Privia N. Reg

[tomsax]

Hi i am Tom from Peterborough U.K. iv just got a N. reg Privia ex condition auto

2.4 and i love it so far are they all very poor on petrol i also smell petrol in the bus??? Also i can feel like a tapping only slight through the accelerator pedal not all the time???. My air con blows warm air> any thoughts please thank you Tom.

[smoftah]

only have a suggestion for the air con. It may need a re-gas to get the cold air back.

Many local garages do this, but I would go to Kwik-fit as they have a good warranty on their re-gas.

Hope this helps

[tomsax]

only have a suggestion for the air con. It may need a re-gas to get the cold air back.

Many local garages do this, but I would go to Kwik-fit as they have a good warranty on their re-gas.

Hope this helps

Yes thanks Tom.

[glenny boy]

i hade 1 as well they are bad on petrol thats why i changed to a lucida diesel dont go to kwik fit for air con ring around

[propnut]

What consumption are you getting?? I may ne able to help you improve it. Well tuned and driven correctly you should get 20 around town and up to 26 on the open road if an automatic and 28 - 30 if its a manual. There are a number of things that wear and contribute to the high consumption.

As for your air con it will depend on whether you have an R12 or R134A system. 1994 was the cutover year so it depends if yours is a 94 or 95 N reg. If its R134A any air con place Kwik Fit included can refill it. If it is R12 you will either need a drop in gas like R49 or you can get a R134A retrofit kit off eBay. I fitted one 2 weeks ago and so far so good.

As for Glenny's comment on the Lucida, yes being diesel they are slightly better on gas but not hugely so and seeing as diesel is more expensive than petrol it sort of cancels itself out. A real advantage of them is they can be run of veg oil either virgin or waste. However waste needs filtering. Also virgin oil in many places is over £1 per litre now and in fact getting close to the price of petrol.

However whilst Previa do, like any car, suffer from blown head gaskets the Lucida's suffer from Cracked heads. To put it into perspective, if you are able to fix a car yourself a gasket job on a Previa will cost you £40 for a gasket set + £20 for a set of head bolts plus your time and effort.

A head on a Lucida will cost from £350 for a reweld to around £850 for a genuine Toyota head. Then you still need to buy gaskets, bolts etc.

Now glenny in another post has spoken about Steelseal, well it like Kseal do a great job. In his opinion it is a permanent fix in my opinion it is a get you home.

My advice stick with the Previa and let's see if we can improve your MPG.

[tomsax]

What consumption are you getting?? I may ne able to help you improve it. Well tuned and driven correctly you should get 20 around town and up to 26 on the open road if an automatic and 28 - 30 if its a manual. There are a number of things that wear and contribute to the high consumption.

As for your air con it will depend on whether you have an R12 or R134A system. 1994 was the cutover year so it depends if yours is a 94 or 95 N reg. If its R134A any air con place Kwik Fit included can refill it. If it is R12 you will either need a drop in gas like R49 or you can get a R134A retrofit kit off Ebay. I fitted one 2 weeks ago and so far so good.

As for Glenny's comment on the Lucida, yes being diesel they are slightly better on gas but not hugely so and seeing as diesel is more expensive than petrol it sort of cancels itself out. A real advantage of them is they can be run of veg oil either virgin or waste. However waste needs filtering. Also virgin oil in many places is over £1 per litre now and in fact getting close to the price of petrol.

However whilst Previa do, like any car, suffer from blown head gaskets the Lucida's suffer from Cracked heads. To put it into perspective, if you are able to fix a car yourself a gasket job on a Previa will cost you £40 for a gasket set + £20 for a set of head bolts plus your time and effort.

A head on a Lucida will cost from £350 for a reweld to around £850 for a genuine Toyota head. Then you still need to buy gaskets, bolts etc.

Now glenny in another post has spoken about Steelseal, well it like Kseal do a great job. In his opinion it is a permanent fix in my opinion it is a get you home.

My advice stick with the Previa and let's see if we can improve your MPG.

Hi propnut, First of all thanks for the in depth reply. well i am getting about 30 miles for £10 its an auto. I dont know much about cars can i ask if the water in the tank should be a greeny colour?? i also get a slight kind of metaly tapping i can feel through the accelerator pedal not all the time ] thank you in advance Tom.

