Clocked BMW

PaulKK

Clocking seems to be rife unfortunately, I rang about a NI reg 320d with 70,000 miles on it yesterday. Did a HPI check last night to discover it was recorded with 125,000 miles on it in July 2008.

Its no wonder so many hide their reg when advertising their car!

ninty9er

Depending on where you check, the mileage isn't actually a record, but an estimate absed on age and car type.

Cartell has a disclaimer for this or at least it did when I bought my car in Jan 08 with 25k miles on it. Cartell suggested it should have almost 50k it being 7 years old at that point. I've had it 2 years and almost doubled the mileage and it's still below 50k with its 9th birthday approaching.

bungler

qz wrote: »

My Alfa is 1999 and has only around 24000 miles on it! Genuine too, it's been in the family since new. I took this picture back in the summer.

23,000 miles of it have been clocked up been towed

rebel.ranter

I have a 1996 320i Convertible with 100k miles on it, that's not far off your 82k miles. It took ages to go from 50k to 60k miles as I had a company jeep at y disposal for about 4 years, only using the car on fair weather days.
I bought it with 50k miles in 2000 & handed it over tot the wife with 64k miles in 2005!
So low mileage is possible!

dubal

I have a 1996 320i saloon with 83k miles on it, I have owned it since 1999 so I know its history fairly well.

I cycle to work, so its often not used during the week, the original owner (who I know) lives beside the dart station so he didnt use it during the week either.

Its well serviced and still doesnt give me any problems.

Dubal

An Ri rua

I think that a vital point that's being missed here is that these low mileage cars that some of you have a lot of faith in may not be getting the servicing they require. Not your own cars! Not attacking them. Just low mileage older cars as a general buy. I wouldn't recommend etc.
Another poster earlier mentioned how vital servicing was. I have a 2000 Xantia HDi that I bought, one owner, in 2005. It had a full service history until then. Since then, its had oil & filter changes every 5k even though the manual says 10 or 12k, as 1. its cheap and 2. most of us do a lot of small journeys in our cars, hence wear.

I wouldn't give a damn about mileage on a car but I would about servicing. A low mileage car that has just has standard interval servicing (ie fleet manager maximums) is a bad buy in my opinion. A car that's potentially clocked as its selling with no recent service history, but cheap as chips, could be a true bargain. A car that's got a nice service history with no problems could be a well scanned scam that, worse still, may not have had the required servicing. The UK has a mileage register. To my knowledge, we don't. But the NCT database could store such info as one poster points out.

I'm on 170k with same clutch and same exhaust as new. Its my 3rd Xantia over the years and, like many cars, once you know them and know what problems to expect, then there are no problems.

There are all sorts of reasons why mileages can be low. But IMO those reasons amount to a car that can have potentially more problems than one bargains for when paying the cash premium wrongly expected of such cars.

As James Ruppert of Bangernomics fame notes, there's a lot to be attracted to in a high mileage car, particularly as they're so cheap, hence the risk is lowered already.

corktina

my 1995 escort has 53000 on it...it cost nothing when you deduct the T&T and the new stereo and tyres on it and when it goes wrong, I'll throw it away. How is that not a good buy?

An Ri rua

corktina wrote: »

my 1995 escort has 53000 on it...it cost nothing when you deduct the T&T and the new stereo and tyres on it and when it goes wrong, I'll throw it away. How is that not a good buy?

Is your question aimed at me? If it is, then I would need to know whether you mean a good buy for you when you did, or the next person? Is it a diesel escort or a petrol? And did it get minimum services only since 1999? Did you pay more for it because it was low mileage?

I'll be honest, I don't understand your question at all.

corktina

rhetorical i suppose, but you suggest a low mileage car isnt necessarily a good buy and that a higher mileage car with service history is a better buy. Just pointing out that IMHO my method would be cheaper, its as close to free motoring as you can get.

(Its petrol and I paid 310 sterling for it, no service history whatsoever)

ottostreet

robbie99 wrote: »

Arguably there's no way a bmw can last 14 years without having low mileage.

I dont know if im reading that wrong, but im curious as to what ya mean by this. ive had two 318is's, one 99 with 165k miles, and most of the original bmw suspension components and clutch have been changed in the last 5k!

the other one is 18 years old with 100k and still going strong.

a look around at the vast amount of 80s bmws still on the road, and the high proliferation of early 90s e36s as well suggests that they are one of the better marques for survival?

500sel

To answer your question, it is possible to check depending on how thorough the offender was