The Joy of Running an Old Shed (Vol 2)

[bodhi]

Still trying to get my head round the AC in the SpaceCivic. It generally blows warm but I'm getting cool air from the vent by the steering wheel - not cold, but definitely cool.

Up until now I've been happy to assume it's broken and just use the BMW when it's hot, but I'm intrigued now I'm seeing signs of life from it.

[deadtom]

deadtom said:

shed #1 (2007 Octavia Scout that I paid £3500 for a month ago) is in the garage today due to lack of AC, front suspension knocking, split CV gaiter and exhaust fumes getting into the cabin when sitting idling / low speed driving.

Now taking bets on which side of £2000 that lot will cost to fix.

initial estimates are:

lack of AC; possibly failed condenser, £500 ish fitted, though I am not sure this is the main problem as the system hold pressure, so while a bad condenser would reduce effectiveness I don't think it would stop the AC functioning at all

front suspension knocking is both lower arm bushes kaput; £500 ish fitted

split CV gaiter; £120 ish (not sure if CV joint itself is OK)

exhaust fumes in cabin: Failed EGR cooler; £1300 ish fitted

so a cool ~£2500 all in, plus the £5 that I bet myself that I wouldn't see any change out of £2000.

I phoned the dealer I bought it from and they are pretty much flatly refusing to help, because the car I traded in against it turned out to be Cat N, which I genuinely was not aware of, but doesn't surprise me at all.

I've asked the dealer if they will take back this one and refund the cash payment I made against it, and we can both walk away from the situation.

[BenS94]

bodhi said:

Still trying to get my head round the AC in the SpaceCivic. It generally blows warm but I'm getting cool air from the vent by the steering wheel - not cold, but definitely cool.

Up until now I've been happy to assume it's broken and just use the BMW when it's hot, but I'm intrigued now I'm seeing signs of life from it.

They never work on the FNs, usually the compressor and/or condenser.

[7 5 7]

deadtom said:

initial estimates are:

lack of AC; possibly failed condenser, £500 ish fitted, though I am not sure this is the main problem as the system hold pressure, so while a bad condenser would reduce effectiveness I don't think it would stop the AC functioning at all

front suspension knocking is both lower arm bushes kaput; £500 ish fitted

split CV gaiter; £120 ish (not sure if CV joint itself is OK)

exhaust fumes in cabin: Failed EGR cooler; £1300 ish fitted

so a cool ~£2500 all in, plus the £5 that I bet myself that I wouldn't see any change out of £2000.

I phoned the dealer I bought it from and they are pretty much flatly refusing to help, because the car I traded in against it turned out to be Cat N, which I genuinely was not aware of, but doesn't surprise me at all.

I've asked the dealer if they will take back this one and refund the cash payment I made against it, and we can both walk away from the situation.

Crikey!

I know shedding is a mentality, but to me £3500 is too much of a "no-mans land" in terms of ripping it up and starting again - almost feel obliged to fix it at that price.

Not sure if anyone else thinks the same, if it was £1000/1500 you could get some back as scrap or sold as spares/repairs, and get most outlay back, too much of a fall/loss at anything higher personally, then you fix, and something else rears its head and before yiu know it the "cheap" car owes you £5k!

Hope the dealer is nice enough in this case, good luck.

[WPA]

BenS94 said:

bodhi said:

Still trying to get my head round the AC in the SpaceCivic. It generally blows warm but I'm getting cool air from the vent by the steering wheel - not cold, but definitely cool.

Up until now I've been happy to assume it's broken and just use the BMW when it's hot, but I'm intrigued now I'm seeing signs of life from it.

They never work on the FNs, usually the compressor and/or condenser.

Agreed, mine had a new compressor fitted by the last owner £500 but even that stopped working after 2 years and I was not getting really cold air.

[bodhi]

WPA said:

BenS94 said:

bodhi said:

Still trying to get my head round the AC in the SpaceCivic. It generally blows warm but I'm getting cool air from the vent by the steering wheel - not cold, but definitely cool.

Up until now I've been happy to assume it's broken and just use the BMW when it's hot, but I'm intrigued now I'm seeing signs of life from it.

