Shite mojo

[Bren]

The bollocks with the vectra, has,for the first time in my life, made me consider a brand new car.

 

I may be able to sort it with a can of mister muscle, however if I cant then it's an expensive fix with either a turbo or dpf needed. Not viable on a 12 year old car.

 

I have spent most of my afternoon messing about and realised I have little enthusiasm any more - one thing doing a resto project, but a different matter trying to patch up your daily.

 

Why new? Simply because nobody looks after their cars any more - they are white goods. I cannot understand people paying upwards of £6K on diesel cars with 90k on the clock when you know it will turn out expensive. I have been lucky with my cars in the past but I have a feeling my luck has run out.

 

I may get the car fixed - but I may not...

[Split_Pin]

When I got pissed off with my Corsa constantly breaking down last year I bought something else cheap to tide me over the winter.

 

It's sat over the winter but my mojo has returned and I'll be sorting it soon.

[Zantimisfit]

No logic to it of course but I think you get a feel of an older car and whether you can trust it or not. I've had some high milers which I had total faith in. I've others where I had beads of sweat just waiting for the inevitable pop, bang...silence. They just 'felt' untrustworthy and it was always a surprise/relief to arrive at your destination. Funnily enough the ones that have let me down have been new/newer ones with fangled innards!

[Sigmund Fraud]

The AS solution would be to replace it with something older and simpler. Something like an early 9-3 dizzler, perhaps, that you can easily fix yourself with scrapyard/ebay parts.

[Junkman]

The bollocks with the vectra, has,for the first time in my life, made me consider a brand new car.

 

 

A Vectra, at least for me, is a brand new car. You should however consider, that it's a Vauxhall, thus shit.

The car you need has to fulfill two requirements:

 

1. Be older.

2. Be not a Vauxhall.

[Cavcraft]

Everyone has moments like this, part of life. New cars are ace, not the enemy like a few would have you believe, but some won't have the character of an older one.

[eddyramrod]

If all you need is a tool to get you to work while keeping you dry, there might be a place for a modern, such as a Pug on a "Just Add Fuel" type of deal, where you can sling it back after three years and get another.  However: for your own mental health, make sure you have something old and relatively simple to enjoy on your own time.

[garbaldy]

Moderns are not evil they are just not for everyone.

 

My mojo has just had a serious kick in the baws with the sale of the estate confirmed on Friday, this really means I shouldn't have just bought yet another car 😚

I am now forced to switch to warp factor 9 and get all none runners moveable due to the tied cottage I'm in just incase the worst happens.

[Bren]

No logic to it of course but I think you get a feel of an older car and whether you can trust it or not. I've had some high milers which I had total faith in. I've others where I had beads of sweat just waiting for the inevitable pop, bang...silence. They just 'felt' untrustworthy and it was always a surprise/relief to arrive at your destination. Funnily enough the ones that have let me down have been new/newer ones with fangled innards!

Therin lies the issue - I have the feeling that even if this is sorted it will be something else.

I suspect this is why the car was chopped in. Because of it's complexity there are not many wanting to take on involved repairs - even the local vx specialist told me if it was fuel related he would'nt be going near it.

[John F]

Well, there's your answer then - the Vectra is too complex, therefore get something less complex.

 

Like a Mk 3 Cavalier.

[Kiltox]

Been there, done that - my new car arrives in 3 weeks.

[doug]

I feel your pain. Popped into my local scrappy yesterday for some bits thinking it would be no problem. He really put me in my place when he said "Na mate we dont keep anything from the last century" Bad enough when the scrappy does not think cars I am trying to keep road worthy are not even worth keeping!

[UltraWomble]

I buy as new as we possibly can ( ie <3yrs old) for the main family car, then run it until it starts to fail in large, expensive and interesting ways.

Its looked after, serviced and everything that needs doing, gets done. But occasionally the thing will throw up something stupid and expensive to the point that its simply not viable to run it any more.

Then I repeat the process again. Generally the car lasts 5 to 10 years, though the Zafira lasted just 22 months.

 

For me, I buy shite.

Oh and I have an unhealthy obsession with mopeds.

 

Everyone is different about what they want out of life & stuff. I was working with a nurse today who works uBer shitloads of agency hours to pay for a yearly holiday to Thailand and a new Audi A5.

I couldn't be arsed with that shit,I like my time away from work.

[egg]

Agree with others, mojo comes and goes. Sometimes I think sell the lot and put a down payment on a Sandero. Even DW thought about giving up on the Omega for about half an hour!

[castros_bro]

I think you have found a problem a lot of us will encounter. As "new fangled electronically controlled crap" cars age into the autoshite spectrum (and diesels get banned) the back street fettler in his/her lockup will struggle to keep their knowledge and skills relevant.  I can weld, have access to a lathe and have been known to change a clutch by the road side but a fault with durashift semi auto gearbox on a Fiesta took me months to understand.

[egg]

Those semi autos do seem the work of Beelzebub!

[djimbob]

Recent turbo related problems with my daughter's Pug 207, 2008, 1.6 hdi, have led me to the conclusion that modern dizzlers, used for the commute, are entirely destined to fail at some point, leading to economic write off

 

Simply put, since the tax changes in 2006, whereby low emissions are rewarded with low, or no, tax, manufacturers have done their utmost to comply with these low emissiona, to the point where all the muck gets recirculated in the engine and ancillaries until filters, pipes etc become clogged, and major failures occur, especially if used for the commute, when the engine doesn't get hot enough to burn crap off efficiently.

