High mileage vehicles

[Downstream]

I periodically see threads about time to buy a new vehicle usually after 100,000 miles, but I was wondering how many on the board operate at the other end of the spectrum driving their vehicles to limits that seem crazy to many.  My family does this with all of our cars.  My lowest mileage vehicle is a 2012 Subaru outback with 180,000 miles and my other one is a 2002 Chevy Suburban with 330,000 and still going strong on the original engine/transmission.  I will have to fix a rear main seal oil leak one of these days but most of these have that problem that is normally fixed when you have to do transmission work because you have to drop the tranny to fix it anyway.  this one I bought with 80,000 miles and have not had to do much major work on it yet.  This is my 3rd Suburban of this vintage and they went 240,000 and 280,000 on the other 2.  The 240,000 mile one was running fine but it had the air autoride suspension that went bad and it was over $4000 to fix without any after market options.  With the price of used cars I normally look to buy vehicles that are around 150,000 miles with good long term track records.  I am planning on taking my current one in and let my mechanic look it over and confirm the rear main seal issue and let me know what else I may need to fix at this time.  Here is a photo of my high mileage ride.



 

[chevytaHOE5674]

I have 4 vehicles on the road ranging from 103k to 270k miles. Would take any of them across the country tomorrow if needed.

Trouble in the salt belt is high mileage means they are usually rust buckets. My truck with 270k on it probably only weighs 70% of what it did when new, thanks to the rust falling off at every bump in the road.

[Southside]

My '06 pickup has 430K on it, the '06 Sienna has 250K and the new to me '06 GMC van has 190K, zero plans to retire any of them. 

[Wlmedley]

Almost all of my working career I had a company truck that I kept at home so I didn't put a whole lot of miles on a pickup so I kept them a long time.Best I ever did was buying a used 1984 Dodge pickup in 1986 for $6500.I drove it until 2001 and sold it for $4500.Other than tires and oil changes and brakes I didn't have to do anything to it. I thought $2000 for 16 years use was pretty good.

[barbender]

I remember when I first started driving, if I lokloked at a rig and it had over 100k I wouldn't even consider it. Haha. The last diesel pickup I bought had 118k on it and I was thrilled to find one with nice low miles like that😊 The rust belt kills rigs, just like Chevy says. If they weren't rotting out, I would just keep fixing and fixing. 

Now I am looking for a newer diesel pickup. That is quite depressing if you aren't into spending huge money. I saw an ad for one that has high (to me) miles, about 260k, but it looks super clean. I may check it out, the price is good. On the flip side, I found an 08 Dodge dually, only 56k on it and they want $42,500😬 I don't know if I can bring myself to part with that much coin.

[peakbagger]

Sad to say, up in New England with the agressive chemicals used to keep the pavement bare in winter for clueless drivers who dont know how to drive in snow, rust kicks in long before the running gear breaks down. A popular trick is to buy a car from down south with high miles, a roasted interior and rust free body and haul it north and swap relatively low mileage northern running gear from a rusted out donor car. 

[thecfarm]

barbender, how right you are on the 100,000.
We bought a van with 80,000 and thought nothing of it. 
I just bought a toyata Tundra with over 300,000 on the body. Motor has 100,000 on it.

[moodnacreek]

Right now I am trying to buy a 01 f450 with 80,000 miles. If this works out it will replace a 1971 f350 rack body dump that is in great shape and has 70,000 mile on the truck and 30 on the engine. Problem is that I need to pull the 6 ton trailer over the road and the '71 has 4-56 gears and the speed limet is not 55 anymore. My '91 350 diesel pick up , 250,000 miles does not  go out in salt and I need to be able to haul lumber down from the north country all year long.

[NE Woodburner]

Son has a Dodge 1500 with over 340,000 miles. Body is mostly bondo now but the engine still runs great and doesn't burn oil.

[Tom King]

387,000 on my '01 Chev dually Duramax/Alison that I bought new.

267,000 on the '04 Subaru WRX hatchback with Farm Use tags on it.  It makes a good run around the farm vehicle.

We like to buy new and take care of them.

[B.C.C. Lapp]

My wife's truck is always the newest one around here.  Right now she has a 2016 F150 with 32,000 on it.  She don't drive much or far.

My main truck is a 2010 F150 with 184,000 on it.   My second truck s a 2006 GMC 2500 with 110,000 on it.   I run my trucks till I just cant get them inspected any more.    Then I take her hand me down and buy her a newer one.  

Mileage dont ever enter the decision to replace a truck.   The bodies, frames and just about all of it rusts and  rots long before the motor quits.

[Raider Bill]

We did a ford 09 F450 couple months ago that was used by a guy doing Uship. 875K.
Truck was beat up but ran.
We get one of these high milers about once a year. Always used for highway hauling.

[sprucebunny]

Bought my first 4runner locally with 165,000 on it. A '97. Made it to 265k before it was too rusty.

Second 4runner had 80,000, a '99. I flew to Kansas City to get a Texas car. Rarely drive it in winter. I oil the frame.

6 or 7 years ago I flew to NC to get a California RAV4, '99 with 131,000. It's 2WD don't use it in winter. Have a '12 RAV4 AWD bought w/60k for winter. About to get rid of that while it has some value and get something in FL or GA.

[Ron Wenrich]

I have a 2005 Toyota Tacoma with 135k on it.  The frame was replaced 3 yrs ago.  I only put about 5k on per yr.  I thought about a new one, until I checked out the prices and I couldn't get the options on it that I wanted - 4 cyl with stick, at a reasonable price. 

I did check out what was in the used market, and the results came back being a truck like mine with more miles.  Guess I'll keep it and get it detailed, so it looks like new.

