Toyota Emina 4WD GX

i bought a lucida by accident. i had a 4 door saloon car and i guy showed up and offered me a swap i had a test drive and with my car gave him 150 quid (mind u my car was due for mot in 3 weeks (june) time and road tax in 5 weeks ) so in other words i didn`t had to put my car through mot or tax it. this lucida had tax till 30 of nov and mot till june next year.anyway lucky me. then i started to understand my lucida and everyday i loved it more and more. it really is good on fuel mine is 2.2td. i always put 10 quid fuel each time (1.17p a litre) and next refill is after 74 to 80 miles and the size and seating capacity of this (mine is 8 seater)i think its a gold mine. 75 miles with 8 people and still lots of space left for them to play football what more can you ask for. iam very happy with it and will buy again if this 1 packs up. if anyone can help i was just woundering how do you know if its a 2wd or 4wd. thanks for reading

After expanding our family to three youngsters and regularly hosting students from foreign countries, it was time to get something bigger, i have a 2003 vectra, so i only had limited funds to spend. after trawling ebay and the local papers, i found 3 to look at a lucida, an estima emina 2wd and a 4wd as well, the lucida was dispelled quickly as it sounded like a nail, the 2wd was nice but pretty low spec and hadn't had the problematic cylinder head fixed.

i then went to view the 4wd estima emina on an L plate and was immediately took aback. It was owned by an elderly couple, it had been used to go abroad 3 times a year and looked very tidy. It had had a lot of work done, the head had been replaced, a tow bar fitted a lot of receipts for it. It had a body kit on it and even a spoiler, was fitted with reverse parking sensors and had alloys and sports springs. it was up for £1500, he had only just dropped it down from £2500. so i took it for a test drive and was very happy with it. we started haggling and he was standing strong until i pointed out that it had a damaged tyre, i had seen this as i got out, he dropped the price by £100, i offered him £1300 as i would replace both rear tyres to ensure even wear, and it had a short MOT, eventually he agreed. it failed on emissions so an oil change later i took it back and it flew through. i removed the sports spring as it affected the handling and replaced the 15" alloys with a set of 17" set. so my advice is shop around and you will find a bargain

Plenty of room 7-8 seats luggage space very good better than avarage. compared to other people carriers versatilaty is by far better than most, value for money & seats 8.

The Toyota Emina 4WD GX is a fantastic car and I'd have another later one. I bought mine as a none runner with a broken cam belt. It costs $5000 for the dealer to change a cam belt and it HAS to be done at 100,000km or it will break. The reason it's so expensive is because of the Auxiliary drive shaft that has to be removed. If you take the engine down this far you may as well change the water pump, aux drive couplings and seals. The most common cause of death on these cars is broken cam belt or leaking water pump causing the head to crack. Anyway I fixed mine myself in my garage over a 6 month period using parts from the UK and local wreckers. It cost a fraction of the dealer price and I made sure I rebuilt the turbo charger and cleaned out all the breathers. People just don't look after cars and then wonder why they go horribly wrong. The up-shot of everything is that I think Eminas are really good cars.

We bought our Toyota Emina GX People Carrier middle of 2004. It had done 54,000 miles, We did a lot of shopping around for the right one. we were looking for some sort of service history and certain features. Ours has the J top roof which adds about another 3.5 inches to the hight of the interior. It is a 1995 M plate and was on the forcourt for £5999. We found that we had some bargaining power and was able to get another £1000. off the forcourt price as is pretty standard these days. Check the waranty covers you for parts and labour for a minimum of a month, one of two dealers didn't cover the mechanics of the car only the electrics which is no good, but they were much cheaper about £2000. Cheaper but I would not recomend going their, we went back to the original dealer and he almost matched the price for us to get the sale. Most of the jap imports don't come with a service history but that said ours has had stickers placed on the engine compartment door under the pasenger seat indicating when the services were done, there were also some lables inside the fuel cap door so have a good look around to see if there is any indication anywere. you need to hear the car from stone cold.

