More rental car reviews

[Adam W in MN]

Can't lock the car without the key, and honking the horn. No interior manual locks, it's all electric and by the car, not the door.

I rented a Jetta last weekend from Alamo and I had this same issue. The horn honking drove me nuts and I did notice there were no physical door locks inside. Once I tried locking the doors with the driver door open by pushing the lock button next to the power window switches, hoping to avoid the horn, but of course it wouldn't allow it because it's smarter than me. I might lock my keys inside.

The car had pretty good power and I could hear some turbo whirring when I got on it. The transmission shifted pretty nicely, too. I certainly liked it a lot more than the other crap I've rented.

Did you use the media plug in jack for the radio in front of the shifter? I always bring a cable with me now on rental car trips for the aux in jack. I use it to plug into the headphone jack on my iphone and play tunes since not a lot of cars have Bluetooth music streaming yet (at least not rental cars). When I would plug in and start the Jetta, it took seriously like 2 minutes to start playing music. The radio screen kept saying "initializing media outlet". WTF

[Tammer in Philly]

Last weekend for a wedding in eastern shore of Maryland I rented a Buick Regal. It was interesting. Serious competition for a Toyota Avalon IMO. It did everything well and bored me to tears. Good power, surprisingly quiet and refined, good road holding, suspension not jittery or wallowy (i.e., far better than most GMs and on par with a more expensive version of the Cruze that impressed me recently). What was weird was just how isolating it was. The steering wheel could have been a joystick. No feedback at all, no road vibration, no chassis vibration, nothing. No sense of tire grip. You just had to trust it. For most people who don't think about driving as anything other than pointing a car where you want it to go, this is a very good car.

Things I didn't like: seats were typical GM: wide, flat, made for fat people. I found them horribly uncomfortable at first, but they were at least firm enough to not give me lower back pain. The car has a voice activation system that is ridiculously awful. Maybe it learns and adapts, but from the get-go it was really tough to use and I gave up trying quickly. Other than those two things, it was a very competent mid/ large sedan. The kind of thing I could comfortably recommend to a boring friend who doesn't like cars.

-tammer

[Mike W.]

Last weekend for a wedding in eastern shore of Maryland I rented a Buick Regal. It was interesting. Serious competition for a Toyota Avalon IMO...
-tammer

Funny, I've always considered the Avalon a Toyota Buick. I admit I've never driven one, but styling, Toyota's reputation for not building drivers cars, it just seemed like a natural. I guess it's come full circle, Toyota built a better Buick, so now Buick is competing back.

[Tammer in Philly]

Last weekend for a wedding in eastern shore of Maryland I rented a Buick Regal. It was interesting. Serious competition for a Toyota Avalon IMO...
-tammer

Funny, I've always considered the Avalon a Toyota Buick. I admit I've never driven one, but styling, Toyota's reputation for not building drivers cars, it just seemed like a natural. I guess it's come full circle, Toyota built a better Buick, so now Buick is competing back.

That's exactly what I meant. For many years the Avalon was the best Buick one could buy. I haven't seen whatever the current Avalon or equivalent is, but given my last experience in modern Toyota products I would not be surprised if this Buick was better. Numb and boring, but very good at its intended role of being numb and boring.

[geordi]

Hired this little puppy for a drive from Pisa to Siena on the back roads. The turbo diesel was suprisingly quick and handled very nicely on the twisties. I used the paddles for the ''fun" portion of the drive. Seats fit like a glove and at 6'3", I had a lot of room in the cockpit. I'd consider owning one.

[Tammer in Philly]

Nice. I like the rentals one can get in Europe. I had a pretty nice Fiat small people mover (NOT a Multipla - Chroma, I think) for a drive down the Amalfi coast from Sorrento. Held 4 in comfort and handled very competently on tiny, twisty cliffside roads.

Lately in the US (all 4-day work rentals):
--Chevy Cruze base model. Holy shit, so horrible, especially compared to the LT or LTZ model I recently reviewed very favorably in this same thread. Zero power, transmission gearing so widely spaced that there was really uneven acceleration, suspension both harsh and floaty, interior made of recycled 20-oz bottles. Awful.

--Dodge Avenger. Boring, unrefined, awful sounds, crappy build quality.

--Mazda 3. Quite nice. Much better transmission, can't fool it into selecting the wrong gear by playing with throttle position, responsive. Not powerful, but moves well enough. Far better suspension to the Cruze, on par or slightly better than the Cruze LTZ. Better steering feel than all of the GM models I've driven recently, including the Lacrosse above.

