Help! Which car do I choose?

WhichCar

Hi,

I need advice on which car to get please!

I'm looking for:
2008 or later
Budget €10k max
Hatchback
Efficient with fuel
Reliable
I travel about 10k miles a year (does this rule out diesel?)
Needs to be safe (so presumably should have Stability control (VSC/ESP/DSC))

I'd prefer not to have a tiny car, so am thinking Focus or Auris over a Fiesta or Yaris, but I am open to other models too.

Anyone any ideas?

bazz26

You might get something like this close to your budget, probably still upto 2 years left on the Hyundai warranty too:

http://www.driving.ie/used-cars/Hyundai/i30/DELUXE-1.4/34013603178210000/

JohnBoy26

I Kia cee'd should be considered as well. these are the same car mechanically as the Hyundai I30, and like the I30 they are highly reliable well built cars.

An Auris on the otherhand are a poor car by any standards, It beggers belief how Toyota Ireland got away with calling these ''the best built cars in the world'' :rolleyes:

shooter88

With your budget and models your after getting a diesel would suit better more mpg and reliability..a lot of diesels in your reach are 1.6 or lower..petrol cars are a thing of the past plus newer diesels are punching out the power to either match or beat petrol

colm_mcm

shooter88 wrote: »

getting a diesel would suit better more mpg and reliability..

Mpg yes, reliability not so much.

ba_barabus

shooter88 wrote: »

petrol cars are a thing of the past plus newer diesels are punching out the power to either match or beat petrol

REALLY??????

shooter88

colm_mcm wrote: »

Mpg yes, reliability not so much.

I always had great experience with diesels even the brothers diesel focus with 175k miles it gets a hard life and is fairly well drove on..never a spanner bar a oil change and wheel bearingsx2..
My mondeo diesel 150k miles
Never got a problem and its the troublesome tdci..
A regularly serviced diesel will easy do twice the milage of a petrol

WhichCar

Thanks for your replies. Interesting about the Auris - I assumed it would be a contender. I have been considering the Ceed and i30 as well. The diesel decision has me a bit stumped. Seems to me that having them serviced regularly is a must. I've never owned a diesel before... On the other hand if I tried to resell a petrol car in a few years, there might be no market for it.

WhichCar

Also, I read somewhere that if you don't drive more than 10 miles on a trip in a diesel that it's not good for it. Is that true? Mostly I'd be travelling 20 miles to work and back, but my family are less than 10 miles away, so would I be undoing the benefits of a diesel if I go to visit them? I know it probably sounds like a stupid question, but I am a bit thick when it comes to cars!

JohnBoy26

WhichCar wrote: »

Also, I read somewhere that if you don't drive more than 10 miles on a trip in a diesel that it's not good for it. Is that true? Mostly I'd be travelling 20 miles to work and back, but my family are less than 10 miles away, so would I be undoing the benefits of a diesel if I go to visit them? I know it probably sounds like a stupid question, but I am a bit thick when it comes to cars!

No at that mileage you would be far better off with a petrol car. What little mpg you will save with a diesel could be wiped out with the maintainance a modern diesel requires.

WhichCar

That's interesting. I drove a diesel for a couple of weeks recently and didn't notice any huge savings in fuel. Don't like the sound of 'the maintenance a modern diesel engine requires' - sounds pricey!

colm_mcm

Don't bother with the auris, they've addressed a lot of the weak points with the 2013 model, but the outgoing model was inferior in many ways to the corolla that went before it.

I'd pick an i30 if I were you, ceed is good too but the interior of the Hyundai is better .

bazz26

shooter88 wrote: »

With your budget and models your after getting a diesel would suit better more mpg and reliability..a lot of diesels in your reach are 1.6 or lower..petrol cars are a thing of the past plus newer diesels are punching out the power to either match or beat petrol

Which is exactly why someone only driving 10k miles per year will find better value in buying a petrol car because all the sheep want diesels, pushing the purchase price up. At 10k miles per year it would take the OP along time to make back the purchase price difference between the two in mpg savings. Also if the OP is doing mostly short trips then a diesel engine isn't even going to be warmed up so it will not be at is most frugal.

WhichCar

Ok, so i30 petrol is a runner

What about safety though? It's 'Marginal' on the Euroncap Adult Occupant test (http://www.euroncap.com/tests/hyundai_i30_2008/331.aspx). The Ceed is the same (http://www.euroncap.com/tests/kia_cee'd_2007/297.aspx)

What do you think about the Ford Focus?

JohnBoy26

WhichCar wrote: »

Ok, so i30 petrol is a runner

What about safety though? It's 'Marginal' on the Euroncap Adult Occupant test (http://www.euroncap.com/tests/hyundai_i30_2008/331.aspx). The Ceed is the same (http://www.euroncap.com/tests/kia_cee'd_2007/297.aspx)

What do you think about the Ford Focus?

The I30 and Cee'd are better built than the focus imo. Ifgoing for a Focus avoid models with keyless ingnition as this can give trouble, also avoid buying a 1.4 version, they are very underpowered and dog slow.

colm_mcm

The ceed got 5 stars straight off, its sister car the i30 didn't, then it was retested a few months later after some revision and got them.

WhichCar

I heard that about the 1.4 Focus before. Out of interest is it just the facelift 2008 1.4 that is slow, or would earlier 1.4 Focuses (Focii?!) be under-powered too, do you know?

colm_mcm

Same engine since 04 or 05 or whenever the mk2 was launched.