Too little mileage on a second hand car, any concerns?

censuspro

I'm v close to buying a 2008 Opel Zafira, 1.6 petrol with 40,000km. Is there any potential problems with buying a car with that low mileage? My concern is that if the car has been sitting for long periods without being used would there be any potential problems in the short to medium term?

166man

That's only 10k km a year, sounds about average for a petrol family car I'd say. If the service history checks out I doubt you have any reason to be worried.

CiniO

censuspro wrote: »

I'm v close to buying a 2008 Opel Zafira, 1.6 petrol with 40,000km. Is there any potential problems with buying a car with that low mileage? My concern is that if the car has been sitting for long periods without being used would there be any potential problems in the short to medium term?

40k per 4 years makes 10k per year.
That's not really low mileage.

Anan1

10k kms a year is 6k miles, it is well below average. Have you checked out the service history?

Jimmy Garlic

It is 4 years old, it couldn't have been sitting around for that long unused. If it did 10k a year or there abouts and was serviced every year then there should be no problems. There should be a record of the services it received.
If there isn't and/or there are signs of wear not consistent with 40k (pedals, steering wheel, seats etc) , stay away.
A 2008 with 40k should be mint, almost as good as new.

CiniO

Anan1 wrote: »

10k kms a year is 6k miles, it is well below average. Have you checked out the service history?

Zafiras, as well as other MPV are very often owned by mothers with many children, and used for school, playschool, shopping runs.
10k a year assuming car is used 6 days a week, gives 32km a day.
That's not that little really.

censuspro

Thanks for the replies, any thoughts on the €10.5K asking price? I haven't checked service history yet, is it worth doing a reg check on motorcheck.ie or one of those sites?

Leonard Hofstadter

Have you considered the diesel?

The 1.6 will be very slow, as in dangerous to overtake slow moving traffic on main roads kind of slow. A low power and low torque petrol engine and a large, heavy MPV do not make for happy bedfellows.

Also the diesels will be lower on tax and much easier to sell on, not to mention being considerably more powerful.

That said, if the car is going to be driven around town most of the time, a petrol is better, but it will seriously struggle with any kind of load on board.

Personally I think €10.5k is too much for a four year old car with an engine that nobody wants.

166man

censuspro wrote: »

Thanks for the replies, any thoughts on the €10.5K asking price? I haven't checked service history yet, is it worth doing a reg check on motorcheck.ie or one of those sites?

Private or dealer sale? Seems a bit pricey for a private sale if it is.

censuspro

166man wrote: »

Private or dealer sale? Seems a bit pricey for a private sale if it is.

It's from a garage which is run by a family member. I've been looking into Zafira's for about two months and €10k seems reasonable for a 08 with low mileage. See here, it's the club model with a/c and alloys btw.

There is also a 2007 model, 40,000 miles which is also in the club edition, asking price is €8.5k and comes with one year warranty from a main dealership. I haven't seen the 2007 model yet but based on the info would anyone advise which model would be the better option?

censuspro

captainspeed wrote: »

Have you considered the diesel?

The 1.6 will be very slow, as in dangerous to overtake slow moving traffic on main roads kind of slow. A low power and low torque petrol engine and a large, heavy MPV do not make for happy bedfellows.

Also the diesels will be lower on tax and much easier to sell on, not to mention being considerably more powerful.

That said, if the car is going to be driven around town most of the time, a petrol is better, but it will seriously struggle with any kind of load on board.

Personally I think €10.5k is too much for a four year old car with an engine that nobody wants.

Diesel is not really and option as it will be only used for short trips.

CiniO

captainspeed wrote: »

Have you considered the diesel?

The 1.6 will be very slow, as in dangerous to overtake slow moving traffic on main roads kind of slow. A low power and low torque petrol engine and a large, heavy MPV do not make for happy bedfellows.

Also the diesels will be lower on tax and much easier to sell on, not to mention being considerably more powerful.

According to what I've found 1.6 petrol on this zafira is 115 BHP and provides acceleration 0-100km/h in 13seconds.

There is a choice between 1.7 or 1.9 diesels, but they are not really much more powerful, with exception from 1.9 150BHP which is probably very difficult to find.

If OP needs more power, he should go for stronger petrol. (1.8 140BHP, 2.2 150BHP, or 2.0Turbo 200BHP)
Diesel will provide better fuel economy, but not much more power than 1.6 petrol.

166man

censuspro wrote: »

It's from a garage which is run by a family member. I've been looking into Zafira's for about two months and €10k seems reasonable for a 08 with low mileage. See here, it's the club model with a/c and alloys btw.

There is also a 2007 model, 40,000 miles which is also in the club edition, asking price is €8.5k and comes with one year warranty from a main dealership. I haven't seen the 2007 model yet but based on the info would anyone advise which model would be the better option?

I would easily go down a year and up another 20k km and get a a €2000 saving in my pocket.. It's not as though there's a huge tax saving to be made anyway.. With your mileage and needs petrol would suit you better.

colm_mcm

CiniO wrote: »

According to what I've found 1.6 petrol on this zafira is 115 BHP and provides acceleration 0-100km/h in 13seconds.

There is a choice between 1.7 or 1.9 diesels, but they are not really much more powerful, with exception from 1.9 150BHP which is probably very difficult to find.

If OP needs more power, he should go for stronger petrol. (1.8 140BHP, 2.2 150BHP, or 2.0Turbo 200BHP)
Diesel will provide better fuel economy, but not much more power than 1.6 petrol.