We had a 2013 diesel Jetta.  They recalled the car and we had 165k on it.  It was still running good.  We traded for a 2017 Jetta that has only 80k on it.  Looks like we'll be keeping that one for a while. 

[rusticretreater]

2004 Chrysler 300M  250,000
2000 Dodge Dakota 160,000
1996 Subaru Impreza Outback 150,000
2017 Nissan Rogue 80,000

The Dakota is a working truck and I am in the process of repair/maintenance to make it last another 20 years.  I replaced the driveline from the engine back(clutch,trans,ujoints, diff rebuild) and now have to disassemble the rear of the truck to repair the frame rust.  Big job, but it is preferred over a newer truck with payments, insurance and taxes.

I run synthetics for all the fluids I can.

[barbender]

Ron, my Dad bought a new Toyota 8-10 years ago. He had a heck of a time, as he wanted a 2wd 4 cylinder manual. I think he wanted a standard can too, but couldn't get that even though the truck had to be special ordered.

[Sedgehammer]

Sold 2 mini vans 2 years ago with over 250k on each
Sold my 01 chevy pickup, 6l with 290k last summer
My 04, 8.1L has 167k
The 2013 gmc yukon xl has 150k
Wife's kia niro shows 90k

We just run them till we've gotten our money's worth

Anyone buying new needs to go see a special doc. Prices are just stupid

I've purchased used trucks down here for friends and family up north. That way they can but a nice rust free used vehicle

Here's my 04 



 

 

 

 

[Ianab]

Here's a local 93 Toyota Corolla that's clocked up 2 million kms. ( 1,242,000 miles). 

Toyota Corolla passes two million kilometres in New Zealand - Drive

Gets serviced every 2 weeks, and is on it's 20th cam belt. Original engine and transmission though. Open road running so the engine is running smooth and warm all the time. 

[Walnut Beast]

Cummins is king! Many many Cummins rams in the million mile and high mileage clubs. Here is a guy with a Cummins Ram that has 1.7 million. 160k a year. He said if he changed oil every 3k he would be doing it every week. He changes oil every 10k

https://www.farmshow.com/view_articles.php?a_id=646

[Roundhouse]

I recently remarked to dad, the best thing about buying new is that it allows you to put off car (truck) shopping for a long time. That said, I've only purchased 3 trucks new and many more used before that, and quite a few secondary used trucks since. 
My current daily is a 2013 Tacoma bought new in Jan. 2014 that has 112K on it now. It's been a great truck, as was my '09 Tacoma that preceded it. In driving it year round though I have to keep an eye on the frame. It's covered against replacement until Jan. 2026 should it rust through by then. 
When I had a commute I picked up a 2015 Camry to soak up the miles (60 per day), 28K on that when I bought it in 2018. This allowed me to keep miles and salt off the Tacoma. It was also a great car for teaching a new driver. My eldest has been driving for a year now and the car has north of 80K with many more to go. At that time there was significant savings in buying a car that was "nearly new". Such a savings didn't exist in the realm of trucks.
My other "highway" truck is a 1995 2WD crew cab F350 (7.3L) that I picked up 8 years ago for just under 4000. I was sold on it when I looked underneath and found no rust (it had been a "snowbird" truck taking a camper from MN to TX each year and staying south for the winter) with only 160K on the clock. I do not run it in the winter and it almost always has a loaded trailer behind, equipment or lumber. It does great on the highway, AC, cruise, plenty of power for what I move. It has the opposite problem of a northern truck in that the paint on the roof was flaking off and I've been repainting that this week. A bit of a pain but once I read the new truck threads on here that provided all the motivation I need. It only has about 176K on it now and I remember the time when 100K was considered over the hill, but for a 7.3 with no rust concerns I expect it to be around as long as I need a big truck.
Ironically I have two more trucks with lower mileage than the above but they are "special use".
I bought a 1988 F350 because I wanted/needed a dump for my property. It only had 68K on it. Private owner but it had obviously started out as a "town truck" used for plowing and salting. Ugly rust but the price was right. After the day I bought it and drove it a couple hundred miles to my land it's never been on the road since. Every time I think it's done, I need it again, make a minor repair and it keeps going. It has a pretty fatal frame crack that I've stabilized with a metal bar allowing it to keep making the mile round trip on what I fully expect to be it's last job. Every load dumped is a bonus at this point. 
Most recent is the 1994 F350 flat bed. I have a shortish thread about this one here on the FF. Much better shape than the 1988 but I don't consider this a highway truck either. Only something like 70K on the clock but geared too low for the highway and none of the creature comforts. Without salt, my woods trucks don't even have access to plowed roads in the winter, I expect to get many years out of it for rounding up logs for my sawmill.
I honestly dread being in the market for a daily driver truck again, when the time comes I expect the powertrain options to quite different and my needs could be as well.

[Don P]

I tend to hard mileage over high mileage, but there is nothing from this century on the daily driver list, or the infrequent list either. I get lost after TBI. I can't bring myself to throw away the '80 half ton dodge, set up to plow with posi front and rear. It can do arborist work with the right tires and pull out the concrete truck on the way home. Over a half million miles but its on its 5th engine and 4th tranny. That NP205 is pure stock and has probably run half those miles empty, they built that part. I think I've pretty much changed out everything else at least twice but the rusty sheet metal  :D.

[firefighter ontheside]

We have a '14 Subaru Forester with 223,000 miles.  Its still going strong, but needs oil added before its due for a change.  That's common with these subarus that use really light oil.  I'm sure my wife will put at least 200,000 on her 2020 Forester.  It has 80 now.  I put 189,000 on my last truck.  It was still in great shape, but i needed a one ton.  My neighbor bought the truck from me and I'm sure it has at least 250,000 on it now.  We like to get at least 200,000 on our vehicles, but we don't like to nurse them once they begin to need lots of service.