What to look for when buying a 1st gen?
 

I recently totalled my neon daily driver and I am considering getting a protege, possibly a 1st generation because of the low price. Do these have any reliability issues or problems that I need to look out for? What kind of things do I need to look for if I see one at a dealership that I'm interested in? Any help would be greatly appreciated since I'm pretty new at the whole mazda thing and whatever I buy is going to have to be DEAD freaking reliable since I wont have a lot of money to spend on repairs and I wont have much free time at all to fix problems myself.


-jon

well try to get on with the doch design it has a little more power. also if you can check the compression of the engine if it has good compression then its usually a good engine, check the oil make sure its not dirty like it hasn't been changed in a while. if you can take the vavle cover off to check for sludge. other than that they are reliable cars i prefer the manual to the automatic but thats me.

get the protege. They are outstanding cars. They're relatively easy to fix. Whether it's an automatic or 5 speed, if you dont beat on it too much, it should last 300,000 miles or more.

Is a 1992 Mazda Protege DX with 122,000 miles on it worth driving....?

ABSOLUTELY

hell yeah!!!

nope, its time for the demolition derby with it:evilgrin:

A mazda is way more reliable than a dodge NEON. I know I use to own one and my friend did too. It only lasted us 2 years and shits starts falling apart and we got this brand new.

I'm into Honda and still got the Neon for the hell of it. I'd say they look alright plus its really cheap but to compare the reliability of this neon to a Mazda, there's a big difference.

You can get a used first gen protege for $1000-2000 and this is very decent car that comes with A/C n all the good stuff. (LX)
The BP ( 1.8 engine) is very, very reliable and Please dont get this engine confused with the ford motors cuz this is not ford motor at all...

I've had my engine for almost 2 years and when I got it it had 70k miles in it and I drive it hard everyday and I redline it atleast 1-2 times a day. ( I build it for that purpose) I have no complain on this engines its as reliable as the toyota's and honda's that i've had......

Definitely get a MAZDA !!!!!!!!!!!!