[Waheedy]

A warm regard to all the respected members of this forum.

Introduction:

Even though I have been hovering around from at least 15yrs here, there was almost nothing worthy enough with me to share before, maybe I was a bit lazy / occupied for the same, or to honestly confess, there is only one other article (unfinished) which I had penned down back in 2009, on another forum, after doing a trip to Ladakh on my P220.

But this milestone event in my life with my humble Rav4 (humble in context of the automotive scenario here in KSA), prompted me to pull out my keyboard and jot down my ownership experience, to honor a companion, which will be completing 6 years of togetherness next month and in the process, try and preserve my memories with it.

Being from a middle-class background, owing a car was a rich man’s privilege for us back in the 90’s, but that never stopped me from laying hands on literally any opportunity I could get to drive or ride. Which translated to a regular use of my father’s sparkling Green new Bajaj chetak since I was 9 to a single drive to pick up my cousin in my uncles 800 from his when I was 11. To keep it short, below is a glimpse of my past ownerships / rides, to give you an idea about the analogy that I might dwell into with my writing.


A brief ownership history (cars):

1. Premier Padmini: Was in 8th Grade, when I first laid my hands on a premiere Padmini ( a used car bought by my dad), and polished my driving skills in the tight bylanes of Delhi. It was soon discarded after the ownership costs were too much for him to bear, against the scarce usage.

2. I20 Asta: My second stint was a new I20 (2010) ASTA, which introduced us to a completely new world of features and comfort, but never impressed me with its driving dynamics, as the steering feel on highways was quite unnerving for me. This was again sold after a mere 3 years when I planned to move to KSA and there was practically no one to keep it up.

3. Kia Optima: After securing my first job, I started scanning the market for a used commute & wandered through a relatively good deal with a used optima which had done about 80k and was running smooth. It turned out to be my smallest stint with any vehicle which I have owned (will share the story later) and had to part ways with it in just 4 months. But this was also the vehicle that I enjoyed driving the most, and will always remember it for the 220kmph drag that I did on it.

4. Rav4: Kia was sold to make way for this new member in Feb 2016 and the story henceforth will be dedicated to it.


Selection:

Even though I had always enjoyed driving hatchbacks/sedans, the ingress/ egress from them was always a hassle for me being a 6’2”. Hence my priority was to buy a Compact / SUV, which coupled with my budget constraints of around 80k SAR (roughly 15lac INR) left me with very limited options, which included RAV4, Nissan X-trail, Mitsubishi Outlander, Mazda CX-5 & Honda CR-v (slightly above budget).

Since, my intended use was mostly for highways, and reliability was a big factor, these coupled together turned out to be a major deciding factor, apart from the easy financing options available for a newbie, both of which could only be met by the hugely popular and immensely penetrated network of Toyota in this region & hence it was.


Buying Experience:

I headed out to a nearby ALJ showroom (the only one in town) and scanned for the available options, where the salesguy was hell bent to sell me a camry which was also cheaper (at 75k), and scared me with a waiting period of over a month, particularly when I was in need of a car within a week. But upon my insistence they agreed to get it within 2 weeks and after negotiating with them for a different finance option (which I had found to be cheaper in a different car showroom), I paid them an advance amount of 5k and sealed the deal.

Upon reaching the showroom after the due date, I was told that the delivery is already in country but might take another couple of days to reach our town, at which point I had to literally explain my hardships that I was enduring without a vehicle to which they agreed to compensate the delay with another rented vehicle from their dealership until my consignment arrived.

Finally, I received an evening call after three days that my car was ready in their yard. I went there with my family and we received our car just before the closing of the dealership. A built in Japan masterpiece, smiling in all its glory, with a manufacturing date of just within a month, it was all that I could have asked for, with this experience.

It was a real moment of joy for my family and the start of a long journey of togetherness that we have immensely enjoyed over the last 6 years, and during which the car has served us pretty well, with practically anything that we could throw at it, including moving furnitures, appliances, long road trips in 50.c, sand dune sunsets, a trip to the edge of the world and much more.


Ownership experience:

Being in a new job, one of my key duties were to travel between our head office and branch office (350km) delegating between clients and our design team, to keep the projects running and updated & hence just the next day after taking delivery i out was out on the highway with my R4 ( without even having a peaceful moment of bonding in my garage).

These were two-way trips twice a week and hence within a month I safely lost my 1k & 5k free services to it.

Confronted by the dilemma of further servicing it with Toyota or locally, I dialed up to some experienced friends who have stayed beyond generations in this country and they safely guided me with some key tips of vehicle maintenance, after obliging to which, I was guaranteed to enjoy a premium ownership experience of a Toyota, which were:

1. Change engine oil at every 4k km, with alternate filter changes &
2. Change transmission oil with filter at every 80k km.
3. Use genuine toyota parts only

And to my utter satisfaction, these were the only things that I have adhered to apart from the usual wear and tear items like tires and batteries.

Averaging at around 30k kms / year, I am using it more for long distance touring from my current location in the eastern province to visit the holy cities in the west, which leads to trips of around 3000km during weekends & never has this car taken us off guard or caused even the slightest of trouble with any electronics ( yes a Toyota does have some!!) or its mechanicals.


Some of the key features in this base version are:
4x4, ABS & ESP, HDC, Dual airbags, etc.

Some of the features that I sorely miss till date ( but have become used to) are:
Cruise control and sunroof (demanded by kids).


