Dick Dastardly

;D Am collecting new WRX on Thursday and have read quite a few comments re expensive running costs. What in particular are they?

Either way it won't put me off, it's just a need to know thing! Have just px'd a cooper s and that was positively evil on tyres.

stevoWRX

Petrol ,

since you'll just want to drive and drive and drive ...

Ajax

If you owned a Ferrari you would not worry about the fuel insurance and tyres, you would just enjoy your car.

Scoobys are a little bit like that.

So to recap, if you can afford it have it, if you can’t don’t.

Better still have two cars, an old van/car and a Scooby, use the old one for general day to day stuff and the Scooby for driving, this helps with the Optimax cost and worry of getting it pinched or damaged.

Petrol is the single worst problem, otherwise a reliable car.

Toonman1

It's an expensive car to run against, say a Ford Fiesta. Compared with other cars that will hit 60 in less than 5.5 secs, pull 140mph+, do 30-70 in significantly less than 6 secs and offer excellent 4WD handling and grip - it's not.

I made the mistake of trading my 3rd Impreza Turbo for a new Seat Leon Cupra. Insurance (for me) was £6.00 per month cheaper, fuel costs reduced by only £30 per month (15K pa) and a 10K service was £6.00 cheaper than a WRX. Oh and tyre wear was much greater than any Scoob I've owned. Result? I traded for a new 02 WRX PPP after 9 months. It's certainly worth the extra £36 or so per month on running costs.

Cheers

Dick Dastardly

Know what you mean. The Cooper S was quite thirsty anyway, and looking at the spec in the current imprezza brochure the wrx is quite a bit better on consumption . The tyres were knack'd after 4.5k so am used to forking out for those.

Is the optimax essential? Was reading earlier about not running brilliantly on ordinary UL. As you may have gathered dealer hasn't mentioned any of this - hence the questions.

At the end of the day it won't make any difference to the enjoying the car, but its always nice to have a bit of info in advance.

wrxmania

Optimax really is needed - inside the petrol flap it says 98RON Unleaded only on my UK 2003 WRX. There is tons of info about fuel and the new models here on the Scoobynet. Browse away.

Running costs are O.K. - on an average 80.0p per litre of Optimax, I get around 250 miles per £30 (less if I enjoy it more). Most I have got so far is around 275 miles for £30. All these figures include slow work, fast roads, crawling traffic etc so are a fair reflection. The enjoyment of driving it means I would pay £1.80 per litre for Optimax to drive it.

The ECU retards the ignition timing I believe if you use standard unleaded. It takes tons of refills for it to reset itself (that is what it does). Some folk say only 2-3 fill-ups but everywhere else says lots more than that.

Other than that, enjoy it - get a new exhaust pronto - the one on it is granny friendly.

Dick Dastardly

Testdrove WRX with PPP on it, very impressed, so think when have got a bit more cash in new year will stick that on it.

Thanks for the info.

Toonman1

On the one occasion I had to use 95UL (on holiday in the Highlands - no Optimax and hardly any SUL), it did take 3 tankfulls before the performance was back again. That's almost 800 miles, so it's bad enough.

Cheers