Bangernomics - anyone else a convert?

[buzzer]

My first banger was a result of a job location change, and the lease running out on the company car coinciding. My new job took me to central London so it was easier to catch the train. My company car went back but I still needed a car to get to the station and back. Figuring I didn’t want to leave a decent car sitting at the station for days on end, I bought a 1988 Peugeot 309 1.3 petrol off one of my neighbours for £600. One owner, FSH and 60k miles.

Roll on two fault free years and 10k miles, suddenly another new job… this one is 200 mile a day round trip, impossible to do by train. I carried on using the Peugeot with the intention of getting another car more fit for purpose… but it didn’t happen… I carried on using the car, 200 mile every day. At the end of 3 years the car had 220,000 miles on the clock… (Remember the company was paying me 40 pence per mile to travel the 200 mile a day!!) We used the car for three continental trips, one year we did a trip of 3000 mile to Italy and back!

There has been a succession of cars over the years, all carefully chosen and then religiously maintained, both are key to cheap motoring. My check list for buying is:-

- Buy on condition not age. Lowish miles, good service history. Buy a good car, even if you have to pay a bit over the odds for it.
- Buy “less desirable” cars/colours/specifications…
- Don’t buy cars with serious inherent faults that are expensive to fix (check Honest John and similar sites)

Key to keeping it running cheaply is maintenance, or preventative maintenance. With a background in Fleet Maintenance I have always been anal about maintaining my cars. All oils, coolant, brake fluids, are changed regularly. All are cheap in real terms. I strip and rebuild brake callipers, replace cam belts at half recommended intervals etc. I really keep on top of any jobs that need doing. I guess I am lucky though as I can do all my own maintenance, which really helps keep the costs down.

- There are many advantages to running a cheap banger…
- Its Cheap! – Very little depreciation. (Example - Honda Accord, bought for £2000, run for 2 years and 35K miles, sold for £1700!)
- I never worry where I park it!
- The money I save goes to running a more interesting car which would be impractical to use as a daily driver (Caterham, Elise, Westfield to name but a few…)

My current banger is a BMW 728i which was a bit of a departure from the norm as it’s a big car… had it for three years, its been the best car I have ever owned. It’s still immaculate and in tip top condition. It has to go however as I have just retired so I will be doing short trips and it’s not suited to that… (Shameless plug, it’s on Ebay!)

It’s been replaced by a 1998 1.6 Toyota Corolla. 30k miles, one owner, FSH, 4 new tyres, £1300… It’s totally immaculate! Heres to cheap motoring!

Anyone else running a banger in a similar fashion?

[STW2010]

I am a bit of a convert, but perhaps not quite as much as you. I bought an RX8 a few years back and, as you can imagine, I spent a lot of money on this (servicing, tyres, fuel etc). Then throw in a wedding- the RX8 was sold to pay for this.

Without wanting to take out further finance to replace it I ended up spending £3k on an V reg BMW 3 series with 110k on it. The outside of the car is immaculate, and it has a fsh from BMW. To validate the mileage there is also every single MOT certificate with the car. I am very pleased with this car so far, and can see it lasting me a few years yet.

I am just amazed at what you can get for £3k and under. I was looking at loads of other cars, and simply saw no reason to spend any more. Maybe in 2-3 years I will look to buy another not-so-sensible car, but unlike before I will have it as a weekend toy and have the BMW (or similar) for the daily drive.

Edited by STW2010 on Wednesday 17th November 09:25

[Thorburn]

One of the guys was doing this until his £300 Mondeo caught fire on his way home - thankfully right outside his local fire station! Now he gets the bus as he can't find a good, cheap replacement.
Bit tight when you consider he's earning quite a bit more than me and even I can manage a mortgage plus two cars

I've always liked the theory of it, and I guess I'm kind of doing it as well now, got my Forester for free as my parents were replacing it and I needed a shed for travelling to work in.
Really like the fact that its already cosmetically a bit knackered (dozens of parking dings both sides, giant scrape in the back corner where a horse decided to scratch its nose on the car while wearing a bridal, etc), but mechanically its really solid - always serviced by a good local independent garage and just went through its MOT issue free.

