I'm in the market for an FD and was wondering what type of mileage I should consider. Most of the '93s I've seen are around 100k (more than I'm comfortable with). I know reliability depends on how well the previous owners took care of the car, but what would you guys say as a general rule?

What has your experience been with reliability? I've heard the rotary engine itself is extremely reliable (less moving parts), but the turbos cause a lot of grief.

THANKS

 

I just got my FD yesterday, so take this for what its worth. Mine was a '93, one owner car with 32k miles on all original, all stock parts. The car is in extremely good condition as the guy that owned it REALLY babied the thing. I paid around 19k for it, decent amount over bluebook, but still. Point being, if you look, you can find them with LOW mileage. If you don't wanna drop 20 large on a car though, a remanufactured engine with somewhere in the 20-30k mile range, provided the rest of the vehicle was taken car of well, should do ya just fine. 100k on the car doesn't really mean anything, just that it's been enjoyed.

 

Mileage is not really a very good indicator on these cars. Some of them run to 150K and others die before 50K (even in stock form). It really depends on the modifications, how well it was maintained, and how hard it was driven. In my opinoin, the absolute best case would be to find one with high mileage (or even blown engine) in good condition for a low price. Rebuild the engine and start from scratch. That way you know the exact history of the engine and can maintain / modify it right. It may take extra time to find the right car and to do the rebuild, but in the long run it WILL be worth it. It is a 10 year old car and there is no way to know what has been done to it in the last 10 years...

 

I searched for a couple months and then just got lucky with my find, 24K original miles with basically all realiability mods and def. babied, looks like it just rolled off the show room floor, I am so happy with it! if this is something your serious about just look around and keep your eyes open and don't get too devoted into any one car you see, I looked at and got pretty interested in many cars before I got lucky and found this one

 

Please read the newbie stickie at the top of this forum. Lots of great information there that will help you.