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I'm gonna be looking into getting a car in a few months, s I figured I'd start researching it now, I'm in the UK and basically my main concern is the price of running it, in terms of insurance, fuel and maintenance. I'm quite happy to learn to do routine maintenance stuff myself as much as I can, so that'll help with costs, hopefully. Proposed Budget: £1500 or so. New or Used: Used. Body Style: Probably a reasonably spacious hatchback for easier city driving. Definitely 5-door. How will you be using the car? Driving to work, very occasional trips in and out of the city (the UK is tiny though, so not huge road trips). Do you prefer a luxury vehicle with all the gizmos? There's no way I could really expect much in the way of convenience for my budget, but What aspects are most important to you? Total price, mainly. Decent MPG so I don't feel like I'm bleeding money every time I get in the thing. Decent insurance group. I'm pretty clueless when it comes to cars, so letting me know that my expectations are unrealistic or anything would be helpful, really.
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Mar 18, 2014 12:40
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I'm sick of my 2008 Fiat Grande Punto 1.2. It's done 126k miles and is slowly falling apart after being neglected by 4 owners (including me). I'm sure soon it'll cost more to repair than the car is worth to sell. Location: Nottingham, UK. Proposed Budget: Around £10k. Maybe pushing up to £12k if something's really worth it. New or Used: Probably used. I'm just looking for value for money. Body Style: 5-door hatchback, or smaller crossover/4x4. How will you be using the car?: Commuting 45min each way daily in the city, parallel parking on-street. Motorway journeys (300-mile round trips) 5-10 times a year. Transporting a family in the next few years. What aspects are most important to you?: Cost - insurance, MPG. Luggage space, ideally with flat-folding back seats. AC and Bluetooth. Noise level - would love to hear the radio/not shout over the noise to talk when driving at 70mph. Either a screen to display Google Maps from my phone, OR a USB charging point so I can just use my phone in a cradle and not care about destroying my battery by having my phone screen on for 3-5 hours on long trips. Basic things like usable cupholders would be nice. In my punto, it starts to interfere with changing gears if I use them to store anything bigger than a 330ml can. I don't really care about speed/power beyond having 'just enough' to make the car not hate me when driving at 70mph, my Punto pegs itself at 4k revs and screams the entire time. I like the look of the Skoda Fabia 2015+ (SE trim, 90bhp 1.2 TSI), but it looks expensive for insurance, at £900+ instead of my current £490 per year. I've been looking for alternatives but there's honestly just too many models, generations, and trim levels within each of those for me to be able to feel like I'm making anything other than a totally random decision. I know nothing about cars beyond what I've read in the last few days. Help me, goons~
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Feb 11, 2019 14:42
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:Cars with smaller engines on balance turn higher RPMs at motorway speeds. If you want a quieter and lazier ride, you need a bigger engine, which goes against your fuel economy question. You will have to balance these two to some degree. Is this still true of newer turbocharged engines? My current 1.2 isn't, and I think a lot of the newer 1.0-1.2 turbo engines sound both more economical and more powerful. KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:B/C segment stuff This is super helpful, I'd never heard of the segment classification before (only stuff like 'city car', 'supermini' etc. which I suppose maps to the segments pretty well but at least this is a little less subjective?) Nitrox posted:I love the Punto, but you're definitely pushing it's estimated lifespan. How about Honda Fit/Jazz? The back seats fold down for a surprising amount of storage. If insurance is important, you may want to get a quote list from your insurer in this particular segment and see what fits your budget. Shop backwards, so to speak Yeah, it's definitely dying a slow death. The back windows no longer wind up/down (and are permanently stuck about 3mm open), the back doors don't open without pushing on a specific part of the door as you pull the handle, the front passenger tyre always deflates much faster than the others despite 2 fresh tyres since I've owned the car, the heating fans cut out regularly until I faff with wires under the glove box, the rear window washer doesn't work anymore, I'm pretty sure it's meant to have a thing you lift to shift into reverse so you can't do it by accident but I can just shift into reverse without doing that anyway, and (very occasionally) the electric power steering doesn't kick in when I turn the car on, so I have to turn it off and back on. I've now got a list of cars to investigate, and once I've had a look I'll go to a dealership and check out the ones I shortlist. Thanks goons.
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Feb 12, 2019 10:18
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So I went down the rabbit hole for a couple of days. Looked into basically every B/C segment car I could find and I've shortlisted a few to go check out at the dealer. I'm still looking at the Fabia/Polo, not sure I can put my finger on it but I wasn't a big fan of the Clio from checking it out online but it's also probably worth a look in person. For bigger cars, I'm considering the Honda Jazz or a 2014-ish Ford Focus. I've also looked at the Octavia because it seems to be sort of 'Fabia, but bigger'. I feel like the Jazz or Focus will win out in the end. The Jazz purely on the strength of being the most practical, with the 'magic seats' thing. It doesn't look very exciting but looks like it's got endless space. As much as I tell myself that aesthetics/gadgets/sportiness doesn't matter, I'm probably leaning towards the Focus because it's still bigger and more practical than my Punto, but for under 10k you can get one in pretty high trim levels that include a ton of fancy equipment I didn't even know existed until a few days ago. Time to book in at some dealers I think, before I over-research and end up expanding the list again. Surprise T Rex fucked around with this message at 10:11 on Feb 14, 2019 |
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Feb 14, 2019 09:25
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Kin posted:Just picked up my new Ford Focus Titanium and I know it's probably not unique to this car but I'm genuinely blown away by all the modern quality of life gadgets/features I've used so far. I'm eyeing up a Focus Titanium myself at the moment, looking to buy in the next week or so. I'm legit excited to get in and play around with the extra stuff included. Reviews of my current Punto still mention "electrically adjustable mirrors" and "electric front windows" as 'features' so the difference in the level of technology is going to be ridiculous.
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Feb 20, 2019 09:24
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