Advise needed please

almillar

Very simple in a private sale - you're buying something who doesn't have to know ANYTHING about cars. You can ASK how the head gasket is, but the seller might not know WHAT a head gasket is, never mind its condition, so you, the buyer, must satisfy yourself of the car's mechanical condition.
Whatever you ask the seller, (s)he must reply truthfully to. 'I don't know' would certainly be a truthful answer to lots of stuff.
As for Cat C - seller may not have known, and indeed may not have any idea what you're talking about.
For this info, for buying from a trade or private seller, YOU need to do an HPI check (a proper one, not the simplified text message services). A private or trade seller telling you a car is 'HPI clear' isn't really any use.

colino

Retrogamer, have a look and find out what, "divulge" means.


Don't HPI a car from an established trader, your just adding to Soleras profits. If you don't trust them to do the basics, then walk away, you really don't trust them enough to do business with them and there are plenty of reliable traders around.

timm_2

gunboat4 wrote: »

If you have been mislead and been sold a piece of shxx this means the seller has lied to you and not listed all the faults. You don't say how much or what car you brought.? If you are prepared to fight this im sure there are people on this forum that may be able to structure a plan of attack. ???????????

Hilarious.:rotfl: What's worrying is that people sometimes believe (in good faith) any 'advice' given on an internet forum.

BeenThroughItAll

burlington6 wrote: »

Don't take advice off anyone who doesn't know the difference between ''bought'' and ''brought''

Or, more damningly, 'led' and 'lead'.

Retrogamer

colino wrote: »

Retrogamer, have a look and find out what, "divulge" means.

I know what the word means but i'm not aware of any legislation that states the private seller must "divulge" information in the context the OP has presented.

Happy to be corrected though if you have any sources?

Strider590

Battersbysam wrote: »

I've recently brought a car from a private seller when I got it home I gave it to my mechanic to give it a service and the once over. I've now found out that it is a Cat C write off which I wasn't told about and the engine had been (bodged) for the sale of it. Either the head gasket has gone or it's got a cracked head the EGR valve has been removed the ECU has been re-programmed so it dosnt show up the EGR valve has gone and the thermostat has been removed. Is there any thing I can do to get my money back from the seller who is not willing to give me it back. Thanks guys Sam

ECU probably has not been reprogrammed, it would be too much hassle, the EGR is quite often removed as it's a pile of euro-junk (to meet EU emissions, but not needed in the UK) and it causes nothing but hassle.

Thermostat is probably jammed open (age), it would seem like it was removed if this was the case.

Category C - the vehicle is repairable but the costs exceed the vehicle’s value. Can re-appear on road.

Insurance repairers charge so much that a £900 car would be written off for little more than a deep scratch.

One final fact, most brand new cars leave the factory having already had bodywork damage repaired. Accidents happen all the time in a mass manufacturing environment.

Retrogamer

Just to add to the above, you can get the EGR mapped out of the ECU software for much cheapness these days.
Removing the EGR will often cause the EML or similar to come on so you just apply a code to tell the ECU to ignore the EGR sensor.

I'd see that as a bonus if i bought a car to be honest. Something less to go wrong later.

macman

Lots of interesting speculation, but unless the OP comes back and tell us a) how the vehicle was described and b) what questions, if any, they asked about it's condition (and the answers they received), then this thread is (like the car in question) going nowhere.