I wish I'd never bought.....

[Parky]

We've all got one car that we wished we hadnt bought.

 

Mine is a BMW Mini I got for Mrs P a few months back. I didnt want it but she was adamant. All the usual faults plus a few unique to our one. Quite frankly its great fun to drive but is unreliable, overrated, and always half a step away from an additional problem which costs eleventy hundred guineas to resolve, usually temporarily. And she thought my original plan for her to use the family car while I get myself a Renault 5/Peugeot 106/Seat Ibiza Mk1 as a smoker was a stupid idea.......

 

So, whats the one vehicle in your back catalogue you wish you'd walked away from/not drunkenly bidded on/thought would be an easy fix?

[warren t claim]

Vectra B. Bought to replace a well loved Montego TD to use as a taxi but was a total waste of money.

[Pete-M]

'84 XJ-S H.E.

 

Mechanically ok - other than low oil pressure at idle, bought it at Marks Tey where they used to have all the seized cars from the customs. Drove it from there to Newmarket (£25), gave it a good coat of looking at, fixed the wipers, stapled the headlining up and headed home late one night to Liverpool. It ran on seven or eight cylinders for about 100 miles (another £50 worth of fuel), then burst onto 12 cylinders on the M6 and after a couple of heavy footed acceleration runs ripped the floor around the rear subframe mount - resulting in 'interesting handling'. After another £50 in fuel it got me home. Then after a mighty bodging session got me to and from work in Wigan for a good few weeks whilst it languished in the Auto Trader being studiously ignored by anyone sensible.

 

This was 10 years ago, so spending that much on fuel was more than a bit lavish.

 

It used to cost £15 a day to get to work and back - a massive 38 mile round trip. I replaced it with an Alfa 164 3.0 Lusso which did the same trip, more quickly and more reliably for £5 a day. I used to go to Newmarket regularly in a multitude of large engined old tat - Volvo 760 GLE auto used to cost £40 return, Granada 2.8 injection manual £35, Rover SD1 Vitesse manual £35, Fiesta 1.3 hire car £30. In the XJ-S it'd probably have cost closer to £200 return. It wasn't worth it.

 

Another car I wish I'd never bought was this old Merc 500 SEL.

 

 

I think I paid the grand total of £350 for this, bought it off a geezer who'd had it for about eight years and done loads of trips across Europe in it. He'd put about 150 of the 170,000 miles on it and it had been a brilliant old thing for him. He'd replaced it with an Audi V8 and left the Merc parked up for a couple of years. It had suffered. It needed £150 worth of welding, a new exhaust and two rear shocks to get it through the MOT and probably would have been worth it. I didn't have the spare cash so swapped it for a Sierra XR4x4. I wish I'd not bought the Merc because I've had a serious itch for a tidy 560 SEL ever since.

[Guest]

Recently it was this - Corsa 1200 SXI

Bought off the Retro rides site as it was standard and low mileage. Every time I went out in it it went wrong - sticking throttle - oil pressure swith broke pissing oil everwhere and losing the entire oil from the engine on my trip as well as electrical faults - all good on the test drive . Part of the rear spring was on the garage floor one morning!. I had it three weeks and used it five times so decided to sell it. Ebay etc did not work so I put it in for mot as a full one might help. Failed badly 3 springs - track rod ends - Welding. After many Corsa's this put me off them a bit and if a Vauxhall says ecotec on it I now know they are shit.

In the 1990's it was a Audi 80 GLE which was bad - and getting bits for it was never easy - which type sir - there is two types for that year

[tonedepear]

All this shit I keep buying off ebay. I'm touring the fucking country picking it all up and I don't really want any of it, let alone need it. Aaargh.

[dollywobbler]

A Subaru Impreza Sport when I was 21. I'd managed to switch companies doing the same job, and got myself a £10k a year pay rise in the process. Went to my head so I went out and traded in my 18 month old Daewoo Matiz (losing about half its value) for this over-100k-mile Impreza. On finance. GR8 4 DEBT!

 

Two days later, driving like a twat, I stuffed it into a tree - at one point skidding sideways on two wheels. Somehow it didn't roll. Got it bodged back to something approaching straight and eventually traded it in for a Pug 306 DTurbo. Yet more finance. I've learnt a lot since then...

 

The Bond Equipe is a close call. Paid £1k to save it from the Scrappage scheme and it was a wreck really. However, watching BenzBoy on Retro-Rides sorting out its foibles and making it actually a decent motor has been very heart-warming. Overall, it cost me a lot, but I don't regret doing it.

