Ask an expert

Hi,
My wife and I are looking to replace our ageing Honda Accord with a car of a similar size/engine etc. We've seen and tested a few cars including Accords, Mazda Axelas & Atenzas, We saw a Galant Fortis sedan (sold in NZ as a Lancer) and test drove it. It ticks all the boxes we would like in a car and we were pretty keen until I did some reading online and discovered it had a CVT transmission. I have been vocal in steering other people away from what I hear is unreliable technology. Should I reconsider this position?
We have since seen another example of this car, in the sporthatch variant which has about 33K on the odometer (roughly half the Ks of the sedan). Pretty close to being a new car in my opinion. We'd probably consider mechanical warranties for peace of mind, but am I just being paranoid? What are your thoughts on this?

Generally speaking, we'd consider the late model Lancer to be a good reliable model. CVT transmissions have become much more reliable in recent times, and at this stage, we aren't aware of any particular problems on this model. The manufacturers tell us that new CVT technology has sorted out the unreliability issues associated with earlier CVT's, and our experience does seem to bear this out.
If there's a criticism of this model, it would be that there is a lot of road noise, but if that doesn't worry you, it's generally a reliable car.

We're in a very similar position - looking to replace an aging Honda with a Galant Fortis Sport. With our budget however, we'd be looking at a 2007 with around 60-80000 kms. I also have reservations after reading about cvt transmissions - and I'm also wondering if there is much difference between buying the Fortis and paying a wee bit more for an NZ new Lancer?