ICEDVOVO
That thread on the red 850R with the high kilometres got me going.
Last year I picked up an immaculate little old lady's 850 sedan for $1800 with 4 months left on the rego from Epping NSW.
Bought it for my daughter to replace her white 850 that was bought from a 96 year old WW2 veteran in nextdoor Eastwood NSW ( if he's still alive he'd be 101 now) He was still driving, just getting a smaller car.
Garaged all its life. But not perfect as it must have seen some battles though with a misaligned bonnet and front guards, with gap varying from 3mm to 8mm. Not something everyone would pick but it bugs me.
Seller said it had done only around 40000 km but odometer was reading around 37000.
I don't think anyone believed him and wouldnt even take a look. Pictures on the ebay ad were crappy too. Plus it was on Ebay - not the best place to sell a car.
But it was clear from the log book and receipts that it was genuine. Only 2 services had been done by the local garage, the rest were by the Volvo dealership
When i bought the car I did the plastic gear fix on the odometer and downloaded a hex dump from the ecu , did the conversion using the software tool to find that it had only done 39000kms! So I wound it FORWARD to catch up.
So next time you see a car with low k's and a dead odometer don't believe it's a mirage; it may well be a low k car.
(It was a great deal for my daughter as she had just pocketed $7500 for her white 850 sadly written off by a rear ender.
Was insured for $6300 but they sold the "wreck" for $7500. