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My '99 M has 88K, and I'll likely keep it another 5 years or so. Good luck w/your decision.
Thanks for your response. I am definitely leaning toward keeping the car. I have a landscape business and drive trucks all day. Getting in and driving on a back road has always been enjoyable especially on a summer evening with the sunroof open. The car always has a special balance of handling and road feel and still drives great on the highway. Of course I'm not quite the king of the castle around here so I'll have to work on the wife. But I feel if I do maintain the vehicle properly the car has a lot of life left, unlike what some dealer salespeople may tell you.
I still check out every other 300M that drives by and most other 300M owners I talk to still love their car.
We have both noticed that the gas mileage has not been as good as the prior models (2000 & 2001). However, we have only 7,000 miles on each of the 2003's, so it may get a little better.
In checking the window stickers on the 2003 models. I noticed that they have a pollution index of .48. The 2004 has a pollution index of 1.00. The sticker indicates that the average of all cars is 1.02.
It seems as though Chrysler has been adjusting the engine or pollution control equipment from year to year, affecting the gas mileage. I couldn't find the 2000 and 2001 window stickers for our previous cars, but I would be willing to bet the pollution index is higher than the 2003, thereby yielding better gas mileage.
Nothing we can really do about it, but just another thing to check when buying a car you think you already know...
My wife and I have had 4 300M's and 2 of them have given us a light show (both interor and exterior, by the way). But it happened only once with each car. There were no detectable side effects from the show.
You know that your dealer already has his response in his computer waiting to print out on your work order -- "could not duplicate problem." LOL!
I hope the report and pics are correct!
Lynn Flowers
McKinney, Texas
My only other electrical gremlin has been somewhat recent, I call it the Fan Show! Suddenly, CC fan will kick up to full blast, shutting off CC does not stop the now nuclear powered fan. Luckily, the three times this has happened have been just shy of my destination, so once I "reboot" the car, all is well.
Went to a 4th BBQ, a freind of the evil wife's who had never seen my M before asked if I had just gotten a new car! 5 years of washing, waxing have kept it looking new....from a distance! A few wrinkles up close, unfortunately.
'21 Dark Blue/Black Audi A7 PHEV (mine); '22 White/Beige BMW X3 (hers); '20 Estoril Blue/Oyster BMW M240xi 'Vert (Ours, read: hers in 'vert weather; mine during Nor'easters...)
Two weeks ago our neighborhood in Scituate, Ma. got hit with golf size hail I had never seen here before in my life. I was home at the time and got my new Dodge Magnum (three days old)in the garage before any bad damage but three dings on the car will cost $305 to repair. My 300M was outside at a body shop one mile away and got $450 worth of damage. Some cars in my neighborhood were totaled. There was a tornado warning in Marshfield, the town just south of us.
I haven't run that fast since high school to get the new car in the garage since the hail started small and just became larger and larger. My local area looked like a hurricane hit for the fourth of July weekend.
They have had quite a few national companies here doing work and the local body shops are swamped. Damage was alot worse than what their computer models predicted.
I will probably have them turned when it gets more noticeable. Both front and back brakes have a lot of miles left in them. My pads were replaced by Sears a couple of years ago.
Silver
The bright side as far as potential Chrysler buyers is that although I've had two window motors replaced and one tranny module (udner warranty, first model year issues I believe), no other costs to speak of. Occasional "light shows" all solved by fiddling with the rheostat. So at this point I can give an OK report as far as reliability.
Good luck PJ, keep us posted...
'21 Dark Blue/Black Audi A7 PHEV (mine); '22 White/Beige BMW X3 (hers); '20 Estoril Blue/Oyster BMW M240xi 'Vert (Ours, read: hers in 'vert weather; mine during Nor'easters...)
How many miles does it have on it? I always feel you should get 150,000 miles out of a car before serious (non-maintenance type) costs start mounting up. I got 230,000 out of my '85 Buick Le Sabre and 193,000 out of my '89 Chevy Caprice.
I leased my '98 Intrepid because it was a first year model and I didn't want to take the risk. It turned out perfect over the 3 year lease. I leased my 2000 300M and it had a major (I think) computer problem less than 2 weeks before turn-in. I don't know the cost because it was under warranty. Because I was happy with the leased 300M prior to the computer failure, I purchased a replacement before the computer problem occurred.
The only other problem I had was with my wife's 2001 300M, which she totalled by bottoming out and piercing the oil pan which quickly destroyed the engine @ 36,800 miles. This was an insurance claim and probably not a fault of the car.
We now have 2 2003 300M's. Both cars have presented no problems, but it is early yet. I plan to keep at least one of them for several years..I guess time will tell! In the meantime, there isn't another car I would rather drive (except maybe the Crossfire I share with my wife...).
