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So, two years ago, out of pressing necessity (new job with car allowance) I bought a 2014 Volvo V70 D4 with just over 100k on the clock. Has just rolled over 185k and passed its NCT (MOT) with no advisories and zero spend outside of service and tires. Everything works.....it just does its job of getting me to work and carrying the bikes in the boot come the weekend
We also have a 2012 XC60 which is just tipping over the 200k mark. Owned for 6 years and the only non service item has been an EGR valve which was coked up with the 2km school run and lack of use during lock down.
So being the Ying to Molgrips Yang 🙂 ....are there any other STWers who are happy with their High-Mileage heroes?
85k miles in 2 years, during a pandemic? Blimey 😧!
Mine’s at 123k miles and is 18 years old.
I got rid of my last 2 dailies on 190k and 186k. I wouldn't say they were trouble free, but they were definitely cheap motoring
My 09 galaxy has just hit 162k. It's great for lugging stuff around and it owes me nothing so I'm not worried about throwing muddy bikes / windsurfing kit / tip runs in it. It'll also take us to the South of France was without a hitch
Previous to the current Mazda I ran a Corolla for 339k miles in 12 years and before that a Peugeot 205 for 303k miles over 10 years
You two are individually producing ~8tonnes of CO2 each year, just from the car. And that’s based on a CO2 emission of 130g/km.
That’s more than my entire household produces (6.7tonnes) including heating, food, flights, driving and buying “stuff”. Again - Blimey 😧
I was a courier while back(12 years) I had Clio van i put almost 200k on it !! No issues other than servicing 👌🏻
Hyundai Santa Fe we managed to get it to 175,000 miles before trading it in.
Not faultless but very rarely let us down.
Traded that in for the current high miler the 198,000 V70 D5, which is moving on today to a new owner.
The D5 had a penchant for destroying springs and eating through brake discs.
Hoping that the latest addition to the fleet a D5 V60 get's up near these mileages.
Best I had was 217k in a rover 200 diesel, got sideswiped and written off unfortunately.
Currently at 195k in my v60 (doing 24k miles a year). Hope to get that to 250k and the see how much ev jobs have improved and where the love for ice is going.
Leyland DAF camper on 190k. Breaks down continually
2004 V70 owner here with 193k miles.
Gave it a midlife rebuild during lock down - now good for another 200k miles.
We'll designed and good to work, quality materials.
https://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/volvo-estate-appreciation/
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Thanks to my less than caring employer, and being categorised as an essential worker, lockdown didn't really apply apart from April and May of last year.
It has now paid for itself several times over between car allowance and mileage reimbursement and thanks to the odometer reading is practically worthless. I'd still trust it to bring me anywhere reliably.
Now at a point that running it into the ground just to see what it will do is the only option 🤣
A cousins '01 Focus is coming up on 450K, does it win a prize? It is, annoyingly rust and trouble free, and has been pretty much since he bought the thing - because I've been telling it'll break down any day now for years.
I have just sold a Merc Vito that I took from 185,000 to 227,000 over the last 7 years. Cheapest motoring I have ever had.
A cousins ’01 Focus is coming up on 450K, does it win a prize? It is, annoyingly rust and trouble free
I'm forever being told my 13 year old Mondeo is due to turn to ferric dust, still waiting.
You do realise you’ve now cursed it? Cue a succession of failures now appearing!
I took an Audi A4 from 40k to 300k and it never needed more than servicing. Original clutch and exhaust too. £6k in depreciation in 10 years of motoring - can’t imagine cheaper motoring is possible
Bought my T5 Caravelle at 3 years old with 160k on it - I’ve put another 120k on it and it’s also only ever had routine servicing. With the market being what it is for these things it’s probably barely deprecated at all too
Our V70 is on 220k, but she'll be off soon as we're moving abroad. Shame, as I really like it, even though it's recently developed a thirst for oil and the steering is heavy af. Still on the original clutch but that feels like it needs doing soonish.
Is this a challenge or something?
Is this a challenge or something?
*whispers*
do it
do it
do it
do it...
I sold my MK2 Golf last year with 197,000 miles on the clock. Had been nothing but reliable (after replacing the carb with a Weber and a few other OEM+ upgrades). I miss that car but lockdown and WfH made it unviable having a classic being sat around not being driven...
