I'll soon be changing my car and am looking at the Mondeo. A few questions...
Which engine? I fancy a 2l either petrol or diesel TDCi.
Which trim? I fancy a Ghia or Zetec
Where are the best places to look?
My budget is up to £7k. Best at less than 50k miles and a 51 or newer. I've looked at Car Giant but mileages seem quite high. Am I being unrealistic? Is my best bet an auction?
All advice appreciated
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I would say engine choice depends on how many miles you are doing. The TDCi 130 diesel is excellent but you will pay a significant premium for one over a petrol. Given your budget and requirements you'll be looking at an early 2002 TDCi and quite possibly a more limited choice. However, if you do a lot of miles the TDCi is good for 45mpg+ without watching how you drive it and the premium will begin to repay itself. Early TDCi's did have some problems but these were generally fixed under warranty. The fuel injectors can go without warning and are £300 each to fix - the car has to go to the dealer to have the injector correction factors programmed into the ECU. I had one go on me whilst the car was still under warranty and generally the car will go into limp-home mode rather than break down. The replacement injectors are modified and its not really a problem on the later cars.
The 2.0 petrol engine is nice unit too, much better than the 1.8. All engines in the Mk3 Mondeo range are chain cam so no cambelts to worry about.
As for trim, there's not much to choose between Zetec and Ghia. Zetec gets sports suspension so is a touch firmer on the ride, whereas the Ghia has Climate Control but it is not the best system in the world and can be a bit extreme when it first gets going. You would get a petrol Ghia X for your budget which is very high spec car for the money.
Auction is a good place to buy and you would be able get pretty much any trim with either a petrol or diesel engine for your budget. I don't think you're being unrealistic if you stay away from the big dealers and look at auction, private sales or a small independant dealer.
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My mate got two year-old March 04 2 litre Mondeo Ghia models from Arnold Clark at a windscreen price of £8,999 each (about £1,000 each less than would have been expected).
He also got full trade-in prices for the two Y-reg Mondeo 1.8 LX cars which were taken in PX plus full tanks of fuel and, overall, felt he had got a brilliant deal; certainly it was far less than he would have had to fork out elsewhere and he had already done his homework.
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