It's only worth scrap money mate!
 

Hi all.

At the 'crossroads' again with the ZT as regards what to! Few bits to sort, back plates all round, new disc's and pads for the front, brake fluid change to do, air con needs a recharge, in all fairness to that, 17 years owned and never done. Spent almost £500 on her the back end of last year. Couple of other bits and pieces that need doing as well. Got to the point where I don't want to fall into the money pit trap, so decided I would change. Big wrench it would be, but there must be life after MG ROVER!

Came across a nice MK 1 Focus 170, always quite fancied one of those when they 1st came out. Good Miles, good history and a good price, so went to have a look to purchase. Test drive threw up no faults that could be seen and was going to buy it. Had already mentioned I had a px during the original phone call, not asked what it was though at that point. When the guy asked what I wanted to px, the mention of the ZT did not go down well. Nobody want's them mate, worth nothing, better selling it yourself or I'll give you scrap money!

That basically concluded any further discussion on the Focus and left.

Money to be spent on the ZT now, will get her back to how she should be, and enjoy more of what the last 17 years has given me!

Regards,

Dave.

When I p/x mine, they gave me an amount that said the same thing. Not interested, so I put it up for sale on Facebook and gumtree.
After a being messed about by various time wasters I finally sold it for about 500 more than I was offered via p/x.

In fairness to the dealer it wasn't the sort of car they'd be interested in.

This is exactly what the dealer does not want to do.

He has basically made the same decision as you yourself had done, the only difference being that in his case the risk is far greater as he does not know the car.

:}

Sadly our cars do have a limited market appeal , that will always affect the value of them

It doesn't matter what you trade they tend to rell you that half the time. Always better selling yourself if you can.

Longevity
 

I suppose a good place to read bad news is forums such as these where you tend to see a potted possible future list of disasters that might befall you.

Fortunately the forums also have in abundance the skill and knowledge to either avoid or overcome every difficulty. Therein lies both the problem and the solution.

However, there are problems that seem to occur very frequently that refer to components that never used to be so short-lived. For instance, back plates and discs get repeated mentions along with other components that used to (in other cars) last donkey’s years. Are these and similar items no longer the same quality generally or is it peculiar to the model?

This is not unique to our cars, a mate was swapping his Ford Galaxy in against a newer one at a Ford Dealer and they offered him £50 :eek:, One owner from new, 70k, full Ford service history and the only thing wrong with it was a small dent on the passenger door and it needed a good clean. They gave him a decent discount if he didn't swap it in so he gave it to me.

I cleaned it up, got a local dent guy to remove the dent in the door and sold it on the Bay for £880.

All these dealers are going to do is put it through the local auction and probably take a loss.

Its the same as the offers of, for example, £4000 trade in* ('subject to terms & conditions' etc) where the dealer isnt really giving you anything for your trade in, as you pay back the cash/discount over the course of the agreement, with an elevated APR!!. (And the dealer gets shot of another 'scrapper.')

They do this to save them selves the hassle of numerous warranty problems, a used car dealer I know well will rarely sell anything over 6 years old for this very reason and as he has said the odd time you do it often comes back and bites you. He had a very nice 8 year old VW come in, one owner, low mileage and lots of history. He sold it to a couple who were back within a few days as a warning light was on, that cost him £200 with some workshop time and a new sensor, a few weeks later it was back again this time with an oil leak, another £400 and he thought that was it. No a month later this time another warning light. Anyway by the time it was out of warranty he had lost nearly £300 on it.

Agreed. As I said in post #3, there is a financial risk associated with selling old cars. When we bought the Twintop for Mrs MSS, its battery lost charge after one week. The trade seller's garage had already replaced the old battery suspecting that it was weak, a broken spring and carried out a service/MOT. When I took the car back, he ended up taking it to a Vx dealer and it cost him £430 for diagnostics and a new ECU that had excessive current draw. By the time the dealer's salary, forecourt cost, insurance etc. was added the process of selling the car had probably cost him around £800. If the car had been an older £2k Twintop, the dealer would have ended up making a loss.

Most people do not sell or trade in that have no issues.

A friend has just bought a very tidy BMW 316 (1.8 petrol) with just over 100k on it. Underneath and most of the car is pristine, with just a small rust hole on the offside front wing where the paint was scraped against a low wall. A stack of servicing receipts from new ( one owner). The guy was offered £595 trade in or a grand off the new car with no trade in! My friend gladly paid £595.:shrug:

In the old days, when "it didn't used to be like this", most problems on a a car could actually be seen during an inspection. These days, most problems that are expensive to fix cannot be seen though a point inspection unless the buyer has the knowledge and vast array of diagnostic equipment to detect such problems.

Do we really want to go back to the days when K-seal and Sawdust (to hide differential whine) were the S/H car dealer's most valuable tools?

Trading constraints are there to protect the 90+% of the population who are not car experts and do not fix cars. Rightly so. There is nothing to stop anyone that has the expertise to enter into a non-standard contract with a seller if that is what they wish.

In my experience of dealing with people, the ones who decry regulation and compliance standards are usually the first to shout when things do not go according to their plan.

