Oi PeteM, who is the best car auctions

Bugger, that was the source I was looking for, something ex fleet that had been properly serviced and just "run in" by the time I get hands on it.

Superbs seem to be holding their own at the moment. I guess people have finally woken up that while it isn't as modern as the equivalent year Passat, it isn't far behind and offers a lot of kit.

Guess what I'm looking for is something that was a middle to senior managers car so that it will have the options like leather/cruise/heated seats (I use mine every day in the winter and they are great), instead of the junior manager or ex luxury cab that will make do with beige velour. The dark grey leather option looks really nice on a black car, but the black cloth option would do.

Current shape Passats are going for sod all at the auctions.

55 plate TDI-140 SEs with around 50k miles on them are going through at under £5500.... most are black velour with cruise.

Does make me wonder what mine made - looking a little worn around the edges with car parking dings etc, could have done with suspension bushes, but a brand new clutch and flywheel.

I reckon £4500.

Aye.

I've been quite frankly shocked by how cheap some cars have become overnight on some forecourts.

I can still see some dealers likely to be in big trouble soon unless they slash the price of older stock which apparently still owes them a lot of money from where it was bought in before everything headed south.

They'd be far better off taking a loss now and then ploughing the money back into something else they can pick up a lot cheaper and knock out at the lower current level prices, than holding out in the hope that someone unaware of the current slump might pop in and buy it oblivious to its real current worth.

The place where I got the Passat from, and where my mate is getting his Fabia vRS from on Tuesday has a real mixture of dirt cheap fresh stock, and stuff he's had for ages which is still relatively high price wise.

Speaking of which... are the 130bhp Mondeo TDCis as bad as the report on Honest Johns site makes out?

I had a drive yesterday of a 55 plate Zetec he's got, with 86k on the clock up for £4495... total bargain I reckon, but the above report sounds them out to be a bit of a lemon in terms of flywheel issues etc.

To summarise, it did seem cheaper inside than my Passat, (although the seats were more comfy IMHO), and it smoked a bit too much for my liking when floored even in comparison to a mapped TDI, but not to the point where I'd say it was fecked.

Check for leaking injectors and the infamous flywheel. Otherwise they seem pretty strong. I've seen a few 150k mile ones that have never had any problems.

The flywheel issues are about as common as the Audi TDi V6s suffering from the same thing, it's just there are more Mondeos about. A lot were failing last year as they were falling out of the fleet maintanance schemes and into private use at the same time clutches were getting tired. I know a couple of chaps who have TDCi Estates which do huge mileages and have never gone wrong, but one is an auto - so that may be why.

They do smoke if they're being opened up for the first time in a while, if you tickle 'em round town for a day or two they tend to dump a load of soot the first time you give them stick. I think it may be particulate trap / emissions related. Shouldn't smoke at all much in normal mooching about.

Last weekend there was a dealer advertising 57 plate Mondeo TD's for only £6995 in the local paper (North Scotland)

Having now driven one, I don't think I'd get shot of the Passat to get one.

See my dad loves his. Mind you his last car before it was a Frontera for taking food upto the horses for my mum when she was ill, before she died.

The frontera refused to give up so he kept it until he was totally sick of it. He used to only do a few miles a day so it was fine.

Is his Mondeo the new shape one? My parents are starting to mull over changing their previous shape, 2002 2.5 V6 Ghia X estate Mondy and were having a look at the new one - but mum's quite set on an ST300, and it's for the oddest reason ever[1]. Does your dad have any complaints or issues with it etc? He loves it so I'm assuming not many, but it'd be silly not to hear someones real life experiences rather than just read them in a mag.

[1]We were driving to Beverley and followed an ST300 off the roundabout, then he overtook two of the line in front, and mum followed, nothing odd. Then, when they went for the next over take, mum dropped it right down to go and he must have to as it just stormed away from us in our puny Ghia heh! So that was that, having already decided she really liked the look, and then she got a demo of how much faster it was and she was settled.

I had a tootle about in a 58 plate new shape Mondeo. Rather liked it, and it was only a Zetec jobbie, don't even know if it was a 1.8 or 2.0. Interior doesn't look anywhere near as minging as it did in the brochure pics...

He bought it either late last year, or early this year. Think it was early this year pre-registered.

Yes, he really loves it. He couldn't trade the frontera because although he didn't know because it was a banger, it had an insurance write off marked against it, so they threw in an extra year free servicing.

His is a diesel and because he bought off the lot, he had to have white because it was the only one in the spec he wanted. It was his first ever brand new car so he made sure he got the options. There would have been a waiting list for a darker colour.

When he first got it, he was filling up at a pump just on the edge of sight of the kiosk, the cashier said "Is that one of those new Jags, I saw you pull in looks really smart". He wouldn't believe it was a diesel mondeo.

Obviously needs a trip to Specsavers, then.

To be fair.....

The XF *does* look like a posh Mondeo.

But that's the correct way around.

It's not that the Mondeo looks expensive, it's that the Jag looks cheap.

agreed i like the xf but it aint no jag, gotta be an XJ for me, the XF looks cheap, the XK looks to aston (which i'd rather have because aston make it so you can hear the V8) and the S type aint bad but for me gotta be an XJ, new shape ones are really nice especially in black!

I'd leave the Jag showroom, and go to Merc and get a C63 AMG :-)

S-Type R for me, please.

Good choice sir. I think I'm a bit young for an S-type, I'd look a bit odd or 'Daddy's car' - mind you, the Merc wouldn't be much better I guess. The BMW would make me look like some kind of city/business/lots of credit guy heh.

Weirdly enough, it happened to me the other day, except the other way around - haven't seen loads of the new Mondeos about, but see one regularly (on the driveway of a guy I deliver to a fair bit), and once I saw one of the new Jags (XF, is it?), and it is a remarkably similar shape to the new Mondeo.

And someone else thinks something similar, so with two people thinking it, it must therefore be fact and deserve a wikipedia entry. Or something.

In that it always points towards Aston, in the way that a compass points North, and all roads lead to Rome?

I went in a new-ish XJ and they are bloody nice inside. For me though, I've always liked the XKs (old shape - not seen enough of the new ones to really get a good idea), even though purists say they're not as "proper Jag" as the XJs.