[John F]

A Yamaha XJ900F, bought in 1992 when it was just 18 months old.

 

Back in those days you could get "rider policies", which insured you for any number of bikes up to a certain cc rating. I'd recently had a few 73bhp, shaft-drive Suzuki GS650 Katanas, excellent bikes in most regards but they were down at the bottom of the 600 - 900cc rider policy range - I could have something with much more poke for the same insurance cost. And I could pretty much afford whatever I wanted, within reason, as I was working over in Germany at the time & earning tons of pre-Euro wödge.

 

The logical choice was the Yamaha XJ900F. This was also shaft-drive, was 891 cc and had 100 bhp. So I ignored a little voice in my head that had never trusted Yamaha build quality, especially with their 4-strokes, and bunged 2,900 quid at one (the most I've ever spent on a vehicle, in joint top position along with a 50,000 mile Lotus Excel that I owned once - but that's another shite story).

 

OK, the XJ was fast. My old 650 Katanas had been hard pushed to manage 125 mph on my private motorway whereas the XJ with raised touring screen could comfortably put 150 mph on the clock - legally, woohoo! - on the Autobahn. But its power delivery was linear and somehow uninspiring, it just wouldn't tick over smoothly, and more worryingly it wouldn't ride straight if I took my hands off the bars - I had to shift my weight slightly to the right. At first I thought mine had a bent frame but I test-drove a mate's identical bike and his did the same.

 

A year later I moved back to Britain and sold the bike for just 2,100 quid - one of the few times I've ever made a serious loss on a vehicle. But I was just so glad to be shut of the bloody thing. To celebrate, I went out and bought a 1982 Volkswagen LT28 minibus with full MoT for 500 quid - probably the best vehicle I've ever owned

[Rod/b]

I wish i'd never bought the BX that lasted about 10 miles before it blew up, stranding me in Wales.

[Timewaster]

Sierra Azure 1.8 cvh, engine blew up the first time I drove it. (cost £100, couldn't be arsed to investigate or fix it)

Rover 620 Ti, (also cost £100 - can you se where my username came from?) Fast in a straight line, suicidal in the corners until I discovered the 52psi in the nsf tyre and 14psi in the osf. Major HGF a week later.

Golf Gti 16v, £3k - Cheap for a 16v Golf at the time but something broke every single day I owned it. Traded in at a big loss.

[Shep Shepherd]

My first Volvo, a dark blue 1988 240GL, which had spent most of its life on the Cumbrian coast and was rusted to buggery as a result:

 

 

Wot, no A-pillars?

 

I'm glad that I only paid £200 for it. Having said that, it was mechanically sound and proved to be a capable short-term daily driver which set the wheels in motion for the eventual purchase of The Volvo

[Father Ted]

1996 I bought a N plate 1995 1.1 Mk 3 Fiesta following a disasterous 14 weeks owning a Rover 216 Auto that the dealer was forced to buy back owing to a karked autobox.

 

I bought the Fiesta on finance, first time I had ever done this.

 

The car was the biggest pile of poo I have owned ever and took to breaking down at random inconvenient intervals to the point that I took to leaving the keys in it (it was never stolen ) Because it was on finance I couldnt afford to get rid of it.

The final straw came on the day of my wifes grandfathers funeral when it broke down with a four of us in the car in the middle of a junction in the pouring rain.

I pushed it to the side of the road (knowing full well that in about an hour it would start and run as if nothing had ever happened) phoned for a taxi and phoned for the knacker man to tow the car home.

I still owed 12 months on the car but was over the halfway period - so phoned the finance company to collect it - they were not happy!

[AlsoMike]

I wish I'd never bought this beige turd:

 

 

The purchase process reads like a "what not to do" of car buying, long story short I wasn't thorough enough checking it over before forking over the reddies. On the quick test drive it went ok, nothing unusual. A 23 year old Peugeot is never going to be perfect I told myself. Quickest of glances around the car back at the sellers gaff and handed over some cash, hurrying because I was desparate for a piss and the sellers facilites weren't an option. Set off home and no sooner had I got out the sellers village and the clonking starts when pulling away, brilliant. Braking from speed a couple of times revealed a shocking shudder from the front end that worsened with every mile. When we stopped for fuel the mrs (who had been following me in her car) says "It's smoking a bit.." A quick blip of the throttle, and the now fully warmed up engine puffs out a huge blue/black cloud. Awesome. Angry as hell, I continued home, wondering whether to park it in the ditch most of the way back. Back at home, I found that the water is 50% oil, so add HGF to the list.

 

So now it's sat outside my house with loads of T&T, while I wait for the V5 to come thru so I can frag it, hopefully not losing too much in the process.

