The majority of new vehicles on the market these days have four passenger doors and a large rear hatch that open onto a cargo area. It’s not a new idea; it just took years for it to catch on here in the US. (We had to raise them up and put black plastic fender flares on them to make them` “cool” enough.) It’s an incredibly useful and practical way to arrange a car, so it’s no wonder it’s popular. One of these two is more wagon-y and the other more hatchback-y, but the basic idea is the same.
Yesterday we looked at a couple of cheap sedans in California, close in price but decades apart in age. I really didn’t know how this one was going to go down. A lot of you really loved that old Benz, rust and all, but for some of you that affection was a negative; the Sentra gained some votes precisely because it was something you didn’t have to care about. In the end, though, the old 240D lives to fight another day.
I really love the idea of the old Mercedes, and I really have trouble with the idea of spending money on something that feels like a rental car like that Sentra. The rust on the 240D doesn’t scare me, but the lack of air conditioning does; I worry that the interior smells like sweat covered up by patchouli. If it passes the sniff test, however, it’s Benz all the way for me.
I enjoy picking out cars for this feature, but if someone else wants to put in the legwork and give me a break, I’m all for it. Today’s cars were a suggestion on Opposite Lock, and they’re a great matchup: same basic shape, close in size, close in price, both stickshifts, and both with large sunroofs. But although they arrive at roughly the same place, they get there in very different ways. Let’s check them out and see which one you prefer.
2001 Subaru Forester S – $2,750
Engine/drivetrain: 2.5-liter OHC flat-4, five-speed manual, AWD
Location: Cheshire, CT
Odometer reading: 174,000 miles
Operational status: Runs and drives well
I’m not generally much of a Subaru fan, as regular readers are probably aware, but if I ever did go for one, a Forester would probably be my second choice. (First choice? A Brat, duh.) I like the tall boxy look of them, especially these early ones, and they’re a good size: not too big, not too small. It’s just a pity that you have to go back twenty-five years to find one as refreshingly free of bullshit as this one is.
Mechanically, the first-generation Forester is just a tall Impreza with a Legacy engine in it, a 2.5-liter version of Subaru’s famous flat-four. It’s all-wheel-drive, of course, and this one has a five-speed manual gearbox. Because of the relation to the Impreza, enthusiasts have found that lots of WRX parts bolt right on to a Forester, such as the lower and tighter suspension struts. This car has been so lowered, and it’s one of the few instances where I think reducing a car’s ride height actually improves its looks. It has had a lot of other work done, and it runs and drives fine, but the check-engine light is on. Why? It has no catalytic converters. Why do people do that? If you live in a place where you need to do emissions testing, you’ll need to put them back, and even if not, you probably should anyway.
This is the higher-trim S model, so it comes with all sorts of goodies like heated seats and a leather-wrapped steering wheel. If you’re looking for a nice, plain-jane Subaru station wagon, you’ll have to look elsewhere, like maybe 1983. It looks really nice inside, especially for the mileage. The seller doesn’t say much about the functional status of anything except for the air conditioning and heat, which both work fine. I guess that’s the important stuff.
Outside, things aren’t quite as rosy. The seller doesn’t say what happened to this car, but my guess is that a tree limb fell on it. There are dents all over the roof, including this nasty one on the A-pillar which cracked a corner of the windshield. If you live someplace that requires inspections, and they’re not cool with the cracks in the glass, this probably isn’t the car for you. Fixing that sheetmetal to fit a new windshield in is going to get expensive. At least the falling branch missed the sunroof.
2008 Saturn Astra XR – $2,500
Engine/drivetrain: 1.8-liter DOHC inline 4, five-speed manual, FWD
Location: Newport, PA
Odometer reading: 127,000 miles
Operational status: Runs and drives well
Saturn’s S-series was a great little car. It was durable, reliable, and if equipped right, more fun than you’d expect. Unfortunately, after the S-series ran its course, GM chose to replace it with the weird, trouble-prone Ion. Nobody liked it nearly as much, and sales fell. After the Ion, Saturn turned to GM’s European arm, Opel, for a suitable small car. Enter the Astra. It was a much better successor to the S-series than the Ion ever was, but it was also too little too late. It didn’t sell well, and Saturn didn’t last much longer. But if you can find a used Astra, you won’t be disappointed. They’re nice cars to drive.
Instead of Saturn’s unique “Power Module,” the Astra uses GM’s Ecotec four-cylinder, displacing 1.8 liters. Here it drives the front wheels through a five-speed manual. It’s a nice combination, not especially fast, but well-matched to the car. This one runs and drives just fine, though it has an exhaust leak causing a check-engine light. The seller suspects it’s a cheap aftermarket header that’s to blame. If you can find a factory exhaust manifold to replace it with, that and some new gaskets should solve the problem. It does have a new catalytic converter, so that’s something.
It’s an XR model, and a pretty fancy one at that, with heated leather seats and a great big sunroof. This is the only image we get of the inside, but it looks pretty good. It has an aftermarket touchscreen stereo, which I’m personally not a fan of, but some people seem to like them. The seller says the stalk for the windshield wipers is broken, but the wipers still work fine.
It’s missing some clearcoat on the outside, but otherwise it looks fine – except that somebody spray-painted the wheels black. Why? That’s a trend that really needs to die off. I wonder how hard it would be to strip the black paint off? And could you do it with the tires still on, or would it have to wait until they needed replacement?
If you’re willing to do a little tinkering, either one of these would make a more-interesting-than-average beater. But they definitely will need a little work. Which one are you more willing to wrench on?
The post Which Noisy Four-Door Hatch Would You Take? 2001 Subaru Forester vs 2008 Saturn Astra appeared first on The Autopian.
