Good car and plenty around for parts, too. It is essentially a Dodge so repairs are not expensive. The V6 is zippy and solid. With regular maintenance, this car has never let me down.
Pretty damn good true first car. This is the first car i bought on my own. My sisters boyfriend is actually the reason i got one. He owned a 2007 Eclipse manually v6. I wanted one right away after driving his for awhile. I liked the look of the 3g Eclipse though and i bought mine before going to college with around 110k miles. Wanted to impress the girls so to say with the car. Love the way the car looks and love that its manual. This is a great car to put aftermarket parts in and make that 4 banger run.
Pros: Fun car to drive around in Great handling can pull turns going 85mph with breeze Very light car Looks great Fun car to put money into
Cons: Interior is pretty cheap material AC is shot don't work Cruise control is shot doesn't work Back seats uncomfortable
Overall not a bad car if you can find one with low miles as these models tend to have a lot of problems when getting up there in miles. Car will run way better if you invest money into the car and its performance.
Interior plastics are garbage. My dash was so severely damaged from the sun, chunks of it were caving in. I have seen 30 year old cars in junk yards with dashes in better condition. Had to buy an expensive cover for it.
Transmission got very loud at about 5 years old so I had all bearings replaced and new clutch. Less than a year later the throw out bearing went and it was back for new bearings and another clutch within a year of it breaking.
CV joint snapped while driving it about 5 months ago and took me it the oil filter which caused a big oily mess in the middle of a very busy intersection where it broke down. Clutch master cylinder broke and car had to be towed for that to be replaced.
Axle seals have been replaced 4 times with after market and factory seals and still leak, huge mess in driveway from axle fluid. I had never even heard of a car needing axle seals to be replaced before this.
Headlights were terrible from the day I got it so I drove around with high beams on all the time to see anything at all at night. Replaced those with aftermarket lights and they are much better.
Floor and rear wheel wells are rotting out along with bottom of rear quarter panel on passenger side. Roof had some rust/rot forming that was repaired.
At 4 years old the power steering pump died, $700 part alone. Valve cover gasket and strut mounts also had to be replaced at that time.
Sunroof motor has never been able to open sunroof on its own without me having to push it up to open it.
Key fobs fell apart and had to be replaced after only a few years.
2015 has had at least $4000 of repairs to this car with at least two dozen visits to mechanics in last 6 months. I have probably forgotten to include many other repairs it has needed. I have now had the car for a little over 10 years and it has been a problem from the start. Now, something new seems to break every time I drive it. Currently at mechanics since exhaust pipe is rattling around slamming against car frame causing a lot of noise whenever I go over a bump in the road.