My wife has just got a new job in Keele. This is all well and good, but I work in Hull! Therefore, my annual mileage (my wife can't drive) is likely to skyrocket from about 5000 to somewhere around 30,000. I am sceptical that my 9 year old Rover 200 (excellent car though it has been) will be up to the job and, besides, the petrol costs would be astronomical.
I am now thinking about getting a diesel car. I am not all that bothered about prestige etc. and I think that fuel economy will be my primary concern. My current thoughts are a Citroen C2 1.4 HDI, which has massive fuel economy, but I'm not so keen - a bit of a kids car perhaps? how refined would it be on the motorway, I'm not overly keen on being deafened by the engine! Others might be a Skoda Fabia 1.9 TDI, which seems to be well regarded for refinement and comfort, or the Toyota Yaris, which is reported as being fairly noisy. I am keen on the Toyota's chain cam engine though.
I would be grateful for any suggestions from those 'in the know'.
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I've said it before but here goes anyway...
Go find a Xantia HDi.
Big, smooth, 50mpg, quiet and relaxing to drive on the M-way.
A 2000X with 40k miles will be yours for about £4-5k. OK, so it will probably need a heater matrix (£500 job) some time, and the clutch will need doing at around 100k, but that's some car for the money! Have a look on e-bay or your local free ads and see how many Xantia TDs are about with 120k + miles on them - most will still look A1 (if they don't they've been knocked about so walk away).
I havn't driven a C3 HDi, but I have driven a Fiesta 1.4 HDi (same engine - although the C3 can be had with the barking 16V 90 BHP version). The engine was pretty quiet, but it was brand new so the performance was not yet there.
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RichardW
Is it illogical? It must be Citroen....
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Drive the Rover at 60mph on the motorway to see how good the economy can be? Might be worth using it for a while if it's been reliable, because any other car with 30k / year on it will be worth next to nothing very quickly.
Gareth
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Diesels tend to be noisy when cold, or when running at high revs. Some engines are noisier than others, and difft installations of the smae engine vary in their noise levels ... but for m'way use I'd have thought that one important factor would be the gearing. Bigger diesel engines are now being fitted with a very tall 6th gear, but the smaller engines seem not to get that feature
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Is this likely to be along term arrangement MV? A rough calculation indicates that running your Rover 200 will cost about a grand extra per year in fuel costs* , so it will take a few years for a new diesel vehicle to actually save you money. I would think the rover must be clsoe to zero deprectaiton point, as well.
* based on Rover 30 mpg, Diesel 50 mpg, 25000 extra miles, 85 p/litre.
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Exactly. If your wife doesn't drive, then presumably there is no-one to whom you can pass on your Rover. You will next to nothing for it if you try to sell it, so why not run it until it starts to cost serious money in terms of parts and repairs.
Buying a diesel for even £4,000 will guarantee you perfection, and it will take four years to acheive a saving so better the devil you know. Keep with the Rover until you need to change the car anyway and then buy a diesel.
Great advice - so why do I ignore it?
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Espada III - well if you have a family and need a Lamborghini, what else do you drive?
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Ooops,
Buying a diesel for even £4,000 will NOT guarantee you perfection, and it will take four years to acheive a saving so better the devil you know. Keep with the Rover until you need to change the car anyway and then buy a diesel.
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Espada III - well if you have a family and need a Lamborghini, what else do you drive?
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Apart from the VW TDI units (whether in the Skoda you mention, or the Golf or Seat alternatives), you'll be impressed by the Ford 1.8 TDCI 115bhp unit.
You can get it in various Focus versions, including Zetec and Ghia, and not only is it economical, the in-gear performance will prove vastly entertaining...:-)
A 03 example of the Focus with the TDCI unit should be yours for quite a modest sum of around £8-9k or even better if you put in some research on the Internet. The Zetec version with its sports suspension is great to drive.
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I have just brought a brand new Hyundai Getz diesel. I have to say it is a truly excellent car. Loads of kit as standard, Economical, should be very reliable and the key thing here - a 5 year unlimited mileage warranty so no big bills. Also, it feels like a much bigger car than it is and has loads of room inside considering it's a supermini! I actually think they look really good too although I might be on my own with that one... The engine may sound quite loud but I actually like that too and in any case, it's much quiter than my escort turbodiesel.
If you shop around, you can pick one up for just short of 8,000 notes with 3 years free servicing and 3 years RAC cover included.
It's got to be worth considering?
~James
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I agree on the earlier post about Xantias. The build quality is excellent, as we have found with our 10 year old 1.9 TD, which has not developed a single rattle or squeak in the whole of the 10 years we have had it. The HDI engines are extremely smooth and quiet and perfect for motorway cruising. Used C5 HDIs can be had for very low prices and there is plenty of choice.