They never work on the FNs, usually the compressor and/or condenser.

Agreed, mine had a new compressor fitted by the last owner £500 but even that stopped working after 2 years and I was not getting really cold air.

Ah, fair. Given it's not likely to be on the drive past October/November I'll give fixing it a miss.

[Hoofy]

QBee said:

Hoofy said:

Well, I'm of the mindset that any time the a/c needs "regassing", the first question to ask is - why is it losing gas? Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the whole notion of a company just offering a regas service a waste of space? It's the same as keeping replacing the battery when the alternator's fked and not charging up the battery isn't it?

Going back 10 years or so, seals drying out tended to be the cause, because some people turned the aircon off when it wasn't hot in order to save fuel.
I had a few aircon systems successfully regassed, including my wife's car just after we bought it in 2015.

These days it more often is a sign that a component has failed.
On my wife's now 25 year old Saab I took it to Kwik Fit in April to have it regassed. It passed their machine's tests and was fine for about 10 days.
Then it wasn't. Boss complained.
So I took it back to Kwik Fit and they sent me to their Master Technician in the next town.
He diagnosed a failed condenser and replaced it. All fine now and ice cold.

So I have to agree with you.

Why didn't KF test it before regassing it?

[QBee]

Hoofy said:

Why didn't KF test it before regassing it?

They did. Their machine said it was fine, and it seemed ok at first. It soon became obvious it wasn't.

[deadtom]

7 5 7 said:

Crikey!

I know shedding is a mentality, but to me £3500 is too much of a "no-mans land" in terms of ripping it up and starting again - almost feel obliged to fix it at that price.

Not sure if anyone else thinks the same, if it was £1000/1500 you could get some back as scrap or sold as spares/repairs, and get most outlay back, too much of a fall/loss at anything higher personally, then you fix, and something else rears its head and before yiu know it the "cheap" car owes you £5k!

Hope the dealer is nice enough in this case, good luck.

Yeah, and the kicker is that my last car was a properly cheap (£1800) version of the same, which I bought knowing it was a bit scruffy, but it turns out it was a total heap. I was hoping that spending £3500 on the same age and model would get me something meaningfully better, even if not pristine.

sigh.

Thanks though, it looks like I am in for a long fight with the dealer though.

I guess I should have bought something japanese, but they don't seem to really do the small 4wd estate thing. Subaru outback or forester maybe, but they're a fair bit bigger and thirstier

[Shnozz]

7 5 7 said:

Crikey!

I know shedding is a mentality, but to me £3500 is too much of a "no-mans land" in terms of ripping it up and starting again - almost feel obliged to fix it at that price.

Not sure if anyone else thinks the same, if it was £1000/1500 you could get some back as scrap or sold as spares/repairs, and get most outlay back, too much of a fall/loss at anything higher personally, then you fix, and something else rears its head and before yiu know it the "cheap" car owes you £5k!

Hope the dealer is nice enough in this case, good luck.

When my £2.5k Merc cab shat its engine I looked at spending that £3k - £5k bracket and came to the same conclusion. I upped my budget to £12k after a little budget creep from my original £10k budget but it was either £2k or £10k - in between felt no-mans land without much more security at £5k than £2k.

[Gordon Hill]

Yep 3 to 4 grand is dangerous territory, you almost feel obliged to fix it as it's too expensive to throw away. Either up the budget or go full shed which means that if it throws up this kind of expenditure then it gets weighed in. I've been waiting for the shed Merc to do similar at which point it's adios, luckily it hasn't happened.....yet.

[GlenMH]

Gordon Hill said:

Yep 3 to 4 grand is dangerous territory, you almost feel obliged to fix it as it's too expensive to throw away. Either up the budget or go full shed which means that if it throws up this kind of expenditure then it gets weighed in. I've been waiting for the shed Merc to do similar at which point it's adios, luckily it hasn't happened.....yet.

Yup - my skip of a Merc got through a service and MOT for less than 200 quid. Cheap motoring for the year...

[LR90]

r3g said:

I'm noticing a recurring theme with the VAG shedders in here! Does a week ever go by without a new costly-to-fix problem developing?!

