My Fiesta 1.4Tdci has only done 185 thousand miles and the alternator has failed! I'm right miffed. I had to call out Britannia Rescue 'cos I was stuck at Tesco with a flat battery. Now I've got to work out how to get the auxiliary belt off - I've never tackled one before!

In other words, yes, it's been reliable. It's had a few failures, but that's the first time that it wouldn't get me home without the breakdown man hitting the battery with his defibrillator. (The alternator was putting out 13v, so I was still able to drive home after the restart).

Agreed, good servicing is far cheaper than the alternative.

Also despite being regarded as somewhat old hat now, it helps long life to allow the turbo to warm up before giving it the beans, and to cool down a while by letting the engine tickover for a while before shutdown once hot.

All late Ford diesels are turbocharged,and the engines used in the Fiesta models are the Ford/Peugeot type.Reliability is often down to strict maintenance of the engine ,especially frequent oil changes with a good quality and correct spec oil.

What about the MK5 which finished twelve years ago ran from 1999-2002 are they all turbos?