My brother has a C3 1.4 HDI and has been very impressed by it and, of course, gets 60 to 70mpg.
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How about a secondhand VW with the 1.9 TDI engine, which has been around for about 10 years now? Passat? Golf Mk3 or Mk4? Vento? Bora?
I've got a 10 year old Passat with this engine and it's now done 145,000 miles. People say VWs with this engine are good for 250,000 miles. My Passat does over 50 mpg driving normally.
The lighter Golf (or the Venta or Bora, which are booted versions of the Mk3 and Mk4) should be even more economical.
If you're looking at older VWs, be sure to go for turbo direct injection (TDI) diesels which are significantly more economical than the older indirect type. It's confusing because both types of VW diesel were produced concurrently for a while.
VW's I.9 TDI was the first really popular direct injection car diesel, I think, although Montegos and Fiat Tipos had them earlier.
If you do go for a VW, the cambelt should be changed at the specified intervals, 60,000 miles I think.
Cheers, Sofa Spud
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MV,
As well as the economy be sure to consider comfort in your choice.
Adjustable steering, a good seat, square-on driving position and a spacious footwell are all very important if you value your spine, and a CD and AirCon if you value your sanity.
I'd be wary of supermini's for the above reasons.
CF
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Devil you know, if you can.
Try the Rover for a while. What can you lose? Depreciation at those mileages will be vertical but there's nowhere to fall. Fuel will probably be less than depreciation on a newer car but will (in any case) be measurable so you can try it out and see.
If it isn't comfy enough or if the long miles are nigh impossible for whatever reason, start looking. You'll know what you need, and what the Rover is costing in fuel.
Make the final decision when you know what you need, exactly.
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Maybe keep the Rover for at least a couple of more months and several of the new journeys so you know what its going to cost you in fuel, comfort and state of mind when you arrive at each end. Do the journey at 60 miles per hour and you will end up a wreck concentrating so hard on avoiding the vans, lorries, vans etc overtaking you at the last moment, cutting you up whilst you are planning the occasional foray to the middle lane. Inside lanes are noisy too they are worn out by the HGVs. Stick it at 75mph and pay the extra fuel. The VAG diesels seem to be highly geared as do current 6 speed Mondeo TDCis so you get excellent economy. WhatCar car guide (No offence meant Mods?) gives you the final gearing which can be as high as 38mph per 1,000 rpm. It makes a big difference in mpg if most of your journey is motorway in top gear. Don?t rule out a supermini though they ride and cruise very well. I've recently driven the Fabia and Ibiza 130bhp diesels and the Fabia was miles better on the motorway - quieter and better riding. AutoExpress recently tested a number of diesels from London to John O Groats sticking at the legal limits and the C2 got a lot of praise and it averaged 72mpg a smidgeon more than the Yaris and was also rated for its comfort and cruising ability. As someone else has said get aircon it is a must at that mileage.
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Thanks a lot for the sound advice so far! I think that keeping the Rover for a bit could be worthwhile, but I mainly use it for Motorway miles at present and although it is alright the nois of the engine is a bit wearing on long journies. I'm just not that sure I could take it on 3 270 mile trips a week!
I thought about buying new, but would I be stung too hard by depreciation? At least if I kept the Rover (its a Mark II 214 SLI) I have made all my losses, as it is only worth £700 tops, whereas, as many of you have pointed out, a 3 year old car (if I only kept it for 3 years) with 90,000+ on the clock would suffer serious depreciation.
I have no real experience of this, as the Rover is the only car that I have ever owned, and I have only driven the Corsa that I learned in and the Rover, but are new cars up to taking the sort of hammer that I would be giving them and remaining hassle free for say 5 or 6 years? If not I might be better off gambling with the Rover and seeing whether anything goes wrong with it for 2 or 3 years.
Thanks for all the input so far! Some helpful advice.
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MV, just remember one thing. A 270 mile trip will probably do less harm to your car than, say 5 short journeys in stop - start town traffic where the car won't heat up properly.
All cars have their faults but in most cases, as long as you keep them serviced they should be able to take care of your sort of journey. Eventually you will see the warning signs that things are going wrong, noises etc but if you end up binning the car you lose its value of £700. That will pretty much be what you would lose in value if you bought a £4k - £5k car and then tried trading it in the following week!
So as long as its comfortable and you don't thrash it, then keep with the Rover.
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Hi MV
Run the Rover till it dies or shows signs of joining the choir eternal then start looking.
