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Why do you change cars?

tones said:
Don't know if this is a Saab weakness, but I remember an old colleague in Dulux Australia bringing back a Saab 99 (non-turbo) from a secondment in England in the 1980s. Lovely car, but then something went wrong with the fuel injection system, and it had to be expensively fixed. Then the garage guy said, "Oh, by the way, how's your gearbox?" "WHY????" asked my colleague. "Oh, it's just that a reasonable percentage of them die about this mileage." On asking how much replacement would cost, the dealer mentioned a sum vaguely reminiscent of the distance between galaxies. Suddenly he decided that it was time for a change - he didn't get much of a trade-in deal -. the Australian motor trade had heard about Saab gearboxes.

On the other hand, a colleague has run a 9-3 for approaching 20 years, and I don't remember her ever having gearbox problems.
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I have owned around 9 Saabs including the 99 EMS (injection model) and Turbo, classic 900, new 900, 93’s all turbo’d and not one has had a gearbox fault. I also had a lot of friends with Saabs and I don’t remember gearboxes ever coming up as an issue. Water pumps were a thing as were the early injection systems. Fab cars, still in mourning for their demise.
 
Bob Edwards said:
No plans to change it - I have a cancer battle to win before I think of anything like changing a car I really like.
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Very best wishes for that.

I have bought most of my cars between 1 and 3 yrs old from car rental companies (or a former employer) and then driven them until they were uneconomical to repair or unreliable - usually about 8 or 9 years (rust kills cars in New England).
My last car I bought brand new - first time ever. I think it was the last new Mazda 5 in the Boston area (discontinued in the US - not big enough for the market), and the dealer wanted rid. $20k. It's now 5 yrs old with 25k miles and I'm hoping to get at least another 5 from it. After that it will be something electric, or a plug in prius.

Very few new cars interest me, and I can't justify a fun car because I drive so rarely, and usually have something to haul with me (family, bikes, lumber etc). A minivan works perfectly in that regard. If I won the lottery I might get a miata.
 
At first, aged 18 - 30, I didn't much. If it went I drove it, and when it broke i fixed it myself. new engines/ bodywork, wiring, even on one occasion a home made new front wing moulded in fiberglass from a cast i made.
I think this scheme would have been the one and only but when grandad died i briefly inherited an MG Magnette TC, which so opened my eyes to toad pooppoop motoring that the a
Anglias, Morry1000's and A35s just were never going to be enough again. Luckily around this time I got a proper job and bought my first motorbike...Suzuki GT185 vroomvroom .
Then I got married. Hello Morry 1000 estate, VW polo, etc etc but gradually, as we could the odd 'laugh', the odd 'well, we just got to try THAT' crept in. So a TR6 was replaced by an Audi GT coupe. The Passat estate became an old merc E class 123 estate (3.0 litres of boat like whoosh). 3 Saabs came and went, Audis became Subarus, and all the time there were motorbikes if all this was a bit mundane.

So to the OP. For fun when we could, and for sensible when we had to.

Never, ever, ever, owned a new car until I was 65, when we bought a VW UP. Lasted a year. never again.
 
I should have run a poll. The responses could include:
  1. I change cars when my neighbour gets a nicer car
  2. I change cars when I see one I really like
  3. I change cars when I get bored with the one I have
  4. I change cars if I think it will become unreliable and/or too expensive to maintain
  5. I change cars if the one I have is badly damaged and I know it won't be the same again after repairs
  6. I change cars when my circumstances require a different type of vehicle
  7. I change cars when it is too expensive to repair or maintain
  8. I change cars when the one I have is ready for the scrapyard
On reflection, the last few changes I've made can be attributed to reason #4. But I think I use that as a reason to justify what's really because of reason #2. I have yet to run a car into the ground. None, even the higher mileage ones, have gotten close to being scrap-worthy. That tells me that I've been overly pessimistic about the durability of cars. In fairness, I do lavish plenty of care and attention to my cars, and so they tend to be in better condition than one would expect for the age and/or mileage.

