Should I... Saxo?

[backtothe80s]

So I'm becoming a mature student. The Eunos is up for sale and the volvo is spending it's 6th year in hibernation.

The mother in law has offered me a free car I bought for her a while back. A 1.1 saxo. Mm lovely!

Oil change was last done before God was a lad and the cambelt is 14 years old.

The question is.... Should I cambelt and water pump it (expense, poor sutdent) service it and hope for some cheap motoring or am I in to a money pit?

Good points are that it's only done 70k and has been reliable.

Oh and I home-brewed the exhaust with a Micra pipe and a metal coat hanger.

Is it worth it?

[slater]

I had a 106 for a few years and the main issue was the coil pack playing up. Initially because of dead plugs but even after fitting a new one it was never 100% in the wet.

Like all stuff that age. May aswell rag it around with fingers crossed. Even if the belt goes your not out of pocket.

[ChasR]

Great cars IME. They are generally cheap to fix. Being a 1.1, the cambelt isn't too tricky to change on them. You can leave it, but of course, what else can you afford if it breaks?

The main thing to do on those to keep them going are the oil and the coolant. The latter is well worth doing and will reduce a number of '106 horror stories'.

Issues they have?
-Rear beams go; you'll get play in the rear trailing arms. It's about £400 for a replacement beam ; it affects the GTi/VTS/Rallye cars more
-Rust is an issue, generally around the boot floor meeting the inner arch due to water leaks, as well as the sills sometimes from careless jacking.
-Lower arms can be pricey due to their construction. You can change the balljoints seperately but most garages won't; you need a tool to change them (i.e push them out) and it takes more time than just buying an arm. They're not hard to change however.
-Plastics aren't too bad for the generation TBH
-Door check straps can go, which is why many 106s/Saxos now have dented doors (the floors fold on themselves). 6 years ago, a check strap was £12 from Peugeot, with eBay vendors generally charging much more for them.
-Tyres are cheap but I'd avoid the 106/Saxo VTR&S rim sizes; you're talking about £70 a tyre vs. £40-50 for the same tyre in a 13" combo or if a later Saxo, 15".

I should point out that I've marked most of the major issues there. It won't affect all and most have seen the above fixed now.

The coilpack IME affects a few cars now, with going either new genuine or OEM, short of getting a known one affects things. I've been here before, and in almost all cases, the aforementioned solutions fix the issue. On a Mondeo I had an Intermotor coil pack and Wanknecor leads cause no end of issues. Putting genuine leads on fixed part of the misfire, but a genuine coilpack made the car feel like new again. Another owner I know had exactly the same issue. As a rule I won't touch Intermotor now, besides having other ignition failures down to them (rotor arms on Dolly Sprints going bad as hoopsontoast can testify, and in my case, it cause a Beetle to be stranded on a blind bend on a busy road during rush hour!).

[strikey]

go for it. 18 months in my £300 1.1 106 has been epic.totally reliable and cheap as chips.

[backtothe80s]

Thanks for the input chaps.

My main concerns are the lack of oil and coolant changes and the fact it's daily mileage is like 2 miles a day at the moment. Am I looking at imminent HG failure when I press it in to use (after servicing of course)

Anyway, Heres me in a few weeks

[backtothe80s]

Sorta makes me wanna say Westside iz da best. Wish it was a 5 haha!!

[stealthstylz]

I bought a 100 quid diesel one for going to work and back in. Done 14,000 miles in 6 months and hasn't let me down yet but has needed a fair bit of messing round with to keep going. Parts are mega cheap I've found, though against the purchase price it gets a bit difficult justifying the spend. I'm just putting off spending 50 quid on a pair of new driveshafts

[strikey]

its free....just run it till it dies then weigh it in...perfect bangernomics!!!