Been half thinking about cheap replacements for my dad, I see 20k 5 year old examples are fetching £1k, where as 10 year olf 100k Fiestas are now also fetching £1k.
However where does one buy parts of a Tata in the UK and are they are badly built as the press made out?
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Ugly enough to frighten a police horse, especially the back view; our local bodyshop has a couple as courtesy cars.
Don't know what they're like to drive or own but I've no intention of finding out either!
Rattle if that's the sort of money your Dad's looking to spend, he doesn't need the hassle of searching high and low for bits. Service parts won't necessarily be a problem but if he has a bump and needs, say, a bumper or panel then the problems may start. You want something which is fairly common in breakers' yards when you're looking in that price bracket.
Put the grand towards a tidy Micra or suchlike. Or even a Suzuki Swift! ;-)
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Well he plans to to keep the Fiesta, but the MOT is only a few months away and it is now showing signs of the dreaded sill rot. I intend to treat it over the summer and alongs as its solid it should be ok for the MOT. However the suspension is still faulty and I can't see it passing the MOT so looking out for banger ideas.
I will probably buy the car and my parents will then pay me in installments (like we did with the Fiesta). The Fiesta might just make it for another MOT anyway.
The problem is my dad likes small cars (he found the Escort too big!!).
That said we have had the Fiesta for three years almost and put 25k on it, in that time it hasn't needed a single part from the breakers, all that has gone wrong is all the suspension bushes and the usual pads/discs/exhaust but the high maitanance suspension is costing too much. Its all pot holes and bumps and the Fiesta is well known for its weak suspension.
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Thought about looking for a SEAT Arosa for him? Those are tough little cars.
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The delivery drivers of the indian takeaways all drive jap motors the micra is the favorite probably so cheap to run and maintain plenty of parts have you thought of one of these rather than a festa?
For 1k cash at a private sale he will do ok get long mot.
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My brother - same one who is buying the Golf Plus - had a City Rover as a 'station car' before he got hs current Panda.
I drove the City Rover a couple of times and it was the most nasty, cheap, tacky, under-powered, poor handling car I've been in.
The gearchange made a Maxi's look positive, everything else vibrated or rattled, and you could hardly hear yourself think as you thrashed the damn thing through the gears to get it to the legal limit.
Better than walking or relying on the bus, but only just.
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Frighful cars.
I always remember when Rover refused to let Top Gear "test" on as they said they would just slate it, so James May (being new to TG) posed as an interested customer and managed to get a test drive from his local dealers with hidden cameras. Very funny episode, but only because of how bad the City Rover was.
Think that the administrators dumped a shed load of them on Motorpoint and they were knocking them out for something like 3999, so a 5 year one at a grand looks pricey - a few hundred with a new ticket though and it may be worth a punt - Pug engines IIRC
Last edited by: VxFan on Tue 18 May 10 at 19:25
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Out of curiosity I checked the sales figure for the city Rover.
5057 in 2004 (pan Europe)
1467 in 2005 (pan Europe)
June 2005 was a particular highlight with a whole 8 units sold - at least you were getting something exclusive!
By comparison they sold 20,884 75/ZT's in 2004 and 9287 in 2005.
Any manufacturer who is selling its big sallons 4 to 1 against its small city car offering has gone very wrong somewhere.
Rattle - by comparison what about the 200 / 25 - they were nice and IMO good cars and only about the same size as the current fiesta
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www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4yzPRJGNWA
"I have to say it rides very smoothly"
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City Rover - the worst car you could buy? - Harleyman