I would say I can park it anywhere, but I'm still in the habit of pulling up to Sainsburys and parking in the furthest corner of the car park miles away from anyone

[_Batty_]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Hardly 'bangers' but look at the fun that can be had from as little as £1000.
The MX5 wales hoon.



most cars cost well under 5k (except the two new Mk3.5's)

Edited by _Batty_ on Wednesday 17th November 09:29

[Liquid Knight]

Recently bought this.....



...then found out how rare the car is.

[road_rager]

I've always bought cheap cars mainly through necessity, it only really starts to make sense when you have the time & ability to do the repairs/servicing yourself, and now I have a driveway I do all my own work :-)

[LuS1fer]

I have an expensive Mustang in the garage which I can't really use on weekends or during the week sop use a cheap Mk III Golf GTI which I hurl down muddy lanes, sit in traffic in and generally don't worry about cleaning. It gets what attention it needs for the MOT and that's all. The oil I take out of the Mustang every 3000 miles goes in the Golf. IT has had a full set of Kumho tyres, a clutch cable, two rear discs,bearings and EBC pads and a handbrake cable plus I had to change the front springs when one snapped. However, it is reliable and for the 10 mile commute, perfectly suited.

We also have a new Mondeo which probably depreciated more in the first month than the Golf cost.

I do have a 40 mile journey every Friday and I think anything slower than the Golf would probably irk me to a large degree and the insurance is about £400 which is an annoyance but hey ho.

[hairykrishna]

I like interesting bangers and tend to go for the fast and 'cheap enough to throw away' option. My best efforts so far are a £250 500SEL, a £350 Mk3 Supra turbo and a £180 Mk1 MR2. My current MX5 banger was ~700 quid and is perfect apart from the extremely leaky roof and shoddy paint!

[Chris_w666]

anonymous said:

[redacted]

Unwilling to afford anything else is just as good an excuse.

Not sure my cars are strictly bangernomics because surely over £1000 isn't proper bangernomics. But neither are going to depreciate quickly and both are pretty reliable at the minute so I am happy having less cash tied up in or more being lost on a motor that does its job.

[taylor86]

Mk2 polo bought for £250.
1.3, silent on idle, ran like a sewing machine, body was tatty.

3years.
40,000 miles
Nothing went wrong

Sold for £400
Wish I still had it, absolutely brilliant little car

[buzzer]

[redacted]

[Lucas North]

My first foray into bangernomics was a CRX 1.6i-16, bought it for £400 and then 6months later sold it for £775.

Recently got my Volvo S70, initially bought with the intention of selling it next year, but I'm tempted to just run it until it becomes uneconomical to repair, and the break it. SE model so it's got loads of the desirable bits on it.

[patmahe]

buzzer said:

Thats weird I clicked on your thread because I am a life long fan and practicioner of bangernomics and as it happens I have exactly the same type of corolla as you down to the black plastic rear spoiler and hubcaps, only thing is mine is the 1.3. I bought it to run alongside the Elise, (my only non banger purchase ever - recently sold) I've had it for 2 years 3 months and I do about 18000 miles a year in it. Its never needed anything serious and I do all the servicing myself. I try to put the best stuff into it as I really want it to last.

The list of benefits of bangernomics is huge. I think the only reason more people don't do it is that they simply never sit down and think about what the overall cost of their motoring is. Hence all the brand new Ford Foci etc... knocking about, I just don't think I could bring myself to spend that money on such a bland car (granted my Corolla is bland - but it was very cheap). All of my cars (Elise excepted have been over 10 years old when I've bought them and only one ever gave me trouble (gearbox) and I even sold it for half its purchase price with its problems.

ETA: My next planned purchase is also something that would be considered a banger in most peoples eyes. A tidy little Mk1 MX-5 and I cannot wait.

