Check what it says on the .gov website that's the only info that matters. IIRC I heard similar a few months back but nothing had changed according to the .gov site so I wrote it off as Chinese whispers although it may have been updated since then.
MX5 major MOT fail — what would you do?
- Thread starter Irish_Tom
- Start date
Check what it says on the .gov website that's the only info that matters. IIRC I heard similar a few months back but nothing had changed according to the .gov site so I wrote it off as Chinese whispers although it may have been updated since then.
Not entirely correct. If your vehicle fails it's MOT, it CAN be unroadworthy. However, what you've said suggests that if you have a sidelight bulb out your insurance company is going to void your insurance if you have a crash. Utter nonsense, of course. If, however, you know that the vehicle has something unsafe wrong with it, including if it has MOT fails that are marked specifically as dangerous, it's a different matter.
Any details and pics of where the shell needs the welding work? Sills? Arches? Front chassis legs? All of the above?
As you may already know, mx5s rust from the inside out and will always be in a worse state than you think when you start opening it up.
Clean mk2s can be worth decent money, I sold mine last month for £4k, however it sounds like to gets yours up to a great standard will end up costing you a lot. If you're happy to go down the full restoration route then good luck and I hope you've got deep pockets.
The way I see it you have 3 options,
* sell it as spares/strip it for parts
* repair it as cheap as possible and accept it's going to look rough but with still be an enjoyable fun car
* go all in and do it properly. So repairs by a specialist, full respray, strip and powder coat wishbones and subframe, suspension and bushes refresh, full de-rusting of the shell and underseal and so on. Make sure you fully photograph and keep a log of all the work
As you may already know, mx5s rust from the inside out and will always be in a worse state than you think when you start opening it up.
Clean mk2s can be worth decent money, I sold mine last month for £4k, however it sounds like to gets yours up to a great standard will end up costing you a lot. If you're happy to go down the full restoration route then good luck and I hope you've got deep pockets.
The way I see it you have 3 options,
* sell it as spares/strip it for parts
* repair it as cheap as possible and accept it's going to look rough but with still be an enjoyable fun car
* go all in and do it properly. So repairs by a specialist, full respray, strip and powder coat wishbones and subframe, suspension and bushes refresh, full de-rusting of the shell and underseal and so on. Make sure you fully photograph and keep a log of all the work
Did they do an MOT to find out it would fail without this work, or did you get them to just do a check, if the former then you do realise it doesn't matter that the old MOT runs out on the 20th as it is now invalid.
I sold my mk2 shortly after buying a house. It was hard to justify spending money on it when I had a lot to do to the house (the sills were gone, again)!
I sold it for a pitiful £1k and to this day still regret it. I could've put in the garage and done jobs here and there on it over time. However this may be a better idea in my head than in practice.
I sold it for a pitiful £1k and to this day still regret it. I could've put in the garage and done jobs here and there on it over time. However this may be a better idea in my head than in practice.
As above, Gov.uk is saying it still has a valid MOT.
I'm not sure how the insurance company would deal with it should I have an accident but it's a moot point now anyway. I'm going to hire a car for the next week while we deal with it.
So I've just got back from the body shop and they've confirmed what the MOT garage said — it's going to need about £1,000 worth of work doing to it to repair the rust and a few other little bits and pieces but it will be ugly; about £1,500 to repair it and make it look presentable or closer to £3k to fix everything and give it a full respray so that it's mint.
Clearly, it's not worth the £3k job. I could spend £1k and hope that it makes it to its next MOT without any issues but live with an ugly car,
Alternatively, the guy said he would buy it for £400 (or I could stick it on eBay) and I could sell the hard top for another few hundred. It's also got a private plate that I may be able to sell.
You'll easily get more than £400 if you break it for parts. The 6 speed gearbox is an easy £250 alone, with the Torsen diff about the same. If it's still original then the leather interior should make decent money along with the chrome 5 spoke alloys. A good condition genuine Mazda hardtop with heated glass window should make £300+
Yeah, this would be the best solution. It's just a factor of time/space/inclination to break it, all of which I don't have.
Time to sell
Looks that way.
No other storage space either, I guess
Nope, on-street parking around here. To be honest, even if I had the storage space I honestly don't have the time to try and learn how to do the work. By the time I'd factored in the cost of the tools required and the hours of my time, it would be cheaper to get it done by someone who knows what they're doing.
As I said before, the money itself isn't the issue; it's just whether it makes economic sense to put that money into the current car or put it towards a new one.
Only you can decide that really, if you want to keep the car for a long time then if the money isn't an issue I think you should go for it.
Did they give you a list of what needs to be done? If you get £1500 worth of welding done then how much will the car be worth?
In all seriousness, why not?
Do you like the car? Is the rest of it OK? Would you be happy keeping it for another 5 years or so?
Obviously, If your intention was to sell it on as soon as you got it fixed it would be dumb to spend more than you might recover prior to doing so.
But if you would have been happy to keep it for another 5 or more years or so?
Any car more than about 8 years old isn't worth what you might sell it for, it is worth what it would cost to replace.
One of my regular customers has just spent £3000 repairing the bodywork on his old E36 BMW and I think it was a very good move, he will still be using this car in 5 years time/until he gives up driving (Whichever comes first) I like E36 , I have one myself (Mine is a compact coupe) and am likely to do much the same myself should the need arise...
If it had air conditioning I might be tempted but even with the roof down in the summer I still become a sweaty mess after about five minutes of sitting in it.
We paid £3k for it originally, so chucking the same at it again to keep it on the road seems excessive. I would rather put that money (and whatever I could get for the car) towards something new.
The number one thing I got wrong when buying an MX5 was to think that there was no point in it having A/C. If my one had it the thing would probably get twice as much use.