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Don't know if the tires (I have Goodyear Integrities) really needed to be rotated, but the manual says to so I did. I trust the guys, but you can never be too careful so the second time I had the tires rotated, I numbered the tires in a spot only I knew about. When I checked afterwards, the presence of the numbers confirmed that the tires had been rotated.
I noticed something fairly interesting. I bought the car on 12/29/00 with about 55 miles on it. I had the first oil change at 5,171 miles on 4/19/01. Three months later on 7/26/01 with the mileage at 10,114, I had the oil changed for the second time. Now just two months later (and nine months from having bought the car), I am having the oil changed for the third time. I sure have racked up the mileage.
But they have been fun miles and I enjoy my car today as much as I did the day I bought him.
Change oil and filter every three months. I do it on the first day of summer spring winter and fall.
Balance tires once a year at Sears. Lifetime balance $10 per tire. They will rotate tires at that time for free.
Change sparkplugs and air filter at 30k miles. Inspect air filter every two years if you drive less than that. Platinum spark plugs last longer, like maybe every 60k miles.
Change brake fluid every two years. Also the clutch fluid if you have a manual transmission. Inspect brake pads (front) and shoes (rear) once a year. Sears lets me look at the car when its up on the lift for the tire balance which is when I do it.
Change the transmission oil every 30k miles if you have a manual.
Normally I change the coolant in my cars every two years, but the ECHO has long life coolant which Ive never had a car with before. Change it whenever it says to in the owners manual and use the same coolant that came with the car.
Check your exhaist system once a year by starting the engine and before the pipes heat up, covering tail pipe with a rag to make an airtight seal. If the exhaust system is good you will feel air pressure build up and hear a pop when you remove the rag. Dont let the pressure build up too mcuh or you might blow the muffler off the pipe! If you feel no pressure at all, that means theres a hole in the system. (probably the muffler) Id have Toyota change it because if they do it after that its free for the life of the car.
After the car has like 60k miles on it, every year check the waterpump by grabbing the pulley and rocking it feeling for play. Also, check under the car with the engine running for leaks.
Also after 60k miles or five years, check the boots on the front axle (four of them) for cracks every time you change the oil. You want to catch the boots before they really go because if you drive around with cracked boots youll ruin the joints which cost like $$$ to replace. When you see one boot go bad, have them all replaced. Also at 60 k miles, the valves need to be adjusted. Let Toyota do that as its complicated. (almost no other car uses the method ECHO does to adjust the valves) After 60k miles you can expect the water pump, muffler, and axle boots to go at some point. Quite possibly they will last longer, but at this point you want to keep an eye on them and replace then BEFORE they go.
Consult your owners manual for what needs to be inspected at the interval suggested. This is things like balljoints, tie rod ends, gas cap gasket (important on a FI car!) Whatever the manual says inspect at that interval. Read the owners manual from cover to cover regarding maintainance and do what it says. If you have a question, the answer is porbably in the OM>
In general, use Toyota air filters, mufflers, coolant, shocks. You dont need to use Toyota oil, oil filters. But in general, its a good idea to use Toyota products you wont go far wrong.
They have eliminated the erroneous paragraph that says you would have to roll down your own windows if you got a fully loaded Echo.
I will admit that curiosity got the better of me last time the ad appeared and I called the number listed.
I talked to the supposed seller and asked, "So the Echo has ABS?" "No," came the reply, "Echoes don't even have ABS as an option." I did not tell him that ABS is available as an option.
I asked him about the price and he said that he got a good deal on the car when he bought it and so he wanted to see someone else get a good deal.
I have a feeling that there is something majorly wrong with this Echo and some car dealership is having one of their salesman pretend to be private selling it.
Some would say I am wasting this guy's time and if he and the car are legit, I apologize. But if the guy is some kind of scammer, he deserves to have his time wasted.
Don
Nashville, TN
today i got stuck in the sand at the beach, and got unstuck, and went on with the trip and i noticed when we got back on the highway after i hit 60 mph the steering wheel shook really bad, well i figured there was sand in the wheel wells or something so we went to a do-it-yourself carwash and i cleaned under the wheels and even the engine compartment (where there was also sand). it still did it , i don't know what to do, it gets very shaky after 60 mph, if you have any ideas please e-mail me at smonk59@hotmail.com, thanks
The Echo made the cut and was a finalist in the Under $18,000 category. There were three finalists in this category. The winner was the Honda Civic LX. The other finalist was the VW Golf GLS.
My early 80's Tercel got wacked so hard in a grocery store lot that it jumped up in the air, and ended up part way out of the parking spot. Not a mark on it..
I think the bumper laws need beefed up..
A local dealer is offering to sell me a new 2001 Echo Roxy Edition for $13k flat. Car has upgrade packages 1, 2, and 3 plus the Roxy junk, although the roof rack is a nice touch. He tells me that the "make you dizzy" Roxy seat covers can be removed, revealing the normal seat covers. Good price for a leftover or not discounted enough? Guess I would be stuck with the side striping if I bought it. The car has an automatic transmission. Not sure yet if it has the cold weather group but suspect it does. Thanks.
And if you can't take off the ROXY seat covers, you can always cover them up.
Don
Nashville, TN
My first thought is "How much of a rear crumple zone is there?" My second thought is "What kind of performance do you get out of a 1.3L engine?" (I find the US standard 1.5L plant quite suitable to task.)
Hey, just for fun, let's imagine what could be possible if Toyota dropped in the VVTi engines from the new Celica or RAV4 into an ECHO hatch. . . . It would make a compelling alternative to a Focus ZX3 or Civic Si for the thrill-on-a-budget crowd.
O.k., to be honest, below 3000 rpm the engine is not that strong, but over 3000 rpm the performance is very good.
Max speed of the Yaris Verso 1.3 is 165 kmh (103mph).
My experience while driving through Germany (no speed limit) is that the car can cruise at that speed for hours.
On a very fast downhill section the speedo even showed 198 kmh (123 mph). Thats quite impresive for a 1.3 L engine!
The car is quiet and feels safe even at very high speed.
Did you have the work done at a Toyota dealer and use original replacement parts.Also did you look for undercarriage damage?Why did the airbag not deploy?Are they designed to only deploy in certain situations or was it a malfunction?
Oh PAT, why don't we have an owners' club for the Echo? This board is pretty active and it is mainly active from posts of actual owners.
He has his Echo tinted with 12% tint all round and he has a strip of tint at the top of his windshield.
He says the tint and putting up a sunshield keeps the Echo about 20 degrees cooler than before the tint, but he has a thermometer and he has seen it get one hundred and forty degrees inside the car.
Legal limit in Missouri is 33% (I believe) so that is what I am going to get.
The one incident was when I hit a patch of black ice and I ended up sliding all over the place. Fortunately, there were no cars that close and I kept my cool. I was not going very fast (under 20mph) when I hit the black ice so I don't think the problem was speed, but I don't think it was the car either.
As winter gets closer and closer, I feel confident that the Major (my car is Major Tom) will see me through.
:-)
Pat
Host
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