The reason I posted this thread is to hear about others' perspectives and habits before I entertain the idea of another change that is about to fall due. You all have given me food for thought. I really like the green angle about holding onto what I have if there is no compelling reason to change. In the meantime, I will drive new cars vicariously through Gran Tourismo, YouTube and other media channels.
 
I think another thing is peoples differing opinion of 'running into the ground' my sis shopped her mini in as it came upto 35k miles as it was getting tired and she didn't want to run it into the ground and it become unreliable (her opinion). I've gone to the scrappy for parts and come out to find someone eyeing my Alfa up for the wing and bonnet assuming it had come in for breaking! If you are mechanically minded and have the desire cars are very repairable.
 
Generally I buy a new car when the warranty on the old one runs out. I have rarely bought extended warranties
 
Puggie said:
If you are mechanically minded and have the desire cars are very repairable.
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I think that is true for cars that don't have a multitude of electronic gizmo. I happily self-maintained my previous Subaru Legacy, leaving only the big jobs like cam-belt changes to a qualified mechanic. I'm much less inclined to tamper with my BMW. It doesn't even have a dip-stick FFS!
 
James said:
I think that is true for cars that don't have a multitude of electronic gizmo. I happily self-maintained my previous Subaru Legacy, leaving only the big jobs like cam-belt changes to a qualified mechanic. I'm much less inclined to tamper with my BMW. It doesn't even have a dip-stick FFS!
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Ok, if your electronically minded even new cars are very repairable. But I appreciate not everyone (ok very few people) are likely to want to take a soldering iron to their ECU and start hacking into the CANBUS lines to see what is going on and reverse engineer it. But we are out there, I hope there is a new breed of 'bloke in garage tinkering with cars' for the brave new EV future, I appreciate its a very different world.
 
Yep, for example INPA(andother tools) for BMWs is ...widely available. That, and a £25 cable, and I can read and play with every.damn.thing on my e39. It's enough to tell (for example) which of the rear parking sensors is a bit duff, and test each, one by one, to find by what % of range... stuff that used to be dealership-only capabilities.
 
Puggie said:
Ok, if your electronically minded even new cars are very repairable. But I appreciate not everyone (ok very few people) are likely to want to take a soldering iron to their ECU and start hacking into the CANBUS lines to see what is going on and reverse engineer it. But we are out there, I hope there is a new breed of 'bloke in garage tinkering with cars' for the brave new EV future, I appreciate its a very different world.
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I remember when the E39 5 Series got released. The electronics in that were seen as the future - the death blow for the traditional non-franchised garage but eventually the technology got out there to interrogate the OBD, refind faults and programme the ECUs. Hell, you can run diagnostic software on your 'phone.

There's already people providing cheaper alternatives to fully replacing failed batteries.

Tesla don't make third party repairs easy but they're delaying the inevitable. We can't all afford franchised labour rates, and where there's a market, people will find a way.
 
Puggie said:
I think another thing is peoples differing opinion of 'running into the ground' my sis shopped her mini in as it came upto 35k miles as it was getting tired and she didn't want to run it into the ground and it become unreliable (her opinion). I've gone to the scrappy for parts and come out to find someone eyeing my Alfa up for the wing and bonnet assuming it had come in for breaking! If you are mechanically minded and have the desire cars are very repairable.
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people delude themselves as to when a car is going to become unreliable and hand in big repair bills. My dad is mechanically savvy, but he convinced himself that a Toyota Rav 4 with 75k miles had "a noisy engine, going to be needing a lot of work" . At 75k? Hardly. Likewise a female friend was trying to convince herself that because the electric window had packed up her car was getting unreliable, going to need repairs, etc. Only my assurance that it was neither here nor there, that windows don't generally fail and even if they do they can't damage anything else because they are in the door and away from anything important, persuaded her to keep it. A lot of people use "unreliable" to cover any maintenance activity beyond an annual service . Oh, it needed brake pads, discs and roll bar bushes, it's had it, time for it to go. Getting unreliable. Oh yeah, really serious faults, those.
 