Edited by patmahe on Wednesday 17th November 09:55

[Dr Derek Doctors]

Yep replaced an Audi S4 V8 with a Peugeot 406 TD.

£500 well spent, it does everything the Audi did (except go fast) and also does 40mpg on used chip fat.

[Chris_w666]

patmahe said:

The list of benefits of bangernomics is huge. I think the only reason more people don't do it is that they simply never sit down and think about what the overall cost of their motoring is. Hence all the brand new Ford Foci etc... knocking about, I just don't think I could bring myself to spend that money on such a bland car (granted my Corolla is bland - but it was very cheap).

It was using the my garage cost calculator on PH that drove me into believing that buying a solid cheap motor that wasn't going to lose a lot of money was a good idea. I know my car looks a bit odd, and it is slow, but I get a very sad smugness from knowing that even if I drove it into a wall tomorrow I would have lost less than that bloke who has just bought a new Astra SRI.

[LuS1fer]

Bangernomics can work another way too. I bought a Corvette C4 in 1994 for £7k and ran it for 30000 miles. Granted, I fitted a louder exhaust, a set of pads and did have to fork out £500 for a set of digital instruments that went AWOL but after 3 years, I still sold it for £6k so it was still pretty darned cheap to own.

[mattman]

recently went down this route although not into the sub £1000 bracket. New job in London meant that a very clean 55 plate passat TDI sport was wasted in car parks every day and I worried its was going to get bashed.
Therefore sold it couple of months ago and got this - 99 528i auto touring - cost me £2700 but come with 50,000 miles and full bmw history - its not immaculate like some of the "bangers" on here with a couple of minor dents, some light scratches and some wear on the front leather seats but its perfect for leaving in station car parks. Its also ideal for towing my son's kart around with space to spare if its cold or wet.

Did take me a while to ween myself off of keeping it clean and polished as I've always kept my cars very clean, but as long as the interior is clean then I think a dirty exterior adds to the "banger" style - that and the missus has a new 1 series for me to clean instead!

2000 miles in and no problems to report yet other than so many interior lights drains the battery quick in the pits!

[buzzer]

patmahe said:

buzzer said:

Thats weird I clicked on your thread because I am a life long fan and practicioner of bangernomics and as it happens I have exactly the same type of corolla as you down to the black plastic rear spoiler and hubcaps, only thing is mine is the 1.3. I bought it to run alongside the Elise, (my only non banger purchase ever - recently sold) I've had it for 2 years 3 months and I do about 18000 miles a year in it. Its never needed anything serious and I do all the servicing myself. I try to put the best stuff into it as I really want it to last.

The list of benefits of bangernomics is huge. I think the only reason more people don't do it is that they simply never sit down and think about what the overall cost of their motoring is. Hence all the brand new Ford Foci etc... knocking about, I just don't think I could bring myself to spend that money on such a bland car (granted my Corolla is bland - but it was very cheap). All of my cars (Elise excepted have been over 10 years old when I've bought them and only one ever gave me trouble (gearbox) and I even sold it for half its purchase price with its problems.

ETA: My next planned purchase is also something that would be considered a banger in most peoples eyes. A tidy little Mk1 MX-5 and I cannot wait.

Edited by patmahe on Wednesday 17th November 09:55

A man after my own heart! I was also looking at an MX5 but unfortunately I am tall and long in the body which means I don't fit well in one, I end up looking at the top of the screen!

you are right that people don't think the costs through... A guy at work is changing his petrol Civic which has done 6000 mile for a Diesel one, cost to change £6000. his rational for doing this.... The diesel car will give much better MPG! you can buy a lot of petrol for £6000 for the difference in MPG!

[2 Wycked]

You're overthinking it.

Bangernomics, to my eye, is keeping a car that cost very little (less than £500) and performing minimal maintenance until it can reliably serve you no more.

You're just buying boring cars.

[mattman]

[redacted]