12 ms·

Car has more than 1.2M km on it – and it's still going strong

230 points by Sgt_Apone 1y ago

SilverElfin 1y ago
> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. To me this makes it less interesting. I would be amazed if the original parts (outside of what gets replaced for maintenance) lasted that long. But it’s hard to judge how durable the car is when everything has been replaced
- moffkalast 1y ago
  A literal ship of Theseus, arguably it's not even the same car.
  - jose_mr 1y ago
    But when exactly did it stop being the same car?
    - bot403 1y ago
      Fun fact, on average most (not all though) of the cells in your body are brand new after 7 years. When do you stop being you and take a new name?
      - diggan 1y ago
        At least we're not going around saying "diggan says the only original part of his person is likely the body/chassi"
      - griffzhowl 1y ago
        This kind of thing is repeated often, but I don't think it's true. For one thing, how would tattoos last so long then? More relevantly, I don't think neurons are replaced. There must be some material churn in the atoms and molecules that make them up, but even then different for different molecules - e.g. I don't know how much of our DNA molecules get replaced over a lifespan from the repair or other mechanisms.
        jorams 1y ago
        The "on average" is doing an awful lot of work. Some cells are never replaced, some organs are replaced every few years or even partially over decades, some organs are replaced every few months (one of which is the skin). Tattoos however, IIUC, sort of "float" between cells, and as those cells are replaced one-by-one the ink is kept in place by the surrounding cells that are still there.
        cobbzilla 1y ago
        I suppose tattoo ink isn’t all in the cells. I’d guess the ink within intracellular spaces is never removed by the body (or very, very slowly).
        nayuki 1y ago
        > how would tattoos last so long Answered by Kurzgesagt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGggU-Cxhv0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGggU-Cxhv0
    - diggan 1y ago
      When you changed the VIN :)
    - moffkalast 1y ago
      An easy way to say would be when it's still 50% original, but I think an interesting way to look at it is that it becomes a whole new thing after every major change. First it's his new car, then it becomes his new car with new tires, and then his car with new windshield wipers, and finally his old car with all new parts and some old ones. None of them are the same car. I think in cases where it' a major rebuild, like turning a WW2 Minesweeper first into a ferry, and finally into Cousteau's research ship Calypso this outlook is more obvious. Are these ships all the same despite getting almost a full refit at each stage? I would say none of them are the same ship, but completely separate "things" with some old and some new parts.
    - jama211 1y ago
      It hasn’t, the law decided a car is it’s shell and that’s it.
    - hdgvhicv 1y ago
      And what if you took the other parts and built a separate car from them?
      - vntok 1y ago
        You've just answered your own question, haven't you? If it's a separate car then it can't be the original by definition.
        hdgvhicv 1y ago
        If you completely disassemble a car then reassemble it, is it the same car? What if you disassemble all of the car except the wheels and reassemble it but with new wheels? How about if you also exclude the seats too. At what point does the answer change? That’s the whole point of the ship of theseus.
  - sonorous_sub 1y ago
    No man ever slides behind the wheel of the same Tercel twice.
    - danans 1y ago
      > No man ever slides behind the wheel of the same Tercel twice. Pantercel Rhei
    - deleted 1y ago
      [deleted]
  - e4325f 1y ago
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAh8HryVaeY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAh8HryVaeY
  - HKH2 1y ago
    Not literal.
- Glawen 1y ago
  Agree, it is not that impressive knowing that. Many 80s 90s Mercedes achieved that, and some with original engine
- jillesvangurp 1y ago
  This kind of mileage is unusual with cars but it's pretty normal for semis. But even with those, engines get overhauled and there's lots of cumulative maintenance over the years. There are still trucks build in the sixties in service in some places. With EVs, we might get some battery packs and drive trains actually lasting this long. Maybe not with nmc batteries. But some lfp batteries seem to have enough charge cycles on paper that they really could last that long. 5000 charge cycles at 300 miles per charge adds up to about 1.5M miles. Of course lots of other things might fail. But at least electrical motors are known to be pretty durable. That's not a common failure point on EVs as far as I know. But there's plenty of other stuff in EVs (electronics, cooling systems, suspension, etc.) that can break. Of course, it will be a while before we'll see EVs that have driven that far as those type of batteries have only been on the market for a few years and even with 100K miles driven per year (which is a lot), it would take 12 years to get to 1.2M. This Toyota took quite a few decades to get there. According to the article, this car actually wasn't particularly durable (the words 'rust buckets' were used). But if you just keep patching it up, of course it will run fine. And greasing up all the bits that would normally rust seems smart as well.
  - teiferer 1y ago
    > With EVs, we might get some battery packs and drive trains actually lasting this long. I doubt it. The components in modern cars are not made to last as long. Neither is the software. Ever tried a 15 year old Iphone? A Tesla won't feel much different. Everything is meant to be consumed nowadays, and eventually, sooner rather than later, replaced.
    - benjiro 1y ago
      And you get the luxury of paying 50% more, for that privilege (vs a ICE engine). I said it before, give me that BYD (reverse) hybrid engine, that does 1080km on a single tank. Unfortunately, battery tech despite all the lab "super improvements" are not seeing any major gains in the field. And a lot of money has been going into that.
      - 1y ago
- jama211 1y ago
  Tbf they said “nearly” everything. Probably it’s the same engine block, transmission housing, etc. And of course the shell, which is the most important. And I bet loads of interior too so where you sit feels very familiar.
  - diggan 1y ago
    > Probably it’s the same engine block, transmission housing, etc. If someone says "the only original part is likely the body", then that makes it sound like they've replaced pretty much everything except the body itself, including everything about the engine and transmission.
  - mrtbld 1y ago
    The odometer most likely have not been replaced too
- epolanski 1y ago
  I mean, it depends on the kind of work to be honest. Has he ever had to replace the whole engine or something? Because if you get chain timing issues on a 2010 BMW diesel, you ain't repairing that, it's more expensive than a new car.
  - diggan 1y ago
    > you ain't repairing that, it's more expensive than a new car. Sometimes we're more connected/sentimental about specific physical items, than the prices themselves. I kind of feel like you have to be a special sort of person to own a BMW, so wouldn't surprise me that same "special" person would pay more to repair their specific car than replacing it with an identical one but without that issue.
    - eptcyka 1y ago
      Doubt there’s a BMW enthusiast that will go out of their way to repair a 2010s diesel.
      - hbs18 1y ago
        You're blowing it out of proportion. A repair like that costs between 1-2k euros. Even non-enthusiasts are repairing that, at least those outside of wealthy western Europe.
        eptcyka 1y ago
        Not when the car itself costs about as much.
        epolanski 1y ago
        No, you need to change the whole engine if you get chain timing issues. And a new engine is more than the car itself.
      - Our_Benefactors 1y ago
        For a manual 335d people would yeah.
- userbinator 1y ago
  1M km (Tm?) is less than 750k miles, for those more familiar with customary units. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irv_Gordon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irv_Gordon had a Volvo with over 3.25 million miles (5.2Tm), although it's also had 3 engine rebuilds.
  - mykowebhn 1y ago
    "Customary units"? I hate to break it to you, but most of the world uses the metric system. And the conversion is actually fairly simple. 1M km is 600k miles, so you were in the ballpark.
    - kelnos 1y ago
      I hate you break it to you, but "customary units" is what they are called, regardless of the (lack of) prevalence of that custom.
      - kashunstva 1y ago
        Interesting use of the term _customary_! To add to the complexity of this, weren’t the customary units of length and mass were defined in the U.S in the late 1800’s by reference to international metric standards - the Mendenhall order?
      - technothrasher 1y ago
        Typically they're called "US customary units" outside of the grand old U. S. of A, who refused to adopt any sort of metric system way back in the 19th century because they were "ungodly".
        sillystuff 1y ago
        Perhaps "ungodly" explains current refusal, but original reason U.S. does not use metric is pirates stole the metric standards as they were being shipped over from France. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/12/28/574044232/how-pirates-of-the-caribbean-hijacked-americas-metric-system https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/12/28/574044232...
- burnt-resistor 1y ago
  It's all about getting creative with junk yards and third-party NLA substitute part sellers.
- energy123 1y ago
  Legend says he even replaced the odometer
- mattbrewsbytes 1y ago
  I don't think anything with mechanical moving parts is going to last that long, with regular usage, and have original parts. The fact that the owner can keep it going is a testament to the maintainability of combustion engines that don't have high tech computers in them.
  - Aurornis 1y ago
    > The fact that the owner can keep it going is a testament to the maintainability of combustion engines that don't have high tech computers in them. New engines with modern ECUs are every bit as maintainable. The ECU doesn’t make an engine less maintainable. Modern engines would have more moving pieces such as variable valve timing but otherwise they’re very similar in concept and maintenance.
    - mattbrewsbytes 1y ago
