opinions on this car?

sparkychris

Its almost new banger time, and this has caught my eye, for practical rather than sexy reasons...
I do 50 motorway miles per day and drive to Holland two or three times a year...

What do we think of this...
http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201504232875921/sort/atcustom/radius/15/page/1/channel/cars/fuel-type/diesel/postcode/sy14yg/price-to/3000/price-from/1000/usedcars/onesearchad/used%2Cnearlynew%2Cnew?logcode=p

CrazyRed

My understanding of the 1.9Dci engine is "avoid". They seem to have a significant number of turbo failures that then result in "runaway" where the engine runs on it's own oil at higher and higher speeds until it self destructs. From what I can gather, it's not a case of "if" it'll suffer turbo failure and runaway, but "when".

Additionally, the advert shows another "typical" French car fault - there's a handbrake warning on the screen (not sure if that would be an MOT failure these days and that could be anything from a simple sensor fault (unlikely IMHO) to something major electrical going mammaries-skyward (it's French, therefore very likely).

In all honesty, I would advise avoiding that vehicle.

RS2000.

Handbrake fault on screen but handbrake works, is this the start of the French electrical faults?

Part service history, can't the dealer be arsed to chase this up?

I bet you could do better.

s_b

RS2000. wrote: »

Handbrake fault on screen but handbrake works, is this the start of the French electrical faults?

Part service history, can't the dealer be arsed to chase this up?

I bet you could do better.

part service history says what it is
of course the rest of the car is a hand grenade with the pin out

sparkychris

OK.... I've heard enough!!!!

I hate new banger buying time.... I've been soooooo lucky with my sheds over the years that I just know that the law of averages will catch up with me!

CrazyRed

I've just had a quick skiffle through Autotrader, on a 15 mile radius of the postcode you showed in your link, and three vehicles stood out immediately as worthy of further investigation, given your proposed usage:

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201504293036866/sort/default/radius/15/usedcars/fuel-type/diesel/channel/cars/postcode/sy14yg/page/2/onesearchad/used%2Cnearlynew%2Cnew/price-to/3000/price-from/500?logcode=p

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201504102493348/sort/default/postcode/sy14yg/price-from/500/channel/cars/page/3/price-to/3000/fuel-type/diesel/onesearchad/used%2Cnearlynew%2Cnew/usedcars/radius/15?logcode=p

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201505143465105/sort/default/channel/cars/usedcars/fuel-type/diesel/radius/15/onesearchad/used%2Cnearlynew%2Cnew/page/4/price-from/500/postcode/sy14yg/price-to/3000?logcode=p

The Volvo might seem a bit "leftfield", but my MIL's had one of these exact models, and the same year (it's Euro3 emissions, so no DPF to worry about in the exhaust and the engine in it is bulletproof and capable of huge mileages) for the last 120,000 miles and it's been a superb workhorse, often achieving in excess of 45mpg on a motorway run.

HTH

sparkychris

Cheers red! That Volvo is lovely! What's a geartronic gearbox?!
To be fair, I am scared of automatics.... Banger automatics seem to be a bit troublesome...
I do like that Volvo though!

RS2000.

sparkychris wrote: »

Cheers red! That Volvo is lovely! What's a geartronic gearbox?!
To be fair, I am scared of automatics.... Banger automatics seem to be a bit troublesome...
I do like that Volvo though!

Park, reverse, neutral and drive on one side of the gear change. Up and down through the forward gears on the other.

fatbelly

Actually the Audi looks good too.

The 130bhp 1.9tdi pd engine was the best version of a very good engine - no dpf, fast, economical and goes on forever.

gilbert_and_sullivan

Investigate Volvo and Audi (every Aldi) auto gearbox problems before you go any further.

As for the Scenic, i have a mate with one, funnily enough the engine is the one thing that hasn't given a moments trouble.

Cars fitted with electric parking brakes are now coming way down in price, and about as popular with those in the know as boils, buy one at your own risk, but don't be surprised if £1k bill to fix the park brake alone feature highly on ''reasons i scrapped my car'' threads.

colino

I think you've got the message OP! However it brings up a useful couple of points. When checking dealer ads, look for the subtle and not so subtle clues. Not everything can be a p/x, but what if it was? Good enough to retail should be that, no need to tell all and sundry of source. Branding them as such tends to be laying out that this car isn't quite up to snuff, but he has told you, hasn't he? On such an almighty awful vehicle, positively telling you that it has an electrical fault, but they all do that, suggests that will be his answer to every warranty query. Look too at the rest of the spread of stock. Some of it just doesn't ring true when thought of as initial cost, age, where does that mileage come from? Some dealerships with a less eclectic spread might be thought of as boring. However they know what their customers want and know what they can sell in good conscience. The initial dealer mentioned is a sweeper.
Please don't go too for small dealers/privateers with oddballs, big diesels with autos for example. They may be absolute peaches, but unless you can properly assess them and/or are doing the spanner twirling yourself, the first problem can see it heading for the scrapper.
Some cars have a bad reputation for a reason.