What to do about an old car

It does, but that is what is going to be the biggest reason to scrap a car now. The old 'killers', rust and knackered engines, are not so much of a problem now. Cars in general do last a lot longer. A Fiat of the

70's would have been a pile of metal dust before it got to 14 years old!

Try to decide on a realistic value; use various sources. If the cost of the repairs by the cheapest possible means is significantly higher than

50% of the value, it's time to get rid of it.

Chris

Take the bulb out of the airbag light, get a seondhand headlamp off ebay, keep using it.

To decide on whether it makes sense to scrap it just consider its use and costs. on yors Depreciation is now nothing, car tax whatever, fuel costs over a year, maintenance costs estimate at 500 a year. (160 plus 750 plus 500 equals roughly 1500/year plus insurance)

Compare to a new car: have you got the cash? if so then you have the loss of amenity of the money/loss of interest, the new vehicle will lose all its value over about ten years. calculate any fuel savings (not much probably given your likely mileages), maybe a new car will be a lower tax band, running costs may be a little cheaper. insurance costs may be higher. etc. usually it works out better in the longer term to keep a reliable, known car on the road. (deprec. atleast 1000/year plus fuel say 600, plus tax say 50, plus maintenance 300 plus interest lost and that is all about 2000/year plus insurance, so a new cheap car will cost you your savings plus 500 a year) The situation is much worse if you need to borrow or buy something more expensive)

If you are only thinking of something secondhand then you are in even dodgier territory unless you really know the car that you are buying (from a relative or such like) or you may just get something with a whole load more problems. People only usually get rid of a car because it has problems looming or is really just too old (like yours:) )

But if you need a different vehicle or something for a different job, or something involving higher mileage, more seats or whatever then it is a different proposition entirely.

Yes it is sad to see on ebay that some perfectly good cars are being broken up and sold as parts, because the sum of critical parts can fetch more than the vehicle.

What will actually happen if e.g. a car is declared SORN and it is broken up? Do you still have to declare SORN forever, or is there any way out?

Sorn certicates are now everlasting, so no renewal every year.

You should get a certificate of destruction from the scrap company that gets the body, send that to DVLA and they will remove that vehicle from the system.

Scrap yard, ebay etc either for your car or spares for it

This.(ish)

IME, if you get a 'good' Fiat, it'll run and run - so, unless you really feel like changing it, keep it and run it until something really expensive goes wrong.

It's the same era airbag system as in our Alfa 156 - they are notoriously flaky.

However, you won't be able to remove the bulb from the warning light, as it's an LED soldered to a board, and I believe snipping the wires triggers another warning (possibly the passenger airbag seat sensor light) - so just cover with black tape and put the cluster back in. That's what I did.

Why? What has the resale value got to do with the price of fish if you don't plan to sell it?

You need to look at what it's worth to you as a working car, or what it would cost to replace it with something as good.

In my case it's the OCS ("Occupant classification sensor") circuit that's raising the error.

By the way, if you ever need to borrow an Alfa-compatible set of diagnostic leads, let me know!

No good sadly, because even if the light is obscured, the large letters saying "Airbag failure - stop engine" on the dot matrix LCD won't be!

Daniele

Ahhh. That can be bodged!

Thanks - I made one from a VAG-COM lead a few years back.

Or just stick some black duct tape over the dot matrix for the MOT... it's an advisory, rather than a fail.

Almost certainly fractured wiring under the passenger seat.

[...]

A sensible person would only adopt the approach of keeping the car regardless of anticipated costs if the car was/is a classic that might increase in value.

The OP was asking whether to keep it, or get rid. If the current repair cost exceeds 50% value, then you incur further unexpected costs, it would have saved you money by replacing it. (The 50% figure is what most insurers tend to use to determine repair feasibility.)

Not really.

You need to look at whether it would cost less over the anticipated time that the car would be viable to use, as opposed to getting rid of it and buying another.

Chris

But a car that has a history of being reliable, with a known. Good service and maintenance history, is better than a car with unknown levels of care.

[...]

That might be relevant for a two year old car, but is much less so for a

12 year old one. Of more significance would be if any expensive service items were due, such as a cam-belt change.

Chris

Oh, believe me I've tried.

Last year I bought a so-called mat emulator, that replaces the easily-damaged OCS in the seat. That solved the problem for a few months, but it returned, and I can't get rid of it.

The diagnostic software says the problem is with the OCS circuit rather than the airbag circuit itself. I've spent much of the weekend tearing skin off my knuckles finding and spraying switch cleaner on connectors in those circuits, to no avail so far.

I am inclined to buy another mat emulator, just in case something has gone wrong with the one I bought last year.

Daniele

Absolutely right - it's a complex mat that's easily damaged, and which they stopped using after a couple of years, which is supposed to measure the weight of the passenger for the airbag.

Unfortunately, I've already bypassed it to fix the same problem last year - so what is causing it this time, I don't know.

Daniele

Hmmm.

In which case, I suspect it may be an internal fault in the airbag ECU.

I believe this is what's wrong with our 156, hence bodging the light.

I'd go with taping over the LED and covering or disconnecting the matrix display for MOT purposes...

I'm keeping hold of my ancient old Alfa 75 - I may only do a few hundred miles a year in it, but with creeping legislation, it looks like a very safe bet for being able to run it in the future without too many worries about silly MOT failures.

"D.M. Procida" wrote in message news:1lmk7iw.y8e24q1jm4txcN% snipped-for-privacy@apple-juice.co.uk...

This is a terrific thread for me but I don't know the answer. I've had a 98 Corsa 1.4 Breeze for 13 years, done 65k, has never let me down, it's red so ok, it's a dull/matt pink with black (virtually white) plastic, worth ~?200. Cold it's fine, warmer and I get EML, even warmer and I lose the speedo, hot and the idle speed gets erratic. Never fails the mot but I feel I'd like a newer/better/more modern car.

Or clutch with DMF.

Again, if I had a car that had been reliable through cold, heat and torrential rain, I'd consider the trust earned by the car to be a relatively significant factor when replacing it. It'd have to be replaced by something that is likely to be significantly better/reliable.