Another spec me a cheaper to run car thread (sorry!)
- Thread starter Haggisman
- Start date
2- 3 years newer than 2002 is still old car.
you're replacing an old car with an old car.
up to you
Well yes, but a £50-60/month cheaper to run old car is still cheaper to run
I'd consider any car out of warranty to have the potential to throw up some big bills. More so if it's mechanically complicated (turbos, diesels, DMFs etc)
And warrantys don't cover everything.
Depreciation is often the biggest expense alongside fuel. Either get something that's already depreciated quickly, good on fuel or both for highest chance of minimising costs.
You really want to save money? Look at a used petrol Chevrolet Lacetti, Kalos, Aveo or something. They're not exactly desirable but they are cheap, mechanically simple and fairly reliable. You can fit a lot of bills and fuel consumption into the car being several grand cheaper in the first place, or get a much newer car for the money (perhaps reducing the chance of something going bang).
And warrantys don't cover everything.
Depreciation is often the biggest expense alongside fuel. Either get something that's already depreciated quickly, good on fuel or both for highest chance of minimising costs.
You really want to save money? Look at a used petrol Chevrolet Lacetti, Kalos, Aveo or something. They're not exactly desirable but they are cheap, mechanically simple and fairly reliable. You can fit a lot of bills and fuel consumption into the car being several grand cheaper in the first place, or get a much newer car for the money (perhaps reducing the chance of something going bang).
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Well yes, but a £50-60/month cheaper to run old car is still cheaper to run
like i said you are too focus on the numbers in spreadsheet. dont think you'll save full 50/60 pounds monthly.
you'll end up very disappointed
i went from 1.0 micra to 1.6 focus. the total extra cost was only around £30 monthly. thats include everything.
even ignoring the difference in fuel and insurance, with one of the smaller diesels I'll still be saving £20/month in tax alone
Haggisman - how are you estimating fuel costs for your spreadsheet? I would steer clear of the official figures and use something like the www.honestjohn.co.uk RealMPG figures (unless you are already getting close to the NEDC official figures).
Very few people seem to acheive the official figures these days.
Very few people seem to acheive the official figures these days.
Yeah, I am using the official figures, I'll go plug in the figures from that site in a sec.
£160/month insurance
Well... that was pretty pointless, there aren't realmpg figures for most of the cars on my list
OK. Quick guide (bearing in mind your mileage may vary):
On average most cars get about 86% of the combined figure in mixed use.
Cars to about 2005 generally get about 85-95 of the combined EU mpg.
NA Petrols still get about 85-95% of the combined EU mpg.
Post 2005 larger engine diesels still get about 85-95% of the combined EU mpg.
Post 2005 Small engine diesels (1.6 ish down) usually get about 75-85% of the combined EU mpg.
Hybrids usually get about 75-85% of the combined EU mpg.
Very recently it all goes pear shaped. Some RealMPG figures are terrible (Ford Ecoboost 1.0 variants 60-70% ish) others are fantastic (Honda 1.6 diesel 90% ish). But they are probably too new for you to worry about. There's a lot of 'gaming' the official testing system and stuff like stop-start systems have a disproportionate impact on official figures.
A good starting point is what % of your car's official figure are you currently getting? Don't expect to hit the official figures with a different car if you're only getting 70% now.
A big difference is that recent small engine cars with a turbo (diesel or petrol, there are exceptions) fail to hit their combined figure on a long motorway run. The older ones would. This is because the NEDC test on which the figures are based includes practically no steady state high speed driving. It only very briefly hits 70mph and above. Therefore the manufacturers, knowing they'll only have to publish official figures, don't need to aim to get good fuel economy at higher steady speeds. These smaller engines get fantastic results at a steady 40-50mph. At 70mph +, they don't do so well.
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To be honest, I doubt I'm going to be looking at anything post 2005 anyway, the majority of what I've been looking at has been 2002-2004.
I'm getting ~21mpg at the moment, but it's pretty exclusively short journeys, so that's pretty close to the manufacturers figure of 22mpg for urban.
I've just adjusted my figures to 86% of quoted mpg (including for my current car), and the savings actually come out as higher
Edit: that's using broken down urban/extra urban figures, I'll try it with combined as well
Double edit: using combined figures, adjusted to 86%, the savings do increase across all options by 15-20% (unless my maths is way off)
I'm getting ~21mpg at the moment, but it's pretty exclusively short journeys, so that's pretty close to the manufacturers figure of 22mpg for urban.
I've just adjusted my figures to 86% of quoted mpg (including for my current car), and the savings actually come out as higher
Edit: that's using broken down urban/extra urban figures, I'll try it with combined as well
Double edit: using combined figures, adjusted to 86%, the savings do increase across all options by 15-20% (unless my maths is way off
)
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Not trying to have a go here, but...
Do you expect to get much more than low 20's MPG on the whole if you're only doing short journeys, with any car that is:
a) Fairly old and tired out
b) Being run cold for most of its' journeys
Seriously, how reliable is the car you've currently got? (Mazda is it?)
If it's reliable, then why not breathe a few £ into it and give it a nice new oil filter, fuel filter and air filter. Possibly also spark plugs too. You might get a couple of more MPG out of it if you're lucky, and you at least have a car which is reliable.
Any car in that price range could be hiding a nasty surprise or 2 which you'll find shortly after buying it, or could go badly wrong very quickly and leave you wishing you'd just stuck with what you have! Not saying that's guaranteed to happen, but you're certainly in that territory / price range.
Do you expect to get much more than low 20's MPG on the whole if you're only doing short journeys, with any car that is:
a) Fairly old and tired out
b) Being run cold for most of its' journeys
Seriously, how reliable is the car you've currently got? (Mazda is it?)
If it's reliable, then why not breathe a few £ into it and give it a nice new oil filter, fuel filter and air filter. Possibly also spark plugs too. You might get a couple of more MPG out of it if you're lucky, and you at least have a car which is reliable.
Any car in that price range could be hiding a nasty surprise or 2 which you'll find shortly after buying it, or could go badly wrong very quickly and leave you wishing you'd just stuck with what you have! Not saying that's guaranteed to happen, but you're certainly in that territory / price range.
No problem - any opinions/feedback are welcome
I would hope to get a bit more from a car with a tiny petrol/diesel engine rather than a 2.3 petrol
When I've used my mums 1.7 dti Astra in the past, it has been significantly cheaper to run, even for just getting to work (circa £40/month as opposed to £70)
I did a full service on my car a few months ago (not spark plugs, but oil & filters).
Other than the fact it's "known", I wouldn't have thought my current car is any more reliable than any of the cars I've listed?
It's a 2002, on just over 90k, so similar in both age and mileage to what I'm looking at, so really has just as much potential to go wrong as a replacement, the difference being if I'm paying £50+/month less on running the car, it means £50+/month more to pay for repairs. There's also the fact that if I get the replacement from a trader, I potentially have something to fall back on if it does fail catastrophically within the first month or 2 - which I obviously don't have with my current car.
It's a 2002 6 sport (2.3 petrol), so pretty thirsty