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Sounds to me like the CV joints may be going. I would check on this quickly by inspecting the boots and also by taking it to a mechanic.
Saw a guy yesterday have to pull off the road after his popped off from the tranny. Glad it was'nt me.
Randy
I just get a little tired of the people with problems bringing them here, over, and over again. Reposting their disatisfaction with their cars like we havent heard them out 50 posts ago.
I conceed there are lemons out there. There is arbitration and ulitimately the courts to get satisfaction. If you get a jury you will win because they hate car manufacturers.
I stopped reading the posts that start off -"My Neon is a piece of crap and all this stuff broke and I want someone to pay"
I empathise with the posts that start off, "I have a ------ did any of you have the same problem? How did you resolve it? Is it serious?
Its a fine line, I know, but all the negativity just brings me down.
If you hate your car that much, just trade it for a Honda. I mean that with sincerity because they have the best reputation for quality.
I had a car that stranded me 2 times in 1 year. After the second time, I traded it for a different car. I lost on the initial deal, but I drove the car I replaced it with 120,000 relatively trouble free miles and never looked back.
After having a car that stranded me a couple of times, your problems dont seem that serious to me.
On a positive note, I just took a trip in my Neon, with baggage, drove 250 miles at 70+ mph and got 33 mph with the AC on. Take that OPEC!
Now as far as small car ratings go I think it was road and track that I saw had a little more realistic comparison.
My rank would probably be.
Protege
Focus
Sentra
Neon
Elantra
Corolla 2001 looks much nicer
Civic over priced (financing yikes!)
cavalier or sunfire yuk poor quality uncomfortable ride
As far as engine noise the cavalier, sunfire, and elantra are way worse then the neon.
The protege may be a tad quiter but its pretty close.
So just the corrola and maybe the civic are a lot quiter but more expensive and much more boring.
But when you talk quality, handling, ride and price, with quality getting the most weight, the protege, focus and sentra are ahead of the neon basicly of quality.
Best handling- Protege
Best ride- focus with Neon and protege close behind
best looks- Neon and Protege
Build Quality- Protege, corrolla and sentra are all good
worse handling- cavalier sunfire very laggy
worse looks- cavalier with focus behind but starting to grow on me (too bad its a ford)
build quality- cavalier sunfire
ride- cavalier sunfire and sentra has a reallly stiff suspension making it hard on the a@#
I've had my 2K Neon LX with auto trans since April '99 and it is still as solid and everything is working as well as the day I drove it off the lot.
My wife and I have driven the car for 7000 miles in varying conditions - highway, city, heat, cold, snow, potholes so it has received a pretty good workout. I'm the one that drives it hard and fast and can be seen cruising down the highway @ 90+ mph. The wife is the slow short trip driver.
Yeah the front brakes make an occasional but not very loud squeak, but I have found this to be from rain and humidity causing a fine layer of rust to form on the rotors, after applying the brakes a few times it wears off and the squeak stops. I get the shock treatment sometimes too. It does not happen all of the time so I think it is a combination of factors and not the car's fault.
The only time it has been in the shop has been for oil changes every three months, regardless of mileage, and twice for body work - once from an inconsiderate idiot that left there calling card on my driver's door, and the second when my wife had an accident damaging the left front fender, headlamp assembly and front facsia.
Peace
Edswords yes I chose the neon for the exact attributes you spoke of. I also am prepared for a few more difficulties out of my neon then if I had bought an import or maybe even a focus but the price was right, I liked the options the neon had, it is fun to drive and was the cheapest car I could by in canada with the options I wanted.
Hopefully I'll have good luck with it as I hope many others do too ;-)
Treat your neons well and they may do the same for you.
PS I hate to say but the zx3 focus has grown on me a bit. It has to have better rims though and the focus design in general is still a bit harsh on the eyes.
Good small car for a family
Steel blue,garnet,shale green,STONE white.
The R/T comes in:
Stone white,black,silver and red.
The above was found at http://www.lemonaidcars.com
Go to the site and click on "secret warranties watch" on the left side of the screen for more information.
I stay away from mechanics for something a simple as replacing rotors. For the cost of their labor to turn them, you can usually by decent new ones and install them yourself.
I was writing about the specific problem of warpage which I feel is the sympton of a cheap rotor and while turning the rotors might alleviate the problem for a time, the rotors would be apt to warp again.
That is my complaint with my 95 Neon. The rotors were so cheap they warped & rusted in less than 30,000 miles.
Here is another little tidbit of info: Rotor warpage is not always caused by cheap parts; many cases of rotor warpage has been caused by pads that are simply made of a compound that is too hard, thus heating up the rotors more than they were designed to withstand. This occured with the 98-99 Kia Sephia. They were having high incidences of rotor warpage. The dealers just kept replacing the rotors with new ones and 5,000 miles later they were warped again. Kia finally figured out it was not cheap rotors that were the problem, but rather the pads were too hard and were heating up the rotors beyond their resistance levels. They came out with redesigned pads made of a softer compound and now all the complaints of rotor warpage has disappeared! That could have been the problem with your Neon as well.
