I have signed up to buy a 2001 Passat 1.8 20V SE car from a delaership pending a test drive.
When I first saw the car I was unable to tet drive it as it had a flat battery. They informed me today that they couldnt get it started and were sending it to a VW garage to go through a full diagnostic check and get it up and running.
I am now having second thoughts about buying the car as it may be a fault somewhere that is draining the battery somehow.
Any advice on what I should do? I really like the car, but this is making me a bit jittery, as I have suffered from a car with electrical problems before and it was never out the garage.
The car has a FSH and seems to be in great nick apart from the flat battery.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Cheers
Shooto
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How much is it?
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£5,500 - 50k miles on the clock
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6 photos
2001 VOLKSWAGEN PASSAT 2.0 SE 4dr Saloon (trade)
56,700 miles
Manual
SILVER
Petrol
Manual, 56,700 miles, Silver, One Former Keeper, Full VW Service History,Below Average Milage,ABS,Alarm,EW,EM,PAS,RCL,Climate control, Drivers airbag,MOT July 2007, Immaculate Inside & out.
£4,100
Plenty around cheaper.
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Yeah I guess.
Forgot to mention it is an Estate too, not sure if that affects the price.
I think I'll wait and see what the VW garage said about it, but Im having my doubts now.
Can there be something serious/pricey that would be causing it? Im not much of a mechanic and am not sure how pricey passat parts are.
My current wee Polo has never let me down.
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If the garage are so incompetent that they can't charge the battery before you arrive, I wouldn't touch it with a bargepole. You will have nothing but trouble, who knows what else is wrong.
Have a read of the large post on the cambelt/tensioner problems, that should make you think.
I agree that it is too expensive as well, maybe that price for a diesel, but not for a petrol. Have a look on Autotrader, there are plenty of used Passats around. The Passat is a good car, I've got one, it's the most reliable car I have ever had.
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Great nick, but it won't go.
Runaway unless the price is very low.
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lol.
when you put it like that Its a no brainer.
Cheers
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I've got a 2000 1.8t saloon and wouldn't buy another one! If you want to frighten yourself, do a technical forum search for Passat in the last 12 months and count the hits.
Get a Honda instead.
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Also check the car-by-car breakdown for any VW car with the 1.8 20v engine. There's a good reason why the last owner got shut at 6 years old (and probably somewhere between 60 and 80,000 miles!
If you particularly want a Passat, look for a diesel one. None of the petrols are without their (widely reported) faults, be they unreliable, underpowered, or excessively thirsty.
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Just going back to the battery issue, it's worth remembering that batteries in cars on forecourts are notorious for going flat (all that shifting around and not much else). In theory a good charge will sort the battery out but in my experience batteries often need replacing after being left to run flat, jumped, started, run flat etc... - they just never seem to recover. I've needed to replace the battery on all of my second hand cars.
Having said that, there look like other reasons to avoid this particular car but a flat battery shouldn't be one of them IMHO.
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IMO at 6 years old it may be ready for a new battery, I'd make sure they put a new one on.
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