Going from car free to car lumbered.

[legrandefromage]

I thought you were after a cheap??

 

[Chopper the ex Copper]

As aforementioned, £10k was my budget, which is reasonably inexpensive but still enough that I'm not sifting through the dregs and dross.

The last car I bought before this cost me £72,000...

 

[novocaine]

As aforementioned, £10k was my budget, which is reasonably inexpensive but still enough that I'm not sifting through the dregs and dross.

The last car I bought before this cost me £72,000...

my first house cost me that.

my current car cost me 700 quid.

different folks, different strokes.

 

[Chopper the ex Copper]

Aye, my first house was less than 40 grand, and that's how I made the bulk of my money and quit work at 51.

 

[Siish]

Mk4 mondeo Estate, or s-max, loads of room, happy cruising at motorway speeds and if looked after will go on for ever (just ask Steve's taxis)

 

[CassidyAce]

Looking at what comes into my workshop for electrical issues, I'd stay away from:

Anything French

BMW

Be wary around Ford, many are ok but its 50/50 as to whether you get a good or bad one

Fiat, I have a soft spot for these, easy to fix but always playing up with a niggle or ten

Kia and hyundai seem to be very good

Nissan are another hit or miss but are usually ok

Mercedes OK but can be pricey

Toyota ok

Mazda, rust rust and more rust

Vauxhall, meh....

Dacia despite their Renault underpinnings are actually OK. (rust!!!)

There are very few banger territory cars left and the tidy ones will be written off very quickly as parts become unavailable or prohibitively expensive. Car manufacturers want to sell you new and can't be bothered with older models as recent as 67 plate. The war in the Ukraine has cut off electronics supply for many as well

THEN there is the chip shortage, this has severely restricted the supply of new cats, parts etc, pushing the price of 2nd hand cars through the roof

Later equipment needs recalibration after something as simple as a new windscreen. Headlight replacement can be as much as £3k and so on...

So find something with H7 bulbs, indirect injection and a radio cassette

So, just to get this straight, Kia and Hyundai are very good, but most others vary from OK to crap on the electrical front. Anything else which is good? Just curious because I was wondering about switching to one of the EcoBoost Fords, later this year perhaps, and a bit of inside knowledge from the trade is a useful thing.

 

[legrandefromage]

They are better than most but I only see a percentage of a percentage of what goes wrong so I can only base my personal opinion on what comes through the door

A lot of issues come from rubbish pattern parts from GSF and Eurocarparts, especially alternators.

People can't afford the price of genuine products, those ebay and amazon parts fail very quickly

 

[pigman]

Glad you got sorted, but in a similar vane to you not wanting a VW, I'd never buy a diesel. The soot they chuck out makes em baby killers.
I have sympathy with commercial vehicles where high mileage and the need to cut costs has an effect

 

[Chopper the ex Copper]

With DPF, Adblue exhaust after treatment, and last October's MOT test of 0.00 on the smoke test, my conscience is clearer than most petrol drivers.

Not only that, it is now known that tyres are far and away the biggest source of automotive particulates https://www.theguardian.com/environ...e-particle-pollution-than-exhausts-tests-show and Im guessing ypur car has tyres?

Out main car is a Pornstar 2, is electric, has tyres, and is mainly charged from a fossil fuel power station. I'm going to Hell.

 

[legrandefromage]

Some of the gasses that went down with higher diesel use have gone back up again due to to people going back to petrol

The amount of short journeys people do is the most polluting side to a car. And is often the very reason for smokey diesels in the first place

I have an 80 mile commute, costs me £50 a week in fuel

If I were to go electric, it would cost around £59 a week in charging, (based on a hyundai ioniq) plus the cost of purchasing and charger install (around £400)

Obviously there's different electricity prices but that was based on the current kwh we're charged at.

Leasing is out as I'd end up paying way over the absurdly small mileage allowances.

The whole point of the future was to reduce traffic numbers anyway, not replace them with vehicle for vehicle leaving everyone with exactly the same problems