How important is FSH?

My view is that it is entirely dependant on *what* you are buying. I'd want to be sure that a Lancia integrale had full specialist service history, OTOH I wouldn't care less if it was a Fiesta.

FSH is nice, but like a fresh MOT is no guarantee that the thing will live any longer, and it's not exactly hard to produce some invoices or stamp a book. I think a part documented history can tell you enough about the owner - if they have paid a garage 190 quid to bolt a second hand door mirror on and put a new alternator belt on they I would take the owners opinion of any good/bad points of the vehicle to be pretty worthless. [1]

If I was paying 2K for a 5 year old car, I would use the FSH as a plus point when sifting through the ads, but certainly wouldn't pay a large premium for FSH on a run of the mill kind of motor. Just assume that they have all been clocked and thrashed and take your chance.

I know someone who does oil and filter changes every 3000 miles on a

Personally I'll only chuck a car at a garage if the job is something that I cant be arsed with, like swapping a fuel tank on a Sierra when all the mounting bolts are very siezed into the chassis, OTOH I wouldn't pay £300 for someone else to do radius arm bearibgs on a BX.

Thats fine as long as there is paper evidence of oil changes. Otherwise buying a car on the hope its been changed in 30,000 miles is a bit daft isnt it. Best to keep looking for a model that has the evidence? The cars I have seen tend to have 100k on the clock. So thery will be ok if they have had oil changes, but if they havent it could cause problems as the miles get high.

Yep, very true. A while back a friend of mine was helping a colleague of his look for a car, and they went and looked at a Mk3 Astra (1.4 or 1.6 I think). Genuine 48k on the clock, and at a good price. FSH too. He said it sounded rough as anything and had mayo under the oil filler cap. Give me a good ole' high miler anyday.

Peter

-- "The humble bic biro draws 13 beards, 9 devil moustaches and 49 penises on newspapers in its lifetime."

I'd have walked out on the deal straight away. He should check things like that before agreeing a part-exchange price. Most dealers just do it on overall condition, I'd have thought, though it depends how old the car is. If, in discussions over a part-ex price, a dealer kicked up a stink about lack of service history, I'd sell it privately first, if neccessary buy a cheap runabout (

True. At the end of the day, the best way to judge the condition of a car is from properly looking at it and driving it, and actually talking to the owner about how well they've taken care of it. If the owner has taken care in maintaining the car, chances are he'll be able to remember what's been done and tell you.

Peter

-- "The humble bic biro draws 13 beards, 9 devil moustaches and 49 penises on newspapers in its lifetime."

As I did.

The Passat I've just bought is 6 years and 130k miles old, but has been religiously serviced at 3 VW dealers local to the previous owners. Very reassuring to see - someone who takes a car of that age to a main dealer for servicing is the kind of person who's looked after it well, too.

However, official dealer stamps aren't a make or break for me - I'll place equal value on invoices from a local indie garage. When spending that kind of money, though, I wouldn't buy a car that had some stuff scrawled onto bits of paper by the current owner. That's fine for sub £1k cars, but if you're spending £3k then you want something more concrete, IYSWIM.

I take it you're incapable of using Eyeball Mk1 then? Its so obvious when a car hasn't had decent oil changes that you have to deliberately not check the engine to miss it.

I remember when I was a kid my dad taking me with him to look at an old Cosair. He had a quick look inside and then popped the bonnet. He looked at me and said "Well have a look at the service history now son". He pulled the dipstick out, said "Yes that's nice and clean". That was the only service history he was interested in.

It taught me a simple lesson - you're buying the car, not what someone says about the car.

krystnors

No, I know enough about cars not to waste my money on such crap.

However, working the motor trade I have seen and driven many - possibly the worst car (and worst build quality) I've ever driven apart from a Lada Riva.

In news:clHwd.1941$ snipped-for-privacy@text.news.blueyonder.co.uk, Steve Knight decided to enlighten our sheltered souls with a rant as follows

That's two cars that are worse than an E39 then....

Heh - I tried getting the back end to slide on one of my dad's rivas, not enough power...

Also sprach "Steve Knight" :-

Spacious, nice to drive, comfortable, adequate power, cheap to run, reliable - suited me down to the ground.

All that tells you is that the owner has changed the oil just before putting it up for sale.

Don't those cunning sales people have the sense to put fresh oil in their cars before they put them on forecourt? What does looking at a dipstick of fresh oil tell you? I reckon if the car had old oil in, or was low in oil they might freshen it up ;-)

I know to look for black sludge, mayo, stiff oil cap, but the dealer selling it can clean all that up. Do you take Uri Geller along to discover its past oil changes?

Now tell us about the Maestro....

Crap build quality, poor quality comp "Tin shed construction. 'Red Robbo' build quality. Antediluvian 'A' Series

You weren't trying hard enough.. I had two of them and you could do it, but you had to be *very* violent with it. It usually just understeered horribly..

I've driven worse though. M-reg Austin Maxi being one of them. K (1971) reg Commer motorhome being another..

MIke

Also sprach snipped-for-privacy@italiancar.co.uk (SteveH):-

:)

Aaargh - you've forced me to use a smiley! I really liked 'em. Better than Astras and Escorts any day.