106 Pug - adding power steering???

The message from "Young Laura" contains these words:

Chuck the 106 and get a car that comes with PAS.

The wife gets the mobility component of the DLA, but has never had a Motability car 'cos they're so sodding expensive. She prefers to buy old bangers and bin them from time to time. She's had a couple of Clios recently - they've been quite good - light, easy to drive, good visibility for someone small (not something you could say about an Astra, for example) and disposable.

She tends to pay about £500 for a car and keep it for a couple of years

- that's a vast saving on Motability's prices so she's got more money for fuel etc.

Look, here's one for £800... eBay Item number: 280121044062.

To be fair to the nice Motability people, under two and a half grand a year for a Shiny New Car including everything but fuel ain't that bad. I do take your point about disposable motors though.

The message from Carlos contains these words:

Ain't bad? It's roughly ten times what we spend - if you've got two and something thousand to spare each year good luck to you. The only saving grace is that they include insurance - so make that 2k/year.

Presumably you just bin your cheapy if it goes wrong? Or do you have to add a component for upkeep?

What Guy says. I have no idea how long it would take to retrofit PAS but it's going to be more than just a couple of hours plus the cost of the bits. It would almost certainly be more than the car is worth. A quick look on Autotrader shows that they're about =A31300 - 1500. For that price you can buy a 106 with PAS.

-- Malc

Guy King ( snipped-for-privacy@zetnet.co.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Ummm... "recently"?

Don't you tax, insure, MOT or do any repairs on your car?

Please tell me how to run a car for a year for £250. It costs me 80% of that just to insure it.

And road tax. And breakdown cover. And tyres. And servicing. And MOTs plus MOT repairs.

I'm guessing Guy/his missus is a bit older than us, and he is talking about what you'd consider "an underpowered shopping trolley". My car cost about 80 quid to insure last year - higher IG, younger driver, so I'd expect him to be able to get insurance for similar or even less.

Small engine, so it gets the lower tax band for older cars. Probably doesn't need parts-expensive repairs - I know Guy does his own work. Low mileage, small wheels, so not much on tyres too. Oil change is bugger all. So tax, insurance, MOT, servicing, tyres could well get under 250 quid. Just.

FWIW if I CBA mine wouldn't have been much more - but paying a man to do a couple of things put a hundred quid or so on it.

cheers, clive

The message from "Brian" contains these words:

I don't suppose she spends more than £100 on 'em between purchase and scrapping. She needs a new tyre shortly - I don't mind a few quid on something like that. If the PAS fails or something else major it's curtains.

The message from Adrian contains these words:

Yeah, the last one did two years before being shunted up the arse by a non-stopper so she replaced it with another.

The message from Conor contains these words:

Her tax is zero-rated and her insurance isn't vast, she doesn't cover many miles! Repairs - very little goes wrong in two years if you're not doing many miles. There's no particular point in changing the oil if you're going to scrap it shortly and so on.

The message from "Clive George" contains these words:

That's the point - I can do things to the car for effectively parts cost only - if you've a Motability car you can't, it's included in the rather high price.

But compared to buying a new car yourself, taxing it, insuring it, paying for maintenence and tyres, it is quite good value. And there is the peace of mind that if it breaks majorly, you get another car to run around in straight away whilst it's fixed.