Help me choose a beater

[IVRY PRL]

I have this list:
Acura Integra - Mid 90's
Acura Legend - Early 90's
BMW 3 Series - Early 90's
BMW 5 Series - Early 90's
Honda Accord - Mid 90's
Honda Civic - EG or EK hatch
Lexus ES300 - Early 90's
Lexus LS400 - Early 90's
Nissan Maxima - Mid 90's
Nissan Altima - Mid 90's
S13
VW Golf - Mid 90's
VW Jetta - Mid 90's

Please let me know anything you may know about the cars on it. The only car that I'm intimately familiar is the S13, having owned one and pretty much dissassembled and re-assembled the whole car. Facts only please, no "buy this b/c it's baller" Good or bad experiences with any of these cars is greatly appreciated.
Also, I'm likely selling the G either next summer, or the summer after, and replacing it with a toy, like an S2000 or a bike, so this beater would become my daily. That's why I'm inclined to pick a good one, since I plan to keep it for a long time.
Thanks!

[Jeff92se]

Daily as in the winter also? Kinda takes out the RWD ones unless you're willing to do dedicated winter tires.

[IVRY PRL]

Yup, winter too, and I would have winter tires even on the FWD ones. Snow gets really bad in Toronto, and while I never used to buy winter tires before, I did last season and my FWD Solara was embarassing SUVs with them. After seeing how dramatic the difference in having proper winter tires is, I'll never go a winter without them.

[Jeff92se]

If I'm judging the price right, I think an older Subaru 2.5RS would be a great choice. AWD, 4 cyl, great MPG, killer snow capabilites

[IVRY PRL]

Sadly, those are a bit more than what I'm looking to spend. I did notice that I could get a Legacy in that price range, so I think I'll add that to the list. How reliable are Subarus anyway?
The cutoff is $3000, but in Canada, that doesn't buy you anywhere as much as it does in the US.

[bull3t]

I'd take the LS400...I had a 1990 LS400 as a beater and that thing had a bulletproof motor...I drove the crap out of it and it never gave me a problem even at 250,000 miles.

[GEE35FX]

Honda Civic

[dmitriylm]

If its strictly a beater, I would also look into the 2001+ Hyundai Accent. I owned an 02 with a 5spd as my first car back in high school (bought with 13k miles for $3700 back in 04) and never had any problems with it. I drove it til 56k miles (in about two years) and sold to a friend who's got it at 80k or so right now with no issues. Great gas mileage, cheap parts and just an overall good beater if you're looking for something frugal. Considering I bought one for $3700 back in 04, they should be below $3000 now. Just as a sign of the times I checked craigslist for pricing, and every single ad says gas saver.

[silverG2007]

If cost is a factor (and it always is with beaters), I'd take the BMW, VW, and Lexus off the list.

Too expensive to fix.

What're your goals though? Fun to drive? Good in snow? Fuel economy? Comfort? Roomy?

If I were going to buy a cheap beater..... a few cars that I'd consider that aren't on the list:

Late 90's Cadillac STS (comfortable, powerful, good looking).
Mazda Miata (fun)
Mustang GT (fun and fast)


From the list: a 90's Maxima SE would be a nice daily driver. Pretty quick, pretty comfortable, not too expensive. Same thing with an Acura Legend. I drove one of those once, it drove great!


90's altima and 90's accord are both totally lame. Might as well buy a Ford Taurus. No fun to drive at all.

[silverG2007]

Something else that you may find in your pricerange: 97 Grand Prix GTP. 240hp supercharged engine, comfortable interior, drives great. Engine is very reliable, electronics.... so so.

[IVRY PRL]

It would start off as a winter car, while I still have the G, and then eventually be upgraded to full daily. All the cars on that list are very different from eachother, and they all have a different appeal to them. I just have to like it in some way, and for it to be kinda moddable. Right now my front runners are the Civic, S13 and LS400. S13, because I had one for a long while, and I'd love to own one again. Civic, because I love a really clean, slammed EG hatch, and LS because the black and gray two tone is just pure hotness.
Like this:
Lowered, and tinted heavily, and it would look amazing (to me anyway)

[BlueDevilBAMF]

I have a 1995 Civic EX coupe 5 spd beater... it rocks

[Wannabe6MT]

Infiniti G20 5spd or an Infiniti i30?

[bull3t]

Originally Posted by IVRY PRL

LS because the black and gray two tone is just pure hotness.
Like this:
Lowered, and tinted heavily, and it would look amazing (to me anyway)

That's a UCF20/21...My dad has the same one...I threw my coupe chrome 18s on his car...I think it has 300hp or around there...It drives real nice, lots

of power and luxurious steering...I think it might be out of your 3k price range unless it has really really high miles.

Here's a pic of my dad's...I think it would look really good with, green tint and exhaust.

[IVRY PRL]

Oh is it? I can only tell them apart from the front, they all look the same to me from the side. I was reading up on them last night, they seem very reliable aside from the power steering, which I'm told fails very often on older, higher mileage cars (so... the one I'd be getting )
I'm also tempted by an Acura Legend, since it seems to have all the toys the LS does, and way better fuel economy, but the Legend just doesn't have the presence that the LS does. The LS, and the old MB S-Class from around the same era, are imo the best VIP platforms. They're just so huge, boxy and menacing.
Pretty much what I'm doing now, is finding forums for all these cars, and reading up on common failures on them. The PS thing on the LS has me a bit scared, since from what I saw, it was an expensive repair, but they also included a very detailed way to check if the PS is bad, so I'll have something to look at when I inspect the car.
I'll be looking into Civics today, what I know so far about them, is rust seems to be their only fault, and they're generally fantastic mechanically/electrically, but I could be wrong.