The ACTUAL cost of a car

[KneesUp]

Another thing to consider with older cars is that should you ever have a collision the insurance company is likely to write off the car as the repair bill will be considered to be to large a fraction of the value of the car. You will probably have a large excess on your policy and this will be deducted from the insurance company's valuation of your car when it pays you out. The policy will also be terminated with no refund for any remaining cover. You will be seriously out of pocket.

If you can defer car ownership until you are 25 - 26 then you'll enjoy much lower insurance premiums and a much bigger pot of money to buy a car.

Whilst I agree with this to some extent, it's not always true. I bought a car with a good wedge of history for £700 last year. It has 6 months tax and 11 months MOT, working air conditioning and had only done 90k miles or so. It needed a new suspension spring but my local garage sorted that for £100, so £800 for a five door 1.6 hatchback. It ran perfectly well for almost a year before someone drove into it and wrote it off. As it was entirely their fault the insurance was sorted quickly and I got £1200. A 50% profit. I spent the whole lot and another £100 (reckless, I know) on a 150k miles Citroen which has cruise control and all sorts, and has never put a foot wrong in almost a year, having been to Suffolk, North Wales, South Wales, London, Birmingham and the East Coast as well as normal city-schlepping.

Cheap cars can be cheap to run too. I guess the difference is that if mine exploded tomorrow I could just buy another 'banger' to replace it, but I couldn't have done that when I was younger, so it feels riskier. That said my first car cost £50 in 1994 and did 10k miles in a year before expiring.

My advice - if you must have a car - is:

Buy a car that suits you. I had an expensive sporty family sized saloon before I'd had a family. I now wish I'd had a cheaper car with more room in it and spend the balance on a nice bike, a tent and some weekends away with the bike and the tent in a boot they'd fit in! It cost me £11,000 in 4 years in depreciation and interest, and it wasn't new when I bought it, plus servicing it was expensive. Having enough money and being able to afford it are not the same thing. I had a house before I bought it - I'd definitely prioritise a deposit over a nice car.

Buy the car with the cheapest insurance you can and run it for a few years until you get some no claims. I had a Ford Ka for three years. You can fit a bike in the back if you have to, or get roof bars.

Budget for a service as soon as you buy it. My current car wasn't due a cambelt change for 50k miles according to the dealer-stamped history. The garage showed me the belt on it, and I doubt it would have lasted another 50 miles.

Learn to do things yourself, or make friends with a local garage.

 

[vernon]

Not at all.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...lled-moped-crash-calls-hit-run-driver-up.html

Ignore the hit and run - she was on a scooter on a road with a 70mph limit. I wouldn't ride a bicycle on that sort of road and that has the potential to be quicker than a scooter so why ride a scooter on it?

Honestly - scooters are there because 16 year olds can't have a 125. They are loud, irritating, anti-social and ridden by yobbos called Damien. If you're 17 there is *no* reason to own one. Unless you live in Barcelona.

You still have not provided any evidence to suggest that the restricted speedd of scooters cause accidents that are fatal to their riders. Every other assertion is still a manifestation of your prejudices and they are still unsupported by facts.

 

[sabian92]

You still have not provided any evidence to suggest that the restricted speedd of scooters cause accidents that are fatal to their riders. Every other assertion is still a manifestation of your prejudices and they are still unsupported by facts.

How are they unsupported by facts? The fact is that if you ride something that slow on a fast and often narrow road you are a danger to yourself and to others. Rightly or wrongly if you are on a road with a 70mph limit drivers expect to see you doing at least around that speed, give or take 10% or so. Doing less than half the speed limit is just outrageous. It's exactly the same as when people on bicycles doing 30 get pulled out on - drivers don't expect you to go that fast, and likewise drivers don't expect you to go that slowly on a road with a 70mph limit.

If you were riding a bicycle on the same road you can't expect people to give wide and slow passes because at that speed you're travelling too quickly to do what's basically an emergency stop if there's heavy traffic in the outside lane - it'll cause an accident if you swerve into other cars, or you'll get ran over. The fact is that drivers just do not expect to see people doing it because so many people won't do it because of the danger. You would never ride a bicycle in the inside lane of the motorway (aside from the fact it's illegal, but ignoring that) so why would you ride an equally slow vehicle on a road that's a lane narrower (and more dangerous) with the same speed limit?

 

[Archie_tect]

Don't knock the two stroke awesomeness, third class motoring is better than first class walking!

Do not remove the exhaust baffle... or I'll be able to hear you from here.

 

[donnydave]

Do not remove the exhaust baffle... or I'll be able to hear you from here.

The yellow machine of doom was pretty good on the ears, standard can on the end. You probably wont like my car then, 5" unbaffled (well, a very half-arsed attempt at baffling) sidepipes (one on each side) 108dB on tickover at 750rpm

 

[Boris Bajic]

Do not be dismissive of 14bhp.

