Edited by Mike2828 on 21/02/2017 at 14:31

General wisdom these days is to make a diesel viable you need to be doing at least 15k miles per annum.

We had the BMW 118d for just over 5 years and 37,000 miles. Taking into account all our costs, purchase price and trade in we saved about £2500.

We had the Ceed CRDi for 5 years and 38,000 miles. Taking all the costs into acount again we saved over £2000.

Both cars were nice to drive, their petrol equivalents were slugs despite have the same (or even more BHP).

But with the availability of modern small petrol turbos you get a better drive than a diesel, almost the same mpg and no DPF to worry about. I have calculated taking all the factors into acount I have saved about £1500 over 4 years with the petrol Leon.

Guess which type of engine I will buy form now on.

Oh, I agree skidpan - but very notably, I believe you bought the 118d and the Ceed from new.

Only bought new cars since 1978. Used to buy 2 years old and keep 2 years but in 1978 decided to buy new and keep 4 years. My motoring costs plumeted and I had perfect reliabilty. Every 2 year old car was a money pit within 12 months, even one I bought off my dad!!!!!

Since then my length of ownership has varied between 3 years and 7 1/2 years but in those 39 years I have had 10 new cars which averages out at 3.9 years/car.

I am sure 2 years old cars are better than they used to be but why buy one when new ones have proven to have cost me less.

Now I am retired I intend to swap every 3 years. They don't put pockets in shrouds.

The Focus is a great car, excellent to drive, cheap to buy and there's plenty of choice. The PSA 1.6 diesel is a however a flawed design that I wouldn't recommend to you. It's highly likely to go wrong and almost guaranteed to cost far more over your ownership than the much simpler and vastly more robust Yamaha designed Zetec SE 1600 petrol which is one of the best used cars on the market. Another good option is the Mazda 3 which shares the same floorpan and suspension but uses Mazda's own bulletproof petrol engines. Again these also use the PSA 1600 diesel so keep clear of the diesel. Good thing about these is they're chain driven and therefore there's no timing belt to worry about unlike the Focus.

I quite agree, but then I'm biased as I own (11 years/60k miles [I know, not that many miles] from new and going strong) a Mazda3 1.6 petrol engined car. Just gave it its bi-monthly Italian tune up on the way home from work - revs all the way up to 6000rpm without any bother and still does an average of 40mpg over mixed mileage (reasonably light footed) driving.

If the OP does a reasonable amount of mileage per year (mine has been quite variable, some years [as now] reasonable, not very low), then cars with that engine (the mk1 or 2) should be fine overall - its only when it sits around on the drive for extended periods that problems develop - brakes binding and discs warping. Nothing really other than that, except check for rust on older models. Newer mk2s would probably be find in that regard.

As with any older cars, get a test drive and check it drives ok on a range of roads - pulls away (clutch) and stops (brakes) well, no smoke from the exhaust after startup/use of the throttle (hard). To be honest, the Ford with the same size petrol engine (not sure if they are the same or not - the 1.6 diesel [of doom] definitely is) is probably fine too and has a bigger boot on the hatch version than the Mazda3. Drove one once as a hire car for work when they first came out and was greatly impressed - far better interior quality than the Focus mk1 and good to drive. I actually prefer the looks (inside and out) of it (and its later variant) to the 2011 onwards models.

Edited by SLO76 on 22/02/2017 at 14:19