[pompei]

Mondeo diesel at the end of last year. Only kept it a few weeks. Still have the backache.

 

Cars I wish Mrs P hadn't bought ... all of them

[MK5 Escort]

MK3 Golf 1.4CL - K175 VND. Turned out to be a badly built, uncomfortable, comically sluggish and basic pile of nicotine-stained pile of rubbish I'd ever had. No radio, glovebox lid made from tic-tac box plastic and heavy to drive. Not that economical and spare tyre raised above the boot floor limiting practicality. Did I mention the four speed gearbox?! This car alone put me off VAG products for years...

[jonathan_dyane]

Vw T4 1.9D Transporter.

 

Bought this off a friend of the family as a 'fixer upper', story was that it had dropped the water, but otherwise a good van. Went to see it with the father, and wasn't particularly impressed, scabby body and engine sounded rough (but it was a VAG diesel after all). He wanted £400, I went to walk away when he wouldn't take £250. Father took me to one side and said he thought I should get it so we settled on about £320 against my better judgement.

 

Dragged it home behind the sherpa, and started the investigations. Stupid plastic water elbow was fubbared so got a new one from VW for an inflated price. Fitted it, in the process bad feeling returns when it will barely pull itself up the ramps. Discover water now coming from head/block face. Pull head and find head completely fucked and one of the pistons destroyed and cracked in half. Not impressed. Remarkably bores ok however.

 

Buy rotten Golf 1.9D.

 

Find casting is different and mounts won't fit.

 

Dismantle Golf engine and find it too has a cracked head, but manual advised that these cracking is expected and outlines what an 'acceptable' crack is. My crack on the border of acceptability. Realise VAG stuff is utter shit, and resolve never to own anything else constructed by them.

 

Fit Golf pistons to Transporter. Discover head somewhat different, but the two gaskets have the same holes. Fit it anyway. Have to be creative with the plumbing as the water outlets are different, but remarkably it works.

 

Take for MOT, fails on emissions off scale and knackered load sensing valve.

 

Replace load sensing valve at great expense and remove air filter.

 

Fails mot on emissions.

 

Wind back pump and get MOT.

 

Sell and make nowhere near enough on it to justify the skinned knuckles, time and aggro.

 

No more VAG wank for me.

[Lord Sterling]

K-reg Astra Cesaro.

 

Me and my mate went halves on this when we were much younger and alot more stupid. Non of us had a licence and we barely knew how to drive (I was having driving lessons at the time) we bought it for £70, it had 17" alloys, smooth boot, but it also had a burnt out clutch and seriously bald tyres. We took it to my mates garage were he looked it over, to get it upto scratch we were looking at at least £500. £500 to us back then was (and still is) a huge amount of money that we had no hope pf ever obtaining. I had nowhere to store it so we finally ended up storing it at my mates garage and eventually towed to my other mates house. Eventually the thing got scrapped, we knew nothing about cars and only had limited space. Lesson learnt? I think not

 

Sometimes I feel like I wish I'd never bought this:

 

 

Bought it for £100 in 2008, stored it since then in my garage, finally got some cash together and fitted a new gearbox, brakes, exhaust back box and an MOT. It broke down about a mile from home, had it towed back to the garage where its been languishing again until we figure out the non-starting problem. Its let me down.

 

I hope I am wrong about the Sterling and that I will eventually love it.

[Formula Autos]

One of these:

Slow, tinny, noisy, and unreliable. 1.4 barely throbbing litres of normally aspirated diesel trouble, with barely a month going by without some fluid leak, suspension/drivetrain malady, or weird electrical trouble.

 

Bought at three years old (on finance - wot a fule I woz!) and in no way worth the money. As I was in so deep financially I kept it for over three years.

 

Three years of unremitting sodding misery.

 

However it did have some good points. It handled well - even with the heavy lump up front, was frugal (when it went), and didn't rust. It was also kind on tyres - the Pirellis I put on had plenty of life left when I got rid of the little sod, and I'd put over 30K on them.

 

I still hated it with a passion though, and considered torching the little bugger on several occasions.

[ProgRocker]

For me it'll be the 1986 Ford Escort 1.4 GL. It broke down on the first day I had it. Got it home after some assistance from my dad. Nursed it back to the garage the following day who diagnosed a blocked fuel pipe I think.

 

The Escort was a very underwhelming ownership experience for me. After 2 and a half years of yawn inducing motoring, it failed the MOT requiring a couple of hundred quids worth of welding and I no longer had the ready cash to get it sorted, so I scrapped it.

