When does it become a one way ticket?

[sierraman]

What really finishes a car for people? I.e what causes you to throw the towel in and sell/scrap it?

[strangeangel]

I'll have a go at most mechanical jobs, but weldathons are outside my field of expertise*

[Kiltox]

Fitting an engine and then finding it's still fucked

[dollywobbler]

I rarely chuck in the towel. The Rover bit the dust because I quite enjoyed it for £230, but didn't think I'd enjoy it enough to justify spending that again on getting the gearbox replaced. 

[nigel bickle]

Some cars seem to want to live, and try to help by making life easier.

 

Some seem to fight from every angle, kinda determined not to return to the road. That's the deal breaker, for me.

 

I've tried to force some of these ball busters back on, but they are always miserable to drive, almost certain to keep breaking and totally, totally unreliable.

 

If it wants to live - then it will.

[themildbunch]

I'd say for many people it's simple but immediately obvious things like radios / fag lighters / iphone chargers / aircon / whatever - important things like tyres / riust / engines etc don't seem to matter....

 

On the otherhand I do know people who buy a cheap but MOTd car and drive it until it's really broken then scrap it and buy another... worked better when scrap values were higher though...

[andy18s]

The last car I actually scrapped was a mk3 Golf gti I "won' in a drunken game of eBay chicken...

Absolute dog of a car to look at,with its 4 different shades of red,sunroof that wouldn't close less the last inch properly and an Icv that was set on keeping the tick over around the 2k mark...

It was the absolutely slaughtered bolts on the rear calipers/axle that pushed it over the edge....there were a lot more around back then though so no great loss

[Tamworthbay]

The last one I scrapped was a mini that was very badly side impacted, so if it needs jigging it's beyond me, otherwise I can sort most things.

[Bren]

For me it's rot. Happy to do big repairs on a classic, not on a £300 snotter.

 

For some people its brake pads.....

[RayMK]

If the non-running, rusty hulk is beyond my abilities/finances to fix, I will only scrap it after a stay of 2-3yrs on the front lawn, this being a period of forlorn hope that circumstances will change.

[Junkman]

 

When does it become a one way ticket?

 

When you can't afford the return ticket.

Entirely btw, this applies to your entire life, not just your cars.

[pilninggas]

Every beater I've ever owned has been sent to the scrappy usually when it's fixable, but the cost of parts and time doesn't beat the fact that I am bored with it or sick of niggles. A mondeo I had was driven to the scrappy on MOT day as I couldn't be arsed to replace corroded brake pipes and sort the rust and it was so dull to drive it couldn't redeem itself.

[rml2345]

Only when the costs to get it fixed exceed the total available amount of money to do so even after the liberal application of advanced calculus levels of man maths. Usually at this point it's sold to someone more optimistic/financially suicidal despite all the faults it has.

Mainly because scrapping cars makes me have a sad.

[danthecapriman]

If it's a classic or I like the car then there's no way I'll give up on it. I'll happily spend what it takes or spend hours/days/months welding to sort it out.

If it's just some replaceable thing I'm not fussed about or I don't like the car then it's over when I can't be arsed anymore. Even then though I'd rather try to sell it on or get the banger boys to finish it off instead of just weighing it in!

[doubleyeller]

Well my Rover 214 SLI went for scrap after trying to find a buyer on here for just £120.

One guy came to take a look, and said "On the basis of what I've seen I'm going to leave it..........." It was a solid, reliable and sub 100k, beginner's classic available for absolute peanuts. I just don't know what people expect for that kind of dosh!

 

A shame, because I had put a new tyres,  alternator, battery and downpipe on it, and someone with the know how could have easily replaced the valves and got it through another MOT!

 

If I buy a sub £400 car, I expect to pay the same amount again in getting it fully usable. The rest of the world wants the moon on a stick, so what can you do? I gave it 3 months, and you can only try so hard. I ended up getting £65 for scrap

[dieselassist]

...Ive condemned useable second hand cars Ive bought on a whim to scrap/breaker status in the past, simply on the 'irredeemable' filthy state of their interiors - large holes in the drivers side carpets (even cars with relatively low mileage Ive encountered this), filty manky carpets; blood stains, heater vents spewing out skin flakes/ various small hairs, dog damage - urine faeces, 2 dogs worth of hair etc etc.

 

...Years ago, I might have gone to all the bother of ripping an entire interior out, buying an entire interior including carpets out of the same car someones scrapping n fitting the lot, if its an otherwise nice car... I did this with a mk3 Golf years ago...

 

Nowadays, I cant bring myself to putting on layers of gloves, a respirator etc etc to strip out a manky interior; maybe its 'getting older' or whatever, so I'd just sell the engine n box or whatever n scrap the rest, or selling the entire car on to someone who will do all that...

 

...a young lad I know, bought a B3 1.6TD Passat estate like this - manky, filthy interior - nobody else would touch the car- he ripped out the lot, n fitted two front seats out of a golf - 4 months later he was still driving the car happily about on often long journeys, with no cabin carpets at all - they have become so few in numbers here, especially the estates, that he could not find a scrapper estate for its carpets....

[5speedracer]

Just thinking last week that round here 15yo seems the tipping point.

See 51 plates regularly but far fewer X and Y.

So 15yrs seems to be the modern cars design life...