I know a guy in our indutry who runs a reliability solutions company, based in Essex, but travels all over the UK carrying out analysis. He's a lovely fella, bloody loves his job.
His passat was at 520k last time I asked, that would've been about may.
Had a EP2 Honda Civic Type-R.
Bought at 13,000 miles in (I think) 2004 and sold at 235,000 for scrap in the Feb before lockdown.
Barely serviced, often run dry on oil and ragged to sh1t all the time but the engine still gave out nearly all of it's power and was rock-solid. Honda deserve a medal for designing that engine.
Got rid due to the rest of the car rusting up. Engine was fine 🙂
Mk4 Golf 1.8t gti 203,000 before it got the chop a month ago due to not being economical (to me) to repair. I would have - great car - if I didn't need something significantly larger to lug all my gear around in.
Bought at 180k for £800 off a trusted friend (who himself had bought it at ~10k). Needed a steering rack and a rear spring totalling about £500 which were both a bit annoying, alas a 21 year old vw... Sold for £280 mind to local car recycling.
£6k in depreciation in 10 years of motoring – can’t imagine cheaper motoring is possible
I had a knack for a while of buying dirt cheap high milage vans - £500 or less, running them for a year or two, putting an additional 30k on them, then selling them again for with £10 of what I bought them for. Trick was to buy from classifieds where sellers expect to be haggled down and sell later on eBay where buyers tend to bid up. For about 5 years the capital costs for motoring added up to about £80.
It wasn't a car so don't know if it counts but I drove this DAF truck a few weeks ago and this is what the dash displayed:
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It felt like every single one of those km too, pretty lethal actually! Was an old split box that was very reluctant to change gear, not the best when you're driving it along narrow and steep Welsh back roads. What's annoying is that it should have been fine at that distance but it was not maintained correctly, trucks can easily do double that if looked after well.
As for cars, my current Fabia is in 132k and absolutely nothing has broken on it. The only issue was a corroded lambda sensor plug last winter but a quick clean and it was all fine again. It took until 110k for a bulb to need replacing! Still going strong and I plan to get to 200k before even considering getting rid of it, should be there in 3-4 years. It gets serviced religiously so should make it no problem.
Oh and if you want to see a high mileage hero getting some love check out Car throttle in YouTube, they had a 400k+ Octavia called Miles that they restored and is still going strong, they also had an A4 with 500k+ too!
Has anybody ever put together any real data on the average costs of maintenance for cars based on age and mileage? We all know running older or high mileage cars can be very economical but there's got to be a tipping point somewhere, where most of us decide a newer car will be less hassle. Is it true though, and does the data back it up, if a car is well maintained?
EP2 Honda Civic Type-R.
<pedant>Was it an EP2 or a Type-R? 😛 </pedant>
Honda engines are brilliant, heard of a couple of D16's bursting belts but K series are bombproof. There's a reason they use the same design for performance and cruisers.
I know a guy in our indutry who runs a reliability solutions company, based in Essex, but travels all over the UK carrying out analysis. He’s a lovely fella, bloody loves his job.
Is that bloke called Dean Whittle? He always did do an absolute truck load of miles when I worked with him upto about 15 years ago. As I type this I'm actually looking at a Christmas card from him on my desk, yep, working on Sunday, doubtless he will be too!
Has anybody ever put together any real data on the average costs of maintenance for cars based on age and mileage? We all know running older or high mileage cars can be very economical but there’s got to be a tipping point somewhere, where most of us decide a newer car will be less hassle. Is it true though, and does the data back it up, if a car is well maintained?
Its a long terms strategy (I'm using the word 'strategy' quite loosely here to describe my fairly unplanned way of bumbling through life) - an individual case of a car, or a period of ownership of a car is sort of irrelevant
Oddities like the current market for newer used cars aside.... cars typically depreciate by a factor of several thousands of pounds a year. Off set against that is cost of maintenance. Owners of newer cars are paying that depreciation in the hope/expectation that expensive bills won't happen. Not least given that the cost of purchase and depreciation means they often can't readily afford an additional big bill - so acceptance of predictable depreciation costs is driven by nervousness of unexpected repair costs. People tend to get their income in regular sized chunks and want their outgoings to be in similarly predictable chucks and they'll hedge against unpredictability by spending as much as they can afford to on depreciation.
