What's the cheapest bucket of rust to run?
 

Requirements: :D

Cheapest insurance group
No tax
Runs on fumes
Cheap parts for WHEN it breaks down?


In all lilkely hood I'm going to have to get a "**** box" to drive to my new place of work in a month, as the scoob is currently on a limited milage and social use only exemption.

Your thoughts.


Andy

you want a rust bucket then get yourself any ford ;)

your local rag should get you a runner for pence

Fords aint reliable though....get a Nissan sunny 1.3ls......about F reg, should be reliable, very very cheap to buy, readily available parts..and if you are wanting to go even cheaper, try a nissan sunny 1.7d....horrible to drive but reliable and frugal....

At the bottom end of the price range, go japanese.

Absolute maximum frugality required, desn't matter that they are not reliable, I'm fully capable of fixing them myself.
Don't give a toss if it has minus 6 gazzilion Kudos

Was thinking something old enough to be tax exempt but then the fuel economy would go up I think.
Just been to glasses guide to have look but nothing listed in an easy way to find out the "cheapest"

fuel economy would go down I mean (cost would go up) :rolleyes:

Diahatsu charade 3 cylinder diesel
Toyota corrolla
Nissan Primera..

All 3 cheap and hardly ever breakdown..

I have a Primera and it's great - dirt cheap to buy, comfy, smooth, reliable and even drives OK.

I have the 2.0 engine and I wouldn't describe it as especially economical, though - I see about 30mpg driving it fairly gently. For comparison, I get 22-24 from the scooby. Taking insurance, parts and (lack of!) servicing into account though, I reckon I'll save money overall compared to going everywhere in the scooby, with the added bonus that I can leave it in supermarket car parks without giving a toss about another ding or two in the doors.

Anything old enough to be tax-exempt will probably be someones 'classic' and hence not cheap to buy. Any that is cheap WILL cost you far more than the tax saving to run over a more modern car.

Look at total cost to run for the cheapest to run. Modern enough to be economical, japanese enough to be reliable and cheap to insure, old enough to be cheap to buy.

Get something reasonable for a grand and you may get your money back when selling, maybe even make a profit if you find the right sort of car.

In terms of total cost of ownership, you need a small car with a low insurance group, as this maximises the resale value (due to the young driver market).

From memory, the ford Ka and the Nissan micra (older one, the k11 I think) are the cheapest to own.

what is the cut off date for tax exemtion, I'm going round in circles on the dvla website :(


Andy

Early 1990s French stuff is very cheap these days, doesn't rust much and pretty cheap 'cos they share a lot of major bits between makes.

Think Citroen AX / ZX, early Pug 306, Pug 405 etc.

Don't forget an early (K, L, M, N plate) Mondeo will go to the moon and back at 85mph all day, carry all your junk and cost about 500 - 750 notes. The major body panels are galvanised too so they don't rust. Just make sure its had the cambelt & tensioner done every 70K and that the clutch isn't on the way out -- the front subframe has to be dropped to do the clutch making it many hours of labour, even though the bits are cheap.

Edited to add that tax exemption is for vehicles registered pre 1972. Anything from this time will be a "classic" and you'll pay though the nose compared to a 90s heap

nope what you need is a pony or camal

:lol1:

currently looking at diesels ...

106/306 J,K era

Pre August 1973 to be tax exempt IIRC. It's fixed so it'll still be '73 rather than '74 next year.

Early Micra is what you need. :)

Wouldnt bother with a Diesel 106, the petrol 1.1 does 45 mpg or therabouts, the diesels are painfully slow, the 1.4 does 0-60 in 20 seconds, the 1.1 a comparatively quick 13.7

who cares if it doesn't reach 60 in the whole 15mins it's going to take to get to work, I'll just set off earlier..
As long as I save a few pennies then I dont care.. I have a 385BHP sat in the garage when I come home... ;)


Andy

make that 25mins in the diesel :lol1:

could do what I did....

Found a good car... Ford Ka 20k miles bargained hard and payed just 2K used it for 12 months 30k miles no service and no bills during that time sold it for 2.5K;)

Free motoring for 12 months!

Quite proud of that....

Plums.

Diesel primera never gone wrong in 100.000 miles its the wifes

1973 me thinks

From experience, anything German or Jap (not rice rockets though). Go for the euro boxes the blander the better Toyota Corollas, Nissan Sunnys, Primeras, VW Passats, Audi 80's, Merc 230s.

Avoid learner/studenty cars though like Polos and Micras, (although both are a better option than 106's, AX's and fiestas etc) or cars likely driven by housewives (shopping cars) - they never get serviced properly and have shagged clutches and gearboxes.

Avoid Ford and GM like the plague (only exception is well cared for non-rusty caveliers or carltons) . French usually gets let down by too many important bits falling off and high parts prices.

DO not, I repeat , DO NOT contemplate British cars. Such as Metros and Rovers, even if said Rover may have a Honda engine..it doesn't matter, it will still cost more in parts if they go wrong, such as a shagged distributor (also a reason to avoid late 80's to early 90's Hondas). Montego countryman diesels are ok, just be prepared to get the mig welder out every weekend to patch the sills ;)

ZX diesel ,Rover 218 diesel,anything over 15 years old can go on classic insurance TRUE ,as Ive got an 85 911 and a 1990 ZZR1100 on it :)

nearly bed time so here's some link for me to remember where I was looking. :D

http://www.dvla.gov.uk/vehicles/taxation.htm

http://www.vcacarfueldata.org.uk/index.asp

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/

http://car-insurance-brokers.com/index.htm

http://www.carsurvey.org/


Can someone tell me WTF is a honda insight? :confused:

A Suzuki Alto 1.1 (March 04) seems quite a nice little buy. cheap on tax because of low emissions and does quite good mpg...
down side is it's £3,750 to buy :(

Andy

The Honda Insight is a hybrid petrol/electric car. Pretty good on economy - though still not as a good as a small diesel - but complex and expensive.

My other half has a k-reg 106 diesel. She gets 70mpg on a long run and doesn't ever drop below 55mpg about town. 50bhp but it was only £900 and doesn't have a bit of rust and has been reliable since day one apart from the headgasket going and that was cheap enough to fix. oh and it only had 60000 miles on it too.

I have an sti2 with over 300bhp but i still LOVE driving her car so it's not all bad.
Cheap tax £110 a year :)

Stuart

Bought the wife a K reg 1.1 AX 2 years ago for £500; so far has sailed through 2 mots with just an oil & filter change needed. Has no rust, runs great & is surprisingly nippy. very cheap insurance & does 45mpg, very tinny too, but nothing has broken & they can be fixed for pennies.

I think the 106 has it.. :D

Used to be a pug owner anyway so know what they are like and what usually goes wrong.

Now all I have to do is find one. http://bbs.scoobynet.co.uk/images/smilies/ponder2.gif

Cheers for all your help.


Andy

Nissan Micra/Sunny etc?

Japanese so reliability. Can be insured for about £20 and economy will be pretty good.