I love my old Mopars, but I've been displeased with my Chryslers over the long run since the 99' Intrepid. They're just costing me too much money and time in what are in my opinion very unnecessary breakdowns. I wish I could say differently. Maybe I don't have the money to buy their "good stuff" but even if I did, the last 20 years of laying under them doesn't give me the confidence to borrow $60,000+ for another one.
I gave up on brand loyalty a long time ago. I'm as loyal to Chrysler (or any other company including my employer) as they are to me. You probably know how much that is 😉
I love my Voyager but it was my first car, and my parents had a Grand Voyager. But I understand why people swoon over Toyotas and Hondas. The Chrysler vehicles require you maintain them and on occasion replace major components. I got my Voyager with 130,000 miles and now its over 300,000 but there's been a lot of work done to it. By 130,000 it was on its 2nd compressor, its had carb swaps, trans swaps, numerous more compressor swaps, and pretty much all the bushings replaced. Now much of that is the car going from 20 years old to 40 years old, and 170,000 miles of driving. And it being my first car, I'd accepted that's what people did to their cars because my peers with Honda and Mitsu's were under their cars too.
But after owning my Honda and keeping it stock, I've complained that the car is boring. Short of spark plugs and oil changes, and replacing the radio with an Android Auto unit, its needed nothing and is at 12 years and 115,000 miles. That said the TPMS had kicked the bucket, but Discount Tire will fix as part of their service usually. And all that work that my peers were doing on their Hondas in the 2000's was to make more power and make it less reliable.
That said when it comes time to replace the Honda (which at this point will be 2029), I'm really eyeing a Wrangler 4xe. Why? Despite all its flaws, there's something about this company and its cars that I love and feel for despite its quirks. Nothing in the other brands even comes close in the "feel" dept. Look at the new Civic or the Rav4. My parents have moved on from GM to Mazda, all of those are just blech to me. My exwife when we were married had a Subaru, and while looking at the car it looked great and kind of gave me that feeling, one look at trying to change the sparkplugs, or driving with that slushy CVT completely ruins the experience.
