I am in the market for a new car and i want to buy a 5 speed dsm. The problem is that everyone says that dsm's are unrelible. WHat i was wondering is what are the spicific problems that make these cars unrelible?I am really interested in the cars but i want to know what i am getting into first.Also what kinda milage should i look for? Most DSM's i find have around 100,000 on them or more.Are thses still good or are they all trouble?I am mostly looking at a 1st gen eclipse or talon.

Thanks

hey i have a 92 talon, it has 75k on it and the only problems it has... the tranny is starting to go (the syncros), and the fuel in jectors are bad....
the fuel injectors are msot likely from the guy that had it before me let it sit for awhile, but i've herd that alot of trannys on the 90-93 talon start to get problems around 70k....

I've also heard that the trannys may give you problems.

A buddy of mine also mentioned that the turbos on DSMs start to die around 125k miles. I'm almost @ 107,000 and haven't had any problems with my turbo, so I dunno if that's something you're really gonna have to worry about...may want to check into it though.

sykane;
First generation eclipses are plauged with a number of known problems. First, both the automatic and manual transmissions have been known to be problematic. 5 speeds are notorious for the 2nd gears synchro's needing to be replaced. I'm not sure of the exact problem with the automatics. In either case, these boxes are expensive.

Next, first generation DSM's are known for timing belt failure, and I believe that extends into 2nd generation DSM's as well. The good news on this is that relacing the belt at suggested intervals is all that you need to do to avoid this problem.

Next, the ISCM's (idle speed control motors) are known to fail, regardless of what you do. These are very expensive to replace with new parts. I personally got my last one out of a wrecked Talon.

Next, the ECU's on 1st generation DSM's are also prone to failure. No way around this either, however, I don't know of anyone that has their's repaired that had to do it again. My understanding is that this is a problem with the quality of the capacitors they used in these units. When you get yours repaired they replace them with better ones. This generally costs about $250.00

Throttle position sensors also typically fail on these cars at some point. This is another expesnive item to replace with new parts, but are reasonably inexpensive to get at a wrecking yard.

Other than that the rest of the car is pretty solid.

Mark