Ask Honest John

Most recently answered reliability questions
I would love to buy a Superb Estate as a family car to keep it for a long time. Resources are not limitless, so I have to keep overall cost over 10 years and roughly 170,000 miles in mind. I read of...
I have been offered a Vectra 2004 2.0 DTI estate with just over 100,000 on the clock. I have 2 young kids so this would be perfect as I have a passat just now and it is getting quite tired. The guy that...
As we do 25,000 miles each year, a couple of years ago we bought a 5 year old Citroen C4 diesel for £5000 with 61,000 miles on the clock. Now, after almost 50,000 miles of pretty much trouble-free motoring...
In your summary of the Volvo V50 you state as a 'bad point' that diesels are expensive after 3 years. I have a 40 month old Volvo V50 2.0 diesel with 22k miles and and no problems so far. I need to decide...
Your warnings on the failure costs of turbos, DMFs and DPFs mean that the very features that reduce fuel usage and emissions raise the risks of high repair costs. I note the Fiesta Econetic does not have...
I wonder if you could advise me on the best 4x4 to tow a horse trailer and two ponies? Whatever we buy will have to be used for my work and as our family car, so it needs to be as economical as possible....
I would like to ask you about the reliability of The MK2 Skoda Octavia 1.9 TDI. I know that they are great overall, but I would like to know what you think about the mechanical and electrical reliability...
Hi. I know nothing of cars but I want to buy a good used diesel automatic to last for many years. I don't care about buying the latest greatest model every year or two and I just want the best chance of...
I bought an XL7 5 Door new in Oct 2005 (old model). Now at 70k miles I'm delighted with it in all respects - only fault is the CD player has a jammed disc, and 4x alloys pitted. Both issues replaced by...
We have a 2004 (04) Golf 1.9 TDI which goes as well now (109,000miles) as when we bought it 6 years ago. The next service (116K) will necessitate new cam belt (number 2) plus extras, some brake work...