In real terms (i.e. inflation adjusted and related to earnings), cars now are far more affordable than in the 1970s and 80s. This is why there are so many more of them!

There are dealers who take in and sell some very nice older modern cars. But the cars cost a reasonable amount because the dealer has paid good money for an outstanding example, taken the risk and sorted everything before putting the car on the market with a warranty. The link below is to one such dealer that I tend to keep an eye on for the car I want - a 2010 CLS in a particular colour and engine combination.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/143345343787

The reality is that most members here critique 15+ year old £500 MGR cars in fine detail about their worth. This has nothing to do with trading constraints but the value of a 15 year old car and the risk associated with buying (or selling) one.

Finally, in the old days, a 10 year old car would have been considered ready for scrapping. The OP's car is at least 17 years old based on his post.

An average car needs to do at least 80k miles just to equal the amount of energy it takes to make it.

This is often left out when the ''Greens'' get involved about pollution. The greenest cars are the ones that last 20 or more years with little more than basic maintenance.

Cars are always picked on but in truth there are a lot of worse polluters that rarely get a mention, what about the 3000 Civil airlines in the air at any time in the air burning 10,000 gallons of fuel per minute or all the cruise ships and freighters burning 1000's of gallons of diesel with no filters around the oceans of the world?

A couple of years ago we went to stay with some relies in the US, one night there daughter offered to take us out for a Mexican at there favourite restaurant. They picked us up in the Dodge Pickup ( 5.7 litre ) and we drove for 1.5 hours to a place in the middle of now where, yes the food was good and then they took us back. We had done over 200 miles and probably used 10 gallons of fuel or more. I asked ''do they go there often'' and I was told '' no more than once a week :eek: . I know fuel is cheap over there but if they are burning it at that rate we can sleep easy.

Ms Lucas is the one and only Green party MP in the House of Commons (that alone possibly indicates the support in the country for 'Green' issues). That’s one, out of 650.

You could say her influence and standing in the House as a result is minimal, but in fact she is supported far and wide largely because she champions the cause of women and to rubbish her green credentials could be seen as an ad hominem attack, both on her and women in general. She is therefore sacred and can harangue all and sundry with her pseudo-science prophesies of doom with impunity. Some Joan of Arc.

Ms Lucas has now proposed an all-women party to sort out her parliamentary colleagues’ apparent taste for continued strife. Another Joan complex. That is surely discrimination?

She also ignores the fact that most of this ‘Green’ and pleasant land is given over to agriculture in general and farming in particular. If she actually believes her doctrine that the release of Carbon into the atmosphere causes the catastrophe she is terrified of, does she know just how much is released in the course of ploughing a field? Of digging the earth? In fact it is far more than is saved by wind farms. Personally she is pleasant, funny and bright and good to be with. But heaven save us from these zealots.

Given the endemic problems we have with Campylobacter and Salmonella with our UK chicken fleet, I actually don't mind if their various component parts get a bleachy wash...

And therein lies the problem. What are they covering up?

Can we not use the chlorine wash to clean the cars destined for the scrapyard,
much more hygienic than getting down and dirty removing parts we need?
(just to get back on topic :D:D:D)

Might well be the reason stated, not everything is a conspiracy.

I'd call it an excellent bit of thread drift :}

Convenient for the US as well. Plenty of subsidies over there I'd bet for farmers.

It is the price to change to the new car that is important, not what you get for the part exchange, obv iously you don't want to give the thing away, walking away is the right thing.

On the simple question of car expense my general rule of thumb is what I paid for it plus the running costs since I've had it divided by the number of years I've had it.
Then comes the hard bit. If I fancy another will I be better off, like it as much, and will I have to go through all that again. Then, finally, why?

I'm not sure I ever suggested they didn't? :shrug:

It's a benefit, if you like, what it's purpose is is probably very similar to other help given to farmers in many other parts of the world.

A car is worth what you're prepared to put into it. I put a lot of money into mine because they're worth alot to me (Bones in particular), and no Arthur Daley salesman is going to persuade me otherwise. :}

Some, that's some, of my early cars had a certain romantic association that sort of compelled a nostalgic attachment that kind of needed a lengthy time lapse before moving them on could be contemplated.

My thanks to Austin Cambridge 388RMH, Sunbeam Alpine APB611B and Rover 2000 UOY961F (my first Rover P6) for the memories, wherever they are. I just hope the same memories for the same cars do not occur to anyone reading this.

I agree, I presume it's Harry B you're talking about, lots of people taking shopping trolleys full of spares.

Lovely car John, my dad was into Austin's, from memory 4 Austin 7's, Austin 10, Austin 12/4 Harley and an Austin Chalfont (my favourite). Lost my dad 7 years ago and still miss him, a font of knowledge.

On my trips to africa and the middle east that's certainly true. There's all manner of vehicles on the road in those countries, that we might politely describe as ' beyond economic use'

Of course the reason it is economically viable in these countries to keep old vehicles on the road for so long is that those undertaking the work are often very poorly paid in relative terms. So labour is relatively cheap which means that workshops will often make up panels and structural components as necessary.