[a]

Had a 201? Santa Fe for a Friday and a Monday. It had less than 30K miles and drove worse than my 130 K mile Transit Connect.work van. K Rhodes, I had a 500 for a couple weeks . It demanded full attention whilst bopping around SEMA and the Cape. I felt very vulnerable driving it. Little 4 banger was pretty zippy, even with the the AT. I drove just like I drive the TC. Cruising at 5-10 above and stomping the pedal and holding down until reaching desired speed. I just got a new TC work van. A gen 2 with a lower silhouette and 16 " tires 205 I think. It has GPS to make me paranoid, and my boss gets occasional nasty grams from the GPS folks. I have slowed down sorta. The new van handles very well on the larger tires. Better mirrors and a back up beeper that cuts off the radio when you get too close to stuff. Great little van,

[davintosh]

I just finished driving a rental car for about a week and thought I'd bring this thread back up from the depths in case anyone else has a rental car experience to share, and also just for fun.

The car we rented was a Citröen C4 Cactus. Probably not something that will be in stateside rental fleets, but if you happen to be renting in Europe, the dad-gum things are everywhere. After spending a week with the car, I felt like I got to know it pretty well, and although it was a decently ok car, I can say with some degree of certainty that I'll never own one. Can't say I'll go out of my way to rent one again either.

Ours had the 1.2L 3-cylinder gas engine with a 5-speed manual. I read that they are rated at about 100hp, and although I'd say that isn't nearly enough, the people in the EU who are calling the shots on engine displacement these days seem to think that's plenty. It does ok once you get up to speed, but getting there obviously requires some patience. The weather was cool last week, so we didn't see the air conditioner in use much, but I'd bet it would have a tough time keeping up with freeway traffic running the AC in warm weather. The suspension was a bit on the soft side too; lots of wallowing in turns, and with my son in the back seat, lots of bumps that felt like we bottomed out. The car definitely isn't made for autocrossing.

Ours came to us in a shade of purple that I probably wouldn't have asked for, but like the rest of the car, wasn't terrible; just ok.



The exterior has what they call "Airbump" panels on the sides that are supposed to protect it from door dings in parking lots, and I guess they did the job because there was zero damage on the thing when we picked it up with about 35,000 kilometers on it, and none incurred while we had it. They aren't the most handsome accoutrements I've seen on a car, but they kinda grow on you. The interior was actually pretty decent. Decent amount of legroom & headroom front & back, although my youngest son complained about riding in the back seat. But at 6'3"/250lbs, he complains about pretty much every back seat he rides in. The seats were ok for the driving that we did, but my back wasn't happy with the driver's seat after about an hour drive. I wouldn't want to take it much farther than that. The driver's seat adjusts up/down, forward/back, and the seatback tilts; the passenger seat lacks the up/down adjustment. And my wife's back was none too happy with the passenger seat.



The radio, HVAC, navigation, and pretty much everything else was controlled by the screen in the middle of the dash. When we picked the car up, it was set to speak Estonian. Not sure if the people who used it before us were from Estonia, or did that as a prank, but getting it to speak English took some doing. The manual in the glovebox was in Dutch (we rented it at Schiphol Airport outside Amsterdam) so it wasn't much help, and the system itself isn't terribly intuitive. But I finally figured it out, and it worked pretty much ok, but there were a couple functions I couldn't figure out, like just searching for a landmark. It seemed to always want a nearby city. One strange thing was that the voice for navigation has a volume control that's separate from everything else; at the default setting the voice just boomed over the speakers in the car, even when the music was set to a moderate level! That took a little doing to figure out as well. There was no Bluetooth capability for the stereo, but there was a single USB jack, and the system played well with an iPhone.

One disappointment in the interior was the lack of cupholders; only one for the front seats and one in the back. Must've been taking cues from 1980's German engineers.

So, all in all, it was ok. Definitely not even Super.

[dcains]

We had a rental C-class Benz a few weeks ago, and it had one of those engines that turned off/restarted every time you were at a red light or stop sign. I don't think I could live with that on a regular basis, and wonder how much fuel it really saves? And, what's a starter replacement cost?

[tig]

Citröen C4 Cactus

Ah, the car that comes with built-in​ door dings.

Thank God for those crazy French; nobody else would have thought to do this.

[Mike W.]

We had a rental C-class Benz a few weeks ago, and it had one of those engines that turned off/restarted every time you were at a red light or stop sign. I don't think I could live with that on a regular basis, and wonder how much fuel it really saves? And, what's a starter replacement cost?

Presumably it's an upgraded starter. I know I drove hybrids at work for almost 10 years, they do much the same thing if not more and starters were never a problem. So automakers can make them last if they want to.