I've had my 2009 VW Golf 1.6 that I picked up for £2,200 for two-and-a-half months now and—touch wood—everything seems to be rosy.

It's a proper old-school NA petrol engine and it's also the base S-spec so hardly anything electrical to go wrong.

At 100bhp, it's not exactly fast, but I really like it. And with 'just' 100k on the clock, I'm hoping there's some life in it yet.

My first ever car was essentially the same car (a 15 year old base-spec Golf with the least powerful engine) but that was a Mk2 1.3. That served me well too, despite its st Pierburg auto-choke carburettor.

[(steven)]

r3g said:

I'm noticing a recurring theme with the VAG shedders in here! Does a week ever go by without a new costly-to-fix problem developing?!

My experience is VAG spend their money on the interior, engine, body work and paint. These things are all very nice and generally 'above average' for the price point of the car.

However things like auxiliary components, suspension and running gear aren't great quality. The Wife's Tiguan by 90K miles is on it's third set of dampers, second set of springs, 3rd set of control arm bushings and just had a new prop shaft at great expense etc etc. My Ford which is on 160K miles is all original bar one set of trailing arm bushes. Interior and bodywork aren't anywhere near as nice though.

Not great sheds as they constantly have a list of small items needing replacing, although they will run to high mileage as generally the small things don't all break at once writing the car off.

[Raymond Reddington]

My 2008 Golf 1.9TDi has been decent for the last 9 months and 10k miles. It had a clutch and dual mass flywheel before I bought it. Aircon doesn't work.. needed some tyres and brakes but I can live with that.

Having had several VAG cars in the past, all sheddy ones apart from a newer Golf R, it's been a mixed bag. Old Octavia was great, mk4 Golf V6 was a bag of st.

I agreed to trade it in today for a fairly big loss on what I paid for it but I'm not up for selling it privately so cretins can waste my time - lesson learned here.

[mercedeslimos]

deadtom said:

deadtom said:

Shed #1 (2007 Octavia Scout that I paid £3500 for a month ago) is in the garage today due to lack of AC, front suspension knocking, split CV gaiter and exhaust fumes getting into the cabin when sitting idling / low-speed driving.

Now taking bets on which side of £2000 that lot will cost to fix.

initial estimates are:

Lack of AC; possibly failed condenser, £500 ish fitted, though I am not sure this is the main problem as the system holds pressure, so while a bad condenser would reduce effectiveness I don't think it would stop the AC functioning at all

Front suspension knocking is both lower arm bushes kaput; £500 ish fitted

Split CV gaiter; £120 ish (not sure if CV joint itself is OK)

exhaust fumes in the cabin: Failed EGR cooler; £1300 ish fitted

So a cool ~£2500 all in, plus the £5 that I bet myself that I wouldn't see any change out of £2000.

I phoned the dealer I bought it from and they are pretty much flatly refusing to help, because the car I traded in against it turned out to be Cat N, which I genuinely was not aware of, but doesn't surprise me at all.

I've asked the dealer if they will take back this one and refund the cash payment I made against it, and we can both walk away from the situation.

AC - Check the variable displacement valve on the compressor - modern cars don't use a clutch, instead have the compressor running the whole time (better for them) and vary the amount of gas depending on the demand.

Fumes - if it's the EGR cooler (and this is a VW TDI, probably is) - you can remove it, blank the EGR, loop the coolant pipes, and map it out. Won't affect the engine or emissions and gets rid of another piece of common failure junk. Yours is a BMM engine I think, basically a 1.9 with larger pistons and only 8 valves, way better engine than the 16v unit.

CV Gaiter - just replace the gaiter with a tenner item, if they are lazy you can even get boots you fit and glue on without having to remove the driveshaft.

Front suspension knocking - if it's a light knocking it will be the drop links - very DIYable and cheap - you can easily check if it's the wishbone bushes - get someone to slowly drive off while watching the wheels - if the wheels move backward in the arches it's the big bushes - the small front ones almost never wear out.

