What's a Cat D car?

davidjwest

You could ask why it's a CAT D, the owner may know.

My Mondeo was a CAT D, bought it from an auction that specialises in these for £1,500 and it cost another £1,500 to repair and put back on the road. A similar car with similar mileage, condition and specs would have been nearer £5k so I got a bargain.

Been fine since I had it, covered over 60k miles without any issues.

Hammyman

jase1 wrote: »

See if you can catch the programme "Wrecks to Riches" which is regularly repeated on the Discovery channels on Sky... these give an excellent guide to a typical Cat-D repair job. Quite involved work, and all too tempting to cut corners I'd say.

And this is what happens when clueless people watch programmes based on technical subjects then offer an opinion without having a single clue about what they've actually just seen.

They are not involved at all really. Whilst it may look complicated and severe to a layman, to a mechanic there isn't all that much to it and its certainly not "involved".

scheming_gypsy

and even less on an older car! when i needed parts after somebody smashed my Supra, there was a Supra in the yard that had been written off as a cat D. It needed a head light and there was a small crack in the front bumper.
Actual repair cost was about £45 for a second hand headlight if you could live with a cracked bumper but new it would have been:
Headlight - £150
Bumper - £800
labour, paint, hire car etc.

jase1

Hammyman wrote: »

And this is what happens when clueless people watch programmes based on technical subjects then offer an opinion without having a single clue about what they've actually just seen.

They are not involved at all really. Whilst it may look complicated and severe to a layman, to a mechanic there isn't all that much to it and its certainly not "involved".

It is more involved than typical service work, and requires a higher level of skill than a lot of cowboy garages can provide.

Or are you suggesting that all repair jobs are completed to the same high standard because "there isn't much to it"? :rotfl:

rodenal

I've never seen them do anything on that program that I can't do myself - and I'm not a mechanic so I don't see what you think they're doing that's so involved?

The majority of work on the cars they pick up usually comes down to: swap out a damaged hub / carrier / bumper bar / crossmember, replace with new / known good part then replace a couple of damaged panels, maybe a wheel and you're off.

s_b

thepurplegoldfish wrote: »

Apologies if I'm asking a silly question.

I've seen this car

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/2003-PEUGEOT-206-SW-HDI-XT-GREY-DIESEL-ESTATE-/320730592398?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item4aad08748e

And for me it ticks all the boxes, but I don't know what Cat D means and how it effects the owner. Can someone give me a quick education?

looks a bargain at the mo
make sure its ok before you drive it away
its worth £500 as a breaker

jase1

rodenal wrote: »

I've never seen them do anything on that program that I can't do myself - and I'm not a mechanic so I don't see what you think they're doing that's so involved?

The majority of work on the cars they pick up usually comes down to: swap out a damaged hub / carrier / bumper bar / crossmember, replace with new / known good part then replace a couple of damaged panels, maybe a wheel and you're off.

Including that VX?

In any case, if what you're saying is true that only further condemns the majority of back-street "repair shops" who make complete dogs' dinners of these cars to the point where my mother could see the poor workmanship.

scheming_gypsy

you don't even have to be a back street repair shop. Because the car is still road worthy and legal, the person who originally owned it can buy it back at a fraction of the cost and fix it with cable ties, duct tape and some well chewed Juicy Fruit.
With an older car like the one in the original post; there's 5 years of history since it was written off so if there were any issues they'd have been found and sorted (more than likely)

rodenal

vx220? Haven't seen that one sorry tried to look it up but can't find much that I can look at in work yet. Don't get me wrong if you get somebody who doesn't care about the quality of repair then it's by all means possible to do a rotten job, but it's not difficult work.

fivetide

A repair isn't difficult but a very good repair is.

How many people have fights over repairs with insurance companies over repairs from approved bodyshops using genuine parts?

Getting panels to align properly is a nightmare. You can do something that looks ok no problem butgetting back to factory is not easy. Then there is colour matching. Metallic Silver is really popular these days but is a nightmare to match. Even if it looks ok in the daylight it can show up as a slightly different shade under garage lights for example.

A car smashed at 3 years old will have had almost 5k of repairs done so pretty significant. Of course, an old nail written off because of a crack in the bumper = quick trip to scrappers and sorted. You need to take each car on its merits so it isn't right to say it will have been a minor/easy or horrible repair.

Mind, i would get a car written off in its early life properly inspected. If non-original parts were used to fix it you could well be at risk of tin worm.

5t.