Mazda MX5 & MGF

MX5 is the worlds best selling 2 seater/roadster, so its obviously a pretty good car, downside is that there are lots of them about, so its a buyers market rather than a sellers.

Putting 6k into a 8/9 year old car sounds a bit pricey to me, especially an import, Im not up on prices of 5s so it may be what its worth but Id tread carefully. Consider the implications of buying an import, higher insurance, has it been properly converted (speedo needs changing as do headlights) ? crashed in japan ? stolen and bought over here ? is it really worth all that for air con in a convertible car ? ( never really saw the point of that myself.. )..

MGF is a horrid nasty thing, iirc it usually comes bottom of the pack in every review. I'd avoid it like the plague.

If I was after a 2 seater I think I'd go the RX7 route..

snip

What do I think? I wish my 9-year old car was still worth 1/3 of the new price!!!

myself.. )..

Yea - get an RX7 :)

MX-5 and MG-F values are about the same, and generally your biggest cost of ownership difference will be maintenance. The MG-F on an N/P plate is a bad idea; it had just entered production, they have 'issues' - and they rust. I've seen a T-plate sell for £6K. Rear windows are plastic on both these cars at this age, so they are prone to cracking.

MG-F is less comfortable, though the low speed ride is not as harsh. Did I mention they rust? Great fun and excellent handling, but they have cooling pipes on the floor that even on 3 year old cars can show signs of rusting through, and head gasket failure is not uncommon. They're buggers to work on, too - to get to the engine you have to remove a panel underneath the roof.

Spend the money on an MX-5, the newest UK car you can afford with history. You'll love it. I like the MG-F, but they're just too much of a liability compared to an MX-5 - the MX-5 is just that good, rather than the F being a bad car.

Richard

For when you want aircon on and don't want the roof down ?

It is no such thing.

It does no such thing.

Shame you posted in a public forum then...

It *is* a hairdresser's car and you normally *do* have to be gay to drive one, or at least a high percentage effeminate. Whether or not you think that is important or not is down to personal choice, but cars are about image so you can't really stick your head in the sand and avoid it.

It's a fantastic car, you won't regret it.

Bought a P reg MX5 for the wife two years ago - on the advice of this group - they were right! About the same time someone local bought a MGF and it's often seen parked in the local garage for repair. The mechanics hate it! The MX5 has only needed a set of plug leads and front disks (wife does not brake hard enough) in that time. I did the cam belt and it took 30 minuets. It now needs new tyres - £30 ea, so I treated the corrosion and repainted the wheels whilst I was at it. The only big expenses I can see coming up are a new exhaust in the next two years (£400) and a new hood (£500 ish) will be needed some time. I Waxoiled it last year and now expect it to last forever :-)

Slatts

Just completely forget about depreciation - you always lose out in a BIG way - it's part of owning a car.

In 3 years, said car will be 12 years old, and as such, worth about 10p.

Infact, £6500 seems VERY expensive to me for an almost 10-year old car !

I had a look around in Autotrader, and they do seem to hold thier value exceptionally well - £5k will buy you a '95 M plate wil reasonable mileage. A '93 K with proportionally higher mileage willstill get nearly £4k, so by the standards of most cars the MX5 is almost a good investment :-)

An equivalent age/mileage family car of the same initial value would be worth about £1.5k-2k by now. Having said that, the 'Eunos' imported version doesn't do quite as well, which isn't suprising given that you know NOTHING about it's life before arrival in the U.K.

I paid 9k for a 3 year 5 month old Roadster import with 18k miles- DIRECTLY from a specialised importer - Mazda dealers at the time were charging 12/13k for cars with a 1 year "full warranty" but no service history but admittedly give you a good p.exchg!(- so most people are overcharging but in the South east especially and will probably get the dosh if we have a nice spring)

As the owner of a Primera and a jeep I admit that the "summer car" is used all the time except when I have lots of shopping I was told an MGF (I think looks a better car BUT sadly for Rover still not reliable) is a Chaps car and the MX5 is a blokes car still folks still call it a hairdressers cars but the truth is it can be a fun, direct steering, cheap reliable car (just give itan annual service) which won the best handling car in autocarlast year beating Porsche, TVR etc. etc. TVR - a mans car (again unreliable) a man with a small ****** admittedly but still a "real man"

Have a look at dandycars.com, you get a history report of the cars previous life, a guarantee that it's not stolen/crashed/written off in Japan, and have a look at some of his stock - even the £3995 G-reg he has looks about a year old!

/felix

I wouldn't put much faith in a dealers claim or gurantee that it had not been stolen/crashed/written off, but the RAC inspection and the 12 Month warranty are good things.

they are a bit expensive.