Car woes

Don't buy a Punto.

Since buying in 2001 and not including stuff done for MOT:

Windscreen wipers stop working, while driving in the rain... Apparently a common problem, so much so that Fiat only sells the whole bloody assembly motor included.

Car overheats, problems with the fan, then car doesn't start, not enough juice...
Stuck with battery problems: 5 times, middle of the road: 2 times :

Right front wheel nicked. Seriously... nicked! what is this? A bad suburb in the states... in a movie? Oh, and of course the other tire need replacing as well.

Windscreen wipers dead again. Oh F me... knock off parts for repairs. Less stupid.

Battery actually dies... New battery. Radio goes belly up as well cuz I don't have the codes

Numpty here forgets the car in the parking space past 4:3pm (got out of the Uni at midnight). Car impounded.

Yesterday: Clutch on its death bed, goes out screaming, new installed.

I can't get a break...






On an unrelated note, if you are in the Edinburgh area, I know of a nice car that will be on the market soon. I have it from good source it quite a catch!

What's a Whipper - one of your "interests" that you want to keep quiet about?

It sounds like you need a Rover. Very much like Pentax, the magazines slate them, but those who know, value them.

I bought a Rover Montego Estate and ran it for 11 years and did 193,000 miles. In that time it needed just 3 new batteries, 1 clutch, 1 water pump, 3 hoses and 3 sets of brake pads. Definately the best car I ever had.

My current Rover 600, I have had for 3 1/2 years and have only required 1 set of brake pads and 1 cv joint cover.

Who's the tired person that needs replacing?

Should be tyre, we're not American

Its wipers, the damn contraption came apart...

Not the tyre, the whole wheel, metal frame, tyre and bolts. Bastards! Who wants a wheel form a Punto, it was magnesium, just a rusting steel one.

The best car I ever had was a Mitsubishi Lancer. I bought it second hand and drove it for 14 years. One cylinder head gasket was the only problem with it. Eventually I scrapped it, as it cost more to insure it than it was worth.

My son was heartbroken when I did that, and his first car, bought a couple of months later was a Mitsubishi Colt, which was really just the hatchback version of the Lancer.
He traded it in (!) for a VW Polo when he needed room for baby stuff. The polo has been more hassle than either Mitsubishi was.

I now have a Renault Kangoo. I don't like it much but it is practical.

My husband drives a Prius (company car), his second, and fifth Toyota. He's had lots of different cars, but has stuck to Toyota sine his first Avensis.
I expect when he retires we'll buy whatever Toyota he is then driving from the lease company. I hope it will be the Auris hybrid .

Seconded. My wife had a polo and the only thing worse than the car was volkswagen GB/dealership cabal.

It wasn't that hers was a Friday afternoon job. I worked with someone who had one a couple of months newer, and I could tell him what would break next.

I've nailed my colours to the Toyota mast..for the time being anyway.

trouble with Rovers these days is if they DO break you try getting parts. My little sister had a 214, nice car, generally very little trouble, except that it needed a bottom hose and it was quite impossible to get one.

Never had a car...

Please don't go comparing Pentax to Rover! Would Alan Partridge own a Pentax?

I do hear good things about the engines in later Rovers. Apparently they were made by Honda. You can't go wrong with Japanese brands. Well maybe apart from C-non!

Thanks for the thread on the punto. Need to buy a smaller car, and was considering one. Had a Bravo once and it was very reliable- in fact I loved it- so was considering another fiat.

So in 9 years You have had a new battery, an overheating problem, couple of sets of windowscreen wipers, a new tyre and now a new clutch.

Everything else can be put down to your own forgetfulness or some thieving oiks.

After reading that I would say .. buy a Punto, that's pretty damn good in 9 years imo.

As Mike-P says, take out the "human element" and I've heard of worse cars.

A Rover 200 owned by one of my own colleagues, for example, which had had two new engines inside 60,000 miles.

A first generation Mondeo owned from new by a friend's dad, which required new engine mounts before it needed an MOT, due to corrosion.

I'm on my second Fiat, a Bravo, after owning a Grande Punto (admittedly a complete redesign from the previous Punto, aesthetically and mechanically) and they haven't missed a beat in over 100k miles between them.

Whilst I agree with the negative comments about VW dealers, I can't complain with the cars themselves, not the older ones anyway. I've had a mk 1 Polo, 2 mk 2 Golfs and a Corrado (15 years old this year and still going strong), and they've all been a joy to own, sturdy reliable and cheap to maintain.

Compare that with my Mazda MX-5 (supposedly ultra-reliable due to it's Japanese heritage) which required its catalytic converter replacing (as well as the HEGO sensor) before it was 6 years old.

The problem is with cars, you rarely hear about the good ones, and you're only ever really working with a sample size of 1 when you hear a horror story. After all, if every Rover was as good as the ones we've heard about here, I'm sure they would still be getting built somewhere.

I had a Peugeot 306 which I drove from 110,000 to 168,000 and in that time it never failed to start first time and get me to my destination.

It was rattly, the diesel engine sounded like that of a canal boat, it accelerated like an asthmatic snail, on one occasion the heater matrix blew and ejected a fine mist of coolant water into the "de-mist" system, thus turning it into a very effective "re-mist" system, but it never actually failed to get where I was going. Also it did a constant 55MPG whether I was poodling around town or hurtling down a motorway at 70. Oh and driving it up and down multi-story carparks was the best upper body workout I've ever had, since it had no PAS.

Sometimes I really miss that car.

That is a very good point and one we go out of our way to stress on the car forums I'm on.
Nobody ever comes on to say "what a great vehicle..."
It is always, " My head has cracked" ( the only common problem on these, but then, they are over 15 years old. )