|
Must be a reason that tehre are so many old Volvo estates around. Tells me all I need to know about what to buy, plus the cbc 'what to look for' is somewhat shorter than for the Merc.
|
|
Mk4 Astra or Skoda Octavia
|
|
A diesel cherokee jeep, going for peanuts at auction at the mo, and run forever
|
|
What with the old 2.5 VM, you sure? I know these engines were a bit dodgy in Range Rovers. Individual cylinder heads and prone to gasket failure if I remember rightly.
|
|
|
A diesel cherokee jeep going for peanuts at auction at the mo and run forever
www.honestjohn.co.uk/forum/post/index.htm?t=70751
|
Pug 406 better than many think
Not in my personal experience they're not, too many electrical niggles and on both 406's I've owned poor economy due to high weight of car. The only good point about the 406 for your purposes (carrying bumpers) is that the load area with the seats down is very long, about a foot longer than an Octavia estate, and has no lip at the bottom. IIRC a 3 metre length of conduit would fit inside a 406 estate from the passenger footwell to the tailgate with very little flexing needed.
The Octavia has a greater luggage volume but this is achieved by the boot being wider and taller - also the boot floor is 6" below the level of the bumper which makes loading/unloading large, heavy indivisible items awkward.
Dave TD.
|
A good 405 TD estate takes some beating. A good simple engine that can even run on veg oil if needs be.
Steve.
|
|
My 405 has done 20,000 in the last year. Loves veg oil, needs no mods to use it, and its cheap to fix if needed. I saw a tidy one go on Ebay last night for £230, needed new starter and glow-plugs, but with 10 months MoT and 3 tax. Hard to beat.
|
I saw a tidyone go on Ebay last night for £230 needed new starter and glow-plugs but with 10 months MoT and 3 tax. Hard to beat.
Mmmm, reading between the lines it might just need a complete engine......................"sniff of easy start and away she goes"
|
|
No, I don't think so. Glow plugs wear out, and what a lot of people don't realise is that you can turn the key several times to increase the heat to them, so when they start to lose oomph you give the key two, three or even four turns. I had a 405 on terminal glow plug decline that needed four turns, but luckily someone wrote it off before I changed them.
|
I suppose I'll have to pitch in with a vote for the ubiquitous Mondeo estate. Well, someone had to sooner or later.
I've had several on and off over the years and have been unable to break any of them regardless of edition.
|
I reckon as a cheap workhorse, the Mondeo takes a lot of beating. As long as you don't get saddled with a clutch change, it won't bite you with a big bill, and all engines are good for 200+k if maintained to schedule.
I would also recommend the Volvo option. I've had an S60 for 9 months which is built like a tank, and the way in which it comes apart and goes back together when you service or work on it just smacks of quality engineering. Fasteners don't corrode, bits line up perfectly, and it rarely goes wrong anyway. Volvos are built to last forever from what I can tell.
Cheers
DP
|
Yep, I would also recommend the Volvos. Had a 940 estate and two 850 estates and they were all very good.
Re the clutch thing on Mondeos. By way of nothing in particular I just thought I'd mention that until I started using this site just over a year ago, I had never heard of particular clutch problems on these cars. I had certainly never heard of a "DMF". Not denying that some people must have encountered problems or they wouldn't have mentioned it but it was not something I was previously aware of.
As I mentioned I have had several Mondeos which I use as work cars and are therefore fully and heavily laden most of the time and run to very high mileages. None of them has ever suffered from a failed clutch.
Quite a few of my contemporaries run Mondeo estates. In our line of work we cover large distances carrying lots of heavy/bulky kit and are usually self-funded. Therefore a reliable, low running cost, large estate is ideal. I know of one Mondeo which is still going strong at 240k with everything non-consumable except the exhaust being original. I guess I can count more than a dozen Mk3 diesel estates I know of which have easily exceeded 150k and a lot more without clutch failure. I have never actually heard of one failing other than on here.
Doesn't mean a thing being such a small sample I know, but I thought it was interesting nonetheless.
To use a cliche, I, and my friends who have them, regard them as pretty bulletproof really.
No comfort I know to those who have had problems. Sorry to hear of those.
|
Thanks Humph Backbridge,
But what is.........
a "DMF"
thanks
Bumperman
|
I didn't know either 'till I came here. A "dual mass flywheel" apparently. Allegedly I should have got through a few of them but I suspect my car doesn't know it has one.....
|
Humph - I wasn't referring to the DMF issues reported on the diesels, or suggesting that Mondeos are more prone to clutch problems than any other. It's just that the Mondeo's clutch change procedure is one of the most labour intensive on anything this side of a supercar. This makes it a very expensive job, which almost certainly exceeds the value of all remaining mk1 and an increasing proportion of mk2 cars nowadays. Parts are cheap enough - a clutch kit for a petrol car will cost you less than £100, but you're then looking at major surgery to fit it which needs certain know how if you want to avoid wrecking the car's handling and driving characteristics.
I am a big fan of these cars, having had a good experience myself, and seeing my dad's old M reg 2.0 which his neighbours son now owns, still happily tootling around with over 200,000 miles on the original engine, gearbox and clutch! It still sounds incredibly sweet too. The clutch really is their main weakness - not in terms of likelihood of failure, but in terms of what it will cost you if you get caught out.
Edited by DP on 05/01/2009 at 23:22
|
And the seller has killed the starter in the process, behind every ebay "bad bits" tale lies a story, I've had my fingers burnt and I've bought a minter, roll the dice................
|
|
Perfectly possible, I'd agree. I spoke to the owner, and I think it was genuine, but it wasn't worth more than £200 to me, so I bowed out. If it had gone for the opening £150 I'd have bought it to use as a Christmas Tree. (ie rob for bits)
|
Mark II Mondeo estate, providing you find one that isn't just about to need the clutch doing!
|
Humph, its a horrible job to do, lots of pro mechanics farm the job out to clutch centres.
|
|
|
|
Thanks stunorthants26, but what is
cbc 'what to look for'
thanks
Bumperman
|
|
Oh gosh, did I let of one of the BR's biggest secrets? ( and great resources ) :-)
|
|
V.olvo 740. Bulletproof.
|
Volvo 740. Bulletproof.
I agree. I've two Volvo 240s. One's my daily commuter, now on 409,000 miles. The other is our second car and cost £100 three years ago.
|
|
|
|
Bumperman
You say 'reasonably economical'....with my low annual mileage that means 30mpg...more important to me are the cost of repairs and depreciation.Being biased I would suggest you look at the old style Legacy estate. I have owned two, plus a 5dr Impreza, all with the standard 2.0 engine which returned 32/34 mpg on average.
Hugely reliable, and plenty of internal space...more so than the new Tourer models.
The only thing wrong with my last '97 R reg GLS Legacy estate was a slight lack of power.....very, very cheap to buy and all 3 of mine cost peanuts to run with servicing at a local trusted mechanic. In 7 years of ownership all I needed, aside from normal consumables, were new rear bushes, bought outside the dealer network.
|
My Mum had two of these in succession when I was a kid
www.cardomain.com/ride/2670934
it was perfect for our family picnics on the downs, weirdly it was even the same colour as this one...
tinyurl.com/8gncmv
Can't remember when I last saw one on the roads...
going misty eyed now thinking about it...
Guy
|
Guygamps, thanks for posting that, i really liked the Crown custom, it was so different and closely followed by the huge Datsun 300 estate that stood out from the crowd with its twin rear wipers.
Been some years since i've seen either.
Can you remember if the Toyo was as reliable as the rest of the range, IIRC it had a host of accessories unheard of at the time.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