 

Is the rumour correct that Ford UK used cheap Russian steel in the mid to late 1980s? Ford almost had a 'Lancia' situation there if they did.

 

Wish I had bought a Skoda Estelle/Rapid , a Lada or a Yugo instead - while there were still many of them on the roads!

[carlo]

I wish I'd never bought this beige turd:

 

 

The purchase process reads like a "what not to do" of car buying, long story short I wasn't thorough enough checking it over before forking over the reddies. On the quick test drive it went ok, nothing unusual. A 23 year old Peugeot is never going to be perfect I told myself. Quickest of glances around the car back at the sellers gaff and handed over some cash, hurrying because I was desparate for a piss and the sellers facilites weren't an option. Set off home and no sooner had I got out the sellers village and the clonking starts when pulling away, brilliant. Braking from speed a couple of times revealed a shocking shudder from the front end that worsened with every mile. When we stopped for fuel the mrs (who had been following me in her car) says "It's smoking a bit.." A quick blip of the throttle, and the now fully warmed up engine puffs out a huge blue/black cloud. Awesome. Angry as hell, I continued home, wondering whether to park it in the ditch most of the way back. Back at home, I found that the water is 50% oil, so add HGF to the list.

 

So now it's sat outside my house with loads of T&T, while I wait for the V5 to come thru so I can frag it, hopefully not losing too much in the process.

 

If this is the listing I've just seen on ebay I'm surprised you haven't left some negative feedback yet!

[Rod/b]

Ford Escort 1.4 :

 

Oh how could I forget? Mk V shape Orion 1.6 LX. The biggest pile of automotive dog turds i've ever owned. There was nothing wrong with it per se, just it was shite at everything: engine, handling, ride, build quality, image, everything was just shit, as were all Mk Vs. I knew this before I bought it, so fuck knows why i did. Absolute wankboxes with no redeeming features. I look forward to the day they are extinct.

[Shep Shepherd]

Oh how could I forget? Mk V shape Orion 1.6 LX. The biggest pile of automotive dog turds i've ever owned. There was nothing wrong with it per se, just it was shite at everything: engine, handling, ride, build quality, image, everything was just shit, as were all Mk Vs. I knew this before I bought it, so fuck knows why i did. Absolute wankboxes with no redeeming features. I look forward to the day they are extinct.

 

I almost bought a 1991 Escort 1.4LX 5-door scratchback in 2000, but ended up with a 1994 Rover 214Si instead. I think I made the right choice...

[rml2345]

Has tp be the utter lemon of a Rover 75 I bought from a slightly iffy garage. It had all the halmarks of a wreck too... Not as advertised, dodgy dealer in a lockup... But it was cheap, and a diesel. Besides, the Volvo was costing me a fortune to pilot back and forward to work.So I paid them cash for it...

The next day it broke down with clutch master cylinder failure and has never run for me since, due to it having a list of problems as long as you like and now no MOT. Did about 60 miles though, and would have another Rover 75.

Just not THAT one.

With hindsight I should have checked the front carpet for massive fluid leak, but it looked clean, smelled alright and the gears were fine so I didn't bother.

[dollywobbler]

Oh, a few years back, I did buy a 1991 Isuzu Trooper swb diesel. It was absolutely shite at pretty much everything. Its only redeeming features were a limited slip diff (GR8 4 OFF ROAD) and a Herald-esque turning circle. The LSD was a waste of time because it had less suspension travel than an F1 car and therefore got stuck. A lot. It had leaf springs at the rear, only I suspect someone had replaced them with girders. The only suspension seemed to come from the tyres. Being a naive type at the time, I obviously blew several hundred quid on off-road tyres. They were good, but expensive and unecessary.

 

What really pissed me off, apart from the shite performance and dreadful on-road manners, was the fact that it had no towing points! What sort of an off-roader doesn't come with towing points?! I took it off road twice and sold it. Got most of my money back I s'pose, but that didn't include the tyres...

 

Here's a photo of it. Stuck.

 

Edit - the front wheel is off the ground at the full extent of its travel! Not like a 2CV/Range Rover...

[eddyramrod]

...A 1978 Austin Maxi, in 1986. I'll never have another. 1750HL, allegedly, in white with a brown vinyl roof and brown interior. It really was as awful as it sounds, and that was before things started going wrong. I decided to replace the rusty tailgate with one I picked up at a local scrappy (same colour, conveniently) which took three of us all day to fit. Should have been, what, an hour's work? Soon after I found out why, when I decided to fix up some bodywork. Under the white I found maroon. At the back, and only down to about wheelarch level. Under the white at the front, it was primer, then metal; no maroon. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh boy... Later a wire came loose behind the dash, filling the car with smoke and a smell of burning. I coasted to a stop, switched off (wisely) and bailed. Sadly I'd switched off in time and the car didn't burn itself to the ground. Believe me, that's the best fate for a Maxi.

