I test drove one the other day, and I have say, I liked. Strictly utilitarian. I missed the power locks, clutch had a weird short pedal travel, it revs too fast at 60mph (3k!), and it turns out the BT works with phones but will not stream audio. Only two speakers in the front doors, but who cares, the kids in the back never listen to me anyhow. No center armrest but I see one on Amazon for $70 so no big deal there. No usb input but there is an aux input on the am/fm/cd player.
Simple controls, no gizmos, but it did have an mpg readout. Cool. I actually thought it accelerated fast. Maybe not sporty, but decent. I thought it was plenty peppy. In some ways I wonder if that high rpm is a good thing: rather than attempt to keep up with traffic, might one rather live life in the slow lane, and see if 40mpg is attainable? I did not get the feeling that this had to be flogged, nor downshifted for every hill.
The door pulls on the outside were flat black, and the rear seats did not fold at all. And there is no trunk release--you have to use the key. Which may be a selling point: instead of locking the doors the hard way when at walmart, put your laptop into the trunk instead, and never lock the doors. The door sills looked like they would get scratched stupid fast. Would want to cover those in short order with plastic film.
As opposed to the Mirage, no power stuff to break. More rear seat room, larger opening rear doors. Longer wheelbase, I thought it rode better. Certainly more quiet. Also, Nissan has more dealers in case one wants to visit one. But the Mirage has a better warranty.
I did see mention that changing sparkplugs on this 1.6 was a pain, have to remove intake manifold and drain coolant and whatnot. But the coolant and plugs have to be done at the same time, so maybe that is trivial.
In ending this mini-review, I am curious what others think, and if there are trouble spots on these cars. I mean, like how Matrix manuals can eat input shaft bearings, or Altimas eat pre-cats or that the oil filter is hard to change (been meaning to youtube that bit, have not yet). I saw 5k OCI but missed oil type; I suspect nothing fancy there needed.
Simple controls, no gizmos, but it did have an mpg readout. Cool. I actually thought it accelerated fast. Maybe not sporty, but decent. I thought it was plenty peppy. In some ways I wonder if that high rpm is a good thing: rather than attempt to keep up with traffic, might one rather live life in the slow lane, and see if 40mpg is attainable? I did not get the feeling that this had to be flogged, nor downshifted for every hill.
The door pulls on the outside were flat black, and the rear seats did not fold at all. And there is no trunk release--you have to use the key. Which may be a selling point: instead of locking the doors the hard way when at walmart, put your laptop into the trunk instead, and never lock the doors. The door sills looked like they would get scratched stupid fast. Would want to cover those in short order with plastic film.
As opposed to the Mirage, no power stuff to break. More rear seat room, larger opening rear doors. Longer wheelbase, I thought it rode better. Certainly more quiet. Also, Nissan has more dealers in case one wants to visit one. But the Mirage has a better warranty.
I did see mention that changing sparkplugs on this 1.6 was a pain, have to remove intake manifold and drain coolant and whatnot. But the coolant and plugs have to be done at the same time, so maybe that is trivial.
In ending this mini-review, I am curious what others think, and if there are trouble spots on these cars. I mean, like how Matrix manuals can eat input shaft bearings, or Altimas eat pre-cats or that the oil filter is hard to change (been meaning to youtube that bit, have not yet). I saw 5k OCI but missed oil type; I suspect nothing fancy there needed.