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The elderly (for Scotland) Ford Focus 1.6 TDCi I bought off an old customer for £1100 a year and a half ago, has just managed to scrape through another Mot. It’s cost buttons again, but comes with the usual advisories for rust underneath expected of any old Ford that’s lived through thirteen Scottish winters. But as it stands right now I’d easily get my money back if I sold it now with nearly 13 mths Mot. I’m considering a nearly new Dacia Spring as a commuter to replace it, but may run it for another year while I change my mind every other day.
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Glad to see you're still around slo, did wonder..
Good news about the Focus, think I've mentioned in the past neighbour has a fiesta with the same engine, getting on bit but never given a moments trouble.
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Years ago I was ‘between’ cars and needed a put me on. Contacted my mechanic pal who worked at a large indie auto engineers, and got a call saying he was doing an MOT on a car with a For Sale note in the window.
Lowest price he would take was £2k. It was a Focus and he recommended I buy it.
The only detail I had was a one owner and FSH & very high mileage.
when I collected it turns out it was a 1.6 Tdic ‘ Sport’ run out model. Needed 4 new tyres, did a belt change (£300) and sold it for £2600 a year later.
very economical practical runaround.
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“Glad to see you're still around slo, did wonder..
Good news about the Focus, think I've mentioned in the past neighbour has a fiesta with the same engine, getting on bit but never given a moments trouble.”
Still about, still missing my daily car related chat. Not the same volume of people on here sadly.
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We've had discussions about 'bangernomics' before. The word originally meant cars which were basically unsellable but might last for one more MoT - if not, they went for scrap, but if they did you tried for another year.
I suppose I must be a long-term adherent as the closest I have come to buying a new car may have been an ex-demo run-out Mk.1 Prairie in 1988, followed by the present ex-rental Pug 207SW bought at the end of 2008. These days there are few genuine bangers, and the word has come to refer to any fully-depreciated car. My 205, now 35 years old, is no banger, but is fully depreciated and probably on the way back up. I could have let it become a banger by spending nothing on it, but that was not what it deserved.
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My 2003 Focus ghia with a 2.0 petrol engine is still going strong after I bought it in 2018 for £400 . It’s had a clutch and a few other bits done including the rear sill corrosion. Still drives very sharp and the ac is freezing cold .
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I do have a soft spot for the Ford Focus, the Mk I in particular. They’ve almost all been claimed by the weather up here sadly, with a few rare exceptions. A 2.0 Ghia is very worthy of preserving, but my favourite was the humble 1.6 Zetec, with its sweet spinning Yamaha designed motor.
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>> I do have a soft spot for the Ford Focus, the Mk I in particular..... my favourite was the humble 1.6 Zetec, with its sweet spinning Yamaha designed motor. >>
Nice to see you back, SLO. I share your affection - you might possibly remember my HJ posts about our faithful old auto Focus estate with its bullet proof powertrain needing no maintenance apart from engine oil and a set of plugs every 50k miles. Bought at just over three years old at 29,000 miles, it lasted another eighteen years and gave us over 130,000 miles. I just changed the oil and filter every 10k miles and replaced things when they wore out, or broke. It never failed to complete a journey (although a blown fuel pump fuse nearly did). If its replacement, a Peugeot 2008 1.2 130 EAT6, now nearly seven years old, matches that, I shall be more than satisfied. (And before you ask, I have no intention of replacing its cambelt either, unless it starts showing signs of deterioration like the early DAYCO crumbly ones).
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“ If its replacement, a Peugeot 2008 1.2 130 EAT6, now nearly seven years old, matches that, I shall be more than satisfied. (And before you ask, I have no intention of replacing its cambelt either”
Nice to hear from you John. You’ll enjoy that when I changed the timing belt on this Focus 1.6 TDCi last year, the original 12yr old belt showed no real wear when I had it in my hands. I should’ve just left well alone on such a low value car. It’s a habit, I typically do the belt and water pump on every car I get that’s over 7yrs old, unless there’s an invoice for the job.
