Rover SD1 Vitesse.

Hardly a trustworthy seller. He says "MOT until May 2018 no advisories."

Yet it failed on the 17th May 2017 prior to the pass.

I do not see how that makes the seller's statement untrue. It failed on 2 items. Those 2 items were presumably replaced. It then passed with no advisories. QED

Speedo replaced at 54000. Why?

Rear hatch CL faulty Rear speaker covers damaged Door speaker grill damaged Faulty oil level meter NS rear door rusted Faulty horn but bodge fitted Laquer peeling Chrome strips faulty Boot leaks Air conditioning not working

Etc etc. Probably worth about £200-300

When I last had a car with a mechanical speedo, it had a problem with the speedo at 55,000 thousand miles - it ticked and the needle twitched about 3mph each way at speeds above 40. That ended up getting replaced.

SteveW

In my 50+ years of owning cars I have never had a mechanical (or digital) speedo' go faulty on me.

Asking price. Not sure it will achieve that, although a heavily restored one did at auction. This car isn't what you'd call restored. Just garaged at all times and only used in the summer for many years. And any repairs done as needed, and to a high standard.

There is another - not quite so good - at a dealer for £19k. But again an asking price.

It's a 30 year old car. Only an optimist would expect it to be perfect. What is good is to see an honest ad for a change.

You couldn't even buy a scruffy base model for that with an MOT.

I had experience of two, both B-plate MG-badged. My Maestro EFi had to have the speedo replaced after about 18k miles, and younger daughter's Metro also suffered a dead speedo, but I can't remember the mileage.

Just remembered my first car, the sit-up-and-beg Ford Prefect, which also had a very dodgy speedo. In 1967?

Late SD1 have an electronic speedo, and the sender in the gearbox (a sort of early hall effect device, so active) notorious for failing. The speedo head itself pretty reliable - apart from the trip counter failing to re-set to zero.

I'm guessing they were terrible rot-boxes as I have not seen one on the road for a long, long, long time. Bloody shame. I had a few of 'em back in the day and the ride quality was easily up to XJ6 standards if not even better!

You don't see any cars of that age on the roads regularly either.

They do, of course, rot, but no worse than others of that era and better than plenty. And have the benefit of a good supply of new spare panels at a decent price.

Having had both, I'd disagree. The XJ6 has a far better ride. But the handling of an SD1 is more nimble. And since it's a lot lighter, far better performance.

Perhaps it depends on which engine option you have, then. The one I referred to was a 3.5 V8 auto. I also had the 2.6 manual SD1 and that was nowhere near as smooth. But that V8 model was certainly up to Jag standards IMHO (and I've had many various Jags over the decades: XJs, various MkIIs and even a formidable and awe-inspiring 420G!)

As for Vauxhall Vivas...

Not entirely fair, though. Vivas preceded the SD1 in production by many years, during which time it might have been expected that lessons concerning corrosion prevention had been learned - and applied!

Mine is the top of the range model, the VDP EFI.

You really can't expect a rigid rear axle to compete with double wishbone IRS. Or, indeed very basic strut front suspension to compete with double wushbones, for a comfortable ride. Many said the XJ6 was better than the Rolls.

If you go to a half decent classic car show or two, you'll see all of these that you hardly ever see on the roads these days.

What does surprise is the big differentials in current value these days different makes or models which may have cost about the same when new.

Interesting. The suspension and wheels and tyres on those two are virtually identical.

Base models (2.3) had smaller tyres and ordinary rear shocks rather than Nivomats, so slightly harder rear springs.

What I was getting at was maybe the extra weight of the V8 (yeah, I know it was mostly alloy but still heavier than the 2.6) gave the ride a bit more 'gravitas' if you get my meaning. But I've had Jags either side of that particular Rover and AFAIC, there was no difference in the ride quality between the two marques. I really go for a floaty, insulated ride where you get abstracted from the pot-holes and noise as much as possible. That V8 SD1 auto ticked all the boxes in this respect. But it's all subjective so no amount of arguing is going to help.

Arguably the XJ6 was the equal of a RR in terms of ride comfort, of that there is little doubt. Not sure about "better" though. The 420G might