What percentage of 20 year old cars are on the road?

On Tue, 27 Oct 2009 11:04:36 -0400, "C. E. White"
> wrote:

>A Toyota commercial they are running in my area claims that 80% of all
>Toyota sold in the last 20 years are still on the road. This seemed to
>be a very low number to me. What do other think?
>
>I would have thought given Toyota's increase in sales over the last
>twenty years they would have had more like 90% of the cars sold in the
>last 20 years still on the road. Toyota sales have been increasing
>over the last twenty years, so a higher percentage of Toyotas will be
>newer models. Since a high percentage of Toyotas are newer vehicles
>that are more likely to still be on the road, the overall percentage
>of Toyotas sold in the last 20 years will be higher (becasue of the
>newer car bias). For GM, the math works the other way. GM sales have
>been stagnent or actually declining over the last 20 years, so a
>higher percentage of their cars will be older and therefore less
>likely to still be on the road. I am sure the 80% number is based on
>registrations, so it might be that it over estimates the number
>actually in daily use - or under estimates it in cases where cars are
>used off road (or illeagally) and not registered.
>
>Does anyone have any actual numbers? I am confident that 100% of the
>NEW vehicles I purchased in the last 20 years are still on the road,
>but maybe I am an exception.
>
As you say (snipped the rest for brevity) the ad is deceptive.
What else is new?
Steve Scharf posted this link some time back in a discussion about
longevity.
http://www.desrosiers.ca/2007%20Upda...0Longevity.pdf

It's a bit dated, and GM/Ford/Chrysler is lumped in one bucket,
"imports" in another. And it's Canadian.
No raw numbers or fine breakdowns, which always disappoints the
analyst in me. Because of that I don't really trust it. I don't know
the "intent" of the report or who put the numbers together, and how
they did it. Call me the eternal skeptic.

R.L. Polk is a company that has access to state registration
databases.
http://usa.polk.com/Industries/Research/
"Polk Used Vehicle Registration Reports
Used vehicle registration statistics assist you with stocking
inventory, purchasing vehicles at auction as well as identifying
market trends and unveiling opportunities. The reports are completely
customizable you define the specifications, geography and
time-period."

I actually called them once to inquire about getting an extract of
registration data. Just to satisfy my curiosity about longevity and
as a tool in arguments.
It was too expensive for that purpose.
But with registration data and sales data, longevity is easy enough to
figure out. And it's not a high volume of data.
Make/Model/Year - maybe cylinders and color, depending on the state.
Perhaps 20 bytes max per car, depending.
Have to talk to the data guy who knows the format.
Breakdowns by state (rust belt vs non-rustbelt) could be done.
Of course there are built-in "unknowns" due to vehicles relocating
from state to state, but most stay home in one state.
Here's an example of why color could be useful, if only to satisfy
curiosity.
I've got a white '97 Lumina. Good runner, basically repair-free.
Just did a 3K mile trip to Florida with it. About 150k miles on it.
Thing is, a lot of these white Luminas suffer from peeling paint.
Comes off in big honking sheets, leaving the undercoat.
I stopped mine pretty early by pulling off the loose stuff and sealing
the edges and covering the primer with a few cans of spay paint.
Doesn't look very good when close, but I don't care.
I've seen a lot of these white Luminas with the poor paint.
Wonder how many get junked early because of that paint.
Most people just won't put up with that.
Just curious. But that's the type of thing that will show up in the
numbers. But you have to have the numbers.
Otherwise you're dealing with anecdotes.

--Vic






>

C. E. White wrote:
> A Toyota commercial they are running in my area claims that 80% of all
> Toyota sold in the last 20 years are still on the road.

And I personally own about half of them...

wrote in
:

> On Tue, 27 Oct 2009 16:33:54 +0000 (UTC), Tegger >
> wrote:
>

>>
>>I infrequently see cars (of any make) older than about 1992. Cars
>>older than about 1989 are almost non-existent around here.
>
>
> You need to read the claim.
> 80% of vehicles sold over the last 20 years are still on the road.
> This could be true even if NO 20 year old Toyotas were still on the
> road. There are still a significant number of 1989 Toyotas on the
> road, particularly in the south, and California (where the majority
> were sold in the beginning)
>



That's why I said "unless that missing 20% is all concentrated up here
[in the Rust Belt]". Sure, it's possible Toyota's figures are accurate if
you include the dry southwest. Cars stay rust-free for a /long/ time down
there.

Informal survey by myself today:
Mileage covered: about 100
Number of cars observed: thousands, I'm sure
Number of cars obviously over 20 years in age: one (~'85 Olds Cutlass)
Number of cars that were older than 1993: maybe 20

I would say that the overwhelming bulk of the cars I saw today were between
five and ten years old.

--
Tegger

Vic Smith > wrote in
:


> Steve Scharf posted this link some time back in a discussion about
> longevity.
> http://www.desrosiers.ca/2007%20Upda...Reports/2007%2
> 0OBS/Trends%20in%20Vehicle%20Longevity.pdf
>
> It's a bit dated, and GM/Ford/Chrysler is lumped in one bucket,
> "imports" in another. And it's Canadian.
> No raw numbers or fine breakdowns, which always disappoints the
> analyst in me. Because of that I don't really trust it. I don't know
> the "intent" of the report or who put the numbers together, and how
> they did it. Call me the eternal skeptic.



Another thing not covered in that Desrosiers document: Annual mileage. It's
one thing to have a vehicle still registered for the road, but quite
another to have it registered but rarely actually going anywhere.

