GTi 1.6 THP Prestige 200 3dr

Love/Hate relationship

Great looking car with plenty of kit for the price. Goes like stink and runs like it's on rails.

I had a white 208 GTi with the panoramic roof. Came with plenty of mod cons (heated seats, sat nav, climate control, cruise control, auto dimming mirrors, parking sensors, auto lights/wipers) and the engine was an absolute joy to rev. Seats hugged you in all the right places and were super comfortable.The car had only done 19,000 when i purchased it and the dealership threw in 1 year extended warranty, which ended up being a godsend.

When I collected the car and took it home, I could smell burning/hot oil as soon as I got out of the car. I figured because it had just been serviced, they maybe spilled oil somewhere in the engine bay which gets hot under use. After a while, a whine started occurring regularly. Turns out an oil seal was not doing the job it was supposed to and it was leaking oil everywhere. Bear in mind, this is only 1 month after a service. Another issue which reared its head at the same time was the ridiculous vibrations through the steering wheel under speed and the fact that the wheel was not centred. No big job for the dealership to fix I thought, but they couldn't completely resolve it. Vibrations were mostly gone with a wheel alignment check, but the steering wheel was still off-centre (annoying at the best of times but even more so given the steering wheel has a red centre line mark).

The infotainment system would randomly on occasions make a loud pop and just turn off and back on for no reason.

In reverse gear, i would occasionally get a droning noise from the clutch/gearbox. Peugeot would not fix it under warranty because "it didn't make any noise when we had it".

I also had a scary moment on the motorway when using the cruise control. I applied the brakes, but after taking my foot off the brake, the cruise control automatically reengaged and tried accelerating up to speed again.

Finally after 6 months of ownership, the fuel pump discintegrated and send parts of it through the fuel lines, to which I lost power on the way to work and a warning light appeared on the dash. The guy at the dealership initially pointed the finger at me for not getting it serviced at a Peugeot dealership, but Peugeot sent somebody from France to diagnose the problem (which took weeks) and they determined that it wasn't a fault of my own. I then had to wait 2 months for a replacement fuel pump to arrive and be fitted. However, they didnt check the fuel lines for contamination from the disintegration, so they were likely still contaminated. I wasn't prepared to risk the car going wrong considering they didn't bother checking any other area of the engine and got rid of it there and then.

It's such a shame because the car looks great, goes well and feels amazing to drive. But it stressed me out every day wondering what was going to go wrong next.

For driving pleasure, i can only recommend it, but for overall ownership, it's nothing but heartache.

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