $1200 dollar difference at trade in
HOWEVER Redbookfigures for oct 2002 GXL are
Site Link
$$35,900for the TD
and for the equvilent v8
Site Link
$26,600
a difference of
$9300
These figures are taken fom the upper limmit of trade in price quoted from redbook
It shoulfd REEEEEEELy br noted that RAC is using pure speculation o there trade in value after 5 years and redbook gos by what actually is going on

Hi Davoe

I would have thought the diesel is worth more than $1200 over the petrol to considering the start price, but note, this RAA site you use is however comparing the manual diesel against auto petrol.
Your $9300 data is for comparing two auto's.
As noted they do not use Redbook but Glass's data, but I don't think that Glass's data is pure speculation!

However even if you use the redbook figures the diesel still comes out as poorer value but by a lot less, because input price is higher again for Auto.

Using redbook values on Oct 2002 auto 100 series, max trade in price.
Depreciation is 73390-35990= $37400 diesel and 61390-26600=$34790 petrol.

I.E $12 per week more in depreciation , then take off $8 less in fuel/maintenance , so get nett running cost of $4 higher for diesel over 5 years.

Robin Miller

hmm I missed that the RAC was comparing a man to an auto - bit silly really
It would be interesting to plug the redbook figures into there spread sheet.
By your calculation it is around $1000 difference over 5 years. Given that a TD would be lot more saleable (less of them and more highly sought as a second hand vehcle) you would be far more inclined to sell it privatly than trade it in
that pretty much evaporates the price advantage the petrol has over the TD
leaving the final choice as Petrol v diesal rather than how much either costs

So why is it you will still pay $10k + for a turbo 80 series over a petrol 4.5 both GXL both Auto's, not alot of turbo diesels for sale compared to petrol especially in auto form, wether the 80 series holds its price better then a 100 series I dont know but still a big differance resale. Six months ago you couldnt give an 80 series petrol away due to the high fuel costs ($1.50 a litre) but has since recovered a bit since the rebate for gas was introduced. Regards Steve M

I also think red book are miles out with some of there values.I just sold our commodore for 4k more than was noted in red book. Regards Steve M

Hi Eric, can you let me know where you eventually bought your vehicle from
Thanks
Chris