Your Bangernomics successes

mcjordi

Just picked up a 53 plate mg zs+ 1.8 with 106k on the clock. stainless steel exhaust 11 months mot and 1 week tax for the grand old sum of £250 goes like poo off a stick.
no signs of any hg failure.. been advised uprate head gasket/head fitted a while back.
any time it lasts will mean its a bargain.. can get £250 plus scrapping it

Rolandtheroadie

I've been lucky with cars and motorbikes in the past, but my latest buy has become a money pit.

From a £800 buy, I'm now double that into a Frontera and it still isnt going (although should be very shortly)

Probably going to cut my losses and park it up to be worked on at my leisure which will save an MOT, 4 tyres and tax (at least another £700 by my reckoning) and buy another banger to see me through.

worried_jim

£60 of petrol lasted just over a month and using http://www.fuelly.com I have an mpg figure of 26.4. Quite happy for this as most journeys are under 5 miles, although I did notice from looking at the receipt that the price of gas had gone up 5p a litre since the previous fill in February. Filled the tank on Tuesday night from low fuel warning light for £72- Most I have ever spent on fuel in one go- hopefully should get a good 5-6 weeks out of it, even more so now the weather is warming up.

mcjordi

well the mg is gone..
lasted me all of 10 days :rotfl: was using poo loads of water.. owed me £350 in the end as i taxed it.. sold for £350 to a guy who fixes up rovers/mg's so i lost nothing.. well just the fuel money i put in it.. even the insurance was free.. (i cancelled it well within the 14 day cooling off period)
so ran a car for 10 days for about £20 in petrol (well 15ish as i got money for a couple of lifts)

couldnt hire a car for that/or even get the bus. i covered about 150 miles in it :j

hunt begins again:D

worried_jim

mcjordi wrote: »

well the mg is gone..
lasted me all of 10 days :rotfl: was using poo loads of water.. owed me £350 in the end as i taxed it.. sold for £350 to a guy who fixes up rovers/mg's so i lost nothing.. well just the fuel money i put in it.. even the insurance was free.. (i cancelled it well within the 14 day cooling off period)
so ran a car for 10 days for about £20 in petrol (well 15ish as i got money for a couple of lifts)

couldnt hire a car for that/or even get the bus. i covered about 150 miles in it :j

hunt begins again:D

Sounds like HG if using loads of water. Good luck with the next one!

mcjordi

worried_jim wrote: »

Sounds like HG if using loads of water. Good luck with the next one!

yeah probably.. didnt really like the car anyway but it did get me 10 days of use with very little cost..
eyeing up a citroen xsara for 400 notes with tax and test.. now i like xsaras and still have a box full of spares for one..

worried_jim

mcjordi wrote: »

yeah probably.. didnt really like the car anyway but it did get me 10 days of use with very little cost..
eyeing up a citroen xsara for 400 notes with tax and test.. now i like xsaras and still have a box full of spares for one..

Great value cars- always lots of choice on autotrader.

rev_henry

James_Nolan wrote: »

I have one of these as well Bought last June after I smashed up my £100 volvo 740 estate that lasted me 3 years (best car I ever bought and still annoyed I put it through a hedge backwards!)

Paid £960 odd for my 940 Celebration (but cashed the remaining tax in for £120 odd as i'm disabled). Very minimal service history, few reciepts here and there, and one for a cambelt change 5 years ago but condition wise it was as perfect as you can get, owned by an elderly gent in a lovely house, so I bought on condition rather than history.

I use it just to go to work and back which isn't far, and use it for trips to le mans every year etc and never breaks.

At the moment, mine needs an oil change, as I haven't had it done since I got it, it needs a new exhaust manifold gasket, 2 new rear tyres and could probably do with a cambelt, as well as the aircon regassing.

Sounds like a long list but £250 odd and it will be sorted for the forseeable. Love my old volvo's and much more reliable than mates vauxhalls or french rubbish

You know that has a non interference engine right? So you could just, er, leave the cambelt until it snaps, then replace it. Although that does cause an inconvenience of leaving you broken down at some point...

alastairq

Volvo 740 estate, bought off ebay for £500 [surprise win, honest....put bid in and forgot it]....owner promptly taxed it for a year..which wasn't in the deal originally...and a 12 month MoT!

It went to Inverness the following day!.....needed a new pack on the alternator though....and the driver's window was wedged closed by a wump o wood inside the door.......a small nut 'n bolt cured the broken pivot, so window went up and down nicely.

Bought to tow a massive trailer.....over 5 years of ownership, it covered over 130,000 miles...had a new clutch [abuse on my part] and the usual strip and clean that Bosche K-jetronic fuel injection regularly needs.

Fitted a new cam belt, just in case..simple job on these...

Remould tyres lasted close to 30,000 miles!!!! Fitted new brakes [PFS had a promotion].....left the front discs till the old one's wore out [bad idea]...still have a set of new front discs in the kitchen cupboard......must ebay them some time?

Lovely car to drive, like an old sailing barge. Loads of room inside, no getting elbows in ribs inside this one.

A local specialist Volvo breaker was useful.

eventually, the alternator decided to overcharge, and I ignored the warning signs [like, occasional high-speed wipers?]...so on one slightly longer-than-usual journey, the battery exploded under the bonnet.

The voltage surge took out any electrics that were running at the time.....ignition, fuel pumps, hall sensor, some relays, all the daylight running lights, etc.

Costed the replacements, came to just short of £200 new.....did not cost the barfed knuckles and em!!!!!!ance factor.

Kindly work colleague lent me his surplus Skoda Felicia estate, R-plater....to tide me over!

TAx was due end-of-month on volvo, so that had to be factored into the expenditure that month....

Skoda was for sale, and an offer of 300 was accepted, it had 6 months ticket, tax for four, and returned another additional 15 or so mpg's......

poor old volvo, no contest really, so...I scrapped it, got 130 for it as it stood [got rid of a load of other scrap as well..old wheel or two, etc]

the Skoda has surprised me....[I am very familiar with things old skoda, anyway]...cheap to run, but has had bits when needed, consumables all of them...alternator brush pack, starter eventually....brakes....eventually....exorst, eventually......the odd temp sensor..I still have a box of new brake bits to fit, when the old one's finally pack in.....I suspect I'll end up with a cupboard full of new, unused parts if I'm not careful?

Broke a bottom spring cup the other week...not skoda's fault, but the shocker maker's! new item bolted in lickety spit, by the roadside outside my front door!

The one problem I have is that I don't posses a hard-nosed sense of business...no way...I have rarely if ever sold on a car for more than I paid for it originally...[except the skoda that paid for my ESAB mig!]...and I don't throw bits away!

Probably the reason why I've been divorced three times?

jase1

worried_jim wrote: »

Great value cars- always lots of choice on autotrader.

The Xsara has always been a good cheap choice; designed when French cars hadn't gone stupid with all the troublesome electrics (so they were tolerable) and unloved so cheap for what they are. They don't rot either. The 90s Skoda of the Froggie car world, I'd say.

Very nearly bought one in 2006.