For my money a 4/5 yr old Diesel Skoda Octavia bought with say 70/80k on it for £4.5k would be good for another 100k and not a lot of money to lose.
Higher mileage Octavias on initial purchase are chasing buyers at the moment on Autotrader and the potential to haggle as they seem to stick means a good deal can be found.
This size car will be far more relaxing and comfortable than a C3 and dare I say it more reliable if the oil and cambelt are seen to when due.
as always
Mark
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You didn`t say the size engine.the 1.4 is good on a run.1.6 isnt as good.around 4mpg difference.2.0 litre is poor.on a run.if you have 1.4-1.6 stay with it for a while.you may be surprised at econonomy.and as long as serviced correctly will last you a while.unless you are determined to replace it.stay with what you have.
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Was mech1
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Change job?
That's a serious suggestion, by the way! Life is too short to do 30k miles per annum if you don't really have to.
As you'll never see your wife, you could change her instead.
(That's not a serious suggestion.)
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Due to the nature of my work some years I only drive 10K miles a year and others 40k miles a year. I bought a Fabia TDI on one of my quieter years. It's a great little car, good comfortable, rapid performance, good economy. I was very happy with the car until I had a change in contract which meant driving 120 miles a day. The car coped well with the mileage, but I didn't.
I started suffering with back pain, sore back of heel from pushing the accelerator. The cabin, seats, lack of footwell space and lack of cruise control made the car uncomfortable for regular long journeys. Also short chassis (wheelbase) cars not matter how good just don't ride as well as longer cars. Shorter wheel base cars seem much better for short town runs, longer wheelbase cars for long runs. Small cars bounce around more on motorways, they don't cruise as well.
In short as much as I liked the car, I had to sell it and get a larger car as I wasn't coping with the long journeys. Incidentally I later bought a Volvo S60 D5 and my problems were solved, the journey became far more comfortable. I realise this car might not be in your budget, but the point I'm trying to make is that I would not recommend a small car for long journeys.
I hope this helps
WipeOut
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Echoing comments above, 30k a year means a long time in a car. Less non-working time for you, you'll get up early and get home late. Might be worth considering a job change. I personally factor travelling time into my rate of pay - ie you can get effectively better pay going to a less well paid job that takes 20 minutes to get to than you can going 2 hours each way to a better paid job.
Car-wise, don't get one less than 3 or 4 years old, by the time you've finished with it it will be worth approximately 50p, so you may aswell let someone else take most of the depreciation costs beforehand.
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MV said:
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>>...or the Toyota Yaris, which is reported as being fairly noisy. I am keen on the >>Toyota's chain cam engine though"
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I've had a Yaris 1.4 D4-D for about a year now. I don't think its particularly noisy, and the fuel consumption is excellent. Over the last year I've done about 24000 miles, mainly on back roads at 40 - 60 mph, and the overall fuel consumption works out at about 70 mpg.
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I agree have had a Yaris D4-D for nearly a year. Its only noisy on start up and it cruises at 80mph on motorway at 3000rpm. These cars are excellent. the fuel consumption is like running moped. They are as quick as any 1600 petrol car and so well engineered. I truly believe these will be 200k cars in the future.
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I would agree with others who have recommended the VW TDi. I live in Nottingham and have to travel to work in Walsall each day, a distance of around 500 miles a week. I bought a second hand 1998 Vento 1.9 GL TDi in October 2003, it had 74000 miles and a full service history (very important if you are buying a diesel). To date the car has done 95000 miles and apart from the regular servicing nothing has gone amiss with it. I drive it steady, withing the speed limits and can get just under 600 miles on a full tank of diesel, costs around £37 to fill it at the moment. I havent properly worked out the MPG but i guess it is in excess of 50mpg. I have driven it at higher speeds and even so it still achieves around 540 miles on a full tank. The Vento is very good value for money, if you can pick up a late model one it comes with electric windows all round, electric sunroof, air conditioning, power steering, ABS, drivers airbag etc and as they are not as popular as the Golf the prices are a heck of a lot cheaper :O)
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I would seriously suggest the Xantia along with a few others.
Only consider the petrol as well, it will be less economic to run but the 2.0L 16 valve is great on the motorway.
Personally I would look to find an 8 year old 16v 2.0L with OK mileage and SH for 3 figures and run it till it dropped, then get another.
When I was trying to sell it, my 16v Xantia VSX was being ignored by people who were parting with serious money for TDs, which were often high mileage rubbish that was likely to land them with a huge repair bill within a few months.
The chap who bought my car paid £600 for a 73k with good service history and all the comforts including electric windows, sunroof etc. He homself admitted that he couldn't have asked for a better deal.
Hugo
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