This week's Shed was going to be a cheap, low-mileage Saab 9000, but it was thought that some of the more alert readers might have noticed that last week's SOTW was also a Saab. More importantly, Shed quite fancied that 9000 himself, and he obviously didn't want a load of PHers queering his pitch, so his sights were realigned onto something that we've never seen in this column before: a BMW 1 Series
Funny thing, the 1 Series. When it bounded into our world like a happy puppy in 2004, it was the mainstream brands' worst nightmare. It offered all the kudos and prestige of the BMW brand at very un-BMWish (ie sub £20k) prices. Private and fleet buyers alike joyously abandoned their traditional brands for the table-tossing appeal of a keyring with the stylised propeller on it.
Ones were sprightly little things. Over time, however, owners started to notice some of the 1 Series's drawbacks, like crashy suspension and Hobbit-style accommodations in the rear. Building down to a price comes with consequences. In the One's case that was a slide down the reliability tables.
As the lustre began to fade in line with the secondhand values, and the One became just another car to be used rather than cherished, the big chiefs at BMW had to take a bite of the cold, curled-up sandwich of brand dilution. They were selling a lot more cars at the bottom end, but the downside was a loss of faith among the moneyed sorts who had been reliably shelling out for the company's high-profit, properly premium products.
Still, one man's bill is another man's saving, and 1 Series prices continue to drop relentlessly into shed territory. Today's example is not only under our £1,500 qualifying bar, it's well under it at the oddly whimsical price of £994. Leaving aside the potential awkwardness of agreeing the price, turning up with a grand in cash and then standing there looking at your feet while the salesman dips into his pocket for your six quid change, it looks like a lot of car for the money. It's an SE in resale silver with alloys. The last (currently Covid-extended) MOT in June 2019, when the car had just over 130,000 miles on it (it's done 11,000 since), had just one advisory for an exhaust mounting. If that wasn't sorted at the time and it's just a hanger they're talking about, a couple of 2p zip-ties will do the business.
Apart from what looks like a mysterious bulge in the nearside rear door bottom, which could just be a trick of the light, the E87 5-door body looks clean, as does the interior. Then you notice the biggest word-worms in the apple: 'noisy clutch'. In BMWs of this ilk, that will be down to one of two things, depending on the point in the clutch pedal's travel when the noise presents itself: the clutch release bearing or the dual-mass flywheel. All DMFs make some noise. If you can live with the dagga-dagga, the decision to fix it or leave it will be as much down to your own tolerance levels as the car's.
Shed had an E46 320d Touring with this noise. Predictably, knowing his luck, it turned out to be the DMF. The old skinflint managed to fix it with a few lengths of barbed wire and half a dozen carefully placed Brillo pads, but having the job done properly will almost certainly generate a four-figure bill, even with a friendly garage on your side. That's because not replacing the clutch at the same time would be a bit like Shed paying for his missis to have her beard lasered but then leaving the enormous nose wart in place.
What else could go wrong? Door handles and windows stick, brakes can wear a bit more quickly than you might expect, and uneven wear on the front tyres could be bad tracking (check the camber pins) or a bad steering rack, or both. Traction control and ABS systems fail, manual gearboxes aren't in the Focus class for slickness, and faults can arise on the airbags and seatbelt tensioners. Water seeps up through the back seats, soaking the boot-mounted PDC unit and causing a Christmas tree display of warning lights. The 2.0 turbo N47 diesel engine produces 163hp, enough for a high-7sec 0-62 time and a 135mph+ top speed, but it also falls into the dodgy swirl flap category.
The assumption from the vendor's 'long MOT' claim is that a fresh one will be issued with the car, given that it's very much not long at the moment. You could have a nice argument about that (and the £90 admin fee) while you're waiting for your six quid change. In other news, somebody bought that Saab before Shed could put a call in, groogh.
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