Anyone seriously tried "Bangernomics" as transport

The most i've EVER spent on a car ( my t25 panel van ! ) was ?200, and even then it was through gritted teeth. I think its VERY VERY VERY stupid to spend loads on buying a car, and total lunacy to take out '000 on finance.

If you need finance for a car, a phone, clothes etc then you can't afford it/them.


My bug was ?49 ( it was mean't to be ?50 but i lost a pound coin on the way to collect it )
My rust free mk1 was ?100 ( they wanted ?300….er…no. )

and the previously mentioned, horrifyingly expensive van was ?200…

MK2 golf gti bought ?1100 two and a half years ago sold yesterday ?900 only needed general servicing and a s/h gearbox which i did on my drive , so thats ?300 pounds to do 90,000 miles . I dont include servicing or tyres as what ever car i have will need something doing with the kind of mileages i do for work .I dont think its quite bangernomics but i dont feel too badly off. My mk1 is only slightly behind phils though , and as Steve said a problem with buying another dub is that your likely to get attached to it and then the costs go up .

In 1994 I bought a 1991 MKII Driver from a bloke at work, he had it from new and I got it for what he was offered as a trade in against a new Rover. Think it was ?5K or might have been ?5.5 :? . Ran it for 5 years, autochoke carb was a pain but DIY serviced it myself and nothing significant broke or wore out. Traded it in for a 2 year old Polo diesel and got ?3.5 back. Less than ?2k deprecation over 5 years on a newish car was good I though.

Ahhh the days when VWs really were reliable, durable and did hold their value. :roll:

Are some people missing the point? You can get some pretty decent cars for around 700-800 quid, I'd hardly call them bangers  :wink:

It?s all relative. 20 years ago when I started driving, new cars were relatively expensive and people had to keep old bangers going, nursing them through each MOT and only scrapping them when they really were scrap with Fred Flintstone floors and engines burning more oil than petrol. Cars were more DIY friendly and people seemed have the skills and willingness to do maintenance and repairs themselves.

The drop in prices of new cars and the fact that they are selling 2.5m a year means that yes you can buy a rust free modern car for 700-800?.but?.its not DIY friendly and if you can?t or won?t DIY, a new clutch, ECU or cat can mean that it gets scrapped.

It?s all very well apparently saving ? by purchasing a ?200 banger and then spending every weekend and another ?50 in parts keeping it on the road. Most people don?t have the time, facilities or inclination to so. I take off my hat to the lads on here that run a 25yr old MK1 as their only transport and do 10,000+ miles a year.

Some interesting stories there from the budget motoring world  :wink:

Like I say in my original post the crucial factor for me in keeping costs down is insurance - whatever I choose HAS to be pre-'92 to qualify for classic insurance and MUST be DIY friendly. Believe me even a shagged out post '91 Corsa given to me for free is still going to cost me a few hundred quid third party to insure in my postcode - one of the downsides of living in central London sadly!

Also most cars that saw the light of day design wise for the first time post late eighties have the dreaded ECU. Anything goes on those and its a scrapper for sure.

I'm revising my budget downwards though on my first choice though - the W124 Merc estates. These are going on ebay for silly money (<?500) for cars with full MOTS and some tax that are runners. For that kind of money I can cover my outlay by breaking it without too much trouble if anything major goes.

Rich - how was your Merc 300CE reliability wise? Seem to be more Merc 300TE's around in my price range than anything else… which mechanically is the same as your 300CE (6 cyl 12v petrol)? Certainly seemed like a decent tow car and solid considering what you paid for it. Given the choice in the sub ?1000 bracket I'd rather be tooling around in something like a Merc than something a bit more mundane….

But then as someone else said I'd probably be breaking one of the cardinal sins in bangernomics terms and getting attached to a car rather than seeing it as a method of getting from A to B as cheaply as possible  

Chris

You need to be careful with classic car insurance because its normally part of the terms and conditions, that it covers a 2nd (or 3rd, etc) car and that you have another car which is the regularly used car. For example, I have 3 cars, 1 of them is insured as a regular one and the other 2 on classic car policies.

problem I have is old cars have character… out of everything I've driven the one I didn't get attached to was the newest because it was so boring!

