Advice for narrowing down potential new car?

Atomic Pineapple

I was wondering if anyone has any advice on how you might narrow down what car you would change to when you are looking to buy a new car but literally have no idea what you want?

I used to have a genuine interest in cars but that has waned in recent years as I got older and had to concentrate on other things so its an area where my knowledge is also very limited.

I currently drive a 2010 1.8 TDCI Focus and I really want a change but I can't seem to figure out what exactly I want to change to.

My drive to/from work is only around 25 miles a day but I do long drives most weekends around 100 - 150 miles.

I do know I want something more refined, with more toys than I have had in cars before, so something high spec but I also want to get something that is fun to drive and somewhat powerful before I get too mature and need a boring family car.

I have around €20k to spend. So has anyone any ideas or hints or tips on how you'd limit what you want so you could focus the search?

MuppetCheck

Firstly decide if you want petrol or diesel and how old you're prepared to go.

Most of the decent petrols post-08 seem to be a VAG of some variety - there's a few GTIs and A5s. I'm guessing petrol from your post. The VAG engines are tunable, there was also a nice Renaultsport Megane on DD the other week. I'll see if I can find a link.

EDIT - Here it is.

http://www.carzone.ie/search/Renault/Megane/2.0-RENA/201549239032844/advert?channel=CARS on Carzone.ie

Atomic Pineapple

Petrol would seem to make the most sense but as you say petrol's have become an incredibly limited market in Ireland, its actually scary when limiting searches to petrol how little there actually is compared to diesel.

That said I think I could just about get away with a modern diesel too, my commute doesn't involve any traffic and I do the long drives on the weekends so I am open to a nice diesel too.

The only car I've actually gone to look at so far was a 150 Leon FR diesel, and I actually really liked it.

MuppetCheck

Yeah, there is very little out there. There shoukd in theory be a few more pop up in the new year mind.

If you're tempted by a diesel like that the 184 FR is worth rooting out. Has better suspension and the extra few bhp really make a huge difference and don't impact running costs. I'm biased but they're a cracking car.

Atomic Pineapple

MuppetCheck wrote: »

Yeah, there is very little out there. There shoukd in theory be a few more pop up in the new year mind.

If you're tempted by a diesel like that the 184 FR is worth rooting out. Has better suspension and the extra few bhp really make a huge difference and don't impact running costs. I'm biased but they're a cracking car.

Very hard to find though and they don't come with the DSG for some reason, I really liked the DSG.

colm_mcm

But you're open to other manual cars?

Atomic Pineapple

colm_mcm wrote: »

But you're open to other manual cars?

Sorry my previous comment sounded like I was discounting the 184 version because of the lack of DSG, certainly not, I would definitely consider one if I could find one for sale.

I am open to both automatic and manual, just meant I was really impressed with the DSG having never driven one before and found it odd it wasn't available in the 184 version.

cros13

Have you considered going electric?

The Nissan Leaf has a new 30kWh battery for 161.

Running costs are 10-12 times lower than a diesel. I do 4500 - 5000km / month for about 20 euro of night rate electricity.
It's got a roughly similar kW motor to your focus but a lot more torque. Great fun to drive. Does in the region of 9.5 second 0-100km/h, but the immediate torque is addictive.
Spec is much higher than your focus with standard Nav / remote access from your smartphone / heated seats etc.

Range on the new battery is quoted at more than 250km but realistically it's 180km or 160km in the winter.
The new battery can rapid charge a bit more aggressively. 7%-90% in 20 minutes.
The rapid charging network for the Leaf are the blue locations on this map: https://www.esb.ie/electric-cars/electric-car-charging/electric-car-charge-point-map.jsp

If you were willing to stretch the budget the BMW i3 is an option (I have both a 141 Leaf (soon to be 161 30kWh) and a 151 i3).
The i3 adds about 9-10k to the price but more than doubles the power to weight (with a software hack she'll do 0-100 km/h in 5.5 seconds) and comes with a ton of extra standard equipment.
There are a few used example about here and in the UK (5K VRT credit for imports from the UK... so essentially no VRT on a used i3)

celtic_oz

skoda octavia 0% finance

start 18K

http://www.skoda.ie/brochures/Documents/pricelists/NEW%20OCTAVIA%20SALOON%20PRICE%20LIST%202015.pdf


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EJ46ta2Rwnc