Before You Buy

The Five Minute Car Check (video)

This short video will show you how to choose a reliable car using a simple five-minute car check.

Types of vehicles: convertibles and sportscars

Types of vehicles: station wagon / estate

Types of vehicle: coupé

Types of vehicle: sedan

Yuppie Four-wheel Drives

They’re an environmental and safety nightmare and their days are numbered.

Forty years ago, four-wheel drives were for farmers, soldiers, hunters and the odd explorer. They were listed in most car guides as commercial vehicles, along with pickup trucks and goods vans. The sight of a four-wheel drive on Main Street simply meant that Farmer Brown had come to town for the day.

The origin of the SUV

Cabriolets & Convertibles

Convertibles are so beautifully impractical that they often remain the domain of the young and the rich, but that doesn’t stop us wanting one.

Japanese Secondhand Imports

For all our concerns, many people have had a great run from Japanese imports.

Few topics have stirred such controversy as imported secondhand Japanese cars. They wiped out New Zealand’s car manufacturing industry and would do the same in Australia if they were ever allowed in en masse.

Types of Vehicles

What do terms like ‘sedan’, ‘kingcab’ & ‘softroader’ mean? Below is a simple, generalised guide. Please note that the pdf version of this article (which you can download for free, above) contains useful silhouette images of each type of vehicle to accompany the descriptions.

Please note also that there is no universal agreement as to what many common vehicle terms actually describe, so we can’t guarantee that everyone will agree with our descriptions or even the names we give types of vehicles. 

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