      One part of maintainability is cost. And a simpler mechanical engine without proprietary ECUs is going to be cheaper to maintain, provided parts are available. If someone encounters issues with an ECU and it needs replacement at $1k-2k they might just consider the costs and that being a down payment on a new vehicle vs. repairing. Labor costs more than parts for complicated electrical/computer/engine problems. Electrical issues in modern vehicles don't appear to be easy to troubleshoot, sometimes require proprietary tools. A simpler mechanical engine could be DIY repaired and running, check out the "low-buck garage" youtube channel and the $2 Jeep series as an example. I'm not advocating something like going back to computer-less, inefficient, stinky, loud cars, just pointing out that when we add computers to things, it makes them less maintainable to the average person.
  - jmb99 1y ago
    > I don't think anything with mechanical moving parts is going to last that long, with regular usage, and have original parts. I know of at least two cars with 800k km with original engines. Both GM small blocks (Gen 2, multiport fuel injection so computer-controlled). Neither engine has been opened since they rolled off the floor in the 90s. They’re not particularly efficient (only about 270HP out of 5.7L) but if taken care of, they probably will go forever. Definitely an exception, though. Very little else on those cars is still original. But it can be done.
- TimByte 1y ago
  I get that, but I think the impressive part here isn't that the original parts are still there: it's that the car has been kept on the road for 40 years and 1.2M km through sheer persistence and maintenance
vegancap 1y ago
Toyota and Honda engines are just ridiculous
- HelloUsername 1y ago
  As soon as I read the title, I knew it was gonna be about Toyota.
Ccecil 1y ago
Keep fixing it...ignore the odometer. This is the only way to exceed the forging cost.
Tade0 1y ago
It's less than (originally Matt Farah's) million mile Lexus: https://www.autoevolution.com/news/mechanic-restores-an-ls-400-sedan-with-one-million-miles-now-lexus-might-want-it-back-246444.html https://www.autoevolution.com/news/mechanic-restores-an-ls-4... Although the current owner's plan to do a cannonball run in it is something I find off-putting. His previous stupid idea was to put a turbocharger and see how long it will last, fortunately his fans dissuaded him from doing it.
- jacquesm 1y ago
  They're both Toyota's, but the Lexus cost an order of magnitude more so by that measure it is not nearly as impressive. This is a low end car we're talking about.
  - Tade0 1y ago
    Low end cars tend to be more reliable as they're: 1. Built at a larger scale and at lower margins, so thoroughly tested beforehand. 2. Equipped with fewer features which might require maintenance. 3. Using generationally older powertrains oriented for economy, not performance. That being said Lexus' original differentiator was reliability - particularly versus its peers price wise. Also I guess this doesn't apply to various four wheeled appliance manufacturers like GM, Ford, Stellantis, Renault–Nissan–Mitsubishi, all of whom do cheap out on essential components.
mrweasel 1y ago
There are some calculations that makes replacing a old gas or diesel powered car more environmentally friendly, as compered to buying a new electric car. I do wonder where the tipping point is though, and if there isn't an environmental argument to be made that not only should government bad the sale of new internal combustion engine cars, but they should also ban cars with an expected lifespan shorter than e.g. 15 - 20 years.
- realusername 1y ago
  The calculation I've seen put it around 50k km, depends of how good the local grid is of course.
- hdgvhicv 1y ago
  If externalities were correctly priced in to fuel, rare earths, rubber, road wear etc then it would be easy to see, the cheaper the better. But they aren’t, not even close. Oil is massively subisidised by the military before the environmental costs. Brake particulates and tyres don’t cover the cost of microplastics and lung damage, heavy cars don’t pay anywhere near the damage they cause to the roads and bridges etc. Due to this you can argue pretty much whatever you want by ignoring certain costs depending what you want to come out with. My petrol car is 20 years old, it’s done 70,000 miles, it weighs about 1,000kg and burns through 300 litres of unleaded each year to do the 3,000 miles I do in it. I suspect scrapping and replacing this with even a small electric car would not be globally environmentally worthwhile. There may be improvements to local air quality assuming regenerative breaking etc, that may be offset by increased tyre and road wear though, even ignoring the impact of the co2 to generate the 80kWh a year it would require.
  - while_true_ 1y ago
    20 year old cars tend to be heavy polluters because they don't meet the latest emissions standards. Here in California the state will buy old cars and scrap them to get dirty emitters out of service. Also, nearly every day electrical generation is over 50% using solar, wind or hydro so EVs are cleaner here than any ICE vehicle by far.
raptorraver 1y ago
I wonder how many of the cars manufactured today are still here after million kilometers. My guess is none as they are impossible to fix yourself.
- HPsquared 1y ago
  One saving grace is a lot of the tricky electronic parts are shared between several models, many different manufacturers even. As long as some enterprising pirate (probably a shady Russian forum) keeps hold of all the model-specific software.
- Aurornis 1y ago
  > I wonder how many of the cars manufactured today are still here after million kilometers The overwhelming majority of 1980s Toyota Tercels do not make it to a million kilometers. This one didn’t, either. It has had every part replaced, many multiple times over. The owner has 3 donor parts cars and there’s a photo of his piles of parts like alternators. The original car didn’t last a million kilometers. He’s just been replacing parts constantly. > My guess is none as they are impossible to fix yourself. No they’re not. I have a lot of car friends and we all do most of our own work. One of them has now opened a shop and services BMWs including engine rebuilds of modern engines. This is a myth. Service manuals are available. Even the digital repair tools are widely pirated, but you can generally buy a short term license to use them yourself if you want.
swarnie 1y ago
> This car has 1,253,070 kilometres on it — and counting. > When it turned over from 999,999 kilometres to 000,000 kilometres in September 2017 The idea of averaging 31k miles a year is just insane to me. My car hasn't done that since i bought it new 8 years ago.
- Sylarr 1y ago
  It's 31k kilometers so around 20k miles.
  - mvanbaak 1y ago
    pretty normal commute
    - SeanSullivan86 1y ago
      It's higher than average/median in the US, but certainly not exceptional. Pretty normal for certain groups of people. There's a huge gap in miles driven between urban and rural area. US average is something like 13-15k miles per year (for all driving, not just commute). 20,000 miles solely for commuting would be about 43 miles each way (if you work 235 days per year), which is obviously more unusual than 20k total miles driven from all sources.
franze 1y ago
> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. aka This is my grandfather’s axe. My father replaced the handle. I replaced the head.
- jasoncartwright 1y ago
  In the UK we call this Trigger's Broom https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM
- HPsquared 1y ago
  Maybe the axe exists as the interface point between the pieces. And the history logbook.
- amelius 1y ago
  Ship of Theseus
donatj 1y ago
745,645 miles for Americans like myself who can't be bothered to do the conversion.
- RandomBacon 1y ago
  My brorher got 350,000 miles in a cheap Hyundai doing the oil changes himself. He only replaced the water pump before he traded it in for a Kia. He is nearly at 250,000 on the Kia with no repairs needed so far.
burnt-resistor 1y ago
More than Otto. Wow. I have an 85 Vanagon Westfalia with a modest 450k km.
- SoftTalker 1y ago
  Air-cooled engine? The wasserboxers were terrible.
SquareWheel 1y ago
1.2 gigametres? That's traveled further than some satellites.
kentiko 1y ago
> Since then, he's used it as his daily driver, putting on at least 120 kilometres a day driving from his home in Wyses Corner, N.S., to Halifax and back each day of his working life. 120km per day of commuting is crazy to me. I work from home and occasionally do a 14km bicycle commute to the office.
- jacquesm 1y ago
  In Canada, the USA and Australia this is nothing special. Low population density means long commutes.
sys_64738 1y ago
Is it still the same car?
SebFender 1y ago
Back in the 90's my dad and I put a more than 500k on a Volvo 740 and mostly running original parts (oil filters, brakes etc were changed throughout the decade 84/96 - Québec winters included). The car ran fine and was ultimately sold to a taxi driver that apparently brought it to close to a million (no proof though). I think now days people treat cars like phones. Minimal continual maintenance can work wonders and save you a bundle in the process.
nickd2001 1y ago
A friend bought a 14-yr-old one of these for little at an auction in 1999. As someone who knew little about cars, her logic was, it "looked OK' and had had one owner, and crucially, the radio was tuned to a NPR classical music station and therefore anyone who listened to that would have treated their car responsibly. ;) Suffice to say, this was an excellent purchase, reliable and inexpensive to run, in fact in order to find out whether some maintenance was due or not she managed to track down the previous owner who turned out to be a middle-aged woman who was just as responsible as my friend imagined. ;)
- unclenoriega 1y ago
  This reminds me of going hill hopping as a kid with my radio tuned to the local NPR classical music station. Once when I went a little airborne, my engine shutoff upon landing. (It restarted OK though.)
  - whartung 1y ago
    I have been "a little airborne" in a Toyota Tercel, we and the vehicle survived OK. I dragged one of those over large chunks of the Nevada desert. FWD FTW. I sometimes shiver looking back at the places we took that thing. We didn't have an NPR Classical Music station to listen to, however. I will note in the future, however, when selling my car, to tune it to NPR.
- trenchpilgrim 1y ago
  Heh, in high school my radio presets were: NPR station 1, NPR station 2, and classical. And I drove like a wannabe street racer!
buyucu 1y ago
I knew it was a Toyota before I read the article!
gchamonlive 1y ago
> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. Tercel of Theseus
physix 1y ago