Ownership and maintenance costs:

The car till date, is a tightly packed unit, without any squeaks and sounds and the only other maintenance that I had to undertake were:

1. Replace one of the leaking rear shocks at 80k= around 350SR with labor
2. Change one of the front connection rods at 120k (which has a broken seal) = around 400 SR with labor.

Some of the regular maintenance undertaken ( for your reference) are:

1. Change oil / alternate filter, upto 120k km, at every 4000kms & thereafter I started changing oil & filter together at each oil change at every 3-3200 kms, which translates to roughly 5000SR (upto 120k)
2. Changing brake pads at every 40k (approx.) cost around 250k with labor each.
3.Changed the front discs at around 150k (this one was slightly high) at around 1000SR.
4.Have changed the transmission oil only once (second is due now), costed around 450SR with labor.

To summarize, this car is a live example of a hassle free vehicle ownership for me, from Toyota, and my worst fear is that I may be hooked on to them for lifetime.

Next being the LC300 I guess..

[Waheedy]

Thank you mods for approving my first post here and to the members for liking it.

Hope to continue my writing journey hereon and add more experiences in the future.

[Amrik Singh]

Congrats for having a good drive. I had got my Wife a Rare Two Door RAV4 15 years ago, while in Dubai. Never got its feel out of mind.
Three years ago, my daughter was on the lookout for her first Car in USA, I selected RAV4 for her. Today, she feels proud to own the Car which has been ranked the best selling Car in some states of USA, beating the Ford. The only major problem in driving it myself, whenever I am visiting USA - I do not feel like driving a Car in India.

[landcruiser123]

Hi Waheedy,
Congrats on the great milestone. I'm sure you can easily reach over 300l miles on this reliable machine.

I was pretty curious on why you change the oil in 3-4k km intervals? Do you drive in city traffic with a lot of short trips? Generally, these cars are built well enough that an oil change every 8-10k kms is enough. (And it helps the environment too )

[Waheedy]

Hello Landcruiser123,

Thanks for your nice words.

Indeed i do see some offerings in the used car market here, where cars above 300,000 mile mark are available for sale. But honestly, i doubt if i will bear with her for so long :-).

Apart for the oil change, since beginning i was sticking with the 5k mineral oil, and coupled with the long highway runs that I was undertaking initially, in the hot summers of KSA, i preferred to go for an oil change at every 4k, just to be on the safe side and to be in line with the advice that i had received from some friends.

And later that changed to a 3k interval, after the car had crossed the 120k km mark.

I guess i could sustain that because usually it costed me just around a 100SR (almost equal to a tank full of fuel), and i did not mind spending that on an interval of 2-3 months, or after a long trip.

But, i must admit that i never thought about the environment factor & will surely study the possibility of changing this with my next vehicle.

Thanks..

[Waheedy]

Originally Posted by Amrik Singh

Congrats for having a good drive. I had got my Wife a Rare Two Door RAV4 15 years ago, while in Dubai. Never got its feel out of mind.
Three years ago, my daughter was on the lookout for her first Car in USA, I selected RAV4 for her. Today, she feels proud to own the Car which has been ranked the best selling Car in some states of USA, beating the Ford. The only major problem in driving it myself, whenever I am visiting USA - I do not feel like driving a Car in India.

Hi Amrik sir,

Thanks for your compliment.

I too can recall that one of the other inspirations for me in going for this car, was one of my cousins here, who owned the pre update version of the same model as mine.

And for sure, you have selected a reliable companion for your daughter. I wish a lot of trouble free memories for her.

[Amrik Singh]

Here is what I owned then

[Waheedy]

Originally Posted by Amrik Singh

Here is what I owned then

Attachment 2272988

Most of the two door SUV's or Compacts, are a beauty to behold, and so is your's.

And even though i rarely come across the two door version of this model here, it is quite common to see the four door version with a rear mounted spare running around till date, even after almost 10yrs since it was upgraded.

[gandharjc]

Congrats on completing 160k. Your car is the best looking 6 year old vehicle i have ever seen - do you have some sort of paint protection on it?

Also, curious why you don't use synthetic oil - it lasts longer than mineral.
Happy miles!

[Waheedy]

Thank you mods for placing my post in the news section yesterday.

It was just a small effort by me to add a drop of my experience to this vast pool of knowledge here, from which me along with millions alike have been benefitting for more than a decade now.

Thanks for keeping it up and running, wishing years of prosperity and brotherhood to all the members.

Regards

Originally Posted by gandharjc

Congrats on completing 160k. Your car is the best looking 6 year old vehicle i have ever seen - do you have some sort of paint protection on it?

Also, curious why you don't use synthetic oil - it lasts longer than mineral.
Happy miles!

Thanks gandharjc,

You reminded me of one of my key consideration in going for this purchase (which i forgot to mention above) , and that was its good resale.

Owing to the temporary status of residency, i believed that it was wise to go for a car which could be easily parted with (without much loss), if things go wrong and i have to depart.

And because of this fact always in foresight , i actually hesitated to spend any further on its upgrade or protection and enjoyed it mostly in its original form.

As for the paint, i always followed the standard SOP for highways in this region, which is to highly clad it with liquid detergent on all the long runs & get it washed immediately to avoid any further chemical reactions, guess it payed well..

Now regarding the oil, i actually prefer to visit the garage atleast once every quarter, to have a general checkup & topup, which comes free with an oil change ( i am a bit lazy or spoilt for the less cost here maybe), and hence deliberately abstained from using synthetic, as that would have devoided me of this peace of mind routine.

Also, as previously stated, it feels a bit reassuring to change oil and get the car serviced after a long weekend run between the east and west coast of this country, covering around 3000kms in the process within 2-3 days.