Great opportunity........or is it.

[noj472 Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close noj472]

Hi everyone,

Need a little advice on this one if possible. 1st time poster btw.

i have a chance of buying a very cheap 05 grande v6 (4,000) but with very high Klms (365k) had a reco engine installed at 180ks.
Car is straight, patchy service history, head unit doesn’t work no 3rd row seats, floppy auto gear stick but drives really well. Air susp has been replaced with coils.
Can anyone tell me I’m nuts or should I jump on it.
It will be a Sunday car but also taking two young ones and wife camping into the bush so some reasonably harsh 4x4ing asked of it.

thanks in advance and absolutely love the info floating around on this forum.

cheers AJ

[Pradosaur Member Find all posts View Profile Close Pradosaur]

If it’s petrol I’d steer clear..

[mjrandom Out of control poster! Find all posts View Profile Close mjrandom]

The V6 is a great engine but does not tolerate poor servicing. Why was the engine changed? If it was a result of the service history and the replacement has been treated the same be wary. Look at the 120 section for other tbings like dashboard cracks and amts might still have parts for the wonky gearshifter.

[Guest Close Guest]

If it’s petrol I’d steer clear..

More reliable than the diesel. and if serviced at correct intervals will see well over half a million kms.

[Tonz Member Find all posts View Profile Close Tonz]

it certainly sounds cheap but if your not mechanically minded enough take it to local mechanic , pay them to give it a good look over , paying attention to that rebuilt engine . The big thing for me was why was the engine changed at 180 k , ??? what the hell happened . they are normally a tough engine . i payed 5k for my 1999 with 265k and i am still happy after two years.
.

[Guest Close Guest]

it certainly sounds cheap but if your not mechanically minded enough take it to local mechanic , pay them to give it a good look over , paying attention to that rebuilt engine . The big thing for me was why was the engine changed at 180 k , ??? what the hell happened . they are normally a tough engine . i payed 5k for my 1999 with 265k and i am still happy after two years.
.

Most likely had a poor service schedule and gummed up the sump leading to oil starvation and boom..

[Tonz Member Find all posts View Profile Close Tonz]

Yeah i guess there are a lot of reasons why a motor can die prematurely. If there is an issue like a radiator leak or oil loss or what ever my miss's would drive it till it stopped , she has done this over the years a number of times . i can say, you should look at the temperature sometimes , and check oil or stop if you here strange noises , but no! ,,,,, she will drive till it stops even with smoke poring out . ...
She will say I don't know what happened ,Then she will say it just stopped. !... so if this prado had a driver like my miss's anything could have happened , and most probably did.
btw im not knocking female drivers , its just that my miss's happens to be one. She is really good at other things, but prolonging the life of a Prado would not be one of her strong points...