It used to be 12.5bhp (I thought it still was).

Back in the 90s, an unrestricted 125 (Mito, Freccia et al) could knock out 30+bhp, but those little rockets had a power curve like the North Face of the Eiger and were hard work in traffic.

Many years ago (long after passing my test) I briefly rode a borrowed Honda MBX80. It barely made 10bhp and was a dirty stinkwheel, but it simply FLEW in traffic.

It was also mustard on twisty roads and stopped before you'd touched the brakes. People get all penis-size obsessed about power and swept volume, but that often has more to do with carpark posing than real-world riding.

Two-stroke is fine (Mmmmm... two-stroke exhaust...). Small capacity is fine. Litre-plus bikes are often the preserve of dreamers and braggers.

 

[Archie_tect]

donnydave, you might be curious to see the maximum recommended dB levels for sustained noise. Anything consistently over the sustained levels will cause threshold shift in your hearing.... mine was permanently damaged by sustained noise levels in my late teens/ early 20s. You might want to get the exhaust properly baffled before you suffer a permanent threshold shift in your hearing too.

http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/noise-exposure-level-duration-d_717.html

 

[donnydave]

donnydave, you might be curious to see the maximum recommended dB levels for sustained noise. Anything consistently over the sustained levels will cause threshold shift in your hearing.... mine was permanently damaged by sustained noise levels in my late teens/ early 20s. You might want to get the exhaust properly baffled before you suffer a permanent threshold shift in your hearing too.

http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/noise-exposure-level-duration-d_717.html

A chap with a similar setup to me has a baffle design that can get me down to 96dB which includes perforated tube and stainless scouring pads from tesco, I've only run the car once and not driven it yet. I'm the kind of person who wears earplugs to gigs so don't worry!

Honest thanks for your concern, please don't mistake for Internet sarcasm!

 

[Archie_tect]

A chap with a similar setup to me has a baffle design that can get me down to 96dB which includes perforated tube and stainless scouring pads from tesco, I've only run the car once and not driven it yet. I'm the kind of person who wears earplugs to gigs so don't worry!

Honest thanks for your concern, please don't mistake for Internet sarcasm!

No problem Dave... my hearing is seriously affected because I used to drive a Beetle up and down from Leeds to Dundee in the late 70s without stopping and when I got out I could neither hear the engine running or anyone speak for a few hours. Being young and daft I thought nothing of it. Your hearing initially recovers after a few hours but done repeatedly causes an irreversible threshold shift.

 

[cd365]

But at least if I get all the kit, I will be nice and warm by the time I got to where I am going. Plus it will be a lot quicker than cycling in a 20mph headwind.

It will be a lot quicker but you won't be nice and warm! It gets very cold at speed when you are just sitting there, i.e. not pedaling!
20 years ago I used to take my 125 to Birmingham from Coventry every day, it was a 30 minute commute. I had planned to do it year round, come the middle of November I gave up, I had started to struggle to break because my hands were so cold and I had all of the gear on.

 

[Over The Hill]

Coming in late on this one, but I think the budget is not too far off.

If you buy a good one then you may not expect too much trouble. I run old cars and they really are good and seem just as reliable. I would just try to stay more around the £1000 mark rather than £500 and it will pay. Get something with a new MOT and it will not be far wrong.

VED in pre 2001 cars is £140 for a below £1549 cc car.

I agree with others don't bother with breakdown cover. In past 10 years I have broken down once - garage picked up car for free but would only be £35 if they charged. Contrast that with £700 for 10 years AA cover.

If you are 21 or over then there are oddly some good deals with small new cars where they pay the insurance. This may be worth a look.

 

[Archie_tect]

Windproof padded jacket and overtrousers used to keep me warm enough in winter... travelled everywhere on my 1976 Honda CB200- even in snow.

 

[MarkF]

Personally I'm of then opinion that if you can afford it - buy it. You can scrimp but at the end of the day there is not a cost you can put on your own life. A Vespa does what, 30mph? Coming off at that speed hurts but doubling that speed (even slightly more than that) on even just a 125 is going to do you a lot more damage.

Regardless of affordability, what's the point of buying something thing that I feel that have no need for? I weigh up the risk and the risk is pretty much infinitesimal, just like with cycling. Bicycles do more than 30mph are you suggesting leathers for cyclists also?

Anyway, no way am I wearing anything not cool on my Vespa

 

[Matthew_T]

Looks like the main spend on a bike is the bike itself. Decent ones are around the £1000-£2000 mark. You can even get a brand new one for £2500.

Thanks for all the help on here. It has probably saved me a lot of money.

I am currently trying to find out if I have to do a CBT on a 50 or a 125. As, when you have completed the CBT, you can drive a 125 with L's. But if you cant take the test on one, can you hire a 50 from the motorcycle training place?

 

[ayceejay]

Back in the 60's I had a mini and when I sold it after two years I calculated what it had cost me = 7 pence a mile