2003 skoda octavia 1.9 diesel v 2004 diesel 1.9 vw bora

darby1

Hi guys,

Just wondering which of the above would be the best buy in your opinion?

a 2003 1.9 diesel skoda octavia, 135,000 miles for €3000

or

a 2004 1.9 diesel vw bora, 100,000 miles for €5,500

assuming all other things equal.
car tax for both is similar - around €585 per year

Nissan doctor

Its down to which one you like the look of best as they are both the same car. Same chassis, suspension and engine etc etc..

GTE

darby1 wrote: »

Hi guys,

Just wondering which of the above would be the best buy in your opinion?

a 2003 1.9 diesel skoda octavia, 135,000 miles for €3000

or

a 2004 1.9 diesel vw bora, 100,000 miles for €5,500

assuming all other things equal.
car tax for both is similar - around €585 per year

That Bora has been priced by someone who thinks the VW badge will carry a premium.

The Octavia is the same car and the mileage is fine. Only thing to watch for, and to be honest that is for both of them considering the mileage is how well they have been looked after.

I they are both reasonably similar and well maintained the Skoda wins hands down for me.

EDIT: The Skoda may have a safety thing less and possibly drum brakes on the rear. The VW is all disc.

darby1

many thanks guys,

bbk just wondering if you could clarify what you mean when you say "the VW is all disc"

and what are drum brakes on the rear that the skoda has.

and do you mean that the bora would be the safer car?

apologies but I am not that technical!!

many thanks

Jimbob 83

All disc as in the type of braking system installed , drum brakes at the rear are no big deal tbh once you have discs in the front + both cars have an excellent ABS system and the skoda is prolly the slightly heavier body

GTE

darby1 wrote: »

many thanks guys,

bbk just wondering if you could clarify what you mean when you say "the VW is all disc"

and what are drum brakes on the rear that the skoda has.

and do you mean that the bora would be the safer car?

apologies but I am not that technical!!

many thanks

That model of Octavia has been built up until this year and was known as the Octavia tour. That had disc brakes on the front and drum brakes on the rear. I dont know if it was for that particular model of whether it was widespread throughout the whole generation of Octavias.

Whether that has any impact on the real world is for someone else to say as I have only had a car with all disc brakes. Incidently my car is a Mark 4 Golf TDI which is the same fundemental car as the Bora and Octavia. It was well taken care of and its on 165,000 miles now. No real problems aside from replacing some parts that were at the end of their life anyway.

darby1

Thanks bbk

hopefully the drum brakes are as good as the disc brakes...

god you really know your stuff..

yes, i had heard golf's are good cars, yours is again proof that they are, hopefully you will have many more happy miles motoring in it!

thanks for all your help

darby1

thanks jim bob 83, that really clarified it for me.

good also to know that the skoda is the heavier car, i think also you would have more room in the front of a skoda, more head room etc compared to the inside of a bora

many thanks for all your help

Nissan doctor

darby1 wrote: »

Thanks bbk

hopefully the drum brakes are as good as the disc brakes...

god you really know your stuff..

yes, i had heard golf's are good cars, yours is again proof that they are, hopefully you will have many more happy miles motoring in it!

thanks for all your help

The golf is also the same car. The only difference between the octavia, golf, bora and Seat Leon is the styling and spec. VW relys on its badge along to make sales so usually the Skoda or the Seat will have better spec.

GTE

darby1 wrote: »

yes, i had heard golf's are good cars,

Well because the VW Golf, VW Bora, Skoda Octavia, Seat Leon and Audi A3 and some more are all basically the same car they are all good cars really. They share the same chassis, mostly the same same engine and many other parts.
And we are talking the generation of cars from the 2003 era. There are problems with some newer generation ones.

Where the cars become different would be the Golf/Bora having the disc brakes on the rear too and a step up again would be the A3 having some nice suspension I guess.

In real terms the Golf, Bora and Octavia (I guess the Leon too) are so similar that there is no point paying the premium price that a daft used VW seller puts on it.

Where that puts you at an advantage is now you can say to yourself to look for a Skoda of the similar price as the VW you found and you could find yourself with a better car in terms of spec and some goodies or you can say to yourself that you can find a basic Octavia that was well cared for and you know that you got a good deal compared to a similar Golf or Bora.

Most people selling their VW on second hand would be silly enough to think that its worth more then the Octavia so you generally get more for your money going the Skoda route.

mickdw

Drum brakes are not as good as discs but on that type of car & if driven normally, they will do the job on the rear.

darby1

that's great bbk and nissan doctor

food for thought!

thanks a mill

thanks mickdw, good to know that, i wouldnt be a fast driver or braking excessively so the drum brakes should suffice for me so, thanks for that info