A lot of much older cars get relegated to second or third-car status and
sit in the driveway a lot. People become unwilling to trust the old heap to
go very far without breaking down.

How many of those "80% of Toyotas still on the road" are actually still
covering close to the mileages they did when new? We'll never know, I
guess.


--
Tegger

On Tue, 27 Oct 2009 11:05:48 -0700 (PDT), m6onz5a
> wrote:


>
>All of those old cars must be hiding somewhere because I hardly ever
>see any old ones on the road.

That's another problem with getting "real" and useful meaning from
registration figures.
Where I live in the burbs there's hardly any old cars. My '90 Corsica
might be the oldest car of the closest 200 cars around here.
I just use it for local trips, and wouldn't take it on the road.
But if I go about 10 miles into the north side of Chicago, I can see
all sorts of such cars parked on the streets.
Instead of 1 in 200, it's more like 1 in 10.
I assume that most are used like mine, and not real "highway cars."
But where you're at can make a huge difference in the age of cars you
see around you.

--Vic

On Tue, 27 Oct 2009 21:44:58 +0000 (UTC), Tegger >
wrote:

>Vic Smith > wrote in
:
>
>
>> Steve Scharf posted this link some time back in a discussion about
>> longevity.
>> http://www.desrosiers.ca/2007%20Upda...Reports/2007%2
>> 0OBS/Trends%20in%20Vehicle%20Longevity.pdf
>>
>> It's a bit dated, and GM/Ford/Chrysler is lumped in one bucket,
>> "imports" in another. And it's Canadian.
>> No raw numbers or fine breakdowns, which always disappoints the
>> analyst in me. Because of that I don't really trust it. I don't know
>> the "intent" of the report or who put the numbers together, and how
>> they did it. Call me the eternal skeptic.
>
>
>
>Another thing not covered in that Desrosiers document: Annual mileage. It's
>one thing to have a vehicle still registered for the road, but quite
>another to have it registered but rarely actually going anywhere.
>
Yep. And that's not kept on the state reg DB's either.

>A lot of much older cars get relegated to second or third-car status and
>sit in the driveway a lot. People become unwilling to trust the old heap to
>go very far without breaking down.
>
>How many of those "80% of Toyotas still on the road" are actually still
>covering close to the mileages they did when new? We'll never know, I
>guess.

Agree. My '90 Corisca has about 120k miles, but the last 5k has taken
about 5 years to put on.
And this year it's gone not more than a few hundred miles.

--Vic

Vic Smith > wrote in
:

> On Tue, 27 Oct 2009 11:05:48 -0700 (PDT), m6onz5a
> > wrote:
>
>
>>
>>All of those old cars must be hiding somewhere because I hardly ever
>>see any old ones on the road.
>
> That's another problem with getting "real" and useful meaning from
> registration figures.
> Where I live in the burbs there's hardly any old cars. My '90 Corsica
> might be the oldest car of the closest 200 cars around here.
> I just use it for local trips, and wouldn't take it on the road.
> But if I go about 10 miles into the north side of Chicago, I can see
> all sorts of such cars parked on the streets.



Exactly the point I just made in another reply. Being registered for the
road does not correlate with actual use.



> Instead of 1 in 200, it's more like 1 in 10.
> I assume that most are used like mine, and not real "highway cars."
> But where you're at can make a huge difference in the age of cars you
> see around you.



Yep.

My '91 Integra, still very much a daily driver (with 332,000 miles on it),
is often the oldest car around, wherever I am.


--
Tegger

Tegger > wrote:
>
>My '91 Integra, still very much a daily driver (with 332,000 miles on it),
>is often the oldest car around, wherever I am.

This morning I parked my '74 next to a Desoto and a '54 MG at work. And
I work for an outfit that's supposed to be doing state of the art
technology, too.

The guy with the Model A wasn't there, though. He took the Maverick in.
--scott

--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

(Scott Dorsey) wrote in
:

> Tegger > wrote:
>>
>>My '91 Integra, still very much a daily driver (with 332,000 miles on
>>it), is often the oldest car around, wherever I am.
>
>
> This morning I parked my '74 next to a Desoto and a '54 MG at work.
> And I work for an outfit that's supposed to be doing state of the art
> technology, too.
>
> The guy with the Model A wasn't there, though. He took the Maverick
> in.
>



You work in a very unusual place, I must say. Does your company hire only
one-upmans?


--
Tegger

On 27 Oct 2009 21:30:10 -0400, (Scott Dorsey) wrote:

>Tegger > wrote:
>>
>>My '91 Integra, still very much a daily driver (with 332,000 miles on it),
>>is often the oldest car around, wherever I am.
>
>This morning I parked my '74 next to a Desoto and a '54 MG at work. And
>I work for an outfit that's supposed to be doing state of the art
>technology, too.
>
>The guy with the Model A wasn't there, though. He took the Maverick in.
>--scott


Where I work guys own a 66 stang, a 69 Chevelle (not malibu) post,and
a 61 vette, a '72 Challenger that I know of. On my street there is a
68? Firebird, a 57 BelAir, a 72 Duster, an early 80s Z28, and around
the corner a 69 Z28 and a 65 valiant that I know of. Then there's a
TVR arond the corner the other way, mid 70's.Several early 80s Supras
and Hondas in the neighbourhood too last I checked a couple blocks
over. Early Honda Accord across the street too that is very close to
20 years old.

At least half the rest of the cars on the street will be over 8 years
old - and it's NOT a depressed area.