[propnut]

Unfortunately I need you to be a bit more scientific than that. £10 buys you a different amount of fuel depending on where in the UK you are and even which garage you use. You will need to fill the car to the brim, that is right to the very top of the filler cap just to the point where it is about to spill out making sure you are on level ground. Then before you drive off reset your mileometer to 0. When you next fill up do exactly the same, record the exact number of litres of fuel the tank has taken and the mileage recorded. These are the two figures I will need.

As for the tapping you are feeling it could be your SADs bushes. With the car stationary let it idle and then turn on your lights and air con and see if the tapping returns if so it is the sads. If you cannot feel it then the next time you feel it whilst driving again turn on the lights and air con and see if it gets worse.

Lastly, yes your coolant should be green.

Unfortunately you really should try and gain some car knowledge if you intend to own one of these. This is not because they are unreliable, anything but, however they are old and things go wrong with old cars which many times can be avoided with simple maintenance. If you rely on garages you will get raped on repair costs. Because the engine is in the middle of the car many garages will falsely claim it is harder to work on and charge you more for any and every job.

Chilton do a very good workshop manual which is worth buying either off Amazon or eBay. There is a free online version of it but trust me there is no substitute for the paper version, even if it is for something to read whilst on the bog.

As for the smell of fuel it could be coming from the injector rail or cold start injector, the fuel filter, the fuel feeder pipes or in fact from thr filler neck itself. The latter is known to rust through on cars that have not been regularly washed properley underneath. As a result when you fill up your fuel dissappears onto the service station floor. Either way if you are smelling fuel it is being wasted and will be contributing to your high consumption.

[tomsax]

Unfortunately I need you to be a bit more scientific than that. £10 buys you a different amount of fuel depending on where in the UK you are and even which garage you use. You will need to fill the car to the brim, that is right to the very top of the filler cap just to the point where it is about to spill out making sure you are on level ground. Then before you drive off reset your mileometer to 0. When you next fill up do exactly the same, record the exact number of litres of fuel the tank has taken and the mileage recorded. These are the two figures I will need.

As for the tapping you are feeling it could be your SADs bushes. With the car stationary let it idle and then turn on your lights and air con and see if the tapping returns if so it is the sads. If you cannot feel it then the next time you feel it whilst driving again turn on the lights and air con and see if it gets worse.

Lastly, yes your coolant should be green.

Unfortunately you really should try and gain some car knowledge if you intend to own one of these. This is not because they are unreliable, anything but, however they are old and things go wrong with old cars which many times can be avoided with simple maintenance. If you rely on garages you will get raped on repair costs. Because the engine is in the middle of the car many garages will falsely claim it is harder to work on and charge you more for any and every job.

Chilton do a very good workshop manual which is worth buying either off Amazon or Ebay. There is a free online version of it but trust me there is no substitute for the paper version, even if it is for something to read whilst on the bog.

As for the smell of fuel it could be coming from the injector rail or cold start injector, the fuel filter, the fuel feeder pipes or in fact from thr filler neck itself. The latter is known to rust through on cars that have not been regularly washed properley underneath. As a result when you fill up your fuel dissappears onto the service station floor. Either way if you are smelling fuel it is being wasted and will be contributing to your high consumption.

Hi once again thanks for the long reply it will take me a little while to give the 2 figures i am on the sick for the 1st time in 25 yrs and waiting some surgery

so filling up to the top would just be a dream at the moment. But when things are a little better i will come back to you on that if its ok?. as for the rest it all make very good sense and i will take it on board thanks again Tom.

[propnut]

Sorry to hear that you are unwell and hope you get better soon.

Using an assumption of £1.20 per litre which was probably about right when you wrote this £10 would have gotten you 8.33 litres of fuel

If you did 30 miles = 48km

48/8.33 = 5.76 Km/l

5.76Km/l = 16MPG

And this is absolutely atrocious. you should be getting at least 19 - 20MPG around town and between 22 - 26 on the open road. Note these things are big heavy buses don't expect them to be great but certainly they are better than what you are seeing

The most likely causes are

1. A leaden foot: If you have never driven an auto before then perhaps it is your driving style or your O/D is not engaged/working. If the O/D light on the dash is on then you must press in the button on the end of the gear shift.

2. You have too much oil in your transmission or it needs changing. If you feel the box slipping then both could be a problem.

