Just bought my first car!!

scheek1193 said:

Hey guys! Just bought my first car (always borrowed a family vehicle). Few days ago I bought the 2016 Chevy Cruze LT in Tungsten! Past 3 months I'd been driving a Sonic LT to and from work, 35 miles each way, so a Cruze seemed like a nice upgrade to me!

Click to expand...

spacedout said:

Some of those "stats" are inaccurate for that comparison. The Sonic's optional 1.4T engine has the same horsepower an torque rating as the Cruze in a car that weights almost 400lbs less. Both my cars are stock, 0-60mph is significantly quicker with the sonic almost 10mph faster over the same time. I also find the Sonic much more stable above 75mph, but I think that's due to the larger wheels on my Sonic. Have read numerous reports about how the sonic with smaller wheels gets blown around on the highway and just upgrading to the 17in LTZ wheels greatly increases highway stability.

The sonic is much easier to park in the city, besides having a shorter wheelbase, being a hatchback its another 14in shorter than the sedan so you can zip around slow moving traffic with ease. The cruze drives like a larger car so it does have some advantage with ride quality. Corners I've taken daily in my cruze I can take at much faster speeds(25mph+ faster at times) in the sonic, I suspect some of that is due to the tiny 16in wheels I had on my cruze vs the 17in ones on my sonic. The Sonic is hands down more fun to toss in the corners, something my area of Wisconsin has lots of.

MPG wise they are close, but the Sonic get significantly better city MPG than the cruze, much better than the EPA numbers suggest. EPA claimed 27city, even at 100% city driving I've never gotten under 31mpg. That's a huge advantage, even if I add 10-15% more city driving to my route I still end up at or above the highway MPG rating for the car. I've only had my sonic a few months, I've already had more fill ups above 39MPG than I had over 100K in my cruze. If I fill up , get on the highway and set the cruise in both cars at 60mph, after a few hour drive my cruze would get 38MPG, the sonic 42MPG in summer weather with no AC use. That's 5MPG better than the sonic is rated for on the highway without any hypermiling techniques!

Now would I pay full price for a Sonic LTZ? no freakin way. On the same note I would not buy a cruze LTZ for full price either. Sonic at most is worth about $15K, cruze $22k in my book. Comparing a new 1LT cruze to say an LT sonic, no way I would buy the sonic. Buying my Sonic LTZ used it had already lost that significant chunk of first year value, with my down payment I already owe less than its worth! I was about $4000 in the hole most of the time with my cruze.

I'm sure the OP will greatly enjoy their new Cruze, I know we did and I'm happy it was our first brand new car purchase. After trade in price was deduced from what we originally paid, the Cruze cost us about $260 a month over 48 months and we put 95K on it over that time. Really didn't cost us much more than a lease and we had no mileage limits to worry about.

Click to expand...

MP81 said:

You're comparing a 1st gen Cruze - that comparison was for the 2nd gen, which, mind you, weighs right about the same as the Sonic.

Click to expand...

spacedout said:

Good eye, I did not notice that I though the comparison was to Gen1. Either way I drove the all new Cruze the day I deiced to buy my sonic, the all new cruze has very similar driving characteristics to the Gen1. Nothing wrong with that, I just needed a more city friendly car. Now when the A-hole next to me won't let me merge, I just need to hug up close to the guy in front and I can squeeze this tiny car right in between.

Click to expand...