 

The correct way to change the blown turbo in daughter's car was to change all the pipes leading to the turbo, and of course the turbo, flushing and changing oil and filter 3 times, with a grand total of about £500 worth of parts, and £400 of labour! I swapped the turbo cassette out for an ebay special for approx £80, did an oil and filter change, then flogged it to Evans Halshaw because I had lost faith in it not happening again - once the engine is dirty and clogged up, it stays that way unfortunately with these modern dizzlers

 

Not saying that you have these issues Bren, just sharing my new found lack of faith in the modern oil burners

 

I now plan on either using older diesels, or better still, sticking with petrols

[Bren]

To be honest I saw that the kuga is available with a 1.5 petrol ecoboost - my mate has a focus with this engine and it went really well.

 

I have realised that a lot of cars, like my vectra, really will become extinct due to the cost of repair and the lack of knowledge/ specialists to keep them going.

[red5]

Therin lies the issue - I have the feeling that even if this is sorted it will be something else.

I suspect this is why the car was chopped in. Because of it's complexity there are not many wanting to take on involved repairs - even the local vx specialist told me if it was fuel related he would'nt be going near it.

 

I do see where you're coming from re mojo.

 

But a VX specialist who won't go near a fuel problem?  'specialist' obviously has a different meaning these days. Along with mechanic/motor engineer etc etc etc.

 

Just out of interest, and because I am lazy - what's wrong with Vectra?

[Bren]

Spanner light on dash and reduced power as if no boost.

 

I feel guilty now getting rid of our focus - however it was nearly 15 years old and had to be welded for it's last MOT. I would have felt more guilty if I had ended up scrapping it due to a mechanical or electrical failure like my sister's.

 

My mistake was thinking you could get something half decent for £1.5-2k. You cant - everything is clapped out shite which is up for sale for that very reason.

[cort16]

I think modern diesels are the problem they're just to complex. If it was the 1.8 petrol it would probably be okay.

[blackboilersuit]

For old cars my ethos now is petrol & Japanese only. Bikes are my hobby/obsession and cars are just white goods. I live close to work so can live with appalling MPG figures. If I had further to travel I'd go for a 1.6 civic or corolla, both easily available sub £2k with loads of reliable life left.

 

If I needed something more frugal than that then leasing for £300 a month with warranty, servicing all covered would be tempting. Modern cars (especially diesel) are just too much of a gamble for me to spend £££ to own one. 9 times out of ten you'll be ok but if you are the unlucky one youre going to get shafted with some monumental bills.

[Timewaster]

£6k is the real danger zone as far as cars go.

Too old for a worthwhile warranty, too much invested to bin it and move on.

 

New / nearly new or £1500 max is the sensible option.

 

Of course I ignore this logic totally.

[eddyramrod]

I think modern diesels are the problem they're just to complex. If it was the 1.8 petrol it would probably be okay.

Ask Craigtheprincess about the petrol Vectra I had, that he now looks after.  It was a very good car, just not to my taste.  Had it been diesel I probably would have kept looking...

My entire fleet is petrol at the moment, and with one exception, all over 10 years old.  In fact all over 20 with that one exception.  That one exception is the (petrol) blob, which we've had nearly 4 years now.  We paid retail for it but nothing major has gone wrong (yet!) and if it does, tbh we'll just go the Motability route and get brand new.  Which will leave me free to enjoy my 23, 28 and 44 year olds!

[Bren]

I still have the A6 - petrol because I was no longer doing the trip to Manchester. I had considered a 1.8 petrol estate vec but they are a bit slow and underpowered - a 1.8 can do as little as 25 mpg.

 

We bought a static caravan in North Wales to take the kids so the economy of a diesel was welcome, however mechanical issues wipe out any savings.

[bub2006]

A friend of the wifes has an 06 vectra elite cdti 150 and she has had nothing but issues lately with it. My wife on the other foot has a 53 plate 1.8 active withe the z18 engine so no vvt. It's been no worries over the 3 years she has had it and has 160 thousand on the clock. I've never seen it get as low as 25mpg though. General running around it gets 33-35 mpg. I do agree though it's no ball of fire and does need a bit of a stir through the box.

[Kiltox]

Modern turbo diesels are a lottery as they get older - a couple of years ago I bought a 1.9 120 Vectra estate into stock from a colleague - had been nothing but trouble for him despite being in mint condition, 72k miles and full main dealer service history. Couple of 4 figure bills including the dreaded DMF

 

No idea how it's going with its new owner but it wouldn't surprise me if it goes for years without missing a beat now.

[doobietoo]

I find owning more than one running car is the answer, then if the most used car dies you have an alternative and there is no real time pressure to "fix it for work on Monday" You also have time to replace a terminal or chronically unreliable car with more shite. Even with the additional tax and insurance costs it is still far cheaper than owning or pcping a modern...  

[purplebargeken]

I've had variable levels of mojo for some time now and sometimes it is useful just to walk away for a while.  The mojo usually returns.

 

At that point the following will apply:

 

Money + mojo + AS + eBay = Oh fuck, why did I buy that! WTF was I thinking? Oi you lot, look at my new project.........

[SiC]

I did say when you bought it that you had balls of steel to take on that engine!

 

As the garage I use say to me, you may have to squirt more fuel into a n/a MPi petrol engine, but you'll spend less in repairs. They're simpler, cheaper in parts and labour fix and easier to work on than modern turbo diesel stuff. My choice would be the 1.8/2.0 n/a or the 2.0t Saab sourced units for maximum mechanical reliability/cheapness to run (overall).