What estate car & engine size? £3k to spend

OddballJamie

bodgerx wrote: »

I think you misunderstood. I was not advocating buying that. In fact I accepted that this is the case.

I drive a direct injection petrol and wouldn't consider a diesel for the reasons you state.

I was purely making the point that the 1.8 is probably worse than the 1.6.

My apologies, it was attila_ that recommended it.

I had the 2.0 version of it from 2 ish years old and it cost me a fortune to keep it on the road.

Petrol all the way for me now.

carpool72

OK, so in terms of running costs the better mpg & lower road tax from a diesel is likely to be outweighed by repair costs?

What about load capacity? A 1.6 would do in general but would it be a big comedown from the 1.8turbo petrol and 2L diesel I've been used to? And would it be able to cope with the big loads when we go on holiday (3 bikes etc)? Or should I be looking for a 1.8 / 2L?

Cheers

Foxy-Stoat_3

carpool72 wrote: »

OK, so in terms of running costs the better mpg & lower road tax from a diesel is likely to be outweighed by repair costs?

What about load capacity? A 1.6 would do in general but would it be a big comedown from the 1.8turbo petrol and 2L diesel I've been used to? And would it be able to cope with the big loads when we go on holiday (3 bikes etc)? Or should I be looking for a 1.8 / 2L?

Cheers

Repair costs is luck of the draw in ANY car (servicing costs aside) - you can travel 50,000 miles in 5 years in a diesel or petrol and not spend anything on repairs or a shed load in repairs.

1.8 or 2.0 wouldn't be much in it. If your towing then get the higher torque engine you can.

adjests

This is my opinion only, and I’m sure others will disagree with thecomments.

However, I’m not sure you should discount diesels even if you cover lessthan 10,000 miles a year.

For context the wife had an Audi 1.6 petrol and now has a ToyotaAvensis 2.2 diesel. Mainly used for towndriving (and very short journeys c2miles each) with the odd monthly 40 mileround trip to her parents. In our casethe fuel savings have been far greater than any repair costs. The Audi did 26 mpg and the Avensis does38mpg – the annual fuel saving being somewhere in the region of £500. We’ve hadthe Avensis for 6 years and to date no DPF, EGR or turbo issues.

As Foxy-Stoat, quite rightly points out, one can spend a fortune onrepairs irrespective of whether the car is a petrol or diesel. And in myopinion one shouldn’t necessarily expect a diesel to be any more unreliable orcostly than a petrol engine car.

Having said all of that, the Accord, Volvo or Mondeo are all good suggestions. For my two pence worth, would suggest the Volvo(diesel). For a left field suggestion,how about a Saab?