Potentially need a new car

Uncle_Gravy

Uncle_Gravy

Uncle_Gravy

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Joined
11 Aug 2012
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Location
Wales
After waiting a long while for a fun car, IE the 3.0 Z4, long story short, I've bitten a bit more than I can chew, and with my job where they might be offering me a full time job (Currently agency) Doing 12k miles a year doesn't make sense in a Z4.

I'm not looking to spend more than £3k, I drive on mostly M4 and dually roads Mon-Fri that's just for work, And considering diesel is cheaper than petrol right now, kinda makes sense to go diesel.

I'm not a diesel person, only driven 2 diesels during my 6 year's of driving, a 1.9 Fabia Vrs as a learner car, thought it was brilliant and the higher powered insignia, very nice quick comfortable car but I doubt I'd get one in my budget.

Lets hear some suggestions,

Cheers.
 
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12k miles and Diesel being a penny or 2 cheaper right now doesn't seem like a solid case for going Diesel.
 
I'm happily comfortable in the Z4, I've had the roof down in 3c weather and loved every moment, I simply can't afford to pay off the car, still got a year left of payments, and my current job pretty much requires me to pay to park (£7.50 a day x5) and £40 a week on top for petrol, and the pay is pretty much meh, but at the minute it's all I got.

So thinking about it albeit diesel is 1-2p cheaper than petrol and cheaper tax, it sounds like a sensible option. Imo

I'm happy for suggestions of petrol as long as it gets like 40+mpg cheaper to tax and has a little poke to give me overtaking confidence and keep up with motorway traffic.
 
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I made the move from a MK6 GTi to a MK7 fiesta.

Just make sure it adds up before taking the plunge or you'd regret it; I was tempted to buy a 118i but asked myself if I owned one, would I pay £X more to run a golf, and the answer was yes; this isn't the case for the fiesta.

You'd really need to downgrade to make any of this worth while.
 
Coming from a 3L Z4 to a car with a smaller engine Petrol or Diesel is going to be a big downgrade.

We'll use the 1.9 Fabia Vrs as an example

Tax is around £130 a year the Z4 is £295 a year

Figures say 50+Mpg but realistically in the 40s, the Z4 is high twenties low thirties.

Tyres can't quite comment on cost for both as I've haven't gotten the chance to shell out for tyres but I can assume a hell of a lot cheaper than the 100-200 per tyre for the Z4.

Servicing, not sure on the Skoda or the Z4 but I do know its had its major service done before I bought it so reasonable from what I read.

And then the silly niggly little things that's happened to the car, Leak in the xenon headlight, blown the ballast, still haven't found the source of the leak, a Ballast off the bay is around £60 or £300+ if can't fix the headlight, some scum vandalised the car nicking one of the headlight washers and now the third brakelight the plastic cover protecting the LEDs was hanging off, looks like someone tried to prise off the cover not realising it all comes off by two bolts in the back of the boot lid, so they stuck it back in with some type of sealant.

all that in the space 7 months.

Trust me, I don't like the idea going from a naughty sounding Straight six to a tractor or a slow washing machine sounding 4Cyl petrol engine, but I don't have money to actually spend on myself to enjoy, I don't have the dosh to get me some new PC parts, or to go out and have a laugh with some mates, and I miss that.
 
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For £5k you could get a rather tuned Fabia which is just as fast as your Z4. They pop up on Briskoda every now and then. If you're not into the tuning scene then I'd be looking at spending much less than £5k on a Mk1 Fabia vRS because they're a fairly old car now. £2-3k should get you a nice one.
 
mccarf said:
For £5k you could get a rather tuned Fabia which is just as fast as your Z4. They pop up on Briskoda every now and then. If you're not into the tuning scene then I'd be looking at spending much less than £5k on a Mk1 Fabia vRS because they're a fairly old car now. £2-3k should get you a nice one.
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I learnt in one 6 years ago, probably cause it was the only car I had driven at that time but thought it was brilliant, Really easy to drive, it was comfortable, it was quick and quite spacious I thought, I'd love one.
 
it'll work out if you go down to something like a fiesta, where the tyres are smaller, insurance will be lower, ved will be lower and likely mpg improvements too.

All of those will add up and probably help - but be sure you're happy to do 12k a year in that size of car (in fairness our little fiesta is perfectly ok for that sort of use). I'd also be buying a small petrol, though unfortunately you're not going to get into one of the 1 litre turbo cars for the money.

Swapping the z4 for something like a civic (or any similar sized car) is, imo pretty much a waste of time - you'll still be running 17 or 18" tyres, the ctdi only does about 40-45mpg which you'll get from a small petrol and comes with potential clutch issues. Plus Honda servicing aint cheap

They're a good car, but not going to give you much of what you're after imo
 
Xez said:
That's all well and good but really who wants to throw a dirty big turbo on a daily commuter that won't ever get into that power band and that is required to get them 50+ miles a day reliably.
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That's why I said above if that's not his thing then £2-3k is fine for a normal fabia vRS.
 
Regarding the discussion of Diesel vs Petrol for 12k a year, I guess it really depends on the cars in question. My diesel Leon gets 50-55mpg and I do roughly 12-15k per year so it's worth it over a 35mpg petrol Focus, but not necessarily over one of the eco-boost engines (though I'm sure you'd feel a bit disappointed going to one of these from the Z4).
 
Not really after anything tuned, though I am interested in the standard Vrs Fabia, Its not a small car like a Fiesta, Quite roomy, looks very affordable and with 130bhp it has a decent amount of poke, and being a diesel I dare say if I wanted to in the future I could remap it for a nice little boost in power.

Before the Z4 I had my old man's Gen7 2L Accord, Lovely roomy comfortable saloon, wasn't the best on petrol imo and Tax is £260 ish a year if I remember correctly, but I quite liked the space, which is probably why I'm not looking at Fiesta's.

Insurance is no bother to me, The Zed was £600 to insure for the year, so anything smaller will be a lot cheaper than a big engine roadster.

Tyre wise I get a little discount as my brother works in a tyre shop so not too bad, used to get £20 a tyre for my old clio xD so bad.
 
Code: 
	Fabia	Fiesta
Length	3970 mm	3924 mm
Width	1890 mm	1912 mm
Height	1451 mm	1464 mm

Massive 46mm shorter for the Fiesta, whilst being 22mm wider and 13mm taller.
 
Uncle_Gravy said:
Figures say 50+Mpg but realistically in the 40s, the Z4 is high twenties low thirties.
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Everything else set to one side. You must be able to get 50+mpg out the fabia.

I used to quite easily get over 50mpg (on longer journeys close 57mpg) from an A1 2.0 TDI. Might be in the 40s for journeys less than 5 miles.
 
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