'91 Chevy Silverado passes 1-million mile mark.

[Ryan in Maine]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080212/ap_on_fe_st/odd_million_mile_truck

Man's '91 pickup passes the 1M-mile mark
Mon Feb 11, 11:08 PM ET

GRESHAM, Wis. - Frank Oresnik's trusty pickup truck  he calls it "the old girl"  passed the 1 million-mile mark with a camera crew filming the event and a public-radio audience listening in. "I can't tell you how much fun it was," he said. "It was really humbling, all this interest."

Recent news stories told how Oresnik had just 1,200 miles to go before reaching the milestone in the 1991 Chevrolet Silverado that he bought with 41,000 miles on it in 1996 and used in his business, distributing seafood and steaks in the upper Midwest.

At the time, he was getting his latest oil change  the kind of regular maintenance he credits with helping to keep the truck going so long.

He said he's had the truck's oil changed more than 300 times. It's had so many changes that the oil pan drain plug had to be rethreaded several times, he said, and "you never hear of that."

He passed the million-mile mark Friday in southeastern Wisconsin while on his way back home to Catawba, located in the north in Price County, about an hour west of Rhinelander. He was on County Highway V southeast of Fond du Lac.

On hand was a film crew from Chevrolet's public relations and advertising company, and he was speaking live to Robert Siegel, host of National Public Radio's "All Things Considered."

A news crew from CBS had been with him earlier in the day.

"I wont say it was relief ... it was exhilarating," Oresnik said later during a stop in Gresham where he has one of his longtime customers. "This truck has been so dependable over the years." Now that it's made history, the truck could be headed back to the automaker or Shell Oil. Oresnik said there's been some interested in GM or Shell Oil buying it.

Well, I know what I'm going to get when I get a truck. 

I wonder how many vehicles have actually hit 1-million miles. 

[mtnbkr]

There have been others.  I think several are Toyotas.

More important than the odd fluke here and there that get 1mil miles is the average number of miles a larger sample reaches.

Chris

[Ryan in Maine]

Toyota! Not surprised. An old Toyota pick-up was on sale at a dealership a few hours south and I almost considered getting a loan so I could snatch it up for $6000. 

[The Viking]

There's a Volvo P1800 that has more than 2600000 miles under its wheels...

[Ex-MA Hole]

Subaru actually has a million mile club.

Let's see....I do a bit over 30,000 a year, so....only another 31 years to go....

[charby]

I had an 81 Ford Bronco with 275k on it.

[MillCreek]

A few years ago, the New York Times did a story on several Volvos that have passed a million miles and are still going strong.

[The Viking]

A few years ago, the New York Times did a story on several Volvos that have passed a million miles and are still going strong.

Older Volvos are sure ugly bricks, but they run on and on...

[Tallpine]

We were getting some tires put on at a station in Billings, and the owner pointed out a white Chevy van in the shop that had over 600K miles on it.  It was owned by a glass company IIRC and all the maintenance including religious oil changes had been done in that station.

At 215K my 1991 Suburban is just a youngster

[Iain]

I think there is at least one VW Beetle with over 1m on the clock.

[RoadKingLarry]

My '97 1/2 ton Dodge, v6, manual trans, rolled over 210,000 last night. Nothing beyond routine maintenance done to it but it does need a O2 sensor.

[lupinus]

1mil is certainly a bench mark but I'm surprised (ok, maybe not really lol) so many cars have major problems at like 50k miles.

With proper maintenance and just not beating your vehicle to death most would be surprised just how long a lot of models can last.

[Declaration Day]

My '05 Chevy Silverado has been in for warranty repairs nine times.  Most of them were minor but still far too many for a newer truck.  The new Silverado appears to be of much higher quality.  We'll see.

[Bigjake]

Our Vet's truck is a 99 F250/7.3 diesel auto.  It just rolled over 470K this past month.  still runs like a champ, and looks good too.

[Tallpine]

I think there is at least one VW Beetle with over 1m on the clock.

Wow, that's a lot of valve adjustments 

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Mercedes Benz gives grill badges to owners whenever their cars pass 250,000km increments.  There's a cantankerous old German mechanic not far from my old home whom who specializes in maintaining old Benz's and VWs.  I've seen cars in his garage with half a dozen of those badges.  After a while they start to look like ornaments on a Christmas tree.

[Gewehr98]

I was going to say, I've seen many Mercedes on the road with those grill badges.  Most were pristine in appearance, too. 

[mtnbkr]

I think there is at least one VW Beetle with over 1m on the clock.