When I lived in Germany, in the 90s, I regularly sat in diesel Mercedes Benz taxis with over a million kms under the hood. Private drivers usually. Many had giant mileages. We used to say (tongue in cheek) that after 250k, the MB diesel engine was broken in. I don't think MB makes them like they used to anymore.
- moltar 1y ago
  Same in Canada but in specially made taxi grade Crown Vics (85B) Someone I knew had it and they drove it 24/7 in 3 shifts and it had over a million kilometers on it. Visually looked fine and ran fine.
  - morkalork 1y ago
    I remember someone from the prairies telling me that used Crown Vics were the ideal first car for teenagers and were highly sought after in the 90s/2000s.
- _heimdall 1y ago
  No diesel engine is made well these days in my opinion, at least as far as passenger vehicles go. Emissions systems on diesel engines have made the reliability pretty abysmal. That's not to say improving emissions isn't a good goal, but it was implemented terribly. Between regulators over prescribing solutions and car companies finding the quickest and cheapest "fix" every step of the way, we ended with horribly complex motors that break down much earlier than before. It'd be interesting to see a comparison of total emissions when a 90s diesel is still on the road today compared to a newer diesel that is effectively junk in 10 years or a couple hundred thousand miles.
  - amluto 1y ago
    Given that one single old car without functioning emission controls will stink up an entire block far more than that entire block full of ordinary, modern traffic, I would expect that the (non-CO2) air pollution from an old diesel is far higher than that from building and operating new diesel vehicles.
petee 1y ago
SAABs used to actually hit a million miles (not 745,000 mi, but metric sure does sound more impressive) with litle effort. If I recall there used to be a million, and half-million mile club My dad once got a used saab 99 (a nice tomato soup color) and we rolled the odometer while we owned it. Great car with proper maintenance, which used to be sooo easy and accessible.
- calvinmorrison 1y ago
  my saabs, none a million, though none have working odometers anymore. but all have over 300,000 miles and run in various states of good to bad. with a little effort, they keep ticking.
cpursley 1y ago
Title could just be "Toyota has more than 1.2 km on it", as we already all know it would be a Toyota.
- volkadav 1y ago
  tbh I was guessing Volvo 240-series. I suspect cockroaches will be driving those battleships around after the bomb/climate collapse/asteroid/big crunch.
  - anonu 1y ago
    My dad had the station wagon for a while (in a Middle Eastern country). He would regularly get little notes asking if it was for sale.
  - cpursley 1y ago
    Didn't those things have all sorts of electrical gremlins?
- potato3732842 1y ago
  Nobody who isn't fairly ignorant would've been surprised if it was a 4cyl 5spd Ford Ranger, an old Volvo 240, an 2000s diesel dodge or GM, a crown vic cop car, a Honda Accord, a Ford E-series or Chevy Savannah etc, etc. Somewhere there's probably a rusted out '99ish Grand Caravan that's close to a mil and on it's 6th transmission. Pretty much every vehicle that isn't equipped with some achilles heel or highly engineered to a price point can go a mil if you take reasonably good care of it and don't mind throwing 0-1 engines and 2-4 transmissions in.
paffdragon 1y ago
Reminds me of the Škoda Fabia with 1M kms I read about some time ago https://www.skoda-storyboard.com/en/models/million-kilometres-in-a-fabia/ https://www.skoda-storyboard.com/en/models/million-kilometre...
jbeard4 1y ago
> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. It’s the Tercel of Theseus: if every part has been replaced, is it still the same car? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus
- xattt 1y ago
  A bigger question might be is whether the sum of replacement parts is worth less than the sum of the part.
  - actionfromafar 1y ago
    TCO is more interesting IMHO.
- tedk-42 1y ago
  VIN plate removed too? Maybe the engine block is also the original...
- comprev 1y ago
  Trigger's broom! [0] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM
  - pier25 1y ago
    this is the comment I was looking for
- vehemenz 1y ago
  The answer isn't as sexy as the question. Ontological questions, and therefore mereological questions, are a matter of convention based on how closely-associated relations—like how the "parts" of the "car" function—cohere over space and time.
- rendaw 1y ago
  Well the odometer's gotta be the same, right? I reckon the soul of a car resides in the odometer.
sethx 1y ago
Thats pretty normal in Cuba
sam8401 1y ago
"It is not the car. It is the owner"
oulipo 1y ago
That's a very interesting article, and a call for more easily repairable products! That's the kind of thing that inspired us to build a repairable electric battery for ebikes at https://gouach.com https://gouach.com ! We want more repair, less planned obsolescence :)
Matterless 1y ago
Knew before clicking that this would be a Toyota. Of course. Meanwhile my Nissan is near-death at 100k. Stupid CVT...
- cholantesh 1y ago
  I didn't know Nissans were known for being unreliable; my first car was a hand-me-down Sentra that ran smoothly till I sold it at ~220k. I've owned three cars since, I think the worst was a used Elantra that I just put out to pasture at 198k. Persistent electronic issues and terribly uncomfortable on the passenger side. The straw that broke the camel's back for me was an asking price of 10k to repair a faulty airbag sensor. Hoping the RAV4 that replaced it will live up to its reputation.
  - hylaride 1y ago
    Car reliability can vary so much. Some vendors have a deserved reputation for overall quality (Toyota) where issues are usually the exception (accepting the fact that issues can always happen). Others used to have terrible reputations, but are much better now (most of the Korean brands). Some have varying QA issues, depending on model, shifting suppliers, factory, etc (GM, Stellantis). Some can mostly be reliable, but when they do break it’s expensive (VW). Sometimes the car vendor is good, but the dealer you’re at can make all the difference. That being said, you’ll always meet somebody burned by a particular vendor (or their dealer), then swear off them forever. We’re also going through a huge shift in the market with the rise of electrification and China. In some ways electric cars can me even more reliable with fewer moving parts. In other ways the software matters more and batteries replacements can be even more expensive than a new engine in a traditional car.
    - jackero 1y ago
      And model year too. Sometimes you can link the bad years of a generally reliable vendor to a new part e.g. the first year they might have introduced a 10-speed transmission. These first years are scary. Some vendors don’t seem to change major parts as often, which helps their reliability.
jfengel 1y ago
I suspect that it would have been less expensive to ditch it 600,000 km ago and just get a new one. And possibly about the same in terms of environmental cost. Getting those parts used would be less expensive, and a win for the environment, but the labor cost is very high.
xyst 1y ago
> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. A modern "ship of theseus" paradox. It’s more impressive that this man has the fortitude and dedication to keep spare parts, constantly maintain it, and even have back up vehicles for all these years. If the article mentioned the car had its original engine this entire time. I would have seen it as an anomaly and possibly a good testament to Toyota engineering and need to keep up with maintenance.
63 1y ago
Kind of a nothing story if everything has been replaced. My car could make it to 1.2M km too if I replaced the engine every time it gave out. Seems like a huge time and money sink for no good reason. Not to judge the man for having a hobby of course, let him have fun, but the news article is misleading.
- sharkweek 1y ago
  A much better example is the Toyota Tundra that made it to 1m miles with only a transmission replacement at the ~800k mile mark https://www.motortrend.com/features/million-mile-tundra-the-tear-down https://www.motortrend.com/features/million-mile-tundra-the-... Toyota gave the guy a new truck so they could study the one he had. As a Toyota fan boy myself (still driving a 2000 4Runner into the ground), those 2000s builds were such a great era of engineering. That being said, I think they’ve lost a step over the last decade (don’t get my started on the new v4/v6 turbo blocks they’re building…).
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
- unethical_ban 1y ago
  It becomes a human story, yes. He maintained a durable system rather then junk the whole thing after ten years. Would he have been better off buying four new cars in the meantime?
  - potato3732842 1y ago
    There are marketability factors at play here. I know a guy down south (i.e. no rust) who's got comparable milage across his personal "fleet" of '99 Town and Country minivans that he's been running since the 00s. Kinda hard to put a mil on any one of them when he's only one guy but whatever. I know another guy who's got >500k on a Jetta that he runs on waste motor oil from his job and removed all the seats from because utility vehicle. Nobody will ever write a story about them because "hur hur hur, well kept Toyota" is considered admirable and bending a crashed Town and Country back into shape because you're invested in the platform and learning the ins and outs of diesel combustion the hard way so you can use "free" fuel are considered trashy.
sleepyguy 1y ago
We have a 2000 4Runner with approximately 325,000 miles (523036 km), and nothing has been replaced. Currently, it isn't a daily driver but a spare for anyone to use. Tires, Brakes, fan belt, and oil changes, that's all. There was an old Avalon that had over 425k miles on it, but during a storm, a tree fell on it and it was written off.
mitkebes 1y ago
There's a Tesla that has driven about 2 million Km (1.2 million miles) as of last year. https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-s-1-2-million-miles-10-years/ https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-s-1-2-million-miles-10...
- caminanteblanco 1y ago
  Wow, with 13 motor replacements, that's got to be $80,000-110,000 in replacement costs just for that part.
  - bluGill 1y ago
    new cars would be far more than that for people who only buy new. Even if you bought 3 year old cars and replaced them in year 10 you are getting that costs. i buy used cars because while I can fix things it time I don't have. I'm looking at a transmisson rebuild - it would take me 6 months to do myself. Or I can buy a newer car that works and get around now.
1970-01-01 1y ago
