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Hi,

Been looking at getting something a bit more offroad dedicated than my L series. Have been looking at the Sierras and the later Feroza II's. Anyone have any experience with these vechiles?

I'd never get rid of my L but having somehting with a real chasis and easier to get off the shelf offroading bits and pieces would be great.

Would be interested to hear from anyone who owns, or has owned one.

Cheers,

Ben

my first car was a suzuki sierra i miss that car every day lol. spent more time off road than on the road and you couldnt kill it, real good car but a bit underpowered

Underpowered Suzuki?

You haven't lived 'till you have driven a LJ50...

25KW of raw POWAR

At the moment I am leaning towards getting a Suzuki I have seen some with the Vitara 1.6 engine transplant for sale and these look awesome. The Daihatsu does still look pretty good though.........

One big plus I'm seeing for the Sierra is the amount of bits that seem to be available.

Both are in the same price bracket though I reckon from looking at ebay + gumtree + trading post I could get one ready to go from $3000 - $4000.

i'd go with the sierra my cuz has one and it goes anywhere, you can put hilux running gear on them, which gives you mad flex

Ask yourself ONE question. Can I rock into my local Daihatsu dealer for those genuine parts? It is a bit like same for your local Daiwoo dealer - your local GM dealer is likely to be able to get you Daiwoo parts on order at full crazy price. And if you miss the point above, I don't think you can buy new Daiwoo or Daihatsu in Australia anymore and not many after markt parts for either.

Vitara had auto boxes in them that were Holden trimatics from memory. Earlier Sierras of the 1.0 were a bit gutless to say the least , off road they are pretty light and nimble negotiators.

Yeah.. Jonno is right about buying parts for Daihatsu but same as Suzuki Sierra parts. Most dealerships want stock parts for the old girls anymore, so it's off to places like Coventrys, Repco, Veales, etc for parts and any of the larger items can be found at most wreckers.

I'm a big fan of the Daihatsu Feroza II because very really do you see them with problems. The HD (1.6) motor in them, is the same as the Applause and Detomaso (my favorite Charade). It's like a Subaru thing.. once you have one, you'll find places like this forum (but for other manufactures) and people come out of the wood work

id go the suzuki according to youtube the 4A-GZE engine transplant is becoming popular... places like suzi sport and gumtree are good for spares

Thanks for the advice so far guys.

Yes the parts issue is a big one. I have friends who work at Bursons and a couple of other auto parts places so it's unlikely I would ever go near a genuine dealer. In the past I had a Nissan R31 Silohouette (I miss it!) and remeber laughing my way out of a Nissan dealership after getting a quote on some parts.

It's more aftermakret stuff I would be chasing anyway like suspension gear and rims/tyres. The L series offset and stud pattern to me is the single most frustrating thing about the car!

I didn't know about the Hilux running gear...... have to look into this.

I have heard mixed things about the Daihatsu 1.6 engine but I have seen some around with huge K's and still running fine. On that point I had two people I work with tell me to never buy a Forester (Which I did anyway) - they both stuffed their engines in 98 and 99 models. What I found out after further questioning is that both of them didn't replace the timing belts at the specified intervals and that's what caused the problems.

Cheers,

Ben

My other car is a 1998 Suzuki Jimny JLX (SN413) one of the first to land in Australia. Because of this it has no air bags or ABS so I can do stuff to it! If I could bring myself to part with it:D, lets just say the Subaru would get all my attention;) Top little fourby easy to work on, just a modernised version of the ol' sierra.

J