 

Sent from my X17 using Tapatalk

[sierraman]

I think you just have to make the judgement at the time. Got rid of the P reg Mondeo I had because I had a bill looming for a £300 exhaust joint that I couldn't find for less. Fiesta sold when I discovered rot in the bulkhead, Focus sold when it wanted a load of jobs doing I couldn't be bothered with.

 

As I sit now I'd scrap any of mine if they wanted a clutch or if the engine was shot. In pure economics the mk3 I've got is worth probably £600. A new clutch and DMF wouldn't be far off that. You could argue you'd have a known good clutch, but in reality it's a slippery slope.

[DodgeRover]

When you fall out with it and it's beyond hope of saving, I don't think cost comes into it sometimes...

 

Manky smelly interiors use TFR and a steam cleaner then vax it out....

[New POD]

Having learnt my lesson with a Suzuki sc100, which I scrapped when the clutch failed, I have pretty much been able to stop all cars I've owned going to the scrap yard except the Honda accord 2.2 I-CDTI, when the engine was fucked.  Every time something broke on it, it cost £1500 to get back on the road, so I just decided not to bother.

I regret selling a mini - an 850 which I'd patched for years for my wife, only for her to give it to her friend.  Which I agreed to on the understanding that we had first refusal when she no longer wanted it.  She scrapped it a year later at the MOT.  I'd replaced sills, front valance, wings, floors, brakes, head, gaskets, and god knows how many hours I'd spent on it.

[beko1987]

I scrapped 60% of my old puma when the rear arches fell off, it needed an exhaust, coil pack and God knows what else.

 

Made £500 in parts and got £100 for the rest though, far more than I'd have sold it for!

[Chris2cv]

I have never scrapped a car, traded one that would have been scrapped, but not done it myself. The 2cv reached the point of not being worth fixing about 15 years ago, but has now come out the other side, it would have to be total write off in a crash or fire to get rid of that.

 

 My second moped (currently on my third)served me for about 3 years. It cost me £15 (swapped for a bottle of Jack Daniels) was an absolute pile of crap with the speedo only working for about a fortnight, bastard to start etc, but it went like a rocket - relatively speaking of course. It had several hundred pound bills, then the tank split and the people that looked after it said it was about £300 to fix. It was a 10 year old moped, that would be worth maybe £100 when fixed! I loved that bike and named him Pedward, because like Jedward he was a bit shit!  Sold it to a 16 year old for £150! Result!

 

 The Clio is 14 next week, and due an MOT. Hope I do not have an answer for the question next week!

[beko1987]

Lol pedward

[Angrydicky]

I've never scrapped a car.

[richardmorris]

Me neither.

The first 2cv (bought in 1993) got pxed for my second cx in 2001 after first cx ( bought in 1999) got murdered in France, the cx got pxed for my c5 in 2006 and the c5 traded in against the Mercedes coupe in 2012.

 

Of course there were practical reasons- the 2cv wasn't being used and had a fair bit of floor rot needing sorting, the cx DTR looked perfect and had an immaculate interior but the subframe was dissolving faster than my welder could keep up, and the c5 was doing its best to drive me insane ( and bankrupt).

[The Moog]

 

 

Manky smelly interiors use TFR and a steam cleaner then vax it out....

TFR??

[catsinthewelder]

Traffic Film Remover

[Mally]

Lad bought a T25. Bargain £600. Ran it 12 months.

Steam out of the back, head studs rusted and broke off. Happens if you don't use antifreeze with additive

Had done many miles so decided to splash out.

New engine, did the research and got it from the Heritage place (that sounds good). Cost 3 times more than the camper.

Fitted engine, ran 12 months.

On the 13th month lost power, couldn't solve it. Took to local VW bodger, after 4 days his mate found it.

Took rocker covers off, one side valves only 1/2 opening. Camshaft lobes worn down.

Guaranteed 12 months, 20,000 miles. just over on both counts.

Rang them up, camshaft knackered. "Ah they are metal sprayed sir, have you changed the oil". Yes more often than recomended.

Got us one brought back from South Africa in the reps hand luggage. Trade price in the circumstances sir.

Split the sump, fitted the cam, must have got a shell slightly out because when we got it together was a little tight to turn over.

Be reet when it runs. Wouldn't turn with starter. Going hols for a month in 2 days, lad needs transport.

Bought a Sierra £200. run that for a month until I got back from hols.

Back from hols, hows the sierra? Brill.

Good, sold the T25 for £600.

Sometimes you just get fed up.

[AMC Rebel]

Scrapped my old T suffix (1979) Polo in 1988 with current MOT.  It was a smashing wee car, but I'd got a new job with a company car, new girlfriend, no time, nowhere to keep it and no time to sell it.

 

I got a thing from the DVLA saying someone had put it back on the road, which I was pleased about.  That was probably the biggest billy bargain car ever - £150 for 3 years of fairly decent motoring.

[catsinthewelder]

I've scrapped a few and regretted most of them.  The Panda and Espace were both fit for scrap when I bought them.  The Tipo was killed by a cracked windscreen just as the MOT ran out.  The last 405 needed a clutch and I had another car spare so I scrapped it promising myself a TD in the future which I now have. 

 

I'm struggling to work out what to do with the current crop of chod.  The 1100 doesn't start or stop and still needs more welding.  The Disco has some severe rot around the arse and knackered brakes.  The 405 does at least have an MOT but it looks like I'm going to have to fabricate some bracketary to support the fan belt tensioner as the sump I broke is proving impossible to replace like for like.

 

The Astra needs a clutch but at least it's apparently easy on these and the welds for the next test look easy too.