About my car:
2011 Proton Persona Elegance 1.6MT, B-Line
How I ended up with this car:
Prior to getting a hired purchase for Persona, i have been driving my father's 1997 Proton Iswara for 3 years.
The second handed iswara was rarely driven by previous owner and not well maintained. Even though my father patch it up before it was handed to me (looking back I'm really lucky to have my father to cover my first car, love you dad), i constantly had to deal with wear and tear issues such as failed air-cond system and leaking power steering rack.
The final straw came when government introduced RON95 and removed subsidy on RON97 fuel, my iswara due to wear and tear developed engine knocking. My mechanic deemed unsolvable unless i revert back to RON97.
I decided that yeah, I'll be needing a new car.
11th years now and she definitely needs a new paintjob.
Car selection process:
Budget:
Like any young chap without strong financial muscle, i aimed at a 9 year hired purchase payment of RM500 to RM800.
My candidates:
Persona Elegance B-Line, Proton Saga Full Spec, Toyota Vios and Honda City
So how i ended up with this car:
Having considered my income of RM3,000 during that time, i have decided to drop both Japanese candidates.
My justification was i need to be prepared for any repair cost, and my job nature as a salesperson would definitely burn the warranty out prematurely via extensive mileage clocking.
Since i have planned to pay my car off in 9 years, it's best to get ones that cheap and easy to repair.
In between Saga and Persona, i have chosen the latter as it gives me bigger cabin and luggage space, that i might need it for family use in future.
User Experience:
I have clocked 430,000km of mileage and averaged at 8.0L/100km of fuel consumption.
There's no other better way to describe Persona, it's a car that get things done.
Everything is ok for the car that's made in 2011, with design language I'm happy at. On and off she gets cough and cold due to poor QC and parts quality problem even as a new car, but with my experience of owning iswara for 3 years, and education from my mechanic as well as forum members, we happened to work out fine.
I do find adhering to service schedule tabulated in owner's manual helps keeping car in good working condition, even after warranty period lapse.
Every 5,000km for Engine Oil; 25,000km for transmission, power steering & brake oil; only use distilled water or RO water to mix with radiator coolant is essential; etc etc.
Common issues with Persona that hit my unit were:
Steering rack bush loosen - Solved by changing to aftermarket silicon bush.
Cabin flooded with rainwater - My mudguard men found the leak from an ill formed wiring entrance rubber plug on firewall, behind fender.
IAFM rattling - Fixed by Zordaq at RM50.
Leaking cam cover gasket - Always change it together with timing belt change as part is relatively cheap.
Cracked ignition coil boot - silicon replacement boot is cheap and can be bought online. Use iridium spark plugs and you only need to change boots every 100,000km.
The list goes on but mostly it's just wear and tear that comes with any car ownership.
Thing with this car is it's build with a budget in mind, thus owner really has to understand preventive maintenance in order to keep it from extensive breakdown.
Only mod were strut tower bar and an oil catch can.
Pros:
Affordable initial ownership, simple to understand car and a lot of maintenance support such as DIY video on YouTube as well as mechanic well versed with this car. Part is cheap and abundant.
Some say it handles well, I'll have to agree. As family man i spend more time driving it gently but it never stops to amaze me when I'm alone and have a bit more aggressive cornering style.
Manual transmission definitely keeps the maintenance cost minimum as well as providing fun factors when i downshift and heel toe.
Luggage cabin is really big. VBVBILI.
Cons:
Poor QC, yes. But not deadly for those who willing to DIY a bit.
CamPro is high revving engine, when it's alive at 4k RPM, the roar infiltrates into passenger cabin. Depends on your driving circumstances, it can be an awkward trip rushing to airport with critical parents as passenger (tsk tsk tsk zomok buy proton? "Zomok" being phonetic of "why" in Malaysian mandarin), or an exhilarating journey feeling your engine response to your right foot.
Rear passenger seat backrest slant degree is not something i would proud of. I'm very grateful to my wife and 2 kids who never complain about this.
Ratings:
Total Score: 4, no car is perfect. It has those pet peeves moment but otherwise has been functional.
Performance: 3, hardly buttock-meter pleasing, but it gets out of it's own way.
Quality & Feature: 3, can be better but fair for the pricing.
Space: 5. I fetched furniture from IKEA damansara down to JB, of course with front windows down and one of the cabinet side board protuding out of front passenger window. Manual variant don't have 60:40 fold. Sorry PDRM.
Ride Comfort: 4, nothing to complain for the front semi bucket seats, rear passenger seat a caveat though.
Fuel Economy: 3, imma quote RX8 owners here: Look at Smiles per gallon, not miles per gallon. City driving with full traffic jam can hit 12L/100km, highway cruising at legal speed goes to less than 6L/100km.
Price & Cost: It won best value for money car of the year somewhere 2010, apa lagi saya mau? 5 of course. Albeit government sucker punched me with mandatory airbag for car sold in year 2012 and onwards, it's not Persona's fault.
See the butt mark on briver seat? XD
Summation of my story:
Looking back of my history of car ownership, i sometimes resent to the fact that i should give dad's old Iswara more tender loving care. Perhaps this regret made me a bit stubborn sticking to this Persona and try to give it the maintenance it deserves and hope one day, it will die a rightful way, such as rotten frame.
I truly believed that a car is a tool that should be loved and kept healthy at all cost, and cost of repairing shouldn't be weighted against the residual value of the car.
Afterall it's cost of the new car that we pay to have current car replaced.
Take care of your tool and in time, your tool will take care of you.
Have to agree this is one handsome meter cluster.
Fun Story about my Persona:
Wiring bundle quality is one common issue of this model. Around 3rd and 6th year of my ownership, i faced issue of throttle body unable to respond to accelerator pedal, and knock sensor fault code (bought an OBD2 reader to had it diagnosed + erase as every check in workshop I'll have to pay like RM20 and in the end the code keep coming back).
Throttle body was solved by Proton Plentong, by opening up my wiring bundle near engine and discovered it's all wet. They charge me nothing but spend a lot of labour hours on my car, I'm truly grateful for their help and continuously sending my car to be repaired after accident until their queue time were too long to accept my car.
Knock sensor code, funnily enough, disappeared after an accident repair when i was sandwich between an Axia and Mazda 3, with Axia hit into both of stationary cars in a traffic jam. Bless Axia owner for solving my problem. Mechanic reckon it's grounding issue.
Anyway it taught me nowadays, wireman is always on shortage, and worksmanship of any automotive shifus (including mechanic, wireman, aircond shifu, and mudguard shop shifu) should be cherished, because only with them, we can stay longer with our car. If you have a team of good foreman, you're blessed.
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