Newbie looking for some advice..

[adz_011]

Morning!

Ive just recently sold my Honda Civic Coupe, before that ive had a string of other Civic's all shapes and sizes over the past 7 years and more recently a Integra Type R.

Needless to say its time for a change! Plus with the missus 6 months pregnant, its time to look at something a bit more sensible.

The Vectra seems perfect, 5 doors, decent boot size and relatively cheap to buy/insure.

Im ideally looking for a Diesel Vectra C, but im not ruling out a petrol engines either. The reason for saying Diesel is im currently doing 350 miles a week which 90% of are motorway miles and I know most of the Diesel engines will provide some half decent MPG figures.

I havent got a massive budget, but im hoping £2k - £3k will get me atleast a 03/04 reg with average mileage.

Id also like some creature comforts, but I dont really know much about the different trims and which is best, something that gives rather comfortable supportive seats, not like some in the honda's ive had where your licking the passenger side window when you go round a corner!

Did any of them come with 6 speed gearboxes? as that would also help with motorway driving and MPG.

Did any of them come with cruise control? again would help with motorway driving and MPG.

Its mainly all the different engines that are confusing me at the min, as some are 100, some are 120 and some are 150bhp? So its really to get an idea of which engine is best for MPG but still giving some performance when you put your foot down.

Also what to look for when buying a vectra, common faults to look out for and things to inspect dependant on mileage of car (i.e. suspension etc..).

Feel free to link me to previous posts that may have convered some of my questions or fire away and give me some good honest advice/opinions.

Cheers
Adam

[bigmac]

Hi Adam and
Your budget might get you a decent low milage 2.0 or 2.2 Dti these are solid engines and are chain driven, the 2.2 is more powerful engine and might suit you better, however they are 5 speed boxes but they all come with CC as standard.

If you really want a 6 speed box you will have to buy the 19Cdti but getting a good low milage one for that price might be hard ( Not sure what's about ATM )
Things to look out for on cdti's

• Swirl flaps
• Inlet manifold
• EGR valve
• DMF ( Dual mass flywheel )
• 3rd injector wiring

There might be more things to check but like any car as long as it's been looked after you should be fine, but the above should be checked or ask if they have been done recently

[vectra ste]

hi adz 011

as bigmac said the diesels do have get expensive on parts as the mileage aproaches say 70000 miles plus
they suffer from the same common faults i made a list have a look at my thread vectra ste

http://www.vectra-c.com/forum/showthread.php?t=131272

[bigmac]

His post is here http://www.vectra-c.com/forum/showpo...4&postcount=32
And it's a very well informed post

[bobssignum]

Hi adam welcome to vec-c.
Answers to some of your question,s all vectra and signums came with cruise control but only the later 120 and 150 cdti versions came with the six speed box .
Performance wise the cdti 120 and 150 are streets ahead of the older DTi and they are relatively easy to upgrade with a tuning box/remap .It is not really feasible to upgrade a dti due to fuel pump weakenesses But the DTi have an almost bullet proof engine with only a few minor weaknesses which you will find well documented on here
The CDti on the other hand have a long list of known problems some of which can be very costly , biggest of these is probably the dual mass flywheel and clutch
along with the swirl valve issue which even made it onto television with watchdog

If you are also thinking of a petrol engine vec then look at 2.0t version probably the best engine in all vectra,s apart from the later 2.8 ,s
Hope this helps mate i am sure some of the others will be along to give you some further assistance

[vectra ste]

http://www.vectra-c.com/forum/showth...hlight=economy

have a look at this
if your doing 350 miles a week
i have a 1.8 petrol
you get 120 miles for 20 pounds may be a bit more on a motorway at 60mph say

[Ginge7289]

You will not get a decent CDTi at the moment with that money. Unless you know someone selling, it does not mean you could have a look, for fuel economy then the 120 is better than the 150.

As all the posts above have a look around at the links given and see what you fancy. I think you would have to get a derv instead of petrol as 350 miles a week would be a tank of petrol or half a tank of diesel (As long as you drive sensibly)

[Innes]

As you are doing long mileage and you want comfort I would stay away from the SRi's. The suspension is very hard. Great for cornering but not if you are spending along time in it. The SRi seats are also VERY uncomfortable on a long run. I went up to Guildford with my father-in-law a few weeks back (180 miles) and after 50 miles both our backs were killing us! Usually my SRi does 25 miles to and from work so don't usually notice the discomfort.

Diesel wise i'd get the 120bhp CDTi as its more reliable than the 150bhp CDTi version. If you cant stretch to a CDTi then go for the 2.2DTi. The 2.2DTi has 124bhp compared to the 2.0DTi 98bhp.

If you want to tune your engine the CDTi's are easier than the DTi's.

[adz_011]

I wish i'd never asked!! haha

Only problem I can see with the DTI engines is the majority of they have quite high mileage, which I wanted to steer clear of for the simple fact I ideally want to keep the car for 2 years, in those 2 years I will have clocked up around 50k, 50k ontop of say a 100k car.

If I was to seriously consider a CDTI, at what sort of mileage would all of the issues listed above likely to have been rectified?

Just my luck, all of the vectras im looking at are CDTI's, they are around the 70k mark and range between 2.5k upto 3k. Does that mean the majority of the faults listed by Vectra Ste are more than likely to start appearing their ugly little heads?

The expense of rectifying the issues is a big concern what with a baby on the way, the cash to fix the problems probably wont be there!

I suppose its all down to the service history and what issues have been taken care of, compare that with the cost of the car and the risk of other issues happening during the ownership.

Innes, suspension stiffness doesnt bother me that much, on all 8 of my previous cars ive fitted height/dampening adjustable coilovers, so you could say im a sucker for punishement!! But if the SRI seats are uncomfy then I may need to steer clear!

[Ginge7289]

I would say this is the sort of thing you are looking for, Flywheel and cam belt done already.

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classifi...1501?logcode=p

Or

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classifi...1501?logcode=p