I live a very unpredictable life and have a correspondingly unpredictable income. So the thing I guard against is regular outgoings. In circumstances where I can't work (lockdown aside I once lost the use of my legs for 5 months) I want 'doing nothing' to cost me as little as possible. I buy vehicles that have done most of their depreciation but most importably I pay cash for them upfront and and I pay a price I can well afford. So after they day of purchase theres no monthly overhead in terms of the capital cost.
Because I dont have that overhead I'm not nervous about repair costs because I'm not already having to meet costs each month. I also buy vehicles that suit my purpose well and that I intend to keep for a long time. So I don't think of repair costs in terms of the resale value of the vehicle as I have not plans to sell it any time soon, in fact by the time I sell it I dont expect it to have any value at all. Faced with a big cost my only rationale for not wanting to pay it is if I didnt want that kind of vehicle anymore. If I still want something that does what that car or van does then my only option if I dont repair is to buy a vehicle just like it..... that may well need a repair soon.
So repair costs aren't a penalty for me in the way many people view them, they're investment in continuing to use something I want to keep using. I'm not scared of them, happy if they're not needed but not discouraged that they might be needed
Big bills aren't a worry either - there might be years where beyound an annual service I have no other costs for both my vehicles, there might be years when a few really significant bills all arrive at once and I might pay out several thousand pounds. Across all my motoring big bills are something I cancomfortably pay as often I pay very little - and all the big ticket items I've paid for over the years - new gearboxes, new axels, DPF ****ery don't all add up to anything close to what I would have paid in depreciation in that time frame.
So one car or van hitting me with a few of those big costs in a short time doesnt matter - its not that car at that moment or those repairs needed that the economics apply to, its the whole thing.
similar rational to the above post - if a vehicle meets our needs then we will keep it as long as possible, we'd only replace it like for like so what's the point changing.
Our annual costs for the Volvo average approx £1000 a year. It's a big, heavy, complex 'premium' car so is fairly expensive to run. My Berlingo is a lot cheaper.
I have workshop space, tools, time, no kids and enjoy tinkering.
Bust my v70 doing some routine maintenance.
Changing lower arm and ball joimt i appears to have separated the inside cv joimt.
So it wont move and sounds terrible.
There is 3mm of play in the driveshaft adjacent tp it so i am sure when i pulled the hub carriet off tp spin it so i cpuld drift the lower ball jpint in it moved out as the end bolt was in the drive shaft
So a bike - train commute waiting for a recon to arrive Tuesday
Them Wednesday its up on axle stands then trying to drive the 250,000 mile drive shaft out the box and install the new one
Fun indeed
Changing lower arm and ball joimt i appears to have separated the inside cv joimt.
No idea why so many cars are designed like that. I was lucky on the Passat, it's one of the ones where the driveshaft bolts to an exterior flange on the transmission.
20 year old Nissan Primera here, owned 19 years. Now't goes wrong. Ran a bit rough when I started using it more for work etc, so dropped some quality additive in it for a couple of tanks and it's fine - It's on over 140k miles now, and still looks new.
Just picked up a 11 year old Aygo for £2k to bail my son out whilst his Mk3 Fabia is in bits (tuned to 170 bhp - blew the valves after 6 months), and also for daughter to learn in. Just needed new pads and discs as they looked like they'd never been changed - 98k miles. Been round with underseal, and all's good.
Its a long terms strategy...
You don't need to convince me of it. I've probably spent less on all of my cars together in 25 years of motoring than the average person does on a single car.
I spanner them myself and get both frustrated at doing so and a great satisfaction.
The lure of an easy life is always there though, and that belief that if you just bought something a few years newer or with a few less miles it would cause less headaches.
I understand my questions are flawed because so many cars just aren't looked after and there's all these variables that will skew the data, so I don't suppose we'll have much more than anecdotal evidence to go by, and everybody's experience will differ.