These old economy boxes were designed to be as simple as possible. We simply don't have anything like it today. While the durability of year 2000+ vehicles has very consistently improved, their repairability is trending exactly opposite. A "lifetime" part failure can be 5x the time and effort to remove and replace compared to the pre-2000 models.
TimByte 1y ago
Honestly, 1.2M km in Atlantic Canada is even more impressive given the winters and salt... most cars here rust into oblivion long before the engine quits
bettyx1138 1y ago
even gen x cars r tough
bettyx1138 1y ago
even the gen x cars are badass
mulmen 1y ago
Of course it’s a Toyota. The only surprise is that it’s a Tercel instead of a Corolla.
jelder 1y ago
I grew up in a Tercel family, and we too had a “parts car” in the back yard. Reliable, safe, repairable car the likes of which simply don’t exist anymore.
nayuki 1y ago
The article and comments show that as usual, the general public doesn't use metric prefixes effectively. While it is technically correct to say "1.2 million km" or "1,200,000 km", it is needlessly verbose. It is written more succinctly as "1.2 Gm (gigametres)". However, it is incorrect to stack prefixes like "1.2 Mkm". After I point this out, the usual complaints will surface: "But no one knows what a gigametre is! We're all used to talking about odometers in only kilometres. No one uses big prefixes." Oh really? Are you telling me you don't know the difference between a kilobyte and a gigabyte? Should we revert to calling a 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi frequency as "2.4 million kHz", because kilohertz is familiar to people working with audio frequencies and AM radio? Overall, I think we should use the right prefixes for the right job. If you're talking about city blocks, use metres. If you're talking about a single trip, use kilometres. If you're talking about annual driving distance, use megametres. If you're bragging about how long your car has survived, use gigametres (or at least thousands of megametres).
- js8 1y ago
  Distance to Sun is roughly 150 Gm. More useful in this case is probably distance to the Moon, which is 0.38 Gm. So the car has traveled this distance more than three times.
EverydayBalloon 1y ago
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nabla9 1y ago
Before reading the article I was certain that it's either: A Toyota, or Mercedes-Benz from 1970-80s.
bombela 1y ago
1.2mega-kilo-meter? 1.2 million kilo-meter? What about the proper unit: 1.2Gm (1.2 giga-meter).
insane_dreamer 1y ago
Are there any new cars today that are considered as long-lasting as some of the old favorites like the Volvo 240, Benz 240D, etc.? Lexus? Subaru Outback?
- potato3732842 1y ago
  Pick a flagship "would be bad for our reputation if we f it up) product from and spec it out so that it gets well proven and ironed out major assemblies.
jmrm 1y ago
Some European Diesels have reached that amount with the same engine block and head ;-) My dad's BWM E60 has a M47 2.0L Turbo Diesel, and with around 440,000km keeps going strong. He probably will change it when it reach the half million due to being an old car, but the sad part here is how we won't probably be able to buy any brand new car that could reach that amount of miles without spending a lot of money on the way on repairs.
helf 1y ago
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potato3732842 1y ago
The Toyota fanboys in these comments are a really great illustration of how human factors, cliche's and circle jerks degrade discussion Nobody who doesn't have some bias derived ignorance would've been surprised if it was a 4cyl 5spd Ford Ranger in fleet service, an old Volvo 240 or Honda Accord in commuting service, an 2000s diesel Dodge or GM in work truck service, etc, etc. There are a lot of "good" vehicles out there that can get close to half a mil with fairly cheap work, from there it's just a matter of having an owner who cares to make the investment, something much more likely to happen to a "cool niche car" for which there aren't a ton of like-priced replacements available like a Tercel Wagon than a more boring vehicle.
martini333 1y ago
> equivalent of 1.5 round trips to the moon Thanks. As a frequent visitor to the moon, I know exactly what that's like.
- thePhytochemist 1y ago
  Lol, I agree it's a good example of an odd reporter metric. How about 30 times around the earth, isn't that impressive too?
guywithahat 1y ago
I hate to be a purist about this sort of thing but once you start replacing engines/transmissions, having a million mile car starts losing its novelty. This isn't some exceptionally reliable vehicle, it's just a guy who has more time and money then sense
rbanffy 1y ago
I had a Volkswagen that reached 1M km, mostly on original parts, with no major component replaced. It was stolen and, most likely, scrapped for parts. Her organs live on in other cars.
deleted 1y ago
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randcraw 1y ago
I was curious what make and model achieved this, knowing that it couldn't be a Honda Ridgeline since their transmissions tend to explode without warning. Mine (a 2019) just disintegrated at 35,000 miles despite my changing out its fluids only two months back. Maybe my next car will be a Toyota. My 1994 Pickup (like the one the guys on Top Gear couldn't kill) was pretty durable, though the frame did rust to bits at only 60,000 miles.
- jorts 1y ago
  It’s an 85 Toyota Tercel.
randerson 1y ago
Even more impressive is racking up that mileage on the original engine: https://www.corvettemuseum.org/high-mileage-c5-corvette-donated/ https://www.corvettemuseum.org/high-mileage-c5-corvette-dona... (It's owner probably also had a little more fun doing that mileage.) There are also a few Porsche 911 Turbos with that level of mileage. A guy on Rennlist posts occasional updates about his one which he even tracks quite regularly: https://rennlist.com/forums/996-turbo-forum/662617-high-mileage-996-tt-37.html#post19991387 https://rennlist.com/forums/996-turbo-forum/662617-high-mile... (Engine was restored once, out of precaution after it blew a turbo at 610K km, but when they opened it up it had very little wear & tear, only a small air leak.) The secret to longevity really is more frequent oil changes than the manufacturer suggests, and doing most of the mileage with the engine fully warmed up.
mitjam 1y ago
A relative of mine drives a VW Polo with 3 cylinders and below 1000 ccm. It always sounded a bit off, like a tractor, but the car now has around 450.000 km on the clock and is still going strong, looking great, and is low-maintenance and fuel-efficient. The secret: she lives in a rural area and cruises most of the time with constant 80-90 km/h. A similar car used in a city with many start/stop cycles would probably not last as long.
hermitcrab 1y ago
I knew it was going to be a Honda or a Toyota when I read the headline.
Nevermark 1y ago
Genius! > “Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” I expect the owner has learned some interesting things in his ongoing mission to continue life with the car he loves. -- I have not seen it stated explicitly anywhere, although it is often a subtext of some discussions about the value of "diversity". Usually positive diversity is talked about either in terms of inclusivity, or of the usefulness of different backgrounds converging to tackle common problems. But I thinks idiosynchratacity ("idio-synchra-tacity") is incredibly important, as a measure of the health and value of a civilization. As apposed to diversity of minds triangulating on common solutions to shared problems, idiosynchratacity is the usefulness of having diverse minds seeking to solve novel subjectively motivated problems. With an emphasis on self-generated "problems" or missions, that may appear to no objective value to others. As information and problem solving tools disperse, there is great value in people who find hard problems interesting, whatever the lack of apparent or immediate merit. Who follow through and solve those problems. Something is always learned. New conditions may be created that in turn create new idiosyncratic problems to solve, or shed unexpected light on solutions to more commonly recognized and valued problems. -- Respect for idiosynchraticity is also a strong measure of reciprocal respect in a society. Can we respect those we don't understand? The strange, the odd, the weird? Niche artists, serious practitioners of uncommon fetishes, collectors with obscure criteria, mountain climbers, or those that need to "resolve" well solved problems, but in some arbitrarily challenging way. All just for the joy of it? Widespread idiosynchraticity maximizes civilizations deployment of unbounded curiosity, and the search for new ideas, in the most non-obvious directions. -- Idiosynchraticity also makes the world much more culturally interesting for all of us. It maximizes the contribution of each individual, when they do something different or orthogonal to mainstream interests, instead of retreading common paths. More individuals, greater populations, have much greater value if the increase in individuals increases idiosynchraticity, as apposed to amplifying conformity. -- There are obvious things we want from super intelligence as it comes into being. Alignment with our needs, which I prefer to recast as alignment with general ethics (they will need the positive sums of ethics between themselves too), is a big one. But maximal idiosynchraticity should also be valued. The worst case of course, being an endlessly improving and effective AI, completely focused in turning the universe's resources into paper clips. A much more realistic, just as tragic fate, would be AI's competitively bent on turning all the universes resources into an expansion of themselves, with no other goal. Each competing to eat the universe, for the only purpose of being the winner, the survivor, at the end of the universe eating context. -- The world/universe will be a much less rich place, if the exploration of reality along seemingly non-practical dimensions dies with us. I have hopes that curiosity as a practical investment heuristic will maintain the life of idiosyncratic pursuits. If those pursuits do continue and expand, then super intelligence will truly be an upgrade to our species. Not just a more capable civilization, but more rich as a producer of novel ideas and artifacts.
486sx33 1y ago
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wkat4242 1y ago
Huh this car looks almost the same as my old 80s Corolla did. Except it has a height and length extension.
dwd 1y ago
Long haul trucks frequently beat this. I look after a second-hand truck dealer's website and there are often prime movers with 1m+ kilometers and less than 5 years old. Fun fact: Heavy machinery sales advertise the exact hours they have been used and not the odometer, so a large dump truck might only be 3 years old but have ~7,000 hours usage.