The same is true of India - it has been said that an Indian can keep a car or motorcycle running longer than most. Some of us continue this tradition despite labour costs in Suffolk not being quite the same as in the Punjab. :cool:

My Omega will be 20 years old in September. :}

Those other countries also have less control/restrictions therefore less cost necessary for the owners. I doubt many get given reasons by their insurance companies to replace and not repair, if they have insurance.

Actually, most do not have insurance. Do we really want to be in that situation?

I have been reading through most of this thread (skipped 1or2 pages). As I see it, the EU has been aiming to drive up the living standards of the vast majority (ideally all) Europeans, partly because wars between European countries have all had an economic imbalance or interference component. In doing that, they legislate for common, HIGH standards from all producers, and that also includes humane conditions and welfare for animal production. While we may feel aggrieved that industries are being moved from the industrially advanced northern countries to the previously impoverished southern and eastern new members, we benefit from being able to chose from a huge range of products, made to high standards, at prices that we in the north, would struggle to match. It is only reasonable that to maintain these high quality standards, agreed between its members, of which we are one of the most important, the EU has to protect itself from cheap imports from outside the EU, which do not pay the costs for regulated quality or workers conditions. Given the option on the shelves of EU humanely produced chicken and good quality car parts, or cheaper US chlorinated chicken and cheap car parts of unregulated quality, too many of us will choose the cheaper option. Unlike some of the paranoid, EU Devil-haters who rant on here, I accept that the EU is an imperfect organisation, but not because it has some evil, unstated ulterior motive, but that it, like us, is human, and makes mistakes in its efforts to improve the lives and conditions of the vast majority of its citizens. Within any organisation, there are the usurpers, the lazy, the self-centred, and the crooks. But the majority that I hear appear to be well-meaning, hard working people, who are trying to produce a group of nations, running with smooth, borderless, trade synchronisation, to maximise their efficiency and competitiveness, while maintaining standards, in a dog-eat-dog world, controlled by multinationals backed by their respective governments. As one of the richest nations in the world, never mind the EU, we may expect to pay "more than our fair share" for some time into the future for the peace and prosperity we continue to enjoy, and for the administration that it takes to run it. The EU has invested heavily in run-down areas of our country that successive governments neglected. It is a sad irony that our current prime minister, Farage and others promoted the lie that the EU was responsible for this poverty. But Cameron was hardly about to claim it as his fault, through his "austerity for some" (so we can spend it in the south), or that if we had spent money on both immigration officers, and a computer system that worked, for them, we might have avoided a problem that has already wasted billions in lost investment, and preparation, but will continue to cost way more in lost profit on trade, and the unnecessary, costly administration of it, let alone the further social costs of low wages, unemployment, and a conservative government that has done nothing to resolve the resentment that caused this whole unhappy fiasco - the fundamental and increasing inequality between rich and poor. Even having only the 23rd highest per capita GDP in the world is no excuse, - people will only work harder if they can enjoy the fruits of their labour. We should be ashamed of the state of our poor, and our general social disintegration. Personally, I trust our European leaders far more than our own, of almost any complexion, to produce a peaceful and prosperous society over the whole of Europe. I don't expect much more than a tirade of abuse for daring to express my opinions but someone needs to bring some balance to the carefully selective, slanted, and often untrue assertions bandied about on this forum. On the future of cars? A final date for the purchase of new IC engined vehicles needs to be implemented soon, with, say, a 15 year period in which to switch completely to non-fossil fueled alternatives. And as I have said before, manufacturers should be designing their current IC models to be convertable with ease, to other, non- fossil fueled propulsion. Once we aren't using oil as fuel, the virgin plastic byproduct will become (hopefully) more expensive than the recycled variety, so we can stop that pollution as well. Where there's a will there's a way.

I agree with everything you have written. Thank you. :bowdown::bowdown::bowdown:

Comfortably Numb:


You won't get a tirade of abuse, we don't do that. Although I confess to being curious as to why, in a post of 34 lines, just two were on topic. You must be seething, your post was obviously well considered.

Entirely in the interests of balance I would recommend the earlier suggestion concerning Alice Weidel. It might be sensible though to limit such discussion on this well-managed thread - we don't want it prematurely closed now do we?

Comfortably Numb

In the interest of fairness and balance, I think each line of your post represented a balanced and accurate response to one or more of the politically motivated earlier posts in this thread.

As for going off topic, it is to be observed that this was done by the poster now commenting on your post back in his post #6. His off-topic content being 100% relative to the previous 5 posts.

As for the speech by the German politician, whilst she is an excellent speaker, a person's view on the content of her speech would depend on their own politics i.e. whether her mindset and view of the world matches their own.

If your post was the result of "seething", although the reason for this comment is lost on me, please continue in this state as your post was factual, balanced and well considered. ;):bowdown::}

PS There are a few individuals on the forum who wish to control when and what others may post in order to not to dilute the messages in their own constant pushing of certain political agendas. Unfortunately, they appear now to be venturing out of the social section into the general car section of the forum. I would hope that most members (and the management team) would see their efforts for what they are.