Speaking of which, my own car, I could probably sell today for the price I paid for it 5 years ago. At 150k miles it has not had the same joyful ride into old age as some of the cars here though. It's been a bit of a pig and destroyed itself on numerous occasions, and resulted in many hours lying underneath it accumulating rust in my eyes.
I'm a big fan of keeping old cars on the road, but it's tempting sometimes... That greener grass...
How green is it though? And how brown is mine?
When does the grass die completely, or does it live forever with a little sunlight and nourishment?
Nice effort ! My 01' V70 T5 has just ticket over 150k, barring some electrics that don't enjoy torrential rain it's been fantastic, and with an LPG conversion it's ~£24 = 270miles, which isn't terribly ruinous given it's rampant thirst for fuel...
Today's job is cleaning up the Passat so I can finally sell it. It's on 158k and I just realised the cambelt and transmission fluid have another 2 years to go so that'll help the sale.
However I'm not sure I want to put an advert up now since if I say no viewings during a certain period people will assume we've gone away and will try and burgle us.
Had a Xantia 1.9TD as a company car, ran it to 160k in 4 years - no issues except for a split suspension 'unit'. Serviced every 6k, so almost every other month 🙂
Took my own Mi16 to 150k, few issues really - just heavy on consumables as it was ragged.
Since then I usually run cars to 100k then swap for new/almost new.
The mighty V70 lives again.
Tuesday nihgt put it up in the air. wheels off, Caliper off , Disc off , Lower ball joint dropped steering are disconeected . Collected recon driveshaft from teh corner shoppe.
Wednesday confirm inner cv seperation by feeling a a few loose balls in the boot , Pull DS from hub and its a very floppy cock . Seperate mid DS support bearing and pull DS from gearbox.
Notice the hub dust seal has had it ..flippety flip. Ring main stealer, yep £4.82 but order in only so it will be tomoz.... which is thursady, its going to rain thursday and as much as i like my new found 0645 6mile sprint to the station at 4'c , doing it in the wet , no thanks.
Ok we are going to use the perished seal. Insert new DS into box, then try to align supprot bearing shell. Gearbox refuses to stop dripping . . . have i bust the seal?.. nope ....hang on . I can see into the box more tham before .. Flippeety flip.
Pull DS out . Its the wrong design, Oh my how I laughed . The record for launching a DS into orbit was nearly broken and some new words were invented.
3mm step flange for the oil seal to sit on doesnt appear to be on the recon one.
Goes and shouts at the seagulls abit more.
Coffee , email supplier can you get me the correct one?
Fire up laptop , watch YTube ids on rebuilding CV joints.- Check Haynes manual. Do not attempt to rebuild the joint .. Ignores Haynes manual.
You will need 2 people and a vice and a hammer. I am all alone , and i dont own a vice but sod it, I am going to have a crack as its the only option, and I have a hammer.
TBC
I recently traded in my 2010 V70 at 100k miles for a 2018 V90 for all the usual reasons. My C30 is on 120k miles. My V40 went to 147k miles before scrapping due to death by a thousand cuts. I've never had a Volvo fail to proceed.......cursed myself now typing that.
Do not attempt to rebuild the joint
CV's are fine to rebuild as long as the balls and running surfaces are not damaged - and it's a snug fit to get the last ball back in... Make a note of the CV inner cage orientation as they are designed to only fit one way (one side has an inner chamfer)
But are you sure it's not a Spidon inner joint (the type with the 3 roller bearings)?
The whole shaft will be rebuildable but sometimes the inner joint is staked on so you need to take the outer joint off to change the inner boot. Eurocarparts stock GKN Lobro boots which are OEM.
I also have a selection of CV Oetiker clips just in case.
In leui of a vice i have 2 x 10ltr tubs of paint and a ratchet strap.
Out with the grinder , nip off the 2 clamp bands and " Oh my god this doesnt look good" .Its like someone has poured licquorice into a cup and hidden a load of marbles in it.
Why does my joint not resemble the one in the YT vid? Becaue its full of tar. I work in scewfix, screwfix sell latex gloves . Do i own any latex gloves ? Of course not.
In we go, Molybedium disulphite be dammed, scoop it all out and use 27 sheets of CFR to clean as I go.
Right.- 6 marbles , cage and cup , 6 rifled splines and a 10kg DS with outboard CV still attached , what could possibly go wrong.