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Our new to us 2018 Panda 1.2 is recommended to have the timing and auxiliary belts changed at 75,000 miles or 5 years. Car now on 84,000, so overdue both on mileage and time. I dug the spanners out last week, timing belt, tensioner, water pump and auxiliary belt all replaced with Gates items.
The timing belt was showing extensive, though fairly minor cracking on the smooth side and the auxiliary belt some deep cracks on the ribbed side. Tensioner and pump both appeared fine, but obviously changed. Being no expert, I can't say whether the belts had 2,000 or 20,000 miles of life left in them.
Got to say I quite enjoy spannering although not as much as I did when working. For me, DIY presented the opportunity to see a task through from beginning to end and know it was all down to me. At work, I was a cog in a multinational wheel where failure was another departments fault and success rarely got recognised unless you were shouty. Got my state pension earlier this year and I can see some of the jobs I'd have tackled 10 years ago, being outsourced if they should arise now.
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>>.... when I changed the timing belt on this Focus 1.6 TDCi last year, the original 12yr old belt showed no real wear when I had it in my hands. I should’ve just left well alone on such a low value car. >>
The service book for my 207SW diesel advises changing the belt after 10 years. When that time arrived I wondered whether to bother, but had it done anyway. That was 8 years ago, and assuming the car is still with us in 2028 I may well decide not to bother this time ....
Last edited by: Andrew-T on Mon 17 Aug 26 at 17:00
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Just paid £370 to have a new cam belt on daughter #2’s 52 registered Clio.
The bill is almost certainly greater than the car is worth, but it’s running well, usually sails through an MOT and she’s got to keep it running until she graduates, gets a job and replaces it.
If the overdue belt had failed, the car would have been a write-off, and we’d have been left searching for a cheap car that may well have been a worse proposition than the one she has.
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>> The bill is almost certainly greater than the car is worth,
You might be surprised how much it is worth!!
However you're quite right with the idea of spending more than it's worth to keep a good car that's a known quantity on the road.
We took a 2005 diesel Berlingo to over 150k miles serviced by the book - on its third cambelt when we got rid.
What did for it was a steering fault for which garage solution was to throw parts at it until by some stroke of luck they found the right one.
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>> The bill is almost certainly greater than the car is worth, >>
There is a difference between 'what a car is worth' and 'what it will fetch'. A car's worth is in the eyes of a beholder (or the owner) and may vary greatly. What it will fetch also varies, between zero (because no-one else wants it) and the owner's lowest price ! Although I suppose, realistically, any car has a scrap value.
Owners who reluctantly decide to pay for maintenance on an old car, saying it's more than it's worth, probably haven't found out what it might fetch.
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“Just paid £370 to have a new cam belt on daughter #2’s 52 registered Clio.
The bill is almost certainly greater than the car is worth, but it’s running well,
usually sails through an MOT and she’s got to keep it running until she graduates,
gets a job and replaces it.
If the overdue belt had failed, the car would have been a write-off, and we’d
have been left searching for a cheap car that may well have been a worse
proposition than the one she has.”
Small change to keep a decent wee car on the road. We ran a 1998 Clio 1.2 8v on our company pool fleet until last year. It refused to die. Needed regular wheel bearings and suspension bits as per the norm for an old Renault. But it just kept on going. We’re now almost all running about in Renault Zoe’s, which are so far proving to be very dependable, and cheap to run.
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It’s worth about £200 scrap value.
It looks like it’s been driven by every delivery driver in the N-W, inside the headliner has been cut to glue it back in place, but it’s going like a good ‘un.
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>> It’s worth about £200 scrap value.
Is that the same as value running and on the road with a year's MoT?
Not trying for an argument just curious.
Last edited by: Bromptonaut on Fri 7 Aug 26 at 21:56
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Bangernomics - Paul 1963