 

Shortly after that there was a red Princess 2200 HL auto, with a well-knackered gearbox. Just to prove that one never learns, let me also add in my third (and so far last) Chevette, from late 1993. This replaced my Mk3 Escort van (never let head rule heart...) which had seemed so sensible, and also qualifies for this list. The Chevette had an Escort Crossflow in it, which was totally shot. I don't think I ever even got to drive the bloody thing after I got it home.

 

I've had some real crap in my time! But, I've also had a lot of fun, so I guess it balances out.

[Pillock]

Take a guess

 

[The Moog]

Saab 900 T16S. had gone through a period of not having a 900 so persuaded missus to get one. Got blinded a bit by that fact. bought one reasonably cheap that had been parked on grass for a year. Never ran right and then one day went to jack it up and it went through the sill. In end broke it and doubled my money but really gutted me..

 

Although my new 1982 900 is getting close . Paid 350 for it has only done 60 miles for me in the last 5 months. Now I have lost the keys to it! Already the bills add up to over a grand .. and it is a 8v turbo .. 5 door so is worth bugger all ...

[Guest greenvanman]

...a Series 3 Land Rover 109" SW. I had it for seven years, but only because it was usually too broken to sell & as a student I was too poor to repair the heap. Time has blurred the details (happily) but from my poor recollection it destroyed the following during my ownership:

 

1 x Perkins 4203 engine [a slow, thirsty,oil guzzling monstrosity more at home in a canal boat] - seized

2 x Salisbury axles

no-one[/i] breaks them". Except me, apparently]

2 x gearboxes [the first of these lost 3rd so I drove round for two years revving the new engine (Ford 2.5Di, a brilliant thing) up in 2nd and smacking it straight into 4th]

1 x steering box

1 x steering relay

1 x half shaft

3 x propshaft UJs

1 x homebrew exhaust, endlessly re-welded due to cracks from the massive vibration & the fact that fuck all else would fit

1 x clutch master cylinder

2 x wheel cylinders

1 x wiper motor

5400 million drums of welding wire

8400 cu. ft. welding gas

97 scrap washing machine bodies

etc. etc.

 

I remember, rather less than fondly, taking it for it's last ever MOT re-test. One of the things it had failed on was a leaking fuel tank. So 10 minutes early for the test, there I was parked round the corner wiping the bottom of the crusty old diesel tank with a rag, hoping no more drips would accumulate while blokey did the deed. I say its last MOT, it really was. The new owner either binned it, or (infinitely more likely) scrapped it when the ticket ran out and discovered that it needed eleventy billion pounds worth of welding done.

 

The vehicle details for NFT 126R are:

 

Date of Liability 01 12 1996

Date of First Registration 24 09 1976

Year of Manufacture 1976

Cylinder Capacity (cc) 3327CC

CO2 Emissions Not Available

Fuel Type Heavy Oil

Export Marker Not Applicable

Vehicle Status Unlicensed

Vehicle Colour GREEN

Vehicle Type Approval

 

Fucking good riddance

[Guest]

...a Series 3 Land Rover 109" SW. I had it for seven years, but only because it was usually too broken to sell & as a student I was too poor to repair the heap.

 

Fucking good riddance

 

Was this the one that got robbed because they unscrewed the doors at the hinges, perchance?

[Guest greenvanman]

...a Series 3 Land Rover 109" SW. I had it for seven years, but only because it was usually too broken to sell & as a student I was too poor to repair the heap.

 

Fucking good riddance

 

Was this the one that got robbed because they unscrewed the doors at the hinges, perchance?

 

No, sadly all they nicked was the doors. I'd have been delighted if they'd stolen the whole thing but unfortunately the engine was seized at the time and they probably hadn't brought a low loader. Nevertheless, the thoughtless bastards could always have torched it

[baldrickthecunning]

 

£500 in 2004,

 

Cambelt tensioner was on its last legs

 

Clocked, said 122k and i was told that the car had obviously seen 200k plus

 

Exhaust centre section collapsed

 

Thermostat replaced with a bolt

 

Signs of engine fire

 

Didn't start for 6 months due to untraceable fault - turned out to be fuel sender.

 

Manual fan switch which overheated.

 

Battery jumped out of the box while going round a corner and shorted on the radiator.