If it is the same one I'm thinking of, the engine has been rebuilt several times.  The 1mil miles is on the body/suspension, not the engine.

Wow, that's a lot of valve adjustments 

Ain't that the truth.  Though, you can get around that by installing hydraulic lifters.  I didn't bother though, it was pretty easy to adjust the valves and only took me about 10 minutes per side.

With proper maintenance and just not beating your vehicle to death most would be surprised just how long a lot of models can last.

My personal benchmark is that a car has to hit at least 150k miles without a major repair and has to go to at least 200k without becoming a money pit.  So far, only Toyotas have done that for me. 

Chris

[Boomhauer]

636K miles, '92 Chevy Astro van.

No work done on engine or transmission. Only stuff like altenator, waterpump, balljoints replaced.

Drove 120 miles round trip every weekday for several years. Long trips help the engine dry out and warm up properly, leading to better engine life. Oil changes every 3k miles at home, Quaker State 30 weight. When we finally started tearing the engine down after it started giving us major trouble, it was clean as a whistle inside.

Many people think that anything over 100K is high mileage. It isn't. We don't have the money to trade in cars every couple of years for the latest model, so we drive 'em a long time. Last cars we bought were my father's '99 Suburban with 130K miles on it, and my '99 Silverado with 110K miles on it.

[Tallpine]

it was pretty easy to adjust the valves and only took me about 10 minutes per side.

Wow, that's almost as fast as they go out of adjustment 

My wife (fiance) had a VW bug that was itself made out of several salvaged cars before she bought it.  Then she rolled it and I went out and bought another one that needed an engine.  I swapped the motors from the wrecked one and we drove it for a while.  Finally one evening we made a turn and ended up out in a cow pasture - the steering wheel had broke completely off.  The metal in the front of the chassis pan had rusted so that the four bolts holding the front axle pulled completely through, despite the fact that I had replaced them with longer larger bolts with multiple large flat washers.

So I pulled the body from the chassis on both cars and put the good undercarraige under the good body (had to swap the engine back again of course).  There are a lot of bolts holding them together and I never did get them all back in.

All in all, we got almost as many hours of driving out it as I spent working on it.  The most fun was driving the wrecked one around with no doors or glass as a dune buggy for while.

[mfree]

"My personal benchmark is that a car has to hit at least 150k miles without a major repair and has to go to at least 200k without becoming a money pit.  So far, only Toyotas have done that for me.  "

Define major repair.

[Tallpine]

The most expensive thing we have done to our Suburban (215K) is replacing the fuel pump and sending unit in the 40 gallon gas tank - about $500.  But I wouldn't quite call that a "major repair" - something like an engine or transmission rebuild.

Next most expensive thing was re-coring the radiator after it plugged up completely, but I suspect that was a maintenance problem from a previous owner using tap water to mix with the coolant.

Also, we swapped out the factory "automatic" hubs for Warn manual hubs.

I can't remember anything else except for maintenance stuff: tires, batteries, muffler, spark plugs, filters, engine and tranny oil changes, and a starter.  The parts and labor on these older and simpler vehicles is really pretty reasonable.

[mtnbkr]

"My personal benchmark is that a car has to hit at least 150k miles without a major repair and has to go to at least 200k without becoming a money pit.  So far, only Toyotas have done that for me.  "

Define major repair.

Anything that isn't normal wear and tear (such as a clutch) and doesn't leave you stranded or cost hundreds or thouseands of dollars.

This past summer, I had to rebuild the starter in our 4Runner.  The contacts were wearing and it would sometimes fail to spin.  It cost me $50 in parts and about an hour's worth of my labor.  That, to me, isn't major. 

We had an Altima that developed a rear main seal leak at 80k miles.  That's a major repair, especially at the mileage.  My wife had to replace the transmission in her Grand Am well before it hit 100k.  That's another major repair.

Chris

[mfree]

OK... then my Daewoo was well on it's way to passing your benchmark. The only time it was ever in the shop was for a mixed bag of things I had done that ended up costing a little under $1000... changed the parking brake shoes, swapped out the resistor pack in the climate control fan, fixed an oil leak from the oil pump housing, and changed the timing belt.

And then several thousand miles later, around the 97K mark IIRC, I totalled it

[mtnbkr]

Most cars can make it, so it makes the ones that fail to do so especially annoying.

BTW, the starter repair on the 4Runner was past the 150k mark.  That SUV has been so troublefree, I'm afraid I'm going to have it fail all at once one day.

Chris