Cost to keep a scoob on the road?

Scottland

Scottland

Scottland

Soldato
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I've somehow managed to get the idea into my head of a scoob as a potential next car. However, I don't really have a grasp on how much they actually cost to keep on the road, running well.

I'd be looking for a 2000-2002 UK Turbo, original or bug eye. I think I'd probably try and find a standard one, and keep it (mostly) that way. I believe the respective models would be the Turbo 2000, and WRX?

Would appreciate anyone's input, cheers.
 
bobert50 said:
I'd quite like to know this too :)

What do you drive at the moment btw? just after a step up in speed/power ?
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I've only got a Ford Puma at the moment, which has cost me almost nothing so far other than servicing. I'm also looking at things like Clio cup's, vRS' et al
 
I'm in a similar boat to you, had an mg zr for over 2.5 yrs and its cost about £150 in parts/mot and a further £80 in cheap servicing and new tyres (only fronts needed changing so far). £230 / 2.5 yrs * 52 = <£5 a week to own + petrol. Hard to justify a change really!

Reckon if we keep bumping it up someone with actual scooby knowledge will see it and reply soon ? ;) bet it'll be a couple of grand a year. Don't they need an engine rebuild often around 60k-70k? maybe i dreamt this.
 
There are rumours that pistons came from cadburys, but many seem fine.

I don't actually own one, but one of my best mates does. Fuel seems to be pretty terrible as you would expect. One major expense is the big service - iirc he paid around £600 to include a belt change, which due to boxer engine is a pain in the arse.

General reliability on his has been brilliant - its now on about 105k, ragged daily and starts/runs fine. His is fairly modded tho, with a big roller bearing turbo, p1 injectors, mahoosive front mount i/c, different centre diff, apexi fc commander running several maps (I think he can go between 0.6 and 1.4 bar boost maps), 4 pot brakes, etc.

It does eat tyres, but that's down to how it is driven i think.

The only real problems he has had was a dodgy temp sensor which thought it was -42 degrees, and caused it to overfuel like a tornado on re-heat, and that his cone filter is right under one of the bonnet vents, so when it rains he has to cover it up with a carrier bag or it can suck in loads of water and run rough for a few miles.

His is a proper classic shape one, and the interior is truely horrible. But I don't know if the interior would be different on a 2000 onwards model.

Best research is to buy the haynes book on scoobies, which lists all the models, updates etc. He got it and I have had a flick through and it is really informative.
 
Chocolate pistons... I think not, chocolate if boost turned up and not done properly with a remap! lol

Running costs roughly are as follows:

Fuel: £50 on fuel light, lasts anything from 200-300 miles depending on the driving you do. I get around 250 miles from a £50 around town.

Servicing: If you stick to the book, every 10,000 miles is an oil change and filter and some other stuff. But I'd say maybe £300 a year on servicing.

Tyres: Depending on brand, normally 15-25k, my dad has seen 30k from a set of Falken tyres before. Swap front to back half way through, and just buy 4 tyres when you need to replace.

Brakes: Around £200 for front disks and pads (decent ones) then not much for fitting. Again depends on driving, but I'd say around 30k for front and 60k miles for back?

Other than that I can't think of much else that costs money apart from the modifications :p

Link to ScoobyClinic's servicing costs below for 2001 onwards:
http://www.scoobyclinic.com/download/Serviceschedule_new.pdf

I've only had my 2004 WRX for a couple of months now, but my dad has had his bugeye for about 5-6years I think, so if you have any questions don't hesitate to ask :)

ScoobyDoo69
 
Cheers for that, what about reliability and weak points?

On the face of it, it doesn't seem too bad - although fuel is, as I thought, going to cripple me at £50 a week :eek:
 
Scottland said:
Cheers for that, what about reliability and weak points?

On the face of it, it doesn't seem too bad - although fuel is, as I thought, going to cripple me at £50 a week :eek:
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Reliability shouldn't be a problem, so long as you warm it up for a good 10min (for reasons of oil temperature) before you push too hard, but maybe get an oil temp gauge so you know when you can play :) It's certainly made me more comfortable knowing when the engine is really up to temperature.
I'd recommend using V-Power as they do run better on it, as confirmed by many a tuner.
Not much really goes wrong really, everything seems to be very reliable on them if treated right. Things like gearbox and clutch can go... if you tune them, or just launch the car hard all the time, the gearbox normally can take around 350bhp, but if abused can snap, as expected.

Piston slap is a common thing on classics when the car is cold, they sound very tinny, but once warm they're normally fine, check for things like white smoke from the exhaust to know if the turbo is on it's way out (which can happen sometimes).
I really can't think of anything specific that goes wrong with them if I'm honest, I only hear the stories of "I turned my boost up with a manual valve and my engine is dead" kind of thing and that's due to stupid tuning and not the car's reliability.
 
Just get one, there is a good reason you see so many about. They are very capable, reliable as standard and while costly to own, not tooooo bad
 
I ran a MY98 UK scooby turbo for 2.5 years and 34k miles.

Roughly:

Tyres £500 - a set lasted 8k miles
Fuel 22mpg (Best was 28 on a long run, worst was about 12)
Insurance - £800 per year
Servicing - £500 a year (Parts only did the work myself!)
Consumables - £500 a year

In total I spent about 14k in the time I owned it on running costs and about 6k on mods!

Nothing went wrong with it in that time.

Piston slap is common on MY98 models, but should quiten down when the engine is warm.

The MY99 onwards are the best ones to get, they have better brakes and a little more power compared to the previous model years. They are also easier to remap as the standard ECU can be flashed.

There are some stories about failing MAF sensors on MY99 models leading to engine failure so I'd change that as a precaution.

You will modify it!
 
Scottland said:
Cheers for all the info guys, keep it coming :cool:

Aside from astronomical fuel costs - is doing 20k a year in one feasible?
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Thats about:

4k in fuel
1k in tyres
A classic's service intervals are every 7.5k miles, say about £200 per service?

Have you thought of getting one as a second car? That's what I did after a year of ownership!
 
L1J said:
Thats about:

4k in fuel
1k in tyres
A classic's service intervals are every 7.5k miles, say about £200 per service?

Have you thought of getting one as a second car? That's what I did after a year of ownership!
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Wouldn't want one as a 2nd car, it wouldn't get enough usage to make it worthwhile, or it'd get so much usage that the 1st car wouldn't be worthwhile :)
 
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