3. You have binding brakes and this is a very common problem with these cars that requires some serious elbow grease and attention to sort out. The sliders on the brake calipers seize up. Personally I prefer to buy new rubbers and if need be sliders and bolts from Toyota and do a refit, but you can clean up the old ones.

4. You have a fuel leak which I think we have already established.

5. The car needs a decent service

6. All of the above.

I have just come back from France with 5 passengers and a seriously laden car. We were averaging 80 - 90 MPH where ever possible both to get to our destination in time and on the way back to be on time for the ferry and I was getting 23MPG so just over 8Km/l. When the car is empty I typically get 26 - 28 although I am a big advocate of coasting. Coasting is the art of using momentum to carry the car forward i.e. down a hill, to a traffic light etc etc which helps enormously. However I did none of this whilst in France so the 23MPG is a true representation of consumption whilst driving with a heavy foot. Just hope I don't get a letter from the Gendarmerie inviting me to make any donations to the French constabulary :D

[tomsax]

Propnut. First of all sorry for taking so long to thank you for your advice [Thank you] i will be getting a service very soon. But its funny to hear you say you just came back from France because for some reason i don't trust taking this lovely on a long run I don't know why [really] its is in almost show room cond it runs very nice and i love it despite fuel economy, but something in the back of my mind is making me doubt her???? ony thing i can say is only sometimes but i can feel through my accelerator pedal and sometimes going round a roundabout a kind of metal y tapping feeling only really if i just gently touch the pedal.?? it does not seem to get worse when turning on the lights/air con Thanks again Tom.

[propnut]

I wouldn't worry about it unless it gets bad which is probably the only time you will really be able to identify what it is. Could be the beginnings of your SAD's bushes but doesn't sound bad.

I trust my car because I have personally redone all the mechanics of it so I know what's in there. I can't comment on yours but can say that as far as I am concerned these cars are very well engineered and if looked after correctly will serve for a very long time. A blown head gasket is probably the biggest thing that will go wrong with them and this is only really likely if the cooling system hasn't been maintained. Unfortunately head gaskets are like the wind you never know when they are going to blow but this is true of any car. Have your car serviced and ask them to flush the cooling system fully. You haven't said what mileage your car has done but they are good for 200K + so don't be concerned taking it to France. I see many UK Previa's and our Diesel cousins, the Estima's, when I am on the continent. The cars are supeb travellers and consumption is not bad on the open road.

[tomsax]

I wouldn't worry about it unless it gets bad which is probably the only time you will really be able to identify what it is. Could be the beginnings of your SAD's bushes but doesn't sound bad.

I trust my car because I have personally redone all the mechanics of it so I know what's in there. I can't comment on yours but can say that as far as I am concerned these cars are very well engineered and if looked after correctly will serve for a very long time. A blown head gasket is probably the biggest thing that will go wrong with them and this is only really likely if the cooling system hasn't been maintained. Unfortunately head gaskets are like the wind you never know when they are going to blow but this is true of any car. Have your car serviced and ask them to flush the cooling system fully. You haven't said what mileage your car has done but they are good for 200K + so don't be concerned taking it to France. I see many UK Previa's and our Diesel cousins, the Estima's, when I am on the continent. The cars are supeb travellers and consumption is not bad on the open road.

Hi Propnut yes i will have it done and flushed cheers oh and its done 85k om an N.

[propnut]

Hi Propnut yes i will have it done and flushed cheers oh and its done 85k om an N.

It's still brand new mate, what are you worried about. Mines on 130K and still going like a Boeing :D

If you ever want to sell it let me know, I have friends who are looking for a decent low mileage one.

[tomsax]

Hi Propnut yes i will have it done and flushed cheers oh and its done 85k om an N.

It's still brand new mate, what are you worried about. Mines on 130K and still going like a Boeing :D

If you ever want to sell it let me know, I have friends who are looking for a decent low mileage one.

you will be the first mate promise speak soon Tom.

[GerryGerry]

As for the smell of fuel it could be coming in fact from the filler neck itself. The latter is known to rust through on cars that have not been regularly washed properley underneath. As a result when you fill up your fuel dissappears onto the service station floor

I have recently purchased an N Reg Previa displaying the symptoms mentioned in the quote. Can someone here tell me what's involved in having the the filler neck repaired/replaced and the approximate cost if I were to ask a local mechanic to do it.

Thanks in advance

Gerry