Melders, nice to hear from you again and sorry for the loss of that little compact.

How reliable are those German brands, they aren't any longer sadly, if we compared notes on costs per mile covered the now 24 year old Merc sitting outside which we've had about the same time as you owned the BMW, the results of that calculation would make both of us weep.

Many years ago i was a bit of a kerbside cowboy, but more a Lone Ranger than Liberty Valance type i hope :-), back then i learned that rusting apart Japanese built cars were in a different league regarding reliability than others.

Why for so many years i tried different makes for myself, at one point we had three Merc 124's on the drive, the only one of which to prove in any way durable being the fairly basic (i was told poverty spec by a typical image conscious fool) Diesel version, the rest proved to be money pits, in the case of the estate with full history folder that had been a money pit from day one of its life and it never changed throughout, one thing after another with barely a bill to its name of less than £500.

Consistently throughout my previous work (all they ever needed was routine servicing, simple as can be) and my own car ownership i am yet to have a Toyota let me down in any appreciable way, same with Subaru but the latter is admittedly rather a niche choice, if i could have my time again i would have bought a Corona or similar as my first banger and stayed with the make all of my life and would now have considerably more zeros in my savings account than is the case, so you know what my suggestion is.

One of the nice things about this site is to hear other peoples experiences to compare with one's own. Your stories and views are appreciated. We kept this as a second car as the 1 Seriies really was ugly. The compact had a nice stance on the road and was a really good drive.

The ECU was the final straw as there were other problems including an oil leak that just would not go away however hard we tried to fix it. The other major problem was paint work after accident damage when a garage went out on a test drive without locking the bonnet down.....!! Even when it was working We Buy any Car said I would have to pay them! Also the worry of waiting for the next drama.

Like many here cars are too nuch a temptation to resist but I think we will settle for Mrs M's other car until things calm down. Time for that drink!

I only ever had one BMW, an E34 520i saloon bought used.

It felt like it was hewn from a block of solid steel, no squeaks or rattles, but it was the only car I have ever owned that had the plastic water pump impeller disintegrate causing an instant overheat.

You do wonder what goes through the designer's minds sometimes.

Agree...I've always found BMW's rather disappointing...nothing that special considering the hype.

For me, it's Toyota every time..a BMW my wife had in the past failed to complete a journey..none of the Toyotas she has had since (now 4) has failed in any way.

Very bad here. German cars seem to use degradable plastic which does not stand up well to the heat and insolation of Taiwan,

They all do that sir whatever the weather, our coupe did right on time, circa 10 years old engine wiring loom perished, shorting out a coil pack and spiking the ECU.

It joined the ECU from the estate that also went sideways thanks to MB dealer previously fitting an accessory into the ecu wiring harness which allowed water to enter the ECU plugs corroding the multi plug soldered into the ecu itself.

Don't worry if the wiring loom and ECU doesn't get you the head gasket usually fails between 100 and 110k (every petrol engined MB we had suffered this), and the oil cooler behind the oil filter housing might fail too if it feels like it, always assuming the radiator hasn't split between the transmission cooler and coolant allowing the latter to enter the auto transmission destroying that in the process.

There's lots more can go pear shaped too.