| Motoring Discussion > Mitsubishi Lancer - used car review | Buying / Selling |
| Thread Author: Zero | Replies: 2 |
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New Wed 21 Apr 10 17:28
Mitsubishi Lancer - used car review - Zero
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2007 Mitsubishi Lancer Equipe Estate 1.6 Bought second as second owner, Nov 2009, 19k miles, 2 years 9 months old. PRICE £5650. Impending early retirement and subsequent loss of compny car meant I had to look for another. I had a certain budget available without finance (6k) and I wanted a car as young as possible, It had to have a low entrance and flat floor for the dog, air conditioning, full sized spare wheel and be relatively easy to maintain and cheap to insure. A peruse of Autotrader revealed the lancer to fit most of those criteria. The engine is no barn stormer, but not unwilling to rev (now its been serviced) and is very smooth and quiet for a 4 pot, and only really gets noisy above 4K It has 5 nicely matched gear ratios, with 5th being 3k rev at indicated 70. The gear change feels a little remote, being a tad baulky changing down to 2nd but its no problem and does not annoy, fast changes not being recomended, and its actually quite rewarding to heel toe the change in second sweetly. Long hauls loaded up hills requires a drop down to 4th to maintain progress. The ride is a little unsettled around town but the suspension is incredibly quiet. It handles tidily enough, with little roll through bends, the steering is a little over servoed, and lacks some feel. The dual carriageway and motorway is where this car belongs. At 70mph its very quiet, very relaxing with a smooth ride. The brakes are good enough and the ABS works well. It performed really well during the recent bad winter, but never gave me a moments issue, never getting stuck or seriously out of shape. Visiblity is good all round, with nice wide heated mirrors. With respect to fuel, its getting 40mpg on motorways, and 36mpg urban, with the main annoyance being a very small tank (50 litres) with 330 - 370 miles fillups. Inside its not huge, but roomy enough. For an estate the load area is not huge either, think A4 estate rather than mondeo. You sit low, the seats are a little thin and while not as good as VW chairs, are supportive enough. The dash is pure 70s, none of your Fiesta Darth Vader Helmet look here, but its not as stark as HJ suggested in his review, and all the controls you need are there and to hand. The stalk controls are all as you would expect - no suprises there. Turn off the engine, open a door, and the car bleeps at you and turns off the lights - thats fine by me. The headlights are really low tech H4s, but fitted with Osram 80%+ the lights on dip beam are simply superb, the best I have ever had, Everything is really well screwed together, nothing rattles, and its a real delight to work on and service with lots of room in the engine bay, Its now done 24k, the brake pads appear to have another 2k in them, the original rear tyres are wearing the outsides a bit and will need changing by 30k. The fronts had just been changed when I got it. The heater is furnace fierce and will take the skin off your face but the aircon only really cools you through the vents (I checked it, and its within spec at 10c at the vents with a 21c ambient outside.) Issues? The interior plastic trim and bezels are easily scuffed, marked or scratched, the leather gear knob has worn and looks like its done 100k, and the leather steering wheel has gone shiney, The paintwork is a lovely lustrous metalic, but soft and scratches amd marks easily. Doesent chip tho, and the undercoat is resilient. There is no plastic upper rear wheel arch liner so dirt builds up in the wheel arch upper lip. Something to keep clean. All in all, I am well pleased with it. Its pleasant to drive and own. It does all you want in a simple and relaxed manner, and is trully the second hand bargain of the century. Last edited by: Zero on Wed 21 Apr 10 at 17:29
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New Wed 21 Apr 10 17:50
Mitsubishi Lancer - used car review - Zero
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| Oh and the red instrument lighting at night is really patchy and makes them hard to see with a quik glance. I might even whip out the instrument panel to see if a bulb or two has gone. |
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New Wed 21 Apr 10 19:01
Mitsubishi Lancer - used car review - Baz
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| Excellent! Thank you Zero, it does indeed sound like an absolute bargain! The motoring hacks seem to have dismissed this model out of hand, presumably only interested in the EVO! it's definitely going on my shortlist. |
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