Its still alot more expensive to buy a new car than fix the Rover. Have you had a second opinion on the work needing doing?
Even if you bought the cheapest new car on the market, its still going to be say £2500 cost to change inc scrappage, which may be another 4 years motoring in the Rover even at £600 a year in repairs, which seems unlikely if you have looked after it up till now.
All these people who knock on about spending more than a cars value in repairs tend to gloss over the fact that its still cheaper to repair an old banger than buy a newer car which is fresh enough not to need equally expensive potential repairs and if you buy a new car, they are a massively more expensive option even if they never go wrong.
Your cost to change if you lay down £6k on a reasonable car is £600 a year if you keep it for ten years, thats not including the odd repair that may need doing, plus if you have a major failure on the Rover that is beyond the pale economically, you can just throw it away, whereas with a car that still has value, you are faced with a the much harder decision of what to do with it.
Maybe spending £1k on a bangernomics diesel might be a halfway house for you.
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thanks for all the replies - I think we're going to get the work done to be honest. The engine (Honda 1.6) is still pretty tight - it's just the rest of the car that is having problems.
Work that needs doing is: suspension bushes, new brake discs all round (well overdue..), new front pads, couple of electric problems as well. The quote also includes an oil change etc
I was just a bit worried that this was the thin end of the wedge, but the garage (who I do trust - naive me maybe, but up till now they have been very honest with us, and with my relative who owned the car since 1996 and had it serviced with the same garage), well they have said that it still has plenty of life in it, and that future bills should be smaller.
We had the cambelt changed in April, so that's another reason to keep it I suppose...
Thanks for the replies - looks like the Rover (or Ethel, as we call her) will keep on rolling after all.
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TR, first thing i'd say is yes do the work as you know the complete history of the car, and you've had the all important cambelt changed anyway.
If it were me i'd buy discs and pads from a reputable factors and put them in meself, a considerable saving and really quite easy together with oil and filters, and let your trusted indy do the other work if you don't feel up to it, that may well halve the bill.
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Funnily enough I've just started a thread where we are giving up our low value Citroen in favour of possibly a new car with a scrappage trade in. This time the decision to out the Citroen is certain but at MOT time a year ago we had all the same thoughts as you.... eventually gave it another year with £350 in repairs. Right decision as it has been 100% relaible and only cost £13 for an oil/filter change.
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Hi M.M - I saw your thread this morning and thought that we were in the same boat - funnily enough I am very taken with the citroen C4, especially the 110 Hdi!
good luck with whatever you choose!
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We have had a similar decision to make with my dads 1997 Fiesta Ghia. Because it is a Ghia it has all the luxeries including quick clear windscreen. However the suspension has been costing us a lot to repair, bushes/wishbones etc are always failing on it.
However the gearbox and clutch feel like new (its on 84k) and the engine is pretty quite for those old Pushrod units so its thats pretty decent too. There is a bit of rust on the bodywork but the chasis is solid (no rust underneath). We have decided that it is cheaper to keep repairing the Fiesta than scrappage because the loan will be massive in terms of interest. Depreciation and loan payments come to a lot more than any repair on the Fiesta even if it needed a new engine.
We decided to keep it till it dies which will probably take upto 95 or 100k.
I would probably just keep your Rover too, too many old cars get scrapped when there is little wrong with them.
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>>>too many old cars get scrapped when there is little wrong with them.
That's one small reservation I have about our old Citroen going to the crusher via the scrappage scheme. It is 100% rust free, always starts, has working aircon, 6-CD player, all elec windows etc etc.... but if we get £2000-£3000 you can't say no.
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It is 100% rust free, always starts, has working aircon, 6-CD player, all elec windows etc etc.... but if we get £2000-£3000 you can't say no.
What twaddle - of course you can. And maybe you should have done. You can be sure no-one is doing you any real favour with the £2-3K, it's all hidden in the balance sheet. It's deliberate waste to junk a perfectly good car.
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Andrew,
Well it's still all up in the air and we will ponder for a couple of weeks to make sure whatever the decision is it's right for us.... the only certain thing is that the Citroen is going.
I've spent 35yrs with at least one good value older car on the drive encouraging just the stance you take. I've done my bit for the older car. However life changes and our priorities lie elsewhere so to have at least one of our vehicles with fixed costs for three years may well suit us.
Assuming we decide we want a new car and sell the old one on Ebay it would be lucky to make £750 (unless someone wanted it for scrappage!). In these days of already discounted new cars we'd be lucky to get an extra £750 off for no PX so there would be a £1500 shortfall compared with the full scrappage deal. I don't have £1500 worth of sentiment over a car.
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No, I wasn't looking for £1500-worth of sentiment about your car. Just that it seems more environmentally friendly for it to be kept running (not necessarily by you) instead of 'thrown away'. Yesterday's paper was commenting on the large quantity of wine thrown down the sink instead of being drunk the next day - up to £50-worth a month by some it seems. I just don't agree with unnecessary (or deliberate) waste, that's all.
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Bit of follow up on this...