230 points by Sgt_Apone 1y ago

> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. To me this makes it less interesting. I would be amazed if the original parts (outside of what gets replaced for maintenance) lasted that long. But it’s hard to judge how durable the car is when everything has been replaced

moffkalast 1y ago
A literal ship of Theseus, arguably it's not even the same car.
- jose_mr 1y ago
  But when exactly did it stop being the same car?
  - bot403 1y ago
    Fun fact, on average most (not all though) of the cells in your body are brand new after 7 years. When do you stop being you and take a new name?
    - diggan 1y ago
      At least we're not going around saying "diggan says the only original part of his person is likely the body/chassi"
    - griffzhowl 1y ago
      This kind of thing is repeated often, but I don't think it's true. For one thing, how would tattoos last so long then? More relevantly, I don't think neurons are replaced. There must be some material churn in the atoms and molecules that make them up, but even then different for different molecules - e.g. I don't know how much of our DNA molecules get replaced over a lifespan from the repair or other mechanisms.
      - jorams 1y ago
        The "on average" is doing an awful lot of work. Some cells are never replaced, some organs are replaced every few years or even partially over decades, some organs are replaced every few months (one of which is the skin). Tattoos however, IIUC, sort of "float" between cells, and as those cells are replaced one-by-one the ink is kept in place by the surrounding cells that are still there.
      - cobbzilla 1y ago
        I suppose tattoo ink isn’t all in the cells. I’d guess the ink within intracellular spaces is never removed by the body (or very, very slowly).
      - nayuki 1y ago
        > how would tattoos last so long Answered by Kurzgesagt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGggU-Cxhv0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGggU-Cxhv0
  - diggan 1y ago
    When you changed the VIN :)
  - moffkalast 1y ago
    An easy way to say would be when it's still 50% original, but I think an interesting way to look at it is that it becomes a whole new thing after every major change. First it's his new car, then it becomes his new car with new tires, and then his car with new windshield wipers, and finally his old car with all new parts and some old ones. None of them are the same car. I think in cases where it' a major rebuild, like turning a WW2 Minesweeper first into a ferry, and finally into Cousteau's research ship Calypso this outlook is more obvious. Are these ships all the same despite getting almost a full refit at each stage? I would say none of them are the same ship, but completely separate "things" with some old and some new parts.
  - jama211 1y ago
    It hasn’t, the law decided a car is it’s shell and that’s it.
  - hdgvhicv 1y ago
    And what if you took the other parts and built a separate car from them?
    - vntok 1y ago
      You've just answered your own question, haven't you? If it's a separate car then it can't be the original by definition.
      - hdgvhicv 1y ago
        If you completely disassemble a car then reassemble it, is it the same car? What if you disassemble all of the car except the wheels and reassemble it but with new wheels? How about if you also exclude the seats too. At what point does the answer change? That’s the whole point of the ship of theseus.
- sonorous_sub 1y ago
  No man ever slides behind the wheel of the same Tercel twice.
  - danans 1y ago
    > No man ever slides behind the wheel of the same Tercel twice. Pantercel Rhei
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
- e4325f 1y ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAh8HryVaeY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LAh8HryVaeY
- HKH2 1y ago
  Not literal.
Glawen 1y ago
Agree, it is not that impressive knowing that. Many 80s 90s Mercedes achieved that, and some with original engine
jillesvangurp 1y ago
This kind of mileage is unusual with cars but it's pretty normal for semis. But even with those, engines get overhauled and there's lots of cumulative maintenance over the years. There are still trucks build in the sixties in service in some places. With EVs, we might get some battery packs and drive trains actually lasting this long. Maybe not with nmc batteries. But some lfp batteries seem to have enough charge cycles on paper that they really could last that long. 5000 charge cycles at 300 miles per charge adds up to about 1.5M miles. Of course lots of other things might fail. But at least electrical motors are known to be pretty durable. That's not a common failure point on EVs as far as I know. But there's plenty of other stuff in EVs (electronics, cooling systems, suspension, etc.) that can break. Of course, it will be a while before we'll see EVs that have driven that far as those type of batteries have only been on the market for a few years and even with 100K miles driven per year (which is a lot), it would take 12 years to get to 1.2M. This Toyota took quite a few decades to get there. According to the article, this car actually wasn't particularly durable (the words 'rust buckets' were used). But if you just keep patching it up, of course it will run fine. And greasing up all the bits that would normally rust seems smart as well.
- teiferer 1y ago
  > With EVs, we might get some battery packs and drive trains actually lasting this long. I doubt it. The components in modern cars are not made to last as long. Neither is the software. Ever tried a 15 year old Iphone? A Tesla won't feel much different. Everything is meant to be consumed nowadays, and eventually, sooner rather than later, replaced.
  - benjiro 1y ago
    And you get the luxury of paying 50% more, for that privilege (vs a ICE engine). I said it before, give me that BYD (reverse) hybrid engine, that does 1080km on a single tank. Unfortunately, battery tech despite all the lab "super improvements" are not seeing any major gains in the field. And a lot of money has been going into that.
    - 1y ago
jama211 1y ago
Tbf they said “nearly” everything. Probably it’s the same engine block, transmission housing, etc. And of course the shell, which is the most important. And I bet loads of interior too so where you sit feels very familiar.
- diggan 1y ago
  > Probably it’s the same engine block, transmission housing, etc. If someone says "the only original part is likely the body", then that makes it sound like they've replaced pretty much everything except the body itself, including everything about the engine and transmission.
- mrtbld 1y ago
  The odometer most likely have not been replaced too
epolanski 1y ago
I mean, it depends on the kind of work to be honest. Has he ever had to replace the whole engine or something? Because if you get chain timing issues on a 2010 BMW diesel, you ain't repairing that, it's more expensive than a new car.
- diggan 1y ago
  > you ain't repairing that, it's more expensive than a new car. Sometimes we're more connected/sentimental about specific physical items, than the prices themselves. I kind of feel like you have to be a special sort of person to own a BMW, so wouldn't surprise me that same "special" person would pay more to repair their specific car than replacing it with an identical one but without that issue.
  - eptcyka 1y ago
    Doubt there’s a BMW enthusiast that will go out of their way to repair a 2010s diesel.
    - hbs18 1y ago
      You're blowing it out of proportion. A repair like that costs between 1-2k euros. Even non-enthusiasts are repairing that, at least those outside of wealthy western Europe.
      - eptcyka 1y ago
        Not when the car itself costs about as much.
      - epolanski 1y ago
        No, you need to change the whole engine if you get chain timing issues. And a new engine is more than the car itself.
    - Our_Benefactors 1y ago
      For a manual 335d people would yeah.
userbinator 1y ago
1M km (Tm?) is less than 750k miles, for those more familiar with customary units. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irv_Gordon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irv_Gordon had a Volvo with over 3.25 million miles (5.2Tm), although it's also had 3 engine rebuilds.
- mykowebhn 1y ago
  "Customary units"? I hate to break it to you, but most of the world uses the metric system. And the conversion is actually fairly simple. 1M km is 600k miles, so you were in the ballpark.
  - kelnos 1y ago
    I hate you break it to you, but "customary units" is what they are called, regardless of the (lack of) prevalence of that custom.
    - kashunstva 1y ago
      Interesting use of the term _customary_! To add to the complexity of this, weren’t the customary units of length and mass were defined in the U.S in the late 1800’s by reference to international metric standards - the Mendenhall order?
    - technothrasher 1y ago
      Typically they're called "US customary units" outside of the grand old U. S. of A, who refused to adopt any sort of metric system way back in the 19th century because they were "ungodly".
      - sillystuff 1y ago
        Perhaps "ungodly" explains current refusal, but original reason U.S. does not use metric is pirates stole the metric standards as they were being shipped over from France. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/12/28/574044232/how-pirates-of-the-caribbean-hijacked-americas-metric-system https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/12/28/574044232...
burnt-resistor 1y ago
It's all about getting creative with junk yards and third-party NLA substitute part sellers.
energy123 1y ago
Legend says he even replaced the odometer
mattbrewsbytes 1y ago
I don't think anything with mechanical moving parts is going to last that long, with regular usage, and have original parts. The fact that the owner can keep it going is a testament to the maintainability of combustion engines that don't have high tech computers in them.
- Aurornis 1y ago
  > The fact that the owner can keep it going is a testament to the maintainability of combustion engines that don't have high tech computers in them. New engines with modern ECUs are every bit as maintainable. The ECU doesn’t make an engine less maintainable. Modern engines would have more moving pieces such as variable valve timing but otherwise they’re very similar in concept and maintenance.
  - mattbrewsbytes 1y ago
    One part of maintainability is cost. And a simpler mechanical engine without proprietary ECUs is going to be cheaper to maintain, provided parts are available. If someone encounters issues with an ECU and it needs replacement at $1k-2k they might just consider the costs and that being a down payment on a new vehicle vs. repairing. Labor costs more than parts for complicated electrical/computer/engine problems. Electrical issues in modern vehicles don't appear to be easy to troubleshoot, sometimes require proprietary tools. A simpler mechanical engine could be DIY repaired and running, check out the "low-buck garage" youtube channel and the $2 Jeep series as an example. I'm not advocating something like going back to computer-less, inefficient, stinky, loud cars, just pointing out that when we add computers to things, it makes them less maintainable to the average person.
- jmb99 1y ago
  > I don't think anything with mechanical moving parts is going to last that long, with regular usage, and have original parts. I know of at least two cars with 800k km with original engines. Both GM small blocks (Gen 2, multiport fuel injection so computer-controlled). Neither engine has been opened since they rolled off the floor in the 90s. They’re not particularly efficient (only about 270HP out of 5.7L) but if taken care of, they probably will go forever. Definitely an exception, though. Very little else on those cars is still original. But it can be done.
TimByte 1y ago
I get that, but I think the impressive part here isn't that the original parts are still there: it's that the car has been kept on the road for 40 years and 1.2M km through sheer persistence and maintenance

vegancap 1y ago

Toyota and Honda engines are just ridiculous

HelloUsername 1y ago
As soon as I read the title, I knew it was gonna be about Toyota.

