Buying a secondhand Rover Metro

vax2002

It will have driven on salted roads, at 16 years old, lots of the bits would not need to be driven to corrode.
There is a very good reason you hardly ever see on on the road, they fell to bits in normal use and so shall this as soon as someone starts driving it.

Gloomendoom

jaydeeuk1 wrote: »

If you agree with euthanasia then by all means get your mum to buy one. Even a trolley ding could be life threatening. I've been on one once - never ever again, cigarette paper is thicker than the doors.

You are talking absolute bollox.

The doors are no thinner than the doors on any other car. I had loads of Metro's. I rolled them down embankments, been rammed up the arse by a speeding Transit van, had the doors backed into in car parks, had my dad tip them on their sides in ditches... several times (he's old.) All without getting even a scratch.

mikey72

vax2002 wrote: »

On a P plate the underneath will be like a bag of crisps.

What, smooth, shiny, and as fresh as the day it left the factory. can't go wrong then.

Bufger

I think all of the above posters should detail how many they have owned or what type of professional contact they have had with the vehicles before giving some wild statements! Opinions are like ....

I've personally owned 2, a Tahiti and a bog standard both 1.1. I had 3 accidents in the bog standard one, A rear impact at 25mph, a side impact at 30mph and a front corner impact at 5mph. The side and rear obviously did damage but I wasnt injured (the side impact hit the passenger door which someone on here claims to be paper thin), it dented the door and front wing on the outside but the door card remained the same. The rear impact broke tail lights, the bumper and the boot but the impact was soaked up and I didnt recieve any injuries.

As a chartered automotive engineer I also like to fix my own vehicles and do this for others (family members mostly). The radiator is a common problem which is why people still make them as spares, at a whopping £35 for a rad it doesnt matter how often they get a hole in them! (i replaced in both of mine). As for rust its the same with any old car, i actually found fiestas of the same era to rust considerably more with the rust penetrating the rear crossmembers. In Rovers it is always the paintwork and wheel arches but sills are a common spot too. If its been looked after and has an MOT then you would expect it to have been treated for rust, it is after all road legal with a full MOT.

So all you metro haters, have you even actually owned one or are you just sitting in your BMWs smirking at the rest of society?

Sgt_Pepper_2

It's not a purple one is it?

joho

Crikey - I didn't expect my post to provoke such a flurry of answers!

Mum's a pensioner too, so I'm not too worried about her speeding in it! She's currently driving an utter heap of an M reg fiesta where the doors are bent from thieves trying to rob it so often! So I was just after a nice little, waterproof runaround for her! I know it's hard to tell, but it looks in excellent nick from the photo.

No, it's not purple Sgt Pepper. (off to check.....doubting myself).

Thanks for the answers everyone.

jaydeeuk1

Gloomendoom wrote: »

You are talking absolute bollox.

The doors are no thinner than the doors on any other car. I had loads of Metro's. I rolled them down embankments, been rammed up the arse by a speeding Transit van, had the doors backed into in car parks, had my dad tip them on their sides in ditches... several times (he's old.) All without getting even a scratch.

Can't tell if you're trying to make a case for or against the metro! But if every metro you had ended up on its roof, in a ditch or rammed off the road, I don't think its best feature that it has a fantastic anti scratch paint job would sell it to the OP. Just IMO of course.

maninthestreet

Does £600 include a full tank of fuel?

Johnmcl7

Bufger wrote: »

So all you metro haters, have you even actually owned one or are you just sitting in your BMWs smirking at the rest of society?

Yes owned a Metro, no don't own a BMW. The Metro was a 1.1S with sunroof, five doors, metallic paint and a digital tuner on the radio (pretty good going for a Metro) and I liked it, the boxy shape may not have appealed aesthetically but it could hold a surprising amount in the back for such a small car. There's so many of them sitting around on scrapyards that parts were usually easy to find although the rust was a serious problem on my one. Even with rust proofing there seemed to be more and more work needed each year to get it through its MOT and eventually when combined with the head gasket going it was too much to be worthwhile.

John

Sgt_Pepper_2

maninthestreet wrote: »

Does £600 include a full tank of fuel?

I'd hope so the p registered one I saw is £325.