Mark 1 pre/post facelift Insignia owners review - recommend?

[ACCYSTAN]

Hi, would appreciate your thoughts on owning the 1st generation Insignia?

I’m after a face lift estate model, around 64/15 plate.

The estates do while their value considerably over the hatchbacks.

There appears to be too many issues to list them all but was wondering if real world owners would recommend them?

Would also be good to know if some of the common issues got sorted when they did the facelift (knowing GM I doubt it)?

Also, is the 1.8 or even 1.4 pt petrol just not worth it over the diesel?

Thank you

[757]

You've probably made up your mind by now, since you asked last year.

Petrol 1.8VVT will top trump reliability in these Insignias by a long way, you have to sacrifice more VED of course and a slower pace of driving but they are good solid units, but they need working hard to gather any insignificant pace, but some don't mind that.

I have this engine in my ageing Vectra, very good unit for plodding along once up to speed, will most likely get it again in the Insignia, days of me tearing about are over so slow and reliable is good for me.

1.4 I presume is a the turbo version, yes, still would rather this over a diesel if reliability is a concern for you.

Diesels Insignia's do have a few diesel related issues themselves, plus the usual diesel related issues many other diesels have anyway, parts are cheap anyway in comparison.

[Alan16ac]

Can't help with advice as I've never owned one. However, I've actually always quite liked the look of Insignias. I'd love to own a VXR, but their reliability record puts me off. Plus they are very nasty and plasticy (not a real word?) inside. Benefit of all this though, is that they depreciate like mad, so you can pick them up fairly cheap. And even if repairs are needed on the common models, it shouldn't cost you a great deal.