Buying, Owning & Improving

Toyota Auris

This British-built small family car is cheap to buy, dependable and easy as anything to run and maintain.

For yonks, motoring writers used the Corolla as a benchmark for reliability against which other cars were judged. So much so, it almost became a bit of a cliché. Well, the gauntlet has since passed to its replacement, the Auris, which is hardly surprising given it was built in the same Burnaston factory and started off using the same engines. It’s a car that echoes its predecessor perfectly, being solid, reliable and very able in every respect but not particularly outstanding in any. In a nutshell, if you put getting somewhere without fuss above driver appeal and style and are prepared to overlook its lack of panache, then it’s certainly worth a look.

The small family car made its first appearance here in 2007 and was offered initially with a choice of 1.4 or 1.6 VVT-i petrol engines and 1.4- or 1.6-litre D-4D diesels. The