[davintosh]

We had a rental C-class Benz a few weeks ago, and it had one of those engines that turned off/restarted every time you were at a red light or stop sign. I don't think I could live with that on a regular basis, and wonder how much fuel it really saves? And, what's a starter replacement cost?

Most all our fleet vehicles do that, Mercedes and Fords. On the manuals it only shuts the engine off when you put it in neutral and let out the clutch at a stoplight, then starts it again when you push in the clutch (and it yells at you if you put it into gear before you push in the clutch.) It only does it when the engine is up to operating temp, and doesn't do it often in the winter. Thankfully there's a button on the dash to disable it; I usually push that right away when I climb in the driver's seat.

One of the cool things that helps that feature to work in Germany (at least on manuals) is that the stoplights give you a heads-up before they turn green; when the red light is about to change, the yellow light comes on for a half-second before it goes to green. Just enough time to push in the clutch and put it into gear. The engine starts, and off you go. That's another thing that would be nice to see adopted in the US.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqOcw6XeOeg

[m-racer]

I currently have a new Corolla as a weekly rental. I kind of like it. It took me a bit to turn off the electronic nannies...and it can't be done for the cruise control - begins to back you off when you are aprox. 20 car lengths away from the car in front of you which makes it crap on any interstate highway. Other than that, it handles pretty well for what it is and is zippy...if buzzy for 140hp. I like driving narrow tired cars that take a little effort to wring out (the reason stock 2002s are so much fun). No sunroof. Lots of headroom. Good sound system - at least good enough for me. Wouldn't buy one, but it doesn't insult me to drive it. Also has gotten almost 30mpg so far in mixed driving. Biggest news - didn't suck worse than I thought.

A couple of weeks ago, my local Enterprise thought they were doing me a favor by upgrading me to a Challenger. Six cyl., but spicy. Horrible visibility. Banged my head several times getting in and out. Not sure I understand the concept behind a long two door car. Add heavy to that and it was not my favorite. Was solidly built, I'll give it that.

If forced into the choice, I would take the Corolla.

[dsmith]

Working for Volvo now and in Sweden for 2 wks. Got a company beater at the airport and to my surprise was a manual trans v40 diesel. Pretty fun and the seats are like Recaros.

Still trying to find the Swedish Bikini Team.

[garageboy]

I guess I should post a review, since I asked and no one could (or would. Ha!) state whether an F30 3er 6-speed manual would be as good as an F10 5er 8-speed slushbox....

When I got to the airport, I rented an F30 320d Touring because that was the ONLY car with a manual (and I had 4 reservations). It was very frustrating, as even in large airports in Germany, there are no manuals in the premium class. If I wasn't going to have some passengers on this trip, I definitely would have gotten a 2er or something like that. The 3er felt terrible, and I mean TERRIBLE. I got to a rest stop on the highway, realized I was driving on worn-out M&S winter tires, and turned around and returned it. The thing that surprised me most is that after 10k km, the car felt sloppy and worn out. I have never felt a 3er being cheap, but this thing felt awful.

I then took an F10 520d. It also had snow tires (lesson learned: travel to Germany before Easter, and you will be on snow tires). But it felt refined and significantly closer to a BMW. The steering is way lighter than I am used to, certainly compared to my cars, but by the time I got to my happy place (photo to follow), I had gotten used to the car's dynamics. Unfortunately, it had an 8-speed slushbox. I would use "D" when I was in traffic, as the start/stop would engage, and the fuel consumption was very low (I averaged 50mpg!!!), but I did not like the lack of control of the technology; either it was off or it was on and constantly annoying. I usually left it in sport mode. And manual mode was a joke because it would shift on its own, up, long before getting anywhere near redline, and it wouldn't downshift if it felt it couldn't. Very lame.

But the cruise control was super awesome... BEST cruise control I have ever had on any vehicle. Granular to within 1km/hour. That was slick. And it had a two-step switch, which would either move by 1 km/hour, or jump by 10 km/hour, up OR down. It was completely accurate, and very helpful to stop me from getting photo-radar tickets (I got a FEW in my first days of this trip; they're just arriving on my credit card). If there was a way to retrofit it into my current cars, I would totally do that upgrade.

And another thing I loved was the ability to post the speed limit right in my dashboard. 99.9% of the time it was accurate to within a few meters. This was a VERY cool feature of the OBD. I hear it's available here in the USA, but I cannot imagine it being accurate with the haphazard and arbitrary speed enforcement here in the USA. But I loved that feature. Very slick.

