Originally Posted By: Nick1994
Did the 97' and older ones burn oil too?
Yup. My neighbor's 2001 did too. And my sisters 2002 also, though not nearly as bad.
Originally Posted By: javacontour
The 4A-FE or 7A-FE are bulletproof. The only problem I had was with a cracked exhaust manifold, a common problem.
My 4A-FE had a cracked manifold. My local yards are full of Corollas so a replacement was super simple to find, and install. The one I pulled 4-5 years ago is still going strong.
Originally Posted By: Nick1994
Well, let's say it has 200k and burns 1 quart per 1,000 miles. It can't burn much faster, if it took 200k to burn at that speed it'll probably take another 75k-100k to get down to 1 quart per 500 miles.
Maybe don't ever change it, just a new filter every 15k.
Mine goes through a quart every 200-350 miles or so, give or take, depending how much of that is highway (much higher consumption). This is on used 0w-20 M1 EP that drains out of my Mazda3 after 5000 miles. Using thicker oils (15w-40, 20w-50, whatever) does slow consumption down noticeably, but not dramatically. I throw on a new filter every 6 months, 8 months, whatever. Whenever it seems like its been a long time.
Originally Posted By: Nick1994
I wonder how "buzzy" the 3 speed would be on the highway.
Its buzzier than a 4 speed for sure, but its not bad at all really, as long as the engine mounts are ok, and many in this era are *not*. They are cheap off Ebay and the front and side mounts are simple to replace. The rear is tricky, you'll have to lower the subframe down an inch or so, and jack the engine up as far as you can, then it comes out with some mild effort. Good news is its almost always the passenger front that goes bad, and if it is, things can get EXTREMEMLY buzzy, at almost every speed. I'm talking teeth-cracking buzzy. But its an easy fix.
