ostewart

Enjoy 🙂

Still love my Focus - lovely to drive and parts are cheap

Mileage? 

Reg for MOT history check? 

Hopefully should do you well 😄

You tend to find japanese cars tend to be chain driven (1.8 in my focus is a Mazda engine, chain driven) - but cambelts are fine as long as they are changed on time.

When I had a car with one, I had it changed by a local mobile cambelt specialist (I think it cost around £300) - much cheaper than a local garage.

cambelt shouldn't be that much - my 1.8 focus is on 85k miles and the clutch is fine (touch wood) 

Also factor in the cambelt will likely need doing (100,000 miles or 10-years, whichever comes first, looks like it was changed 2012 so would need doing now, roughly £300-400 or less, shop around for quotes) 

That would be a nice little run around - just keep an eye on rust and get on your knees and check it over nicely. Test drive - check for any abnormal knocks over bumps - engine should sound smooth when idling, and not rattle. Those engines are very reliable 

Might be ok - just make sure to check service history - a Focus would be nicer to drive

They are good but every car has it's issues - let me know what you are looking at if possible

@froggy8 what engine, any links to the advert?

@froggy8 been doing that for the last 5 years! although now I'm out of that industry I can work on my personal review website a little more, rekindle my passion for it. 

Going for the cycling world now - marketing assistant at i-ride.co.uk is the offer I've been given

@bertberr you can get them from Amazon, but not high Street retailers currently. 

Honestly you cannot beat the Final UX3000 at the moment in terms of value for money - I've got a few people in to them

@Jack Reacher I was a bit of a jack of all trades, but mostly Product Specialist / Marketing assistant with a little customer service still (I did that for 4 years before moving to marketing) for a distributor of audio products (mostly headphones). I was writing blog articles, shooting and editing youtube reviews, managing their social media...

Luckily I have quite a few skills so shouldn't be too difficult - already had a friend who works at another similar company reach out to see if they can help. 

@Tug not yet, but I've got 5 weeks notice period to work, then redundancy pay so hopefully will find something. 

After all the advice on buying a car - sorry to hear you got a lemon 😕  sounds like the person knew it had a problem and likely flogged it for cheap without mentioning it.  Not fixing something properly will always cause more issues down the line - don't bodge it, you'll be left stranded when it breaks down.

My grandad loves his vauxhall astra - 1.8 - but I have never rated them and always hear lots of vauxhall hating from car groups 😉 

it's a minefield for sure - I bought my first car from a private seller and didn't know as much back then as I do now - it was terrible and cost me a lot (around £1k in repairs within a month). I sold it as soon as I got 1 injector replaced (bought and sold it within a month), yes it was a diesel, and looked around for something more reliable which brought me to my current car - the 1.8 Duratec HE engined Ford Focus (2008 plate). It was that, or the 2.0 which would have been preferred but there were none around - or a Honda Civic was also on my list, again 1.8/2.0 petrol engine. 

It's been great, it did only have 60k miles on the clock when I bought it, but its been really solid and it's fun to drive too. 

@froggy8 The Focus has a rather large boot, you'd be surprised what you can fit in it. I see you're determined to go diesel by your other posts - just remember they are a lot more expensive to repair when something goes wrong, and you are looking at ones with higher mileage - injectors are not cheap, and the fuel delivery systems are a lot higher pressure than equivalent petrol models. Petrol might not be as economical on long runs, but they are cheaper to maintain usually - especially if they don't have a turbo.

Just watch for clutch issues on the Honda Civic - https://www.civinfo.com/threads/looking-to-buy-2-2-icdti-how-to-avoid-clutch-issues.117409/

Should be able to get a Ford Focus mk2 for that money - cheap parts, reliable and nice to drive - I'd try and find a 1.8/2.0 Petrol if possible, the 1.6 is a little gutless. My 1.8 I've had for the last 2 years has been great with only minor wear and tear items needing replacing (apart from one bit that didn't need replacing and I got screwed over by a garage - suffice to say I'm no longer a customer of theirs)

I'm still an emo kid at heart, welcome to the black parade.

My first proper concert was seeing them during the black parade tour in 2007

I don't bother tracking them, they usually turn up within 2 weeks or so.

DPD send them, just be sure to get a lithium battery label (print one off google if needs be) and put it on the box.

Yay.... lets crash out without a plan and without a deal, go to WTO trading rules and tariffs and see our economy fail and us fall into recession. Lets see the poorest get poorer and the rich get richer. Lets see more people living in poverty and relying on food banks. Sounds amazing guys...

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-45112872

Since the vote 3 years ago, there has been a rise in homelessness and food bank use, the cost of certain items has gone up due to the pound falling in value. I have still yet to see someone provide me with a single good outcome of brexit.

Welcome to the 25 club  

Isopropyl alcohol