Chrysler's Top Three Mileage Misers

Cars.com has recently released their rankings of the vehicles that deliver the "Best Bang for Your Buck" and surprisingly three of the cars included are assembled at Chrysler's assembly plan in Belvidere. This is good news for Chrysler the producer of top-of-the-line Dodge Stealth partsespecially since there are doubts if it can really survive on its own. Being included in the list of cars.com which is a trusted site of customers who are searching for suggestions on vehicles to buy simply shows that Chrysler has some really great products to offer.

Anyway, in coming up with its "Best bang for Your Buck" list, cars.com make use of a formula that combined a vehicle's base sticker price with a calculation of its lifetime fuel costs. Jeep Patriot and Jeep Compass were the top two great buys for SUVs in the cars.com rankings while the Dodge Caliber was ranked second in the midsize listings.

Last 2006 the year when gas prices start increasing above $3 gallon, Japan's Toyota was able to take a big bite off the market share from Detroit's Big Three carmakers. And during that time the Big Three were so engrossed in trucks, SUVs, and minivans. Toyota has taken advantage of this and before the Big Three can act, the Japanese automaker was already taking over of the market.

Chrysler at that time was already offering the Dodge Caliber in the market. Unfortunately the Compass was just hitting dealerships while the Patriot didn't go into production until December---in short, Chrysler has very little products available in the market that can compete with Toyota's hybrid vehicles.

And for this year, it looks like gas prices will soar even higher than last year fortunately Chrysler is in a much better position right now especially with its Belvidere-built products.

It was last year that Toyota passed Chrysler as the No.3 carmaker in the US. The Japanese automaker has also taken the No. 2 spot from Ford and basing on the first Q1 result for this year Toyota has already surpassed GM as world's number one automaker. The huge bulk of Toyota's sales came from its highly fuel-efficient lineup of vehicles.

But basing on the cars.com rankings, when factoring in base sticker price, all automakers have their own models to brag about.

Going back to Chrysler, aside from its Patriot, Compass, and Caliber, its Dodge Charger is ranked at No. 2 in full-size cars while the Dodge Caravan is second in the minivan segment. On the other hand it was General Motors that has gain the top rank in terms of full-size car with its Chevrolet Impala. Ford has also led the list in the ultra competitive pickup truck category wit its Ford Ranger.

As expected Toyota headed the compact car lust with its Yaris and was ranked second in pickups for its Tacoma. Surprisingly, the Prius which is a hybrid that usually has a high waiting list for customers was just ranked No. 6 in midsize cars because of its base sticker price of $22,175 which is $4,225 more than the next highest priced among the top 10 in that category.