Learn me: chevy aveo's

https://bend.craigslist.org/cto/d/2004-chevy-aveo/6291844218.html

Or should I say "learn me: the brave little toaster!" I know these are bad, but how bad? Should I run? Is it "no avail for the aveo"? 

Man, this must be one boring topic...

Not so much boring as penalizing. It's better than walking. Slightly. All of the personality of curdled milk without the zingy taste.

I bet it's a good for taking off of sweet jumps.

can't be worse than the metro

In reply to mad_machine :

I see more running metros. From what I know, Daewoo gave these things all the transmission functionality of sticking a fork in a toaster. Replacing them with the tires was not unheard of. 

From what I remember of them, it's not uncommon for the timing belt to snap and kill the engine before 60k miles...

Yowzas. Avoid like a hurricane. 

In reply to Trackmouse :

I've asked this very question. I ever bought one of that tells you anything. Sure doesn't stop the temptation though!

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/grm/so-whats-up-with-aveos-makes-a-yugo-look-like-a-civic/79632/page1/

I drove one for a summer. It was my cranky grandpa's brand new zero-option sedan, 5-speed, no A/C, power nothing, only AM/FM radio. MSRP was like $8,500! Yet it struggled to hit 30 mpg. I get 29-30 in my Saturn Astra without trying, and that car is leaps and bounds higher quality. Yes that's right - an Aveo will make a re-badged bankruptcy era Vauxhall feel like a BMW. My standards for cars were set this low because of an Aveo.

Didn't have it long enough to speak to maintenance. Didn't need to.

Buy something else. Anything else.

Robbie said:

I bet it's a good for taking off of sweet jumps.

They can be rather amusing to thrash on an autocross course as well, as they turn in pretty quickly. Not necessarily fast around one, but entertaining in a drive it like you stole it way. I did that at the GM Auto Show in Motion... but there may have been a reason the course they set up didn't let you test an Aveo at anything like highway speed.

I've had Aveos as rental cars when I used to travel a lot.

I would choose literally any other vehicle over an Aveo.

I distinctly remember needing to turn off the A/C before attempting to merge into Houston traffic.

CO-WORKER has one. 09 with jus shy 100k miles. It's a pile. A complete pile. Cooling systmen has had major work 3 times in 3 years. Seems to love chucking T-stats and sensors. Eats tire. I finally had it in the garage and put the plates on and the rear beam is tweaked. 

Just.... no. 

Is this the second coming of the freelander? Another car not even grm will defend?

I know zero about them.  But, from the sounds of this board, they are incredibly slow, which I would take as you could drive the wee out of it and never get into trouble (provided it doesn't fall apart).  At that price range, you have lots of room to have fun with it and make "improvements".  Would sticky tires and wider rims help?  4x100 rims are as common as dirt, so you could probably slap some former ricer rims on it and have fun.  Maybe figure out how to put better shocks/springs/bars to wake up the handling?  A DIY cold air kit?  Mock up some type of turbo on it?  Granted, anything you did would probably lower the value, but it may not matter if you're just looking for a fun little commuter.

While others see a pos, I'd take that as a challenge to see what you could do with it to increase the grins per mile......

-Rob

In reply to rob_lewis :

Hard to lower what is already worthless. You have a point, cutting one up would make you out like 50 bucks. 

In reply to rob_lewis :

I like this idea of a challenge. I'd certainly rock this one (even if only a photoshop - I can't tell - it looks cool to me):

Internet says only 2300 ish lbs in stock form, so a motor swap or big turbo should really wake it up.

rob_lewis said:

I know zero about them.  But, from the sounds of this board, they are incredibly slow, which I would take as you could drive the wee out of it and never get into trouble (provided it doesn't fall apart).  At that price range, you have lots of room to have fun with it and make "improvements".  Would sticky tires and wider rims help?  4x100 rims are as common as dirt, so you could probably slap some former ricer rims on it and have fun.  Maybe figure out how to put better shocks/springs/bars to wake up the handling?  A DIY cold air kit?  Mock up some type of turbo on it?  Granted, anything you did would probably lower the value, but it may not matter if you're just looking for a fun little commuter.

While others see a pos, I'd take that as a challenge to see what you could do with it to increase the grins per mile......

-Rob

The hardest part of that equation is there are better starting points out there. The Hy/Kia twins are better in every way. Easier to fix. Not a Daewoo. The engine is a better starting point, the suspension has a better feel, the cars are just made better. I'd find it really hard to waste time on that particular Korean E36 M3box when there are better Korean E36 M3boxes that start where that one would end after mods. 

So what if you swapped everything over from a wrecked Cobalt SS?

In reply to trigun7469 :

Platforms are unrelated so with the amount of work you'd put into it, you could put that Cobalt SS stuff into pretty much anything else and come out ahead.

trigun7469 said:

So what if you swapped everything over from a wrecked Cobalt SS?

painful fiery death

Junk.  The rear axle is a throw away, and it needs to be thrown away pretty regularly.  The timing belt is made of aged cheddar.  No fun.  No swapability.  Paint falls off.

A bicycle would be better.

Streetwiseguy said:

Junk.  The rear axle is a throw away, and it needs to be thrown away pretty regularly.  The timing belt is made of aged cheddar.  No fun.  No swapability.  Paint falls off.

 

A bicycle would be better.

Truth. You'll walk less with the bicycle 

In reply to Bobzilla :

And go faster as well.

I dunno how bad Daewoos really are since a lot of people here seem to like the Cruze. I just did a cylinder head and timing belt on a Suzuki Forenza (Daewoo) because the Tbelt idler fell apart at 70k (but 10 years old..). I actually liked the motor ok. 

I don't have much direct experience with Aveos. I diagnosed a bad PCM on one once. I like the early italian headlight treatment a little bit but find it comically similar to the early Lexus GS front end (which i hate) which may or may not have also been styled by Giugiaro.

I can't really defend the Aveo, and i find something to like about pretty much everything.