Chris… Central London and you don't come to the Berkshire meet  8O that's just rude

I can't see anything wrong with getting attached with a car- after all if we didn't then alot more mk1's would be taken to the scrappy!
I've had mine for over 7 years. It's let me down alot of times, even lost a job because of it! I'd never dream of parting with it now though, would rather lose my left pinky!! it's the grit and determination that sets us aside from other enthusiasts.

Good point, but just checked using the FJ online quote site and selecting only this car on a classic policy makes no difference to the premium so hopefully its OK.

I insured the Campaign through them as my only car on a classic policy last year so am pretty sure this will not be a problem (fingers crossed).

Chris

P.S. Phil - ashamed to say I am kinda carless at the mo (hence this thread) as the Campaign is off the road. I do have access to a "carclub" type rental car (pay by the hour and for excess miles), but its pricey for anything more than short runs around London. At least if I take the plunge with the "banger" merc or similar I might actually be able to tow the Campaign to the off meet  :wink:

Chris,

Merc was very reliable - let me down once when the water pump failed.  Parts can be pricey - ?150 for the pump, dissi cap ?60 odd….

Heavy on fuel unless doing long runs…

Mundane cars are the cheap ones… :wink:

Cheers

Rich

i ran a number of minis kept them on the road though the scrappy yard only lost on one, went to the scrappy yard i was buying my parts from.  

Bangernomics is the only way to motor in my opinion….most I ever spent on a car was ?3k and I hated the nice ness of it…….

The best part for me is every pennny spent on a "banger" has a positive effect ….when you buy a new car it just deteriorates from day one and will never be as good as new…

when you buy a new car it just deteriorates from day one and will never be as good as new…

You obviously have not been to a show with a concourse stand…..

In Ford circles a Dunlop D40 tyre with the stickers still on is worth ?x00's!!!

Better than new is the only way to win, but it must not be modded!!!

But that is the stupid end of the scale where a cars only purpose in life is  to go out 10 times a year to a show…


TT

Exactly and the concours boys idea of fun Mk1 ownership is very different to mine....of course I am jealous but I like my Mk1 dirty and battle scarred....

My moto is restore it, then wear it out yourself, use it everyday, Polishing every nut and bolt is not as much fun as driving it  :wink:

I don't understand concours people a nieghbour a couple of doors away from me has a MG classic car, he pulls it out of the garage only on a sunny day jacks it up takes a clean wheel off and go's back in the garage to clean the wheel doing this to all the wheels. I'm not knocking him it just a little too much for my liking.

DJ said

Exactly and the concours boys idea of fun Mk1 ownership is very different to mine….of course I am jealous but I like my Mk1 dirty and battle scarred….

you're not jealous man, just sensible. When you polish a car more than you drive it, then you're missing the point of having a car at all !  

We turned up at a show @ 8:30 in our not so pristine Sierra XR4x4. 10 minutes polishing was all it got… Guy across the way had Hi Puma Sport… he was still cleaning at 2pm!!! And it was cleaner than mine to start with!!! And that was not even concourse just Show'n'Shine…..

TT

Definitely agree on the mk2 polo, our family had one of the breadvan 1.0s for 4 years and it did nothing wrong at all. Great car, quite quick too considering.

My approach has been to buy cars for the long term, I expect to get eight to ten years out of a car.

Got my current Audi and Passat for ?8k each back in 2001 (18 months old - paid cash so no finance) and have been running them ever since. Not due to even be considered for replacement until 2009. Either has yet had any work required other than maintenance.

I like the idea of bangernomics, but the safety aspect of spending a lot of time on the motorway bothers me. If I was driving around town and not doing too many miles I'd be happy, but seeing what modern cars do to old ones in a crash at motorway speeds puts me off. I've got two winkies under the age of six to carry about…

Cheers,

Drew.