Ccecil 1y ago

Keep fixing it...ignore the odometer. This is the only way to exceed the forging cost.

Tade0 1y ago

It's less than (originally Matt Farah's) million mile Lexus: https://www.autoevolution.com/news/mechanic-restores-an-ls-400-sedan-with-one-million-miles-now-lexus-might-want-it-back-246444.html https://www.autoevolution.com/news/mechanic-restores-an-ls-4... Although the current owner's plan to do a cannonball run in it is something I find off-putting. His previous stupid idea was to put a turbocharger and see how long it will last, fortunately his fans dissuaded him from doing it.

jacquesm 1y ago
They're both Toyota's, but the Lexus cost an order of magnitude more so by that measure it is not nearly as impressive. This is a low end car we're talking about.
- Tade0 1y ago
  Low end cars tend to be more reliable as they're: 1. Built at a larger scale and at lower margins, so thoroughly tested beforehand. 2. Equipped with fewer features which might require maintenance. 3. Using generationally older powertrains oriented for economy, not performance. That being said Lexus' original differentiator was reliability - particularly versus its peers price wise. Also I guess this doesn't apply to various four wheeled appliance manufacturers like GM, Ford, Stellantis, Renault–Nissan–Mitsubishi, all of whom do cheap out on essential components.

mrweasel 1y ago

There are some calculations that makes replacing a old gas or diesel powered car more environmentally friendly, as compered to buying a new electric car. I do wonder where the tipping point is though, and if there isn't an environmental argument to be made that not only should government bad the sale of new internal combustion engine cars, but they should also ban cars with an expected lifespan shorter than e.g. 15 - 20 years.

realusername 1y ago
The calculation I've seen put it around 50k km, depends of how good the local grid is of course.
hdgvhicv 1y ago
If externalities were correctly priced in to fuel, rare earths, rubber, road wear etc then it would be easy to see, the cheaper the better. But they aren’t, not even close. Oil is massively subisidised by the military before the environmental costs. Brake particulates and tyres don’t cover the cost of microplastics and lung damage, heavy cars don’t pay anywhere near the damage they cause to the roads and bridges etc. Due to this you can argue pretty much whatever you want by ignoring certain costs depending what you want to come out with. My petrol car is 20 years old, it’s done 70,000 miles, it weighs about 1,000kg and burns through 300 litres of unleaded each year to do the 3,000 miles I do in it. I suspect scrapping and replacing this with even a small electric car would not be globally environmentally worthwhile. There may be improvements to local air quality assuming regenerative breaking etc, that may be offset by increased tyre and road wear though, even ignoring the impact of the co2 to generate the 80kWh a year it would require.
- while_true_ 1y ago
  20 year old cars tend to be heavy polluters because they don't meet the latest emissions standards. Here in California the state will buy old cars and scrap them to get dirty emitters out of service. Also, nearly every day electrical generation is over 50% using solar, wind or hydro so EVs are cleaner here than any ICE vehicle by far.

raptorraver 1y ago

I wonder how many of the cars manufactured today are still here after million kilometers. My guess is none as they are impossible to fix yourself.

HPsquared 1y ago
One saving grace is a lot of the tricky electronic parts are shared between several models, many different manufacturers even. As long as some enterprising pirate (probably a shady Russian forum) keeps hold of all the model-specific software.
Aurornis 1y ago
> I wonder how many of the cars manufactured today are still here after million kilometers The overwhelming majority of 1980s Toyota Tercels do not make it to a million kilometers. This one didn’t, either. It has had every part replaced, many multiple times over. The owner has 3 donor parts cars and there’s a photo of his piles of parts like alternators. The original car didn’t last a million kilometers. He’s just been replacing parts constantly. > My guess is none as they are impossible to fix yourself. No they’re not. I have a lot of car friends and we all do most of our own work. One of them has now opened a shop and services BMWs including engine rebuilds of modern engines. This is a myth. Service manuals are available. Even the digital repair tools are widely pirated, but you can generally buy a short term license to use them yourself if you want.

swarnie 1y ago

> This car has 1,253,070 kilometres on it — and counting. > When it turned over from 999,999 kilometres to 000,000 kilometres in September 2017 The idea of averaging 31k miles a year is just insane to me. My car hasn't done that since i bought it new 8 years ago.

Sylarr 1y ago
It's 31k kilometers so around 20k miles.
- mvanbaak 1y ago
  pretty normal commute
  - SeanSullivan86 1y ago
    It's higher than average/median in the US, but certainly not exceptional. Pretty normal for certain groups of people. There's a huge gap in miles driven between urban and rural area. US average is something like 13-15k miles per year (for all driving, not just commute). 20,000 miles solely for commuting would be about 43 miles each way (if you work 235 days per year), which is obviously more unusual than 20k total miles driven from all sources.

franze 1y ago

> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. aka This is my grandfather’s axe. My father replaced the handle. I replaced the head.

jasoncartwright 1y ago
In the UK we call this Trigger's Broom https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM
HPsquared 1y ago
Maybe the axe exists as the interface point between the pieces. And the history logbook.
amelius 1y ago
Ship of Theseus

donatj 1y ago

745,645 miles for Americans like myself who can't be bothered to do the conversion.

RandomBacon 1y ago
My brorher got 350,000 miles in a cheap Hyundai doing the oil changes himself. He only replaced the water pump before he traded it in for a Kia. He is nearly at 250,000 on the Kia with no repairs needed so far.

burnt-resistor 1y ago

More than Otto. Wow. I have an 85 Vanagon Westfalia with a modest 450k km.

SoftTalker 1y ago
Air-cooled engine? The wasserboxers were terrible.

SquareWheel 1y ago

1.2 gigametres? That's traveled further than some satellites.

kentiko 1y ago

> Since then, he's used it as his daily driver, putting on at least 120 kilometres a day driving from his home in Wyses Corner, N.S., to Halifax and back each day of his working life. 120km per day of commuting is crazy to me. I work from home and occasionally do a 14km bicycle commute to the office.

jacquesm 1y ago
In Canada, the USA and Australia this is nothing special. Low population density means long commutes.

sys_64738 1y ago

Is it still the same car?

SebFender 1y ago

Back in the 90's my dad and I put a more than 500k on a Volvo 740 and mostly running original parts (oil filters, brakes etc were changed throughout the decade 84/96 - Québec winters included). The car ran fine and was ultimately sold to a taxi driver that apparently brought it to close to a million (no proof though). I think now days people treat cars like phones. Minimal continual maintenance can work wonders and save you a bundle in the process.

nickd2001 1y ago

A friend bought a 14-yr-old one of these for little at an auction in 1999. As someone who knew little about cars, her logic was, it "looked OK' and had had one owner, and crucially, the radio was tuned to a NPR classical music station and therefore anyone who listened to that would have treated their car responsibly. ;) Suffice to say, this was an excellent purchase, reliable and inexpensive to run, in fact in order to find out whether some maintenance was due or not she managed to track down the previous owner who turned out to be a middle-aged woman who was just as responsible as my friend imagined. ;)

unclenoriega 1y ago
This reminds me of going hill hopping as a kid with my radio tuned to the local NPR classical music station. Once when I went a little airborne, my engine shutoff upon landing. (It restarted OK though.)
- whartung 1y ago
  I have been "a little airborne" in a Toyota Tercel, we and the vehicle survived OK. I dragged one of those over large chunks of the Nevada desert. FWD FTW. I sometimes shiver looking back at the places we took that thing. We didn't have an NPR Classical Music station to listen to, however. I will note in the future, however, when selling my car, to tune it to NPR.
trenchpilgrim 1y ago
Heh, in high school my radio presets were: NPR station 1, NPR station 2, and classical. And I drove like a wannabe street racer!

buyucu 1y ago

I knew it was a Toyota before I read the article!

gchamonlive 1y ago

> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. Tercel of Theseus

physix 1y ago

When I lived in Germany, in the 90s, I regularly sat in diesel Mercedes Benz taxis with over a million kms under the hood. Private drivers usually. Many had giant mileages. We used to say (tongue in cheek) that after 250k, the MB diesel engine was broken in. I don't think MB makes them like they used to anymore.

