Buying privately- not done for years & now makes me nervous!
Discussion
There are some cars out there which are now predominantly sold by private sellers but with all the potential pitfalls it now makes me nervous.
The car is 'only' worth about between £3,000-£4,000 but nevertheless.
So many people can't spell properly and write in text speak- which puts me off immediately.
Pictures of the car taken in seemingly dodgy areas.
Anything from the Gumtree website just seems even more alarming.
Price- they're not stupidly giving it away but most similar models are priced at least £500 more.
I never just trust an HPI check- its all about does the VIN number match? Are we at the sellers address?
A woman's number- might be sexist but I would expect a man to sell the car, would putting a woman's name intentionally make you feel safer?
Buying from a dealer is much easier- and I don't mind paying more- but everything I've seen so far is a bit ropey...
The car is 'only' worth about between £3,000-£4,000 but nevertheless.
So many people can't spell properly and write in text speak- which puts me off immediately.
Pictures of the car taken in seemingly dodgy areas.
Anything from the Gumtree website just seems even more alarming.
Price- they're not stupidly giving it away but most similar models are priced at least £500 more.
I never just trust an HPI check- its all about does the VIN number match? Are we at the sellers address?
A woman's number- might be sexist but I would expect a man to sell the car, would putting a woman's name intentionally make you feel safer?
Buying from a dealer is much easier- and I don't mind paying more- but everything I've seen so far is a bit ropey...
The Spruce goose said:
all hpi checkers have a multitude of caveats and would imagine a claim would require jumping through flaming hoops before being told your claim isn't valid.
Get off your arse and go and have a look at the cars as sitting behind a screen won't give you a proper picture.
Well it's a 5 hour round trip so I would actually like to HPI the car first!Get off your arse and go and have a look at the cars as sitting behind a screen won't give you a proper picture.
The advert does indeed look almost too perfect! Pictures are nice, nice location, clean (looking) car, FSH, cambelt change, 1 owner etc... It's almost too cheap.
But I phoned this morning 10.30, this afternoon 2pm, and 10 minutes ago. Just goes to voicemail. I just want to make sure I can view the thing, as if it stacks up I'm having it as a run-around.
But I phoned this morning 10.30, this afternoon 2pm, and 10 minutes ago. Just goes to voicemail. I just want to make sure I can view the thing, as if it stacks up I'm having it as a run-around.
CraigyMc said:
Camshafts aren't service items - you only replace one if it's damaged and unlike a water pump (which sometimes do go as they live a hard life and sometimes have plastics in them, like the notorious plastic impellers on older BMW pumps), camshafts pretty much universally last for the whole life of the engine.
I can't think of a reason why a camshaft would fail short of something catastrophic happening to the engine. In fact, I can't think of a reason to replace one at all unless you were doing it to change the engine timing/valve lift characteristics, but that's usually a naturally aspirated petrol thing rather than a turbodiesel thing.
C
She didn't really know what it was, and to be honest neither did I. From what I gather she's only changed the wear and tear bits.I can't think of a reason why a camshaft would fail short of something catastrophic happening to the engine. In fact, I can't think of a reason to replace one at all unless you were doing it to change the engine timing/valve lift characteristics, but that's usually a naturally aspirated petrol thing rather than a turbodiesel thing.
C
Now how on earth do I find more about the camshafts when neither of us know what it is! This is one of the issue with buying privately. Bit of a gamble that car... Or any car at that price range!
quote from a VW forum:
I'm just a parts man that has worked in VW main stealers for 8 years (off and on) PD engines are very good engines but as this thread mentions there is a "camshaft" issue!
the thing is its not the camshaft that is the problem, its the hydraulic tappets (or buckets if you like) the factory ones are a weak point in the engine and these were revised in November 2005. The original ones straight out the factory were chrome topped, the new revised ones are black in colour and apparently they are "baked" longer and with that they are strengthened!
The actual fault is the buckets wear on the top, causing them to bow out on the lobes of the camshaft, which in turn then wears the lobes and causes all the faults described. The worst case scenario is that the camshaft will snap and in this case the head will not be serviceable (these are around £1500 + vat from stealer)
with me knowing this I replaced the tappets around about 12k ago (around 130k) camshaft was inspected and did not show any signs of wear and only one of my buckets were showing the slightest part of being worn.
I'm just a parts man that has worked in VW main stealers for 8 years (off and on) PD engines are very good engines but as this thread mentions there is a "camshaft" issue!
the thing is its not the camshaft that is the problem, its the hydraulic tappets (or buckets if you like) the factory ones are a weak point in the engine and these were revised in November 2005. The original ones straight out the factory were chrome topped, the new revised ones are black in colour and apparently they are "baked" longer and with that they are strengthened!
The actual fault is the buckets wear on the top, causing them to bow out on the lobes of the camshaft, which in turn then wears the lobes and causes all the faults described. The worst case scenario is that the camshaft will snap and in this case the head will not be serviceable (these are around £1500 + vat from stealer)
with me knowing this I replaced the tappets around about 12k ago (around 130k) camshaft was inspected and did not show any signs of wear and only one of my buckets were showing the slightest part of being worn.
Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff