Car Talk

[OldBerkshireBoy]

13 minutes ago, ChrisB said:

I have been considering a Cooper Convertible as my Summer "Me" car. The fact that the BMW 3 pot has a chain was a major attraction. You are rapidly putting me off the idea.

Friend had one and he said the rear view was like looking through a letterbox!

[oldgregg]

I think the industry has been quite clever in convincing people that belt = bad and chain = good. The reality is that a cheap, poorly-designed chain is worse than a belt, and that a belt is generally much, much cheaper to replace.

On cars with a belt I used to get them replaced every 40k miles regardless of what nonsense intervals the manufacturer stated (Ford used to say 100k on Focuses, and there were many reports that funnily enough they'd fail at around 60k). I don't think I paid more than a couple of hundred quid for a belt replacement. I'd rather that than £600 minimum to replace a chain at 60k miles...

BMW particularly have an appalling reputation with timing chains, made much worse by their extended servicing schedules that are ultimately designed to save them costs on providing servicing plans to customers. Unfortunately, many customers believed the nonsense assertion that 25k miles between oil changes was achievable because of synthetic oils. Mine has had an annual oil change with fully synthetic and a quality filter, obviously.

I hear of so many chain failures on Minis with the N12/N14/N16/N18 engines from Stellantis (formerly known as PSA Peugeot Citroen), and also the BMW N47 2.0 diesel at ridiculously low mileages. I think the F series models with the B38 / B48 modular engines with chain cam are less trouble, but that's a relative thing given that they're still fairly new and I think they do still have cam chain problems.

Also, having driven both a current-gen Cooper and a Cooper S convertible (while our Mini was in at the dealer) I noted that the 1.5 three cylinder is a bit gutless and that the MK3 (F series) cars which now use the 1-series platform don't handle anything like the first two generations do. Getting back into ours was like a night and day difference in terms of handling. The MK3 is soft and wallowy and just doesn't feel sporty or planted at all.

I'm getting the dates and details together at the moment, but yes there will be records of the date it went in for the work and we're in the process of taking it up directly with Mini. 

If you want reliability and fun, I think an MX-5 would probably be a much better way of spending your money. Not sure what we're getting when this thing gets sold (and it is going to be sold once it's fixed!) but it won't be a Mini.

[OldBerkshireBoy]

Are chains actually metal rather than another material nowadays? A debadged SEAT FR or better still the Cupra is a fun car to drive.

[oldgregg]

Our other car is a Honda, so a Type R would be fun 

The Honda is chain cam too, but in six and a half years of ownership nothing has ever actually gone wrong with it. The Mini has done a thermostat housing and timing chain so far this year....

She used to have a Yaris.... Perhaps something nice and sensible like that would be better? I know just the car! 

[OldBerkshireBoy]

2 minutes ago, oldgregg said:

Our other car is a Honda, so a Type R would be fun 

The Honda is chain cam too, but in six and a half years of ownership nothing has ever actually gone wrong with it. The Mini has done a thermostat housing and timing chain so far this year....

I find the Type R to be a little "shouty" and stand out for my liking. Would love Guy Martins Volvo Amazon!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GB2dOX5P_OE

 

[oldgregg]

Yeah I'm not a fan of the looks, but they do now do the Type R Sportline model specifically for those of us who want something a bit more grown up.

It's basically the same car but with smaller wheels, a much smaller spoiler and the seats aren't bright red either. In grey or black it almost looks normal.

But yeah, I do prefer a sleeper. M340i floats my boat but it's 50k and still a Bimmer so you know it'd go wrong.

[ChrisB]

12 minutes ago, OldBerkshireBoy said:

I find the Type R to be a little "shouty" and stand out for my liking. Would love Guy Martins Volvo Amazon!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GB2dOX5P_OE

 

Amazons have gone up alot recently, both saloon, wagon and especially 2 door. They are very much a favoured vehicle on the classic car rallye circuit.

[BrundallNavy]

6 hours ago, oldgregg said:

My wife has a Mini, which is great fun to drive but it is probably the least reliable thing known to man. I actually think a Fiat, VW (anything after the 1.9PD) or Renault would be less trouble.

Having been back to the main dealer four times under warranty because the timing chain didn't sound right (and knowing they have a major reputation for eating tensioners / guides) I was assured repeatedly nothing was wrong with the car even though the independent garage who MOT'd it also said they felt something was wrong with it.

Now it's out of warranty and 1,000 miles later the timing chain is finally making the 'death rattle' sound that means the chain needs replacing immediately.

What fun.

BMW engines do as you say suffer timing chain issues the problem lies when you come to replace it as it’s on the back of the engine requiring an engine out to do it. 

[oldgregg]

Yup, they've been doing it for a long time.

As excellent as the (now pretty much legendary) B58 engine is in terms of power output and driveability, it has a problem with destroying oil filters mainly because of the ridiculous service intervals and that causes cam chain issues. 

And yeah, the cam chain and the VANOS (BMW speak for VVT) solenoids are on the back of the engine where they're a complete pig to get at.

I know most of the german brands switched their model to making money out of servicing rather than selling cars back in the mid-noughties, but it still seems daft.

[Maxwellian]

I had 3 BMW 5 series, kept each of them for just over 3 years from new, doing roughly 75k miles. So from 2010 to 2020 other than servicing and consumables nothing else went wrong. Oil change every 18k to 19k miles.

[Jbx5]

Same as had many diesel BMWs over the last 20 odd years 2.0d and 3.0d doing 25k  a year never had an engine problem.

John

[addicted]

Picked up our new Kia Wednesday, very happy with it. a well tweaked version of the Sportage we already had . This one is a mild hybrid so much cheaper road tax and the engine is noticeably quieter than our last one ever was which  is good , can't abide noisy engines.

 

Carole

[OldBerkshireBoy]

19 minutes ago, addicted said:

Picked up our new Kia Wednesday, very happy with it. a well tweaked version of the Sportage we already had . This one is a mild hybrid so much cheaper road tax and the engine is noticeably quieter than our last one ever was which  is good , can't abide noisy engines.

 

Carole

Just turn the music up, it works for me. 

[BroadAmbition]

[ChrisB]

I love this photograph. The signage looks painted out so maybe around WWll. 

I remember as a child considering Stonehenge "The gateway to the West Country" sat in the back of Father's Armstrong Siddeley.

I would love to go back and drive The 303 when it was like this.

[addicted]

Having had our latest Kia Sportage for a few days after which a few things remained a mystery ( you get very little in the way of a handover these days) and as lockdown was  a little less stringent than when we bought it we popped back to the dealer and asked for help with some of the more complicated issues. Were delighted to find that instead of  keying in instructions to the sat-nav we can  actually talk to this one!

 

Carole

[ranworthbreeze]

13 hours ago, addicted said:

Having had our latest Kia Sportage for a few days after which a few things remained a mystery ( you get very little in the way of a handover these days) and as lockdown was  a little less stringent than when we bought it we popped back to the dealer and asked for help with some of the more complicated issues. Were delighted to find that instead of  keying in instructions to the sat-nav we can  actually talk to this one!

 

Carole

There is no short cut to reading the manual Carole.

 

[addicted]

Hi Alan, The hand book that came with this car is like a London telephone directory and life is simply too short!  Hence the visit back to the dealer!    It was successful, a combination of reading the salient points and a practical demo produced the desired result.

 

Carole

[annv]

The trouble with modern cars is you need a Grandson to work the knobs/buttons i still haven't used a fraction of the possibility that are on my Honda. John

[Timbo]

Thoroughly enjoying every bit of tech on my new fully tech'd out MG HS, especially the brown trouser inducing red Super Sport button. Finally I'm enjoying driving again, something I haven't done since forced to say goodbye to my Scimitar thirty years ago!

[BroadAmbition]

The hand book that came with this car is like a London telephone directory and life is simply too short!  

MrsG's Q5 - Ditto.  I was hoping when I saw the size of it that it was printed in many languages but no, just English - It's huge.  Even simple things like checking the oil level means getting the handbook out and scrolling though the screen display - no dipstick.  No idea how long the adblue will last either, all I know is that I filled it last week and it took about 1:5 x Ltrs

The trouble with modern cars is you need a Grandson to work the knobs/buttons i still haven't used a fraction of the possibility that are on my Honda. John

Our oldest grandson is seven and as of yet he hasn't got a clue either so we are stuffed!

Griff

[ranworthbreeze]

Hello Griff, 

You will find that nearly all the controls on an Audi are the same, with only a slight difference in the satnav. When I get a loaner whilst taking my S3 in for service it presents little issues. They have given me A3's, Q3's, Q5's and and a Q7 all with the basic settings.

Regards

Alan

[addicted]

We've only just discovered about  adblue and the car took the whole 10L container!

 

 

Carole

[NeilB]

My XC60 holds 2.4 gallons of Ad Blue and is about half full at just under 5000 miles.  Just not done any miles the last year or so!

[ScrumpyCheddar]

Oh lovely Adblue what would we do with out the lovely stuff... Thank god for pigs wee 🤣🤣🤣🤣....