10 year old vectra - head gasket gone

Soubrette

It's going to cost £630 to fix - is it worth it?

The mechanic has said the rest of the car looks sound and nothing looks like it will need replacing soon, the car passed its MOT first time in Jan.

It is a bit creaky, central locking only works using the key directly in the car (ie not using the remote), air conditioning doesn't work, the trim is coming off by the door. However in the past 5 years we've had it, we've only had to replace two parts of the exhaust and fix two different sensor lights (apart from normal maintenance such as brake pads and replacing tyres etc).

However, we also have available £5000 to pay for a newer car - we were hoping get another couple of years out of the vectra in which case we would have had a bit more money to buy a better newer car.

So should we buy another 4-5 year old car now or should we fix the vectra and hope we can buy a 3-4 year old car in a couple of years time?

Any thoughts or suggestions welcome

Sou

Barneysmom

Fix it but get more quotes, that one looks very expensive to me?

stormbreaker

Yes I would suggest more quotes. About 12-18 months ago we got the head gasket fixed 'Skimmmed' on our old Astra. First quote was £750. We went with a local garage who estimated £550 ish. It was fixed along with a few other problems including part of the exhaust for under £500.

veggyboy

Fix it and keep saving, you could spend your money and find yourself in the same situation in a couple of months. Get some more quotes though, that does sound a bit steep. You know your curent car is basically sound so it would be worth spending the money

djwolf

Obviously it's your decision, you just need to look at all the options and see which is best financially and practically in the long run. If you do decide to get the head gasket done it probably makes sense to keep the car for at least another year as long as you can put up with the little niggly faults it has. As for the head gasket price that is a bit high, I've known people get them done for around £400.

cyclonebri1

About £120 to 150 max in parts. Asumming nothing else wrong, and there lies the :A:A:A, less than a day to do including a cylinder head rebuild. You ought to be able to find someone to do this for £300 inc pts absolute max. £250 for just the gasket. If you can't bring it to me;)

somech

some of you are mad around £400-500 is a good price
bear in mind its not worth doing a !!!! job
would need head pressure test
head skim
gasket set
head bolts
cambelt kit and tensioners
thermostat and water pump
oil and filter + antifreeze
any one fancy doing this for £250 then? oh forgot aprrox 6 hours labour

w.dws

You could try something like k seal (google if you don't know what it is) as a temporary semi permanent fix sometimes works well sometimes doesn't. I wouldn't take it as gospel form the mechanic that nothing else is likely to need fixing as they always seem to be able to find something.

petrolhead69

if you can borrow a torque wrench and spline key set and a socket set a determined beginner can do it in a day or 2 with a haynes manual. If you dont need a skim you can get a gasket set for £25 and a belt kit for £30, oil for £15 and £5 for antifreeze. bearing in mind this is a cheap car so it probably wouldn`t be economically viable to do a thorough job so a cheap repair on something not safety related is ok. I talked a friend through the procedure plus changing 4 valves out of another knackered head from a snapped timing belt and bearing in mind he had never even changed plugs or oil before he had it done and running perfectly in 11 hours with only a couple of snags. the head bolts were ok, you can check for stretch on them with a straight edge. The car was still running when it was scrapped for rust 18 months later. Car was a p reg 1.8 vectra.
Thats if the car isn`t worth enough to make a proper repair viable, a 10 year old vectra might be borderline unless its in very good condition with low mileage. If the car is worth a fair bit your as well to do it properly with a skim, pressure/crack testing etc but if you only want to nurse it a while until you can trade it in it isn't worth it to pay top dollar.

cyclonebri1

somech wrote: »

some of you are mad around £400-500 is a good price
bear in mind its not worth doing a !!!! job
would need head pressure test
head skim
gasket set
head bolts
cambelt kit and tensioners
thermostat and water pump
oil and filter + antifreeze
any one fancy doing this for £250 then? oh forgot aprrox 6 hours labour

Excepting the head skim and pressure which I would suggest are easily checked for visually £300 would cover it, but not at £55 an hr, some of you guys just don't go to the right people:mad:

Homersimpson

I would always have the head skimmed to be sure its level (unless its an old cast iron head ;-), round by me it only costs about £30