5 Of The Highest Mileage Cars Still On The Road Today
With the average price of a new car hovering around $48,000 and auto loan interest rates at a 15-year high, it's understandable that drivers might want to hang onto their current rides as long as possible. Some motorists have taken that mantra to the extreme, accumulating over one million miles on their vehicles — a figure typically reserved for long-haul truckers.
Here at SlashGear, we have been compiling lists of some of the most reliable SUVs, pickup trucks, and sedans on the road today. Not surprisingly, these lists have been dominated by Toyota and Honda, two brands already well-known for their reliability. Of course, a handful of trucks and SUVs from Ford and General Motors also stand out, owing to the nature of their robust construction.
Not all high-mileage vehicles fit that mold, though. As we'll soon learn, products from such brands as Porsche, Mercedes, and Volvo have all joined the million-mile club with the common thread of fastidious maintenance by their loving owners.
1991 Chevrolet Silverado C/K
Proving that American cars and trucks can deliver an impressive lifespan too, we have Frank Oresnik's 1991 Chevy Silverado pickup truck. Oresnik used the red C/K model — now also known as the Original Body Style (OBS) — to make his daily commute from Shawano, Wisconsin to Chicago, Illinois as a steak and seafood delivery driver. In the process, the reliable steed accumulated a whopping 1.3 million miles as of 2012, though to be fair, Oresnik bought the Silverado secondhand with approximately 41,000 miles already logged.
As a term of endearment for its reliable service, Oresnik nicknamed the truck Old Girl after the boat of the same name in the Humphrey Bogart film "The African Queen." From the photos, we can discern that the C/K has factory two-tone red and silver paint and the 8-foot long bed model. With the exception of some side window visors and a bug shield mounted to the hood, the truck looks bone stock.
As Oresnik explains on Jack Maxton Chevrolet, the engine itself — a 350 cubic inch small-block V8 — has never been rebuilt, although naturally some consumables like the exhaust system and alternator have been replaced. Besides a strict maintenance program, Oresnik also credits a smooth, consistent driving style for the truck's longevity.
[Featured image by Bull-Doser via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | Public Domain]
1964 Porsche 356C
Some folks are just plain lucky, like Guy Newmark of California, who received a lightly used 1964 Porsche as a high school graduation gift from his father. The car is somewhat similar to the iconic one that singer Janis Joplin owned at the time, a 356 model, except Joplin's was a convertible while Newmark's is a fixed-roof coupe. Since that fateful day, the Porsche 356C — nicknamed Blue for its deep blue exterior color — has served as Newmark's daily driver for his job as a yacht broker, racking up over one million miles in the process.
It hasn't been entirely smooth sailing, though. Several years ago, the coupe was stolen from its garage. Fortunately, the thieves were not able to start the engine by hot wiring it, so the car only coasted a few blocks downhill and was soon recovered at the edge of a neighbor's garden.
Newmark has the Porsche serviced religiously — every 3,000 miles to be exact. Of course, a few major repairs are unavoidable even with the best maintenance regimen and this vintage Porsche is no exception. The engine has been rebuilt three times and the transmission received its first overhaul at around the 900,000 mile mark.
In 2016, Porsche itself put together a touching video of the history of the car and its owner, including the magic moment when it crossed the 1,000,000 mile mark.
1963 Volkswagen Beetle
In contrast to some vehicles that have traveled one million miles or more with merely routine maintenance to their original drivetrain, Albert Klein jokes that his 1963 Volkswagen Beetle was horribly built. Klein, who purchased the car brand new in 1963 for $1,900, went on to drive it a whopping 1,610,000 miles over the next 30 years, spending more than $38,000 on upkeep during that time.
Where did the money go? To begin, the engine was replaced no less than seven times. Although Klein gripes about it, an average of 200,000 miles per engine truthfully doesn't sound that awful to us. Additionally, the Beetle has consumed three transmissions and 150 tires. A fastidious record keeper, the Volkswagen owner also put 36,500 gallons of gasoline over the course of the car's first 1,000,000 miles.
Explaining the high mileage, Klein admits that he likes being alone with his thoughts while driving and often goes out of his way just for the fun of it. Although Volkswagen offered Klein a brand new sedan free of charge in 1987, he declined and stuck with his faithful companion until 1993. Wearing its many dents and torn upholstery as a badge of honor, the car was ultimately donated to a museum.
1976 Mercedes-Benz 240D
Mercedes W115 series of vehicles has a legendary reputation for reliability and is considered in some circles to be one of the best-engineered automobiles ever, perhaps only surpassed by its replacement, the W123. Available from the late-1960s through the mid-1970s, the W115 featured Mercedes' first all-new chassis design since its involvement in World War II. However, what most gearheads associate with the midsize Benz is its incredibly durable diesel powerplants, though gasoline options were also available and respectable in their own right.
Gregorios Sachinidis knows a thing or two about the W115's longevity. His 1976 Mercedes 240D accumulated 2,850,000 miles in its lifetime, serving its owner as both personal transportation and as a taxi cab in his home country of Greece. In 2014, Mercedes itself caught wind of Gregorios' remarkable achievement and after verifying that the mileage was legit, it traded him a brand new C-Class in exchange for the old taxi. Emotional attachment aside, that seems like a pretty square deal.
Today, the car is enjoying a well-deserved retirement on display at the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart, Germany.
1966 Volvo P1800S
For decades, the automotive public looked at Volvo as a slightly boring purveyor of boxy but safe sedans and wagons with which to haul the family around to soccer games and ballet practice, but it wasn't always that way. In the decade of free love and the British Invasion music movement, the brand offered a handsome sports coupe known as the P1800. Heck, the car even starred in a James Bond-esque television show called "The Saint."
One P1800 owner named Irving Gordon must have been particularly enamored with his Cherry Red 1966 S model because he drove it a distance of more than 3.2 million miles — enough to reach the moon and back six times over. Mr. Gordon and his sporty Volvo received a Guinness World Record for his achievement, as well as appearing on "The Tonight Show with Jay Leno."
According to Gordon, the secret to longevity is frequently changing the engine oil and not letting anyone else get behind the wheel of your car. Upon Irv's passing in 2018, the car — still looking really mint in spite of its mileage — was purchased from his estate by Volvo itself as both a case study into its durability and for display at the company's museum in New Jersey.
[Featured image by Doug Coldwell via Wikimedia Commons | Cropped and scaled | CC BY-SA 3.0]