The power thing is equal if you look at bhp and 0-60 but in real life, for overtaking etc, it will be much quicker

Given the ops needs, a 1.6 should be just fine

Also consider corolla verso for the better seating system


As an aside, I think the zafira 1.6 is 105hp usually, I know there's a 115hp as well, but I don't know when that came out.

CiniO

colm_mcm wrote: »

The power thing is equal if you look at bhp and 0-60 but in real life, for overtaking etc, it will be much quicker

Could you explains at least in short - how come?

colm_mcm

Torque, mainly.

Matt Simis

CiniO wrote: »

Could you explains at least in short - how come?

He means overtaking, merging on motorway etc. Rolling start type stuff.
0-60 is a pointless stat for real world comparisons.

CiniO

colm_mcm wrote: »

Torque, mainly.

Torque in diesel will be higher, but when you consider it had lower gear ratios, the torque on driving wheels will be very similar to petrol model.
And it's torque on driving wheels which you should be interested in, as this is just a measure of acceleration possibilities.

Matt Simis wrote: »

He means overtaking, merging on motorway etc. Rolling start type stuff.
0-60 is a pointless stat for real world comparisons.

0-60 is the best way to describe acceleration of vehicle.

If both diesel and petrol version have similar BHP rate, and similar 0-60 rate, it just means they will be nearly equally quick for overtaking, motorway merging, etc, purposes.

colm_mcm

Nah, you're way off.


Let's say for example you have a 1.6 zafira that does 0-60 in 13 seconds
You also have a 1.9 zafira that does 0-60 in 13 seconds


The petrol does 30mph in say 6 seconds, diesel doing it in 8

That then means that the petrol will take 7 seconds to get from 30-60, whereas the diesel will do it in 5 seconds

So for overtaking from 30mph or above, the diesel would be faster.



Figures all made up but you get the picture

CiniO

colm_mcm wrote: »

Nah, you're way off.


Let's say for example you have a 1.6 zafira that does 0-60 in 13 seconds
You also have a 1.9 zafira that does 0-60 in 13 seconds


The petrol does 30mph in say 6 seconds, diesel doing it in 8

That then means that the petrol will take 7 seconds to get from 30-60, whereas the diesel will do it in 5 seconds

So for overtaking from 30mph or above, the diesel would be faster.



Figures all made up but you get the picture

Hmmm.
It all nicely sums up the way you presented it.
However I can't understand why petrol would be better accelerating to 30mph than diesel. And I actually don't think that's the case.

Only reason why someone might think diesel is faster, is because it has it's torque available from low revs, so whenever you press the gas, car kicks off forward, while driving petrol, you have to use high rpm to maintain descent acceleration.

Leonard Hofstadter

The 1.8 Zafira is slow, so God only knows how the 1.6 is even capable of moving.

The diesel will deliver its power in a more useable part of the rev range, therefore it will be quicker in reality.

Don't get me wrong, I think petrol is better than diesel because of sound, throttle response, wider rev range etc, but in reality you don't buy an MPV driving pleasure in mind, so a diesel is much, much better in a big and heavy MPV. For higher speed driving a naturally aspirated petrol will be a complete pain in something like an MPV to be honest, you'll have to rev the nuts off it to go anywhere. The superior torque at a much lower point in the rev range means that the diesel will make your life a lot less stressful, especially with heavy loads.

That said, the 1.6 will be fine around town and won't have all the things that can go expensively wrong like a diesel would have:).

colm_mcm

CiniO wrote: »

Hmmm.
It all nicely sums up the way you presented it.
However I can't understand why petrol would be better accelerating to 30mph than diesel. And I actually don't think that's the case.

Only reason why someone might think diesel is faster, is because it has it's torque available from low revs, so whenever you press the gas, car kicks off forward, while driving petrol, you have to use high rpm to maintain descent acceleration.

Go and drive petrol and diesel of the same car and come back.

I don't think you'll be convinced otherwise

CiniO

colm_mcm wrote: »

Go and drive petrol and diesel of the same car and come back.

I don't think you'll be convinced otherwise

No need really for the same car.
Last year we were checking with my friend. I had 1.8 petrol primera. He had 1.9TDI diesel audi a4.
Both almost the same BHP and 0-60 figures and vehicle weight.

On o road trail, we started together, and were going exactly head to head up to about 150km/h.

So no - I don't think diesel with similar power will be faster.

colm_mcm

Ok, super.

CiniO

captainspeed wrote: »

The 1.8 Zafira is slow, so God only knows how the 1.6 is even capable of moving.

The diesel will deliver its power in a more useable part of the rev range, therefore it will be quicker in reality.

All part of rev range is usable.
It's just drivers who for some reason don't like revving petrol engines to the red zone who form an opinion that diesels are quicker.
Surely if you will accelerate between 2000rpm to 3500rpm just to change gear to next one, diesel will be faster.
But if you push petrol to 6000 or even 7000 in lower gears, then petrol will be quick as well.

Leonard Hofstadter

CiniO wrote: »

All part of rev range is usable.
It's just drivers who for some reason don't like revving petrol engines to the red zone who form an opinion that diesels are quicker.
Surely if you will accelerate between 2000rpm to 3500rpm just to change gear to next one, diesel will be faster.
But if you push petrol to 6000 or even 7000 in lower gears, then petrol will be quick as well.

Higher revs = higher fuel consumption and more noise, that's the reason why people don't like revving petrol engines too much.

Plus extended periods of time running at high revs won't do the long term health of the engine any favours....

I enjoy revving the nuts off a petrol engine blasting down country roads as much as the next petrolhead but a petrol engine has no place in a large MPV, especially a NA petrol.