We had a Thatcham cat 1 alarm fitted by the dealer which made our insurance much cheeper the alarm cost us £250. fitted, My wife and I are in our late 20s and live in a reasonably good area and pay around £600. a year fully comp with breakdown, legal, and accident recovery thrown in. some of the big names in car insurance couldn't get near to that quoting around £1200. if at all.

The first job we had done was the Camm/Timing Belt as the small print it often reads that if the cam/Timing belt goes this isn't covered by the waranty, but we had no idea when this was done if at all so we had it changed and had it checked over by a Toyota dealer, In heinsight I regret having Toyota do the Cam/Timing belt as it cost us £350. with a serivce as appose to about £150. at a reputable independant garage. Something well known with the Estima Emina/Lucida's is that the Japs didn't change the coolant very often and in some cases at all and this causes overheating and hence blown cylender head so have the collant system flushed through thoroughly reguarly, if your coolant is mucky you need it flushing as this can quickly cause overheating, it cost us £30 We then had the car undersealed as they have no protection against the elements as european cars do. this cost around £80. and I will have it done again every 2 years. We also had it fumigated and valeted to attempt to remove the yellow cigaret smell and stains as a lot of the Japs smoke This cost another £80.

As you can see the money can quickly mount up and a lot of you may not goto the expense we went to but we were looking at a long term investment. If you do nothing else I would advise you change the Cam/Timing belt and reguarly change and flush the coolant through maybe once every 2 months. Toyota recomend an oil change every 5000KM but I would probably do it every 1000 miles but most of my journeys are long distance. We found that the oil needed topping up every 700miles or so when we first got it but now it seems to be approx 1200miles or when we have an oil change. I just put it down to good regular use and propper maintainance.

The major bad point with this car is the weight issue, or lack of it when as a driver you are the only person in the car. In snow and icy weather the rear wheel drive makes it hard to get the beast up any hills and I am very nervous about driving it full stop in snow and ice, even more so now as I have just had a major accident in it relating to this issue and it is now spring time. I caught a patch of deisel just after setting off from a set of lights and only doing 25 mile per hour managed to spin the car 360 degrees and slam the front into the barrier on a motorway slip road, My lesson is that you make sure you put some weight in it when there isn't anyone else in the car, It doesn't take a lot to loose control.

All this said it is such a good car, myself and my wife love it to bits, we have family that cannot drive and we easily have room to go on hols with them and still have plenty of room for the luggage.

Do your homework when you buy one, if your not convinced, drive one, they are very nice.

The Toyota Emina 4WD GX is a great people carrier, the kids loved it. Really versatile with swivelling seats that also turn into a great double bed. Everything works. Unfortunately despite being well serviced and in seemingly good condition, the engine destroyed itself without any warning in the middle of Ireland. The stupid prices quoted forced me to almost give it away. Stick with a Ford.

Toyota Emina 4WD GX 2.2 intercooled turbo diesel people carrier. This is a totally practical vehicle, has a great image and I would recommend it to anybody.

Very ecconomical, 8 seats, loaded with extras and a brill import vehicle.

I have or had the Lucida version of the Toyota Emina 4WD GX people carrier without 4x4. Great fun and use for two years. However, there is not enough known about these vehicles generally which means that servicing misses out checking crucial issues like A/C and cooling system. If these systems go they can end up with head gasket or in my case cylinder head damage. Costs to repair £595 plus vat new/ recon engine. Recommneded £265 + vat radiator to prevent recurrence. (Only told this by supplier I found on internet - my garage didn't know). £700 was quoted for replacing head gasket and skimming heads incl labour and other parts. So be warned.

The Toyota Emina 4WD GX is a Japanese import but there are lots around these days. The Japanese version of the Previa, comes with a diesel engine, automatic box, four wheel drive, eight seats and sun roofs. Under half the price of a Previa and with a better spec. Handling is a bit old fashioned but it works well. Engine pulls like a train, economy not bad (20-30 mpg) for something this size.