Running repairs for cars are under £100 or low £100s
When it gets into high £100s and £1000s you need to think hard and maybe move on. Even then you could have a classic that is worth keeping going.

Bought my '96 Saab in around 2006 for £1700.
Unsurprisingly I have spent much more than that on servicing parts and repairs over the years. Family members seem to think I am mad but they spend a fortune on nearly new motors again and again every 2-3 years.

So many people confuse the scale of running repairs and parts, low £100s with the huge cost of buying, especially new.
Then there's those that lease for "only £150 a month" (!)
I spend way more on my system and also use it far more than the car

First came across
"My car is getting to that age when it will start to go wrong"
a few years back. She had made up her mind
 
This is because people tend to think in terms of a hypothetical resale value. So they say "why spend, say, an average of £1000 a year on keeping in good condition a car that is perhaps only worth £3000." They then spend £30,000 on a new car, a pile of plastic and computer chips and obnoxious gadgets and no f---ing dipstick, that will cost them £20,000 in 5 years. Or pay £500 a month for the same car, which in 5 years is £30,000.

On a parallel theme, I have a friend who owns the biggest scrapyard in Rome. He has always sold parts, mostly engines and complete transmissions, to buyers in north Africa or the poorer parts of eastern Europe. But recently, he has had problems with the electronics that control both motors and automatic transmissions, the various codes and software for which are owned by the manufacturer. So he has helped form a European association of scrapyards to demand legislation obliging manufacturers to make public and free the software, so an automatic transmission can be recycled, or anything else controlled by a "module."
 
mikemusic said:
Bought my '96 Saab in around 2006 for £1700.
Unsurprisingly I have spent much more than that on servicing parts and repairs over the years. Family members seem to think I am mad but they spend a fortune on nearly new motors again and again every 2-3 years.

So many people confuse the scale of running repairs and parts, low £100s with the huge cost of buying, especially new.
Then there's those that lease for "only £150 a month" (!)
I spend way more on my system and also use it far more than the car

First came across
"My car is getting to that age when it will start to go wrong"
a few years back. She had made up her mind
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That is the trap I'll be avoiding. I'm coming around to the view the residual value of a car is irrelevant to a "keep" or "change" decision. It is the cost of maintenance/repairs vs replacement against remaining useful life.

I shall now wait until retirement before I contemplate another car.
 
I'm at the crossroads
Around £1000 to replace reverse in my '96 Saab 9000
Seems to make sense to replace the clutch while they are in there. Another £200 at a guess
More money of course if they find other things wrong.....
 
PaulMB said:
On a parallel theme, I have a friend who owns the biggest scrapyard in Rome. He has always sold parts, mostly engines and complete transmissions, to buyers in north Africa or the poorer parts of eastern Europe. But recently, he has had problems with the electronics that control both motors and automatic transmissions, the various codes and software for which are owned by the manufacturer. So he has helped form a European association of scrapyards to demand legislation obliging manufacturers to make public and free the software, so an automatic transmission can be recycled, or anything else controlled by a "module."
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What a great idea. I hope he succeeds in getting that passed!
 
mikemusic said:
I'm at the crossroads
Around £1000 to replace reverse in my '96 Saab 9000
Seems to make sense to replace the clutch while they are in there. Another £200 at a guess
More money of course if they find other things wrong.....
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Not really a crossroads. Even if you spend £1,500 you'll have a high quality car for years to come. Today you'd have to fork out £50,000 for something equivalent but probably not as well made. There is the additional advantage that nobody is going to steal it! So you don't have to mess about with incredibly complicated anti-theft gizmos or insurance. AND you'll have a dipstick and a spare tyre! And a seat that adjusts perfectly with a couple of mechanical levers rather than 25 electric motors and a "module."
 
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