I'm in my garage , there's sawdust and tyres and bikes everywhere and the Boot is still on the DS and covered in something that the Exxon Valdese would be proud to have in her hold.
My Right hand is ****ed because im a clutz and have snapped the grippy tendon twice, so holding heavy things is hard for me. Its OK , my imaginary friend can hold it whilst I insert my balls.
So the trick is to mis-align the rifling, balance the cage in mid air using the force and manipulate the DS so you can drop the balls in through the cage into the slots . right , sounds simple enough.
What actually happens is the cage drops and the balls fall out the bottom and you start again . Or you lift the shaft 1mm too much and the balls fall out the top.
Each failure brings on more anger , my hand hurts, my back hurts as I'm bent ovet at 2ft off the ground. Start with a pair of balls , then work round lifting the cage with a flat head screwdiver to open the slot and align the stars so the big ball bearing goes in. Lower cage a fraction , lower DS a fraction . Move round 90' , angle DS lift cage , align , hammer aaaand its fallen out and rolled under the fridge . Find, clean start again.
An hour and maybe 30 goes later and Ive got it assembled. It angulates correctly and there are no spare parts. New grease required, new clips required. Get changed to cycle the 6 miles to the factors . Its against the clock as I have my booster at 1500 , its going to be dark after and its gone 1200 already.
Ride past local Ford main dealer , 1/2 mile from my house... Lightbulb moment ..surely they will have CV molybedium and clips. aaaand lo and behold there is a God , its a christmas miracle, there is a star in the sky ( no its the SAR helo) they do. For the sum of 5 pounds I have 2 clamps and a sachet of moly . You gotta take the little wins. But hang on these are those funny crimp things and funnily enough I dont own a funny crimp tool.
Hayling Hardware , think 'Open all Hours' , sell me 2 jubilee clips so its race home , quick change and back into overalls
Still with me ?
So , cut open the sachet of moly, and squish it into the cup. Slide boot over and jubillee it into place, slide down outboard and jubilee it on. Not ideal but its ok for now.
Under car , DS into diff, align center bearing and bolt up , slot into hub ,disc on , caliper on, Ball joint on, track control arm on , ABS sensor on . Wheel on . Drop car to floor.
Now the moment of truth . Its 2pm so the clock is ticking . It starts , always good, it moves forwards and backwards on the drive. A 3 point turn is executed without any drama so off up the road we go. Its fine , tentativley give it more beans expecting failure but no . So its off to the Health center for booster and a quick 6 mile run to Tesco and it all worked.
Ok , so the handling is abit vague , but i failed to mark the upright so I think i have upset the camber but yep did 150 miles yesturday to xmas lunch and all seemed well.
I hate working on CV joints, it is abominably messy. Yes I am wear gloves but everything gets covered anyway - tools, bench, car, then you rip a glove so you end up with grease inside and outside the glove anyway, and a huge pile of toxic filthy waste to dispose of.
And I inevitably damage the joint reassembling it so have to do it again.
A timely thread! There is a V70 on the street near me for sale, petrol and auto, one owner, all the trimmings, clean MOT with no advisories, full service history, asking £1750. The catch, if it is one, is that it’s done 315,000 miles.
I haven’t been underneath or poked around the engine yet but outside and inside look immaculate. I’d guess it’s been doing long airport runs or similar.
Am I mad to be thinking about it?! Would be and daily commuter (30 miles round trip) and weekend bike mover. Part of me would love to see how high I could get the mileage!
We recently sold our 8th gen civic with 205,000 on it. Pretty sad to see it go but it was showing symptoms of dual mass flywheel failure which really isn't a DIY driveway job, this coupled with all the peeling lacquer and thoroughly kerbed alloys meant it was quite scruffy. I'd replaced all the suspension and the rear axle over the years so mechanically it was pretty good.
Replaced with a Volvo V40 which is definitely a more sedate driving experience than Civic which which was always goading you to boot it out of each roundabout to the redline (even though it was a non-sporty 2.2cdti)
auto
No.
315,000 miles
Certainly no.
£1750
Absolutely no chance - and I love Volvo's.
That’s very clear, thanks! 👍
I agree with RNP.