Another stupid car purchase

Dogbreath

Dogbreath

Dogbreath

Soldato
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
16,661
Location
Devon
Seems it's all the rage to buy crap cars at the moment, so I didn't want to buck the trend.

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2004 ZS180, 65k miles, service history from 30k miles (second owner), MOT until July next year. I wasn't looking to buy one of these, but at £1040 I admit it was an impulse purchase.

It's suffering from a couple of the usual Rover/KV6 problems; heater fan only working on high position (todays job) and VIS motors not working (fixed yesterday). The timing belts need doing though, which is a fairly lengthy job so that's half of next weekend booked up for me. The front bumper mounting needs to be sorted as well, could drive a bus through the panel gaps on the nearside! It looks like a previous owner has caught the bottom of the bumper on a kerb.

Not sure whether to keep it or move it on. On the plus side it's a nice car to drive; feels very taut and handles beautifully, the engine sounds lovely and performance is reasonable and overall condition is pretty good. On the negative side it has a ridiculous spoiler on the back (which could be changed for a smaller one), and the performance/economy ratio, whilst not terrible, isn't as good as my Fiat Coupe. Going to use it for my commute for a few weeks and see how it goes.
 
Fix the VIS motors, do the belts and sell it on :) Belt change is £lol at a garage iirc and the fact that it needed doing explains the price?

Two of my friends have these cars, and they sound *awful* - which I guess is the VIS motors?

lordrobs said:
Looks like an excellent buy! I thought they had twin pipes on the exhaust though?
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missed that, it doesn't look like the right exhaust!
 
[TW]Fox;17785456 said:
£1k for an 04 plate car, excused.
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I know it would probably be one of the last cars on earth you would choose, but I think you would appreciate how it drives.

lordrobs said:
Looks like an excellent buy! I thought they had twin pipes on the exhaust though?
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The facelift version (with shark gill A panels and slabby boot lid) had the twin pipes.

GeX said:
Two of my friends have these cars, and they sound *awful* - which I guess is the VIS motors?
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Duff VIS motors make the performance very flat, feels more like a 2L car. The linkages inside the inlet plenum that connect the VIA motors to numerous butterflies can fail as well which makes the engine sound rattly, and is a very expensive fix. Fortunately the plenum is ok on mine.
 
One of them sounds 'rattly', the other sounds like the top end is about to fail in a spectacular way. I guess both of these cars are duff, there is no 'kick' higher up the rev range. Feels slower than my Xsara. Although, I'd rather have mechanical issues than the confusing electrical issues on the VTS!
 
Glad to see another OcUKer with one of these under-rated and pretty fun (for wrong wheel drive) cars. Enjoy it. :)

One thing I don't understand, you say it's all the rage to buy crap cars... then seem to quite like it? :p
 
Dogbreath said:
handles beautifully
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Rubbish. It's madness to think of an MG ZS to be a good handling car according to some on here.

Either way, that's a pretty stonking buy right there. I wasn't aware they made the Mk1s that late, or did they change between 04 and 54?
 
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There's a couple of 54 plate Mk1s about, either late registered or very very late off the line.

Think the latest Mk1 we know about is on a 56 plate. :p

And yeah, rubbish cars, remember everyone on OcUK has had personal experience of one, and hated the handling and drive.
 
lordrobs said:
Looks like an excellent buy! I thought they had twin pipes on the exhaust though?
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Nope. You can buy a janspeed twin fit system but imo it doesn't sound as nice and weighs more.

Nice car mate, enjoy it. I certainly miss mine!
 
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