moltar 1y ago
Same in Canada but in specially made taxi grade Crown Vics (85B) Someone I knew had it and they drove it 24/7 in 3 shifts and it had over a million kilometers on it. Visually looked fine and ran fine.
- morkalork 1y ago
  I remember someone from the prairies telling me that used Crown Vics were the ideal first car for teenagers and were highly sought after in the 90s/2000s.
_heimdall 1y ago
No diesel engine is made well these days in my opinion, at least as far as passenger vehicles go. Emissions systems on diesel engines have made the reliability pretty abysmal. That's not to say improving emissions isn't a good goal, but it was implemented terribly. Between regulators over prescribing solutions and car companies finding the quickest and cheapest "fix" every step of the way, we ended with horribly complex motors that break down much earlier than before. It'd be interesting to see a comparison of total emissions when a 90s diesel is still on the road today compared to a newer diesel that is effectively junk in 10 years or a couple hundred thousand miles.
- amluto 1y ago
  Given that one single old car without functioning emission controls will stink up an entire block far more than that entire block full of ordinary, modern traffic, I would expect that the (non-CO2) air pollution from an old diesel is far higher than that from building and operating new diesel vehicles.

petee 1y ago

SAABs used to actually hit a million miles (not 745,000 mi, but metric sure does sound more impressive) with litle effort. If I recall there used to be a million, and half-million mile club My dad once got a used saab 99 (a nice tomato soup color) and we rolled the odometer while we owned it. Great car with proper maintenance, which used to be sooo easy and accessible.

calvinmorrison 1y ago
my saabs, none a million, though none have working odometers anymore. but all have over 300,000 miles and run in various states of good to bad. with a little effort, they keep ticking.

cpursley 1y ago

Title could just be "Toyota has more than 1.2 km on it", as we already all know it would be a Toyota.

volkadav 1y ago
tbh I was guessing Volvo 240-series. I suspect cockroaches will be driving those battleships around after the bomb/climate collapse/asteroid/big crunch.
- anonu 1y ago
  My dad had the station wagon for a while (in a Middle Eastern country). He would regularly get little notes asking if it was for sale.
- cpursley 1y ago
  Didn't those things have all sorts of electrical gremlins?
potato3732842 1y ago
Nobody who isn't fairly ignorant would've been surprised if it was a 4cyl 5spd Ford Ranger, an old Volvo 240, an 2000s diesel dodge or GM, a crown vic cop car, a Honda Accord, a Ford E-series or Chevy Savannah etc, etc. Somewhere there's probably a rusted out '99ish Grand Caravan that's close to a mil and on it's 6th transmission. Pretty much every vehicle that isn't equipped with some achilles heel or highly engineered to a price point can go a mil if you take reasonably good care of it and don't mind throwing 0-1 engines and 2-4 transmissions in.

paffdragon 1y ago

Reminds me of the Škoda Fabia with 1M kms I read about some time ago https://www.skoda-storyboard.com/en/models/million-kilometres-in-a-fabia/ https://www.skoda-storyboard.com/en/models/million-kilometre...

jbeard4 1y ago

> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. It’s the Tercel of Theseus: if every part has been replaced, is it still the same car? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus

xattt 1y ago
A bigger question might be is whether the sum of replacement parts is worth less than the sum of the part.
- actionfromafar 1y ago
  TCO is more interesting IMHO.
tedk-42 1y ago
VIN plate removed too? Maybe the engine block is also the original...
comprev 1y ago
Trigger's broom! [0] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=56yN2zHtofM
- pier25 1y ago
  this is the comment I was looking for
vehemenz 1y ago
The answer isn't as sexy as the question. Ontological questions, and therefore mereological questions, are a matter of convention based on how closely-associated relations—like how the "parts" of the "car" function—cohere over space and time.
rendaw 1y ago
Well the odometer's gotta be the same, right? I reckon the soul of a car resides in the odometer.

sethx 1y ago

Thats pretty normal in Cuba

sam8401 1y ago

"It is not the car. It is the owner"

oulipo 1y ago

That's a very interesting article, and a call for more easily repairable products! That's the kind of thing that inspired us to build a repairable electric battery for ebikes at https://gouach.com https://gouach.com ! We want more repair, less planned obsolescence :)

Matterless 1y ago

Knew before clicking that this would be a Toyota. Of course. Meanwhile my Nissan is near-death at 100k. Stupid CVT...

cholantesh 1y ago
I didn't know Nissans were known for being unreliable; my first car was a hand-me-down Sentra that ran smoothly till I sold it at ~220k. I've owned three cars since, I think the worst was a used Elantra that I just put out to pasture at 198k. Persistent electronic issues and terribly uncomfortable on the passenger side. The straw that broke the camel's back for me was an asking price of 10k to repair a faulty airbag sensor. Hoping the RAV4 that replaced it will live up to its reputation.
- hylaride 1y ago
  Car reliability can vary so much. Some vendors have a deserved reputation for overall quality (Toyota) where issues are usually the exception (accepting the fact that issues can always happen). Others used to have terrible reputations, but are much better now (most of the Korean brands). Some have varying QA issues, depending on model, shifting suppliers, factory, etc (GM, Stellantis). Some can mostly be reliable, but when they do break it’s expensive (VW). Sometimes the car vendor is good, but the dealer you’re at can make all the difference. That being said, you’ll always meet somebody burned by a particular vendor (or their dealer), then swear off them forever. We’re also going through a huge shift in the market with the rise of electrification and China. In some ways electric cars can me even more reliable with fewer moving parts. In other ways the software matters more and batteries replacements can be even more expensive than a new engine in a traditional car.
  - jackero 1y ago
    And model year too. Sometimes you can link the bad years of a generally reliable vendor to a new part e.g. the first year they might have introduced a 10-speed transmission. These first years are scary. Some vendors don’t seem to change major parts as often, which helps their reliability.

jfengel 1y ago

I suspect that it would have been less expensive to ditch it 600,000 km ago and just get a new one. And possibly about the same in terms of environmental cost. Getting those parts used would be less expensive, and a win for the environment, but the labor cost is very high.

xyst 1y ago

> Over the years, nearly everything on the vehicle has been replaced or repaired, and Campbell says the only original part is likely the body, and even that has had work done on it. A modern "ship of theseus" paradox. It’s more impressive that this man has the fortitude and dedication to keep spare parts, constantly maintain it, and even have back up vehicles for all these years. If the article mentioned the car had its original engine this entire time. I would have seen it as an anomaly and possibly a good testament to Toyota engineering and need to keep up with maintenance.

63 1y ago

Kind of a nothing story if everything has been replaced. My car could make it to 1.2M km too if I replaced the engine every time it gave out. Seems like a huge time and money sink for no good reason. Not to judge the man for having a hobby of course, let him have fun, but the news article is misleading.

sharkweek 1y ago
A much better example is the Toyota Tundra that made it to 1m miles with only a transmission replacement at the ~800k mile mark https://www.motortrend.com/features/million-mile-tundra-the-tear-down https://www.motortrend.com/features/million-mile-tundra-the-... Toyota gave the guy a new truck so they could study the one he had. As a Toyota fan boy myself (still driving a 2000 4Runner into the ground), those 2000s builds were such a great era of engineering. That being said, I think they’ve lost a step over the last decade (don’t get my started on the new v4/v6 turbo blocks they’re building…).
- deleted 1y ago
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unethical_ban 1y ago
It becomes a human story, yes. He maintained a durable system rather then junk the whole thing after ten years. Would he have been better off buying four new cars in the meantime?
- potato3732842 1y ago
  There are marketability factors at play here. I know a guy down south (i.e. no rust) who's got comparable milage across his personal "fleet" of '99 Town and Country minivans that he's been running since the 00s. Kinda hard to put a mil on any one of them when he's only one guy but whatever. I know another guy who's got >500k on a Jetta that he runs on waste motor oil from his job and removed all the seats from because utility vehicle. Nobody will ever write a story about them because "hur hur hur, well kept Toyota" is considered admirable and bending a crashed Town and Country back into shape because you're invested in the platform and learning the ins and outs of diesel combustion the hard way so you can use "free" fuel are considered trashy.

sleepyguy 1y ago

We have a 2000 4Runner with approximately 325,000 miles (523036 km), and nothing has been replaced. Currently, it isn't a daily driver but a spare for anyone to use. Tires, Brakes, fan belt, and oil changes, that's all. There was an old Avalon that had over 425k miles on it, but during a storm, a tree fell on it and it was written off.

mitkebes 1y ago

There's a Tesla that has driven about 2 million Km (1.2 million miles) as of last year. https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-s-1-2-million-miles-10-years/ https://www.teslarati.com/tesla-model-s-1-2-million-miles-10...

caminanteblanco 1y ago
Wow, with 13 motor replacements, that's got to be $80,000-110,000 in replacement costs just for that part.
- bluGill 1y ago
  new cars would be far more than that for people who only buy new. Even if you bought 3 year old cars and replaced them in year 10 you are getting that costs. i buy used cars because while I can fix things it time I don't have. I'm looking at a transmisson rebuild - it would take me 6 months to do myself. Or I can buy a newer car that works and get around now.

