GenVibe - Community for Pontiac Vibe Enthusiasts

Hello all. I'm new to the forums but have been lurking for quite a bit. Thanks to GenVibe I now want to lower my 2003 Vibe Base. So my wife and I got married in 2000 and moved to Anchorage, Alaska in September of that year. In 2003 we bought this Vibe brand new off the showroom floor and the rest has been history. We started our lives together with this car and we still have her today. She's got 182,000 miles on her. We had to replace the transmission at around 65k due to a failed bearing, but now she runs as strong as ever. We actually drove the Vibe from Anchorage all the way to Tampa, FL back in 2007. We made many stops along the way in Canada and in the U.S. It was the most beautiful trip the wife and I have ever taken. I recently purchased a Dodge Ram 1500 and when it was time to trade a vehicle in we opted to trade our '08 Honda Oddyssey. We couldn't bring ourselves to let go of the Pontiac LOL! I had the Vibe repainted last year. Instead of going with the factory color I went with Blue Jean Blue. I saw the color on a Ford Taurus and thought it looked fantastic. We added an HD radio a few years ago and when we still lived in Alaska my wife had a sun roof installed because...why not right? Other than those couple of changes she is exactly the same as when we bought her. In about three years this car is going to my daughter as her first car. This by far the best car on the planet. Thanks for reading the post and cheers!

Very nice !!!! Welcome to GenVibe .. FINALLY The color looks very sharp! Did you replace the failed 5-speed manual with an identical 5-speed manual? With 120k miles and then some on the newer tranny has everything been ok? Keep this baby rolling for several more years and YES it will be a great car for a young new driver when that time comes. Thanks for sharing your story. Visit often here.

If I'm not mistaken, the new transmission came from a nissan. It has worked flawlessly ever since the swap. Now just out of curiosity, being is the car is chain driven, should I replace the timing chain even if I am having zero problems with the vehicle? Next on my list are new wheels and a 2" drop.

Wow! I love that story!

Welcome to GenVibe!

That blue is striking!

If you have no problem what so ever why would you fix it ? Keep checking for oil leaks at the tensioner.

Beautiful looking car. My wife and I have a similar history with our 2005 Toyota Corolla. We've owned it since we bought it new, shortly after we got married. It's rapidly approaching 250K miles. I'd love to hold onto it if we had a place to store it, but I have a feeling it will be traded in the next couple years.

tfotos77 wrote:If I'm not mistaken, the new transmission came from a nissan. It has worked flawlessly ever since the swap. Now just out of curiosity, being is the car is chain driven, should I replace the timing chain even if I am having zero problems with the vehicle? Next on my list are new wheels and a 2" drop.

I doubt the transmission came from a Nissan. It was most likely from one of the several Toyotas that share the 1ZZ engine with the Vibe: Corolla, Matrix, or Celica.