Question #1: I was playing around with some guy on the street, at a red light, put it on N, and was reving, letting go, reving, letting go...so he could hear by baby's engine (Never went above 3500 R.P.M.) Is this bad?
Question #2: Going high R.P.M. on AutoStick letting go, pushing it again, letting go, with out changing gears. (I was on first, took the car up to 4000 R.P.M., let go, punched it, the car jiggled and "jumped" but remained on 1st)
Anyways, making things short, can reving the car on neutral or on autostick, letting go, and reving it high again mess it up?
Thanks.
In short no. The car has a rev limiter so you can't rev it past like 5K or something like that while in N or P. The car also will not let you rev past redline in any gear or in Auto Stick. Reving like you have done will not cause any harm. Might kill your gas mileage but that would be all.
My M just clocked over to 92000 miles this week.
Still going strong (knock wood) and I still love it. No new cars in sight that I like as well (at least among those I might be able to afford...the new BMW M5 looks interesting, but $90K is a little out of my range!)
I'm retiring in January, so I may be driving my 300M for the rest of my life!
Lynn Flowers
McKinney, Texas
I'm debating buying a rear-wheel drive something, never had one before. As a life time skier, FWD has served me well. But, some cool RWD out there. But, can I put up with snow tire changeover? We'll see.
Less than (unfortunately! Summer's too short here in Boston...) 4 months to the '05 auto show. The shopping shall begin then.
Congrats on the retirement, I'm sure it's well earned and hope it will be comfortable. I'm a long way from retiring...
'21 Dark Blue/Black Audi A7 PHEV (mine); '22 White/Beige BMW X3 (hers); '20 Estoril Blue/Oyster BMW M240xi 'Vert (Ours, read: hers in 'vert weather; mine during Nor'easters...)
May you be the first to reach 1,000,000 miles on your 300M...happy retirement -- wish I could join you!
Some of the mess was superficial, a little water and a cotton towel I had in the trunk took a lot of it off. But that exposed many apparently deep scratches. Maybe I'll try compounding tonight.
Why do bad things happen to good people!!!
'21 Dark Blue/Black Audi A7 PHEV (mine); '22 White/Beige BMW X3 (hers); '20 Estoril Blue/Oyster BMW M240xi 'Vert (Ours, read: hers in 'vert weather; mine during Nor'easters...)
It has now become evident that the miles per gallon has dropped over these model years. The 2000 had the best, the 2001 was slightly lower and the 2003's are both significantly lower than the 2000 or the 2001. The irony of this is that the 2000 had EPA figures of 18 and 26, while the rest had 18 and 27! And the 2000 had 253 HP compared to 250 for the rest.
I noticed that the smog index for at least one of our 2003's was .48. I believe the 2001 was close to .90, which is where the new 3.5L 300's are. The average index for new vehicles is .50.
It appears DC was forced to reduce its smog index over the 300M years, resulting in poorer gas mileage. But how were they able to increase and maintain their EPA of 27 highway?
Maybe all the automakers play these tricks, but I am one consumer who is not amused...it almost seems fraudulent when you consider the millions of $ in penalties they didn't have to pay for being below the government mandated gas mileage for their fleet.
I wonder if they will play the same game with the new 300 -- i.e. start with the high smog index, reduce it (with pressure from the EPA) for the 3.5L from .90 to .50 (or so) and continue to claim the EPA mileage they originally had.
If this pattern holds true, the lesson is don't buy the 3rd year (or beyond) of a new model if you are concerned about gas mileage!
Sorry for the long post...just venting my frustrations on being decieved on gas mileage expectations
I've read several Canadian reviews that claim over 30MPG on the highway. Did the Canadians get a better engine than the U.S. bound Ms? 'Cause I'm not buyin' it!
Still love the car, though.
YMMV.
'21 Dark Blue/Black Audi A7 PHEV (mine); '22 White/Beige BMW X3 (hers); '20 Estoril Blue/Oyster BMW M240xi 'Vert (Ours, read: hers in 'vert weather; mine during Nor'easters...)
My wife would average about 20.6 MPG on her daily commute into L.A. in her 2001 M. She has averaged 19.6 in 2 months in her 2003M for the same commute. When, on occasion, she used my 2000 M, she averaged about 21.2 MPG. So it seems like a 10% decrease in MPG between 2000 and 2003.
I still love my car, too. I just feel DC is playing games with the EPA and the government to maximize their MPG ratings (fraudulently, in my opinion) and minimize their fleet penalties for MPG requirements. I resent buying 10% more for gas as a result of this deception.