Used cars

[Gabrielles blades]

I currently own a 1995 dodge neon highline, i love this car truly, but its maintinance issues are finally starting to pile up to where it might be better to get a new used car. Currently its mechanical systems seem to be fine (except when it rains heavily) but its electrical system seems to have issues with the speedomoter and fuel gauge. They work accuratly, but only randomly; ive tried using electronics cleaner and replacing the actual gauges to no effect. when it rains heavily the engine has misfires a lot of the time causing the car to shake a lot; not sure whats causing this.

anyhow...
Does anyone know of a compact car of similar design to the neon that has an engine compartment with space enough to do repairs without dismantling a lot of things to get to the problem? the neon is a *real* hassle to repair because of the incredably cramped style of construction; luckily i have rarely had to actually repair anything to do with the engine. I know it is possible because a friend of mine owns a car smaller than mine with a spacious engine compartment - the car looks like a real speed demon though so id only get one similar to that if its the only one on the market since i already seem to have a kick me sign with regards to police.

[Marathon]

I don't know anything about engine compartment space, but my father just sent me his Consumer Reports Automobile Annual Issue last week. If you'd like, I could tell you what cars are the best in terms of reliability for different price ranges, hopefully saving you the problem of having to work on the engine.

Going off memory - the Geo Prism and the later Chevy Prism were both top cars in their respective categories (one was under $4,000, the other must have been 4-6K or 8K). Not sexy choices per se, but good cars. Of course, Hondas were up there as well.