Was it a BMW? It was a buzzy, plastic 4-banger turbo diesel (with exhaust notes possibly broadcast artificially via stereo), mated to a slushbox. Perhaps I would have felt differently with a manual, but I understand BMW will no longer mate that 2.0d to a manual; in the new G10, the 8-speed automatic is the only transmission that will be sold with that engine. Meh. Sure, I had a blast with the car in my happy place (yes, I said, photo to follow). It performed admirably and was absolutely trouble-free in 4000km, but I was really glad to get back into my E39 when I got home. That says a lot more about the car, car design, BMW, their direction, etc. than it does about me. I think BMW is only putting quality into their M-cars now. Sad.

[Tammer in Philly]

I had two rental cars today, of a sort. I'm in Utah at the Ford Performance Racing School for the GT350 Track Attack, which is a 1-day track program available for free to buyers of GT350/R models. So rental car #1 is pretty cool; a (non-R) GT350 in Race Red with white stripes. The event cars are in factory configuration, down to the tires and brake pads. Did a series of vehicle dynamics exercises: figure-8 like exercise with increasing/decreasing radius curves and slaloms (running through the various suspension modes to feel how the car changes); ABS and heel-toe downshift exercise; and a skid car (with hydraulic casters that elevate one end of the car suddenly to throw you into a slide). Very fun stuff. The afternoon was on track, first lead/follow, then with instructors riding, then solo.

Most of the people taking the course were relative track novices, so I ended up passing all but 2 cars in a 20-minute session (and lapping one), on a 2.2-mile track with only one passing zone. What really surprised me is how approachable the car is. Y'all may remember that my track car is a ~200hp E36, and while I have driven some faster hardware on track (E46 M3, E36 M3 with Euro S50, modded 135i), I have never really pushed a 526-hp, 3800-lb car around. I was prepared to be intimidated, but really the thing goes around a road course like a much lighter vehicle. Yes, it will get unruly quickly if you are rough with the throttle, and power oversteer is always a toe press away, but it is not frightening and feels very well contained within the chassis. Great balance, better than expected feedback through the wheel, and of course phenomenal noises.




Unfortunately, my other rental car is AWFUL. It's a late-model Nissan Altima that manages to combine that rare trifect of having no soul, being ugly, and being uncomfortable/ unpleasant. I'm okay with some cars being boring, but they need to make up for it by being very effortless to live with. The materials are unpleasant to touch, the engine note is a pathetic moan that is oddly intrusive, and the gauge info displays are difficult to read. It wouldn't recognize steering feel even if an E36 M3 was making love to it.

It has one feature that impressed me: I had the (comfort access) key in a bag, which I absent-mindedly tossed in the trunk. When I went to shut the lid, it refused to latch. The thing knew the key was in the trunk and didn't let me shut it in (even though there is an electronic button on the trunklid that could have let me re-open it. Oh, one other good feature that every car should have (and most do, but my GT350 does not): it actually has an interior handle to pull the trunk lid shut without touching the paint. It is nice to see that on a penny-pinching, relatively downmarket car.

Tomorrow, I'll be driving the FPRS Mustang GT; it's a normal 5.0 with track springs and dampers, running the GT competition pack, and lightened with roll cage and seats/ harnesses. A bit slower than the GT350, but should still be plenty of fun (and apparently they are a bit more tail-happy with less sophisticated TC).

tammer

[dsmith]

I so don't understand how Nissan sells cars. You nailed it and they are simply awful. Even the trunk pull is a screwed on piece of cheap plastic.

[Adam W in MN]

Ford Fusion. Worst steaming pile of shit rental car I've had in many years. The transmission shifted in clunks that would make an 80s GM automatic look sublime. Radio reception was piss poor and the Bluetooth wouldn't pair with my phone. It had a sport mode on the trans which added hesitation to the clunking for shifts.

Today I have a BMW 430i convertible because Enterprise was out of Mustangs so we got the luxury convertible for the same price. Ok car but it doesn't have msport. Good power, nice features, same wandering steering on-center. Ride is super floaty, like a Buick driven over marshmallows. What the hell happened to BMW ride tautness and feel?

[tig]

320 miles round-trip from Chicago to Fitchburg, WI in this with my sister to move another sister with MS who's dickhead husband is divorcing her.

Basically brand new. Great on freeway and in town. Will rent again.

Discovered WI has good beer. Food too. The heat/humidity bites though.

[Mike W.]

[Mike W.]

That's weird, why did I quote Charlie's pic of the U haul? Dunno. But, I've got a twofer now, with a U haul too!

With the breakdown in Colorado a mere ~1350 miles from home I found it necessary to first rent a car for a day, plus the U haul with trailer.