I am also wary of having autoparts stores turning rotors for me, but when my next car needs brakes, I just might try them out and see how they do. I dont have much to lose - except maybe some time.
Hopefully, it will be a couple more years until I'm due for brake work.
Recently, it had been having trouble shifting from first to second gear for the very first time in the morning. Sometimes, I had to push the engine up to 5KRPM in order to get it to shift ... directly to 3rd. After that, I was more or less okay.
Then I started having trouble where the transmission would occasionally take its sweet time to downshift. Sometimes, I would be at a stop for about 10-15 seconds before I felt the transmission thump twice (3->2, 2->1). If I tried to accelerate before the downshifting, I would move but I could feel a difference. (Well, obviously, since I was pushing the car in a higher gear than usual.)
Since my father works for this dealership, I had my father inquire about the problem. The mechanics at the dealership where I bought my car told us there was some problem with the 2000 Neon transmissions made between a certain date that had trouble ('interference') shifting in cold weather. (some internal advisory note)
I should have forced them to look more closely because ---
1) The DOM of my car was earlier than the range of dates the advisory listed.
2) It's June/July; hardly cold weather.
The latest sign of a problem was last Saturday when it was binding in reverse. I attempted to back up, and it took some effort to move backward, and the motion was rather clunky. The car still moved forward fine, but now I was seriously concerned. I had my father drive the car to the dealership (since he worked there) last Monday.
According to the mechanic, they may be able to order parts to replaced the damaged ones, but it's also possible the cost of the parts would exceed buying a new transmission.
Since I purchased a 5/75 service contract on the car, I'm completely covered. The dealer even provided me with a free rental car while mine is being repaired. Perhaps more details as they become available.
The estimated completion date is either Monday or Tuesday, about one week after I brought it in. (ordering parts, assessing the damage, etc.)
The engine vibrates through the dash when idling in reverse (when cold or hot), and the engine also surges when idling in traffic. This has almost caused me to bump two different cars because it surges unexpectedly. Also, the engine tapped the other day when accelerating, and the engine was warm too. Time for a new engine already (I think), AT 12,000 MILES!!! Dodge. They're different alright!
Also, the Neon is loud and unrefined when just cruising. I have a Mazda Protege (1999) and my friend has the 2000 Neon. While I will readily admit the Neon has more power for accelerating and passing than the Protege, it is twice as loud too. Plus, I don't care what anyone says, the Protege's stereo is miles ahead of the Neon's. Of course, so is its reliability and durability too.
-Beanboy
You see more Neons than Proteges because Neons are priced a bit lower than the Proteges. But a few hundred bucks on purchasing is better than a few hundred or thousand in repairs down the road. Also, Neons are used for rental fleets and the like too, and Proteges aren't. That inflates the sales figures of them too.
I',m wondering how many here have read the latest
magazine review (Car and Driver.., I think?) that did a head to head comparison between the Neon 2001 R/T and the equivalent performance Protege' model.
Granted, these are 2001 "sportier" models compared to the 2000 Neon and Protege' models. However, they are fairly similar in having performance mufflers (read -louder than stock),and very similar engines(mainly intake tuning) to the 2000 models.
OK, so according to the posts here, the Neon should be appreciably louder.Well, according to the empirical measurements (without human bias) the "noisy" Neon is exactly..,drum roll please!..
1DB noiser than the Protege in WOT (wide open throttle).In the other sound areas the Neon and Protege' are EXACTLY the same.
Also does anyone remember, the review of various Y2K model subcompact cars by Car and Driver in which the Neon placed 5th and the Protege' 1st. This review was about two or three months ago.
Once again, the notorious "noisy" Neon, was only 1 DB than the Protege'.
I freely admit that the Neon is louder than a Honda,or Toyota at WOT.It's "noise" at WOT is however, extremely pleasing TO ME.My 5spd. ES at 70-80MPH ,in 5th gear is as quiet as any car I have owned. Guess those who are complaining have auto tranny Neons.., I dunno, you guy's tell me.
As for the two reviews and particularily the last one, with the Neon R/T versus the Protege' I'm confused.
Should I believe a non-biased ,electronic, decibel level meter(magazine).., or the emotional "seat of the pants" measurements of human beings(see above posts).
I'm confused fella's .., help me out!
( and dont tell me import's dont have serious problems, I've seen some horrific problems on imports!)
mlaporta: Tip of the day: There are more Neon's on the road because dodge has a better marketing strategy than anyone else, so dont blame neon's.
So, what this means is: If you have a serious problem with your car(no matter if it's import or domestic) you try to FIX THE PROBLEM AT HAND, not degrade the manufacturer because you'll get nowhere, fast.