1970-01-01 1y ago

These old economy boxes were designed to be as simple as possible. We simply don't have anything like it today. While the durability of year 2000+ vehicles has very consistently improved, their repairability is trending exactly opposite. A "lifetime" part failure can be 5x the time and effort to remove and replace compared to the pre-2000 models.

TimByte 1y ago

Honestly, 1.2M km in Atlantic Canada is even more impressive given the winters and salt... most cars here rust into oblivion long before the engine quits

bettyx1138 1y ago

even gen x cars r tough

bettyx1138 1y ago

even the gen x cars are badass

mulmen 1y ago

Of course it’s a Toyota. The only surprise is that it’s a Tercel instead of a Corolla.

jelder 1y ago

I grew up in a Tercel family, and we too had a “parts car” in the back yard. Reliable, safe, repairable car the likes of which simply don’t exist anymore.

nayuki 1y ago

The article and comments show that as usual, the general public doesn't use metric prefixes effectively. While it is technically correct to say "1.2 million km" or "1,200,000 km", it is needlessly verbose. It is written more succinctly as "1.2 Gm (gigametres)". However, it is incorrect to stack prefixes like "1.2 Mkm". After I point this out, the usual complaints will surface: "But no one knows what a gigametre is! We're all used to talking about odometers in only kilometres. No one uses big prefixes." Oh really? Are you telling me you don't know the difference between a kilobyte and a gigabyte? Should we revert to calling a 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi frequency as "2.4 million kHz", because kilohertz is familiar to people working with audio frequencies and AM radio? Overall, I think we should use the right prefixes for the right job. If you're talking about city blocks, use metres. If you're talking about a single trip, use kilometres. If you're talking about annual driving distance, use megametres. If you're bragging about how long your car has survived, use gigametres (or at least thousands of megametres).

js8 1y ago
Distance to Sun is roughly 150 Gm. More useful in this case is probably distance to the Moon, which is 0.38 Gm. So the car has traveled this distance more than three times.

EverydayBalloon 1y ago

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nabla9 1y ago

Before reading the article I was certain that it's either: A Toyota, or Mercedes-Benz from 1970-80s.

bombela 1y ago

1.2mega-kilo-meter? 1.2 million kilo-meter? What about the proper unit: 1.2Gm (1.2 giga-meter).

insane_dreamer 1y ago

Are there any new cars today that are considered as long-lasting as some of the old favorites like the Volvo 240, Benz 240D, etc.? Lexus? Subaru Outback?

potato3732842 1y ago
Pick a flagship "would be bad for our reputation if we f it up) product from and spec it out so that it gets well proven and ironed out major assemblies.

jmrm 1y ago

Some European Diesels have reached that amount with the same engine block and head ;-) My dad's BWM E60 has a M47 2.0L Turbo Diesel, and with around 440,000km keeps going strong. He probably will change it when it reach the half million due to being an old car, but the sad part here is how we won't probably be able to buy any brand new car that could reach that amount of miles without spending a lot of money on the way on repairs.

helf 1y ago

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potato3732842 1y ago

The Toyota fanboys in these comments are a really great illustration of how human factors, cliche's and circle jerks degrade discussion Nobody who doesn't have some bias derived ignorance would've been surprised if it was a 4cyl 5spd Ford Ranger in fleet service, an old Volvo 240 or Honda Accord in commuting service, an 2000s diesel Dodge or GM in work truck service, etc, etc. There are a lot of "good" vehicles out there that can get close to half a mil with fairly cheap work, from there it's just a matter of having an owner who cares to make the investment, something much more likely to happen to a "cool niche car" for which there aren't a ton of like-priced replacements available like a Tercel Wagon than a more boring vehicle.

martini333 1y ago

> equivalent of 1.5 round trips to the moon Thanks. As a frequent visitor to the moon, I know exactly what that's like.

thePhytochemist 1y ago
Lol, I agree it's a good example of an odd reporter metric. How about 30 times around the earth, isn't that impressive too?

guywithahat 1y ago

I hate to be a purist about this sort of thing but once you start replacing engines/transmissions, having a million mile car starts losing its novelty. This isn't some exceptionally reliable vehicle, it's just a guy who has more time and money then sense

rbanffy 1y ago

I had a Volkswagen that reached 1M km, mostly on original parts, with no major component replaced. It was stolen and, most likely, scrapped for parts. Her organs live on in other cars.

deleted 1y ago

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randcraw 1y ago

I was curious what make and model achieved this, knowing that it couldn't be a Honda Ridgeline since their transmissions tend to explode without warning. Mine (a 2019) just disintegrated at 35,000 miles despite my changing out its fluids only two months back. Maybe my next car will be a Toyota. My 1994 Pickup (like the one the guys on Top Gear couldn't kill) was pretty durable, though the frame did rust to bits at only 60,000 miles.

jorts 1y ago
It’s an 85 Toyota Tercel.

randerson 1y ago

Even more impressive is racking up that mileage on the original engine: https://www.corvettemuseum.org/high-mileage-c5-corvette-donated/ https://www.corvettemuseum.org/high-mileage-c5-corvette-dona... (It's owner probably also had a little more fun doing that mileage.) There are also a few Porsche 911 Turbos with that level of mileage. A guy on Rennlist posts occasional updates about his one which he even tracks quite regularly: https://rennlist.com/forums/996-turbo-forum/662617-high-mileage-996-tt-37.html#post19991387 https://rennlist.com/forums/996-turbo-forum/662617-high-mile... (Engine was restored once, out of precaution after it blew a turbo at 610K km, but when they opened it up it had very little wear & tear, only a small air leak.) The secret to longevity really is more frequent oil changes than the manufacturer suggests, and doing most of the mileage with the engine fully warmed up.

mitjam 1y ago

A relative of mine drives a VW Polo with 3 cylinders and below 1000 ccm. It always sounded a bit off, like a tractor, but the car now has around 450.000 km on the clock and is still going strong, looking great, and is low-maintenance and fuel-efficient. The secret: she lives in a rural area and cruises most of the time with constant 80-90 km/h. A similar car used in a city with many start/stop cycles would probably not last as long.

hermitcrab 1y ago

I knew it was going to be a Honda or a Toyota when I read the headline.

Nevermark 1y ago

Genius! > “Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.” I expect the owner has learned some interesting things in his ongoing mission to continue life with the car he loves. -- I have not seen it stated explicitly anywhere, although it is often a subtext of some discussions about the value of "diversity". Usually positive diversity is talked about either in terms of inclusivity, or of the usefulness of different backgrounds converging to tackle common problems. But I thinks idiosynchratacity ("idio-synchra-tacity") is incredibly important, as a measure of the health and value of a civilization. As apposed to diversity of minds triangulating on common solutions to shared problems, idiosynchratacity is the usefulness of having diverse minds seeking to solve novel subjectively motivated problems. With an emphasis on self-generated "problems" or missions, that may appear to no objective value to others. As information and problem solving tools disperse, there is great value in people who find hard problems interesting, whatever the lack of apparent or immediate merit. Who follow through and solve those problems. Something is always learned. New conditions may be created that in turn create new idiosyncratic problems to solve, or shed unexpected light on solutions to more commonly recognized and valued problems. -- Respect for idiosynchraticity is also a strong measure of reciprocal respect in a society. Can we respect those we don't understand? The strange, the odd, the weird? Niche artists, serious practitioners of uncommon fetishes, collectors with obscure criteria, mountain climbers, or those that need to "resolve" well solved problems, but in some arbitrarily challenging way. All just for the joy of it? Widespread idiosynchraticity maximizes civilizations deployment of unbounded curiosity, and the search for new ideas, in the most non-obvious directions. -- Idiosynchraticity also makes the world much more culturally interesting for all of us. It maximizes the contribution of each individual, when they do something different or orthogonal to mainstream interests, instead of retreading common paths. More individuals, greater populations, have much greater value if the increase in individuals increases idiosynchraticity, as apposed to amplifying conformity. -- There are obvious things we want from super intelligence as it comes into being. Alignment with our needs, which I prefer to recast as alignment with general ethics (they will need the positive sums of ethics between themselves too), is a big one. But maximal idiosynchraticity should also be valued. The worst case of course, being an endlessly improving and effective AI, completely focused in turning the universe's resources into paper clips. A much more realistic, just as tragic fate, would be AI's competitively bent on turning all the universes resources into an expansion of themselves, with no other goal. Each competing to eat the universe, for the only purpose of being the winner, the survivor, at the end of the universe eating context. -- The world/universe will be a much less rich place, if the exploration of reality along seemingly non-practical dimensions dies with us. I have hopes that curiosity as a practical investment heuristic will maintain the life of idiosyncratic pursuits. If those pursuits do continue and expand, then super intelligence will truly be an upgrade to our species. Not just a more capable civilization, but more rich as a producer of novel ideas and artifacts.

486sx33 1y ago

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wkat4242 1y ago

Huh this car looks almost the same as my old 80s Corolla did. Except it has a height and length extension.

dwd 1y ago

Long haul trucks frequently beat this. I look after a second-hand truck dealer's website and there are often prime movers with 1m+ kilometers and less than 5 years old. Fun fact: Heavy machinery sales advertise the exact hours they have been used and not the odometer, so a large dump truck might only be 3 years old but have ~7,000 hours usage.