[Pit Pony]

ThingsBehindTheSun said:

7 5 7 said:

Astra H 1.4 petrol, super strong cars, easy to drive, easy to fix, not prone to serious rust - probably thousands of the things for sale under £2k, let alone £3k!

Hmmmm, I have only been concentrating on small cars, I will do an insurance quote and see how much it is.

I must admit I am not a fan of small cars, especially as other drivers seem to try and bully you on the road. It's OK for me as I have been driving for over 30 years and have the shed "drive into me if you like, I don't give a fk" mentality but I am not sure I want my daughter to face the same treatment.

Good call.

Edited to say cheapest quote on a 2009 Astra 1.4 is £3258.11

Small car it is.

Edited by ThingsBehindTheSun on Monday 24th June 11:17

Mazda 2 or a Jazz, might have lower insurance due to normally being owned by older people.

[Mr Tidy]

deadtom said:

Hoofy said:

Well, I'm of the mindset that any time the a/c needs "regassing", the first question to ask is - why is it losing gas? Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't the whole notion of a company just offering a regas service a waste of space? It's the same as keeping replacing the battery when the alternator's fked and not charging up the battery isn't it?

generally I agree, but I suppose not all leaks are created equal. For example, shed #2, has lacklustre AC. It works, but not ice cold. I guess this means the gas is leaking slowly. If I can re-gas it over year or two and avoid having to pay the several hundreds or more it would cost to repair it correctly, that's probably a worthwhile trade off

I paid nearly £3,500 for my 2005 BMW 330i in 2019, but it got made a Cat N last year when someone hit it in the rear and I got back 50% of what I paid so for me that puts it in Shed territory!

So far it has tended to throw up a £400/500 garage bill most years, so when the A/C was only blowing slightly chilled air last month I was expecting another of those bills. But my BMW Indy found no issues apart from a shortage of refrigerant, so it only cost £70 for a regas and now it's blasting cold air - fingers crossed.

[deadtom]

mercedeslimos said:

AC - Check the variable displacement valve on the compressor - modern cars don't use a clutch, instead have the compressor running the whole time (better for them) and vary the amount of gas depending on the demand.

Fumes - if it's the EGR cooler (and this is a VW TDI, probably is) - you can remove it, blank the EGR, loop the coolant pipes, and map it out. Won't affect the engine or emissions and gets rid of another piece of common failure junk. Yours is a BMM engine I think, basically a 1.9 with larger pistons and only 8 valves, way better engine than the 16v unit.

CV Gaiter - just replace the gaiter with a tenner item, if they are lazy you can even get boots you fit and glue on without having to remove the driveshaft.

Front suspension knocking - if it's a light knocking it will be the drop links - very DIYable and cheap - you can easily check if it's the wishbone bushes - get someone to slowly drive off while watching the wheels - if the wheels move backward in the arches it's the big bushes - the small front ones almost never wear out.

Thank you, that's useful stuff.

The EGR I have asked the garage to sort, I don't have the confidence or fighting spirit to take that on on my own. Yes it's a BMM, I'm glad to hear it's a better unit than the 16V as I have heard that the 2.0 tdi was a bit of a step down reliability wise from the venerable 1.9

How would I check the variable displacement valve on the compressor?

CV gaiter I've asked garage to do as it looks like there's a few tools needed to do that which I don't have, and the garage have said they'll check the CV itself and use a recon unit if that's borked, which is good of them

lower arms look to be a fairly easy swap, so I'll have a go at that on the driveway. Looks like it's nothing more complex than a few 16 and 18 mm bolts. Switching the arms shouldn't affect the tracking etc as there's no adjustment on them. I don't have access to a press, so changing the bushes only is probably a no go.

[Drezza]

I'm in the precarious situation of looking at £3.5k "sheds" (Skoda Octavia vRS 2.0 TSI) to replace my 1.9TDI Fabia vRS. Been looking at common problems and they seem to suffer from timing chain tensioner issues and after reading the last few comments I'm thinking it may not be the best idea. However the seller has had the chain and tensioner replaced in 2019 at Skoda and it has a full new set of Michelins and discs/ pads so I think he has looked after it. Decisions decisions...