The head gasket went at the weekend - estimates from the garage are £600-700, which is a bit scary.
That would make over £1200 in repairs alone for this car, not including regular servicing / MOT etc.
Any experts in bangernomics care to give any advice as to whether it really may be the end of the road? We were already looking to get a second-hand car to go with the rover, as we do need 2 cars in this household. If the rover dies, then we'll shortly be looking to get 2 cars!
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First thing I would do would be ring around and get other quotes.
If you cant get the cost down, you will have to spend alot more than £600 to find a car that you can have any guarantee of fault free motoring. Yeah there will be some here who claim they have managed it an they prob have BUT unless you know what your looking at, you could easily buy something with another £1000 that needs spending on unseen faults. Like gambling? :-)
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My dad's Rover 75 needs a new clutch, and he considered throwing it away and getting a replacement. Surprised to see that 75 prices have actually gone up over the last year.
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If £6-700 was the end of it, that could be a yea! but there's no telling that it wouldn't blow up after a few weeks, is there.
You could get a mobile mech to do it 4 less.
A chap over the weekend here spent £000dles on his MX5 - blew up within 6 months :(
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With a car like this keep it until it goes wrong. If you an afford to spend a good £4k with all the inspections etc and want you should be able to get something with a good 6-10 years life in it which will be cheaper than constantly repairing your Rover. Its an L reg car no matter how good it may be other things will start to go wrong.
The head gasket is just the force up theres way of telling you get rid now before it costs you a Rolls Royce.
If however you only have £1k to spend I would probably get the HG fixed, because any car at £1k is a big gamble. I got my Corsa inspected before I bought it, it came with a 12 month MOT, yet I have still had to spend money on it. I've got it to a state which it is a reliable and safe car now so I will probably keep it until something very major goes wrong with it.
Its the same with your Rover, you know all the faults. One thing I will say has your garage taken the head off? If not then how do they know if the cylinder head has already been skimmed? The risk is it could end up being a much bigger job.
Edited by Rattle on 08/12/2009 at 11:35
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It's a 'family car', so i know it's history - mainly trouble free until the last couple of years.
We got it from Granny 4 years ago when it had done 40000, it's done another 43000 since then... We had a hole in the radiator about 18 months ago, but we got it seen to before it really really overheated - otherwise, this is the first engine problem.
I looked in the oil filler cap (no mayonnaise) and in the coolant reservoir (no oil), so was surprised to hear it's a HGF, however I'm not a mechanic! And I do (call me naive) trust this garage, but I suppose a second opinion wouldn't hurt. They were surprised that the honda engine had a HGF though.
It does feel like the tip of the iceberg might be starting to reveal itself. I assume that even if we fix the HG, the chances of it happening again are higher now?
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discs and pads £60 trade
bushes x2 £15 trade
electrical doolally x2 £50 trade (and your avin a larf mate) whats your best price?
so a nice 1/2 days work for the garage
maybe get another quote before committal?
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We've moved on bell-boy! It's a HGF now (apparently)...
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We've moved on bell-boy! It's a HGF now (apparently)...
>oh
must be down to age then
you have to walk away now then dont you
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I think we have to assume you are not a DIYer and that you are happy with your indy so the prices you mention for repairs are the ones the decision must be based on. No matter how much goodwill you have towards this car the spending has to stop sometime... and I think this is the time. With £1200 of repairs facing you already for the next 6mths it's never going to be worth it on an L-reg car due to all the other unexpected problems you could face even after the work is done. I think also it is rarely worth chasing head gasket repairs on an old car if you have to pay a garage to do the work... however much you trust them they are a repair that can come back to haunt you in another year or so.
Just for your interest after all our thinking we bought a 3yr old C3 HDi with very low mileage and traded the old Xsara in to save hassle. It only had a few days MOT left when we did the deal and the figures were on the basis it passed.... which it did with three advisory notes. To sort the advisory items to make it good for the next year would have been £275 plus it needs timing belt, coolant change, brake fluid change and a decent service. At our indy that extra work plus the advisory items would have ben perhaps £550 or more so we made the right decision.
No idea of your family/motoring needs but would a small car on contract lease do you to get at least one worry free car on the drive? We are looking at that way of replacing our other car. We're looking at dealing with Lingscars who do a brand new Citroen C2 HDi for £138/mth with just 3mths down. Hell of an easy way to get into a cheap to run car which will be under warranty for the next three years!
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What exactly are the symptoms that they are basing this diagnosis on then? I hope not just the overheating! My dads old Astra use to overheat sometimes and a mechainic at a reputable garage diagnosed HGF - I had a look, found it was very overfilled with oil, drained the excess out and low and behold, no more overheating.
If your no mechaincally minded, I would get several other diagnosis from other garages.
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Given it's the Honda engine, which is not known for HGF, I would agree with stu - get a second opinion or at least a clear understanding of why they think it's HGF.
These Honda engines are normally good for 200+k before you even need to think about anything other than routine maintenance. The ignitor units blow, but otherwise they really are problem free.
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