Oh, I agree with you about the Japanese cars - at least in terms of reliability. Here in the Northeast, though, they tended to rust away long before the mechanicals failed.

Agreed!

Huh? This was a unibody sedan. There was no frame.  There is no way a body on frame SUV could have provided better protection than this Altima.

Get ‘em a 2012 coupe with a six speed. Safe, fun, and bullet-proof reliability. Avoid the CVT…

You could get the manual six speed through 2012. They’re bullet-proof…

Beauty’s in the eye of the beholder…

I bought my 2012 Altima coupe in large part because it did well in crash testing. (And the VQV6 from the Maxima.  And the bullet-proof reliability).

If those cars were routinely lasting 250,000 to 300,000 miles like today’s cars, they’d still be on the road.

Yeah.  Older cars were better at surviving crashes.  It was at the expense of the people inside, however.  Given the choice I’d rather it be me who survives a crash, rather than my car…

That rear-ramping lift-back feature is better than a crumple zone!

I called the cops right away. They showed up and took a report and I never heard anything. Six months later I found out that the thief had dumped my tires off in front of my neighbors house and he called the police, who came and got them.

My credit was fine and the seats are nice.  But the VQ V6 is what sold me…

I got my 2012 Altima coupe with the VQ V6 and a six-speed a couple of years ago because I was looking for a cheap sporty coupe with a manual transmission. The Altima coupe is drop-dead gorgeous (especially with the red interior), fantastically reliable, relatively rare (they made fewer than 3000 V6/6MT coupes over…

Last winter, porch pirates stole a brand new set of Bridgestone Blizzaks that TireRack had sent me and left on my front porch.  Could have come in handy for this guy.  And when you steal tires, you know exactly what you’re getting…

Criminally Negligent Homicide is criminal…

Real Chrysler Stock Body?!?

Yeah.  If you’re tooling around in a Focus or Fiesta, you’re at a huge weight advantage.  And you’re not as safe on our roadways now as you were five years ago.

Lol! You think the increased average weight of vehicles on American roads is due to “the need for more safety equipment”? Is that why Ford basically stopped making cars and switched over to pickup trucks and SUVs? For safety reasons?

It’s straight forward, but you’re not supposed to connect black to black.

It’s being restored as we speak.