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i know rover have a bad name but im i right in thinking that they have a honda engine ? also are parts easy to come by? and how do you peeps rate them ?
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The Rover 25 did not have Honda engines, it has the Rover K-series petrol /L-Series diesel. The much older Rover 200 did in some guises have Honda units and the diesels if I recall were Peugeot units.
L-Series is decent enough usually, K-Series a mixed bag.
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Seem to have good bodywork they don't seem to rust that much from what I can tell. It is the engines that kill them though, I would not buy unless you know the previous owner, its ifts had a bodged head gasket repair and it goes again you will probably need a new engine.
As longs as you make weekly checks on coolant etc then you will probably be ok with one. my uncle had one and the HG failed on it, it warped the head and it could not skimmed becasue the previous owner had already done that. He had to fit a new engine, cost him £900 and he did it himself.
That said you can get them stupidly cheap.
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For once I agree with everything that Rattle said :)
Rattle is spot on, body work ok but crap engines. As a result they can be picked up for peanuts.
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I'd hope they don't rust only being 7 or so years old for the most part....
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I had a 25 1.4. The 1.4 has the K-series engine so not a honda unit, but not sure about the 1.6 and 1.8's.
It had very tall gearing so would hit 90 in third.
Cant comment on long term reliability as I only owned it for about 18 months from new, but I liked it. Others will be along to tell you all about head gasket failiures, but I am not sure that they were so much of an issue in the 1.4 especialy in a smaller car
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My uncles was the 1.4 16v K series one. I know somebody who also had a 1.4 K series for about two years and never had any issues but it was a 1 year old car.
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Friend has one. A 2003 1.4 and yes it's had one HG already.
I fail to see the attraction. Noisy uncomfortable things with pound shop quality plastics.
Bodywork seems to hold up well though.
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A friend had a 214. The HG went for the 2nd time at less than 100k miles, so he pxed the remains for a 137k, W reg Honda Accord. Hasnt looked back since
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We ran a Rover 214 'bubble' shape which is essentially a 25 for over 7 years. Its finally retired to the garage at 141,000 miles but was a great workhorse the years we had it. The K series is a great engine and doesnt give any trouble if serviced correctly and coolant leaks are attended to. We spend less that 1.5K over those years and that included all servicing and repairs including tyres and exhausts and running the car for 80,000 miles!!!
Our car is still on its original everything other than service items and radiator/headgasket. The rad was leaking for weeks before I drove it 400 miles in a day without checking (stupid in hindsight!) and it ran out of water taking the gasket with it!!
Motorway trips are comfortable and if you get a 103bhp 1.4, they have a good turn of speed and acceleration.
You could do a lot worse and if you discount the very latest ones - 05 model year with the round 'Audi TT lookalike dash vents' then I cant see that you have any concern over internal trim and quality of plastics!!!
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Parts are easy to obtain.
See X Part: tinyurl.com/clfga8
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well thanks for the replys but after reading some reviews i think i will be looking at focus, civic, golf, astra.
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The K-series was designed for 1.1l and 1.4l sizes, so I would imagine very few problems with them.
The 1.6l and 1.8l were weaker engines for it.
A friend of mine had a 1.8l and the head gasket went on that.
Kind of odd but lotus use these 1.8l units in the Elise (170BHP if memory serves).
They also sorted out the head gasket problem by fitting a slower opening thermostat (no cold water rushing through causing a shock to form on the gasket) and designed a new gasket.
I also heard that the replacement gaskets are of better quality so that K-series engines are stronger after a new head gasket has been fitted.
Dunno if its true but this is what I head down the pub.....
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Kind of odd but lotus use these 1.8l units in the Elise
Lotus did use these but stopped years ago. Now use Toyota engines.
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Used owing to the fact that lotus had no money when it designed the elise and that was the cheapest engine with any kind of power (and even then a mk1 elise could have a mere 118bhp).
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The problem is it is all very well saying they are reliable if serviced correctly but how many on the used market would have had all the correct coolant changes etc? On all the cars we have I don't we have once had the coolant changed and we have never had any problems with head gaskets.
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I agree Rattle. One shouldn't have to check the levels daily or even weekly. As far as I'm concerned, the bonnet could be welded shut at the factory.
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So if you bought a Rover 25 you could fit a Lotus Elise engine to improve the reliability ;-)
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interesting concept.
maybe the chassis would survive the first gear change :-)
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No... you could make a K series engine more reliable by fixing it. Lotus re-engineered the Elise to take a different engine. But I know you were joking but some fool might think you were semi serious :-)
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Yes, at the same as I dropped my Lotus Elise engine into my Rover 25 I'd also lower the suspension, put some big wheels onto it, fit a loud exhuast, a loud stereo and black out the windows.....
Ooohh, and top it off with some garish paint job ;-)
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But if the Elise engine was a K-series engine you'd not bother. You'd only need to fix the head gasket problem after failure.
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My brother had a 25 and had no problems with it.
Bit bigger than a supermini, but not as big as a Focus/Astra, so it was handy around town and not too bad on the motorway.
I had a few goes in it and thought the ride and handling was pretty good.
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The problem with HGF on the K series is that there is so much conflicting information on the cause, and the effectiveness of the various remedies.
Some people claim the upgrade multi layer steel (MLS) gasket kit and modified oil ladder has a 100% success rate in permanently curing the head gasket issues. Others have said they've seen subsequent failures of cars thus equipped. Ditto the cylinder head dowels which have been switched between metal and plastic, and back to metal at various stages in the engine's life, and the plastic ones have also been implicated in this issue.
Some claim it's a thermostat location issue. The 'stat on these engines sits on the inlet from the radiator rather than the outlet to it causing a multitude of problems including the cold water in the rad working against the hot water in the cylinder head and delaying the opening of the thermostat, plus the sudden rush of cold water from the rad causing thermal shock to the head when the thermostat opens. There are various kits to relocate the stat which receive varying feedback from owners.
Some say its a casting and assembly quality issue. The quality of the castings on the heads is apparently hugely variable, and many do not meet the level of precision required to form an effective long term seal around the fire rings on the gasket. This to my mind is the most likely explanation, as it is the only one which explains why some K's do 150,000 miles without incident, and others fail repeatedly. There are also reports of engines leaving the factory with cylinder liner protrusion variances between the cylinders that are well out of tolerance.
And finally there's the issue of the tiny coolant capacity of the engine making leaks much more serious. This also shows the origins of this engine - as a small (1.1 and 1.4 litre) engine with ultra-fast warm up times to power a light city runabout. At its original design stage, it was never conceived that it would be stretched to 1.6 and 1.8 litres, let alone be used in a big, heavy 4x4 and a junior supercar!
If you can get the car so cheap you can afford to bin it if it breaks, it's worth a punt
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