Anyone here own a Toyota Sienta?

How's the car holding up? Worth buying 2nd hand?

Never saw lots of Honda Freeds either.

Wonder where have they all gone to?

It's "angkat brg for biz" but the "brg" are persons that uses wheelchairs.

Thinking of buying one to remove the rear seats to fit a side and rear access wheelchair ramps.

Biante pricing in a different bracket.

I can't blame your friend for thinking the Sienta is better than the Matrix.

Wonder why? Toyotas rarely ever make it to the cold door car list.

The sliding side doors and the lower ride height makes it an excellent chassis for installing wheelchair ramps and it's compact size makes it much easier to drive around urban areas especially to any of the public hospitals.

Yes, that's true but that goes for most sub-RM100k cars.

The real "adik" to the Alphard is a Noah.


You won't by any chance recall if it had a good ride quality?

Toyota parts bin car.

I wouldn't touch that one with a 100ft bargepole.

2.4l engine is prone to conrod and bearing failures right around 120k, engine replacement is upwards of RM12k and that's if you can find a donor engine block.

The only Sorento worth buying is the UM series, in Malaysia it would be 2016 onwards and make sure it's powered by that 2.2d engine. It was mind blowing a car that didn't cost RM200k had such good performance.

Any idea if that 3rd row seat could be completely removed?

Avensis Verso is an EU/GB model only isn't it? Was it available in Malaysia?

The 2.4l is prone to engine bearing and conrod failures in the Sorento. In fact every petrol engine in the Sorento are prone to failures regardless whether it is the GDI version or not. If you follow groups on Sorentos you'll know it isn't quite a bed of roses unless it's the diesel or the V6 variants.

I suggest you buy something else and avoid petrol powered Sorentos until there is a recall on that engine in Malaysia as it has been recalled many times in US for engine fires as well.

The purpose of this vehicle is to have a smaller and less cumbersome vehicle to transport persons in a wheelchair. Currently done by a Renault Kangoo, a Citroen Berlingo and Fiat Doblo. All of these vehicles are regular passenger car sized, low floor and have sliding doors on the side which made them ideal for a wheelchair ramp.

Currently the Doblo has 600k on it and is becoming a pain to maintain due to lack of parts.
The Kangoo has 400k on it and would need a new engine soon.
The Berlingo has 450k on it and will need maintenance and repairs done to it that would exceed its value.

Planning to replace all 3 of them with something newer and easier to maintain without breaking the bank account.

That Hiace is a bit too big as sometimes these vehicles go to hospitals, especially public hospitals that's an impossibility to find parking nearby and disabled parking lots are often either abused or occupied.



Interesting, it doesn't appear to be that big from the pictures.

Really? Thought usually Nissan year end is the time they'd throw price and give overtrade allowances. They've stopped that practice recently?

7 seater SUVs and midi-MPVs like the Avanza aren't comfortable as 7 seaters unless the +2 seats are occupied by pre-teen children. Also many of them when you use those seats then you lose a significant amount of cargo room.

I would love to buy another Kangoo, a true workhorse but too bad it isn't being sold any longer and used ones are quite tired examples now. Also later ones were only sold as panel vans.

This post has been edited by BillCollector: Nov 3 2021, 12:44 AM

That's definitely true but both of those lack the sliding doors.

The Freed is a good one too but newest ones would be more than 5 years old.


Definitely buying it for the sliding doors and also lower floor height.

Not too keen on the Serena due to the Jatco CVT and not too keen on that hybrid system.

I'm interested to know if there's any hidden issues with this car as surprisingly for a Toyota it didn't sell in big numbers.


Not that attractive a deal also.

In fact crazy to buy a hybrid with such a short warranty unless there's a separate battery warranty.

I'd probably wait till the Exora is replaced with that one designed by Geely.

No point buying an Exora as its just too antiquated a vehicle and in this day and age there's 0 reasons to buy a car that has as many niggling faults to it.

The Kangoo is a good work horse. It's a surprise that it has held up this long as the one we use is now 17 years old.

7 of them to be exact.

It has indeed surprised me because it was bought 2nd hand where the previous owner said it was “temperamental” and indeed it was as warning lights would come on for no reason at all.

Fugly? Well I actually don’t drive it and to be frank all that have to drive it don’t really care either as they’re grateful the wheelchair can RORO rather than needing to remove the patient from the wheel chair and then loading the patient onto the wheelchair again at destination.

That does make sense.


Good to see this reply.

Has it held up well and to your expectations?

How’s the fuel consumption like?

That’s a definite concern, to be honest unless it’s a Honda, Toyota or Subaru, it should be avoided if problem free is what you’re after. Heat, load and torque are its main enemies.