1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car

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Wed 1 Jan 2020 23:03
1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car - barney100

Got the above whilst mine is in the bodywork shop. Quite impressed with it, nippy and easy to drive, good visibility all round and decent quality inside. It feels bigger inside than it looks and is comfortable. Seems good little car.

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Thu 2 Jan 2020 11:17
1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car - badbusdriver

Got the above whilst mine is in the bodywork shop. Quite impressed with it, nippy and easy to drive, good visibility all round and decent quality inside. It feels bigger inside than it looks and is comfortable. Seems good little car.

We got one for the same reason early last year. It was quite an old car, can't remember exactly, (maybe as old as 2007) but certainly older than my 2010 Caddy van. I was a bit concerned when it turned up that it might have been an automated manual, but it was a t/c auto. Didn't have cause to drive it much, but thoughts were that it was slightly nippier on initial acceleration from a standstill than our Jazz, gearchanges were noticeable compared to the Jazz's 'electronically stepped' CVT. But overall, for the age of the car, it was perfectly fine, and i'd certainly consider it were our circumstances to change and we needed a cheap small auto.

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Thu 2 Jan 2020 19:51
1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car - catsdad

We've been disappointed with the previous model Corsa, the model D

I can't comment on the 1.4 auto but, engine and transmission aside, I expect they share a lot of components with the 2010 petrol manual 1.2 we run as a second car. Its never failed to get us home, goes well enough and has reached 90k but I think its built down to a price.

In the time its been in our family its suffered from most of the common Corsa faults, mainly in the last three years since we bought it from our son -

- broken seat frame

-,jammed rear seat folding back

-interior door handle cable failed due to parting of cheapo crimped joint

- coil pack failiure due to water pooling in the spark plug recess

-wipers slap the A pillar despite being at limit of adjustment, we lived with it as repair is amazingly expensive

-leaking boot

-bolt in exposed steering column worked loose

-2 handbrake recalls

- the heater fan switch failed for all speeds except high.

- it sounds like a sewing machine at idle. Three garages who have service it assure me its a characteristic

Most of these are readily googled as common faults and, recalls and wiper slap aside, are within the scope of a competent diy owner. But its woeful compared to the Astra it replaced that was faultless in 16 years.

We are replacing the Corsa with a Mazda 3 later this month. It won't be missed.

To end on a more positive note, it was a cheap car supermarket purchase and depreciation works out at under £600 per annum.

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Sat 4 Jan 2020 09:52
1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car - badbusdriver

-wipers slap the A pillar despite being at limit of adjustment, we lived with it as repair is amazingly expensive

Surely all that needs doing here is the wiper taken off the splined mounting and moved round?. And as the splines go all the way round, there is no limit to adjustment.

- it sounds like a sewing machine at idle. Three garages who have service it assure me its a characteristic

As someone who reads a lot of motoring magazines, i know that sewing machine comparisons are generally a compliment rather than a detriment, i.e, "the engine ran as smooth as a sewing machine"!

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Sat 4 Jan 2020 11:23
1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car - Terry W

You have hit the inevitable problem if you hang on to a car for too long.

Depreciation falls to a couple of hundred a year, but repairs start to cost real money with the inconvenience of being without transport at times.

A few months ago I sold my Octavia 1.4TSI after 9 years from new - average depreciation £1000 pa and an excellent car. Routine servicing and replacements aside, in my ownership I spent less than £200 on repairs.

But after 9 years and 130k it was clear that faults were likely to turn into costs - any depreciation savings balanced by 2 or 3 unscheduled visits to the garage!.

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Sat 4 Jan 2020 10:51
1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car - SLO76
Current Corsa is a big step up in quality and driver appeal over the previous model. It’s a perfectly decent little car with simple engines and transmissions aside from the Fiat 1.3 diesels which should be avoided. The only problem is the styling is dull and dated, if anything it looks worse than the older car.
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Sat 4 Jan 2020 11:57
1.4 auto - Corsa courtesy car - catsdad
I am sure the very latest model is a completely different car. I was picking up on the favourable impression that an older model had made as a courtesy car.

BBD trust me if it was a simple wiper remount on the spline then Corsa forums would not be regularly beefing about it as an issue. It was a while since I tried to solve it but as I recall the issue was that the arc of the wiper sweep gets too wide when the car is moving and wind takes hold and even if you adjust it to the lowest possible setting for the bottom of the screen, it still slaps the pillar. Repair means replacing lots of parts. It affects C and D models and I have one reference to E as well. Good point about the smoothness analogy of the sewing machine and I will use that if a potential buyer picks up on the metallic noise from under the bonnet ;-).

Terry you are right to a degree about age but I am continually underwhelmed by the lack of quality of any bit I need to repair and unimpressed that the same issues are well documented in the Corsa forums, across successive models. Perhaps Peugeot will instil some continuous improvement practices going forward.
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