The car was a Nissan Rogue. Don't even know what year, probably '23 as IIRC it was under 10K on the odometer. Enterprise kind of went out of their way to get me in it for the day, but for the $160 they charged they should have... Ok, we're not going there. Putting maybe 50 miles on it I didn't get much of a feel, but enough to irritate me. It was impossible to drive smoothly. Push on the gas, nothing happens. Push a little more, nothing. Push a little more and hold on, it's happenin'. Brakes were the same way, not much of a window between not much and too much. Really hard to modulate in basic driving. And the friggin' locks lock automatically as soon as you put it in drive, and won't unlock until you take it out of drive. Push on the unlock button and nothing happens. Brick to the head to the guy in a cubical in Japan who came up with that one. Screw the driver, we decide what should happen. Classy approach. Not.



Then the U haul. A Ford E450, what's that, a 1.5 or 2 ton van? 15 foot U haul box. It drove ok for what it was, a rental truck with 110K on it. But what a stripper. Wow, any more of a stripper and there would have been a pole in the middle. The thing is a good 6 feet across, so the lack of power locks and mirrors was definitely inconvenient, even though I'm not normally that concerned about the locks at least. Manual windows, no cruise, AM/FM radio, not stereo as far as I could tell, but did have a 3.3MM stereo input, an unexpected, but nice feature. Rubber mats, manual seats of course. Seat wasn't great, but better than I would have expected. Dogtracked a little bit, but hey, a 110K U haul? I'm just glad it was only a little bit. Not a lot of power, but I estimated truck, trailer, and Xterra on the trailer at 14K pounds. But not gutless, except going up an 8600 foot grade. Turns out it had a V10 engine. Never broke 10MPG, which was about what I expected. Checked oil the first day out and it was still a touch over full and looked clean, so I didn't check it again. Tranny was a little weird, tap the brakes going downhill to downshift, which wasn't bad, but it was overagressive in doing so and it would flatten out, but not completely, and I'd be taching 4000+ RPM at 50 MPH and I couldn't get it to upshift a gear. For what it was, it was fine. I would have liked power locks and mirrors, but the rest was fine. Now with the box it was, semi's blowing past me at 80+ were almost pushing me off the road with their wind wash, but that's just physics, not a fault of the truck.

[gadget73]

Seems like an excessive amount of tow vehicle for what you needed to pull. I've done similar weight on one of those Uhaul trailers using a 1/2 ton truck and they were fine with it. At worst I'd have guessed a 3/4 ton would be required.

and yeah the V10 is a fuel pig under the best conditions.

[vinceg101]

But what a stripper. Wow, any more of a stripper and there would have been a pole in the middle.

That is great, I'll have to borrow that one. You sir, are a poet.

[1st 5er]

Enterprise kind of went out of their way to get me in it for the day, but for the $160 they charged they should have...

No AAA?

When Phx (fix), the E23 (purchased in PHX), cratered outside Pecos, AAA paid for the car to be towed plus a one-way rental car to get us home so i could return with Burbie and trailer to drag the car those last 300 +/- miles home.

[Mike W.]

Seems like an excessive amount of tow vehicle for what you needed to pull. I've done similar weight on one of those Uhaul trailers using a 1/2 ton truck and they were fine with it. At worst I'd have guessed a 3/4 ton would be required.

and yeah the V10 is a fuel pig under the best conditions.

Yeah, I agree, but you rent from them and you play by their rules. Actually a pickup would have been much preferable as it wouldn't have been blown around by the semi's nearly as much. But it's beancounters running things not engineers.

Enterprise kind of went out of their way to get me in it for the day, but for the $160 they charged they should have...

No AAA?

When Phx (fix), the E23 (purchased in PHX), cratered outside Pecos, AAA paid for the car to be towed plus a one-way rental car to get us home so i could return with Burbie and trailer to drag the car those last 300 +/- miles home.

Yes AAA. I got towed out out of the National Park for free, but I needed a car to get around for a day.

[1st 5er]

No AAA?

When Phx (fix), the E23 (purchased in PHX), cratered outside Pecos, AAA paid for the car to be towed plus a one-way rental car to get us home so i could return with Burbie and trailer to drag the car those last 300 +/- miles home.

Yes AAA. I got towed out out of the National Park for free, but I needed a car to get around for a day.

Yeah, I remembered you mentioning getting towed out of the NP by AAA.
My AAA coverages offers a free rental w/ each tow.
Wondering why yours wouldn't.
Maybe differs by state, or the coverage plan.
We have the Premier w/ RV coverage.

[Kenny Blankenship]

12 years ago I rented something like that on a Chevy Van chassis rather than the full truck chassis. I was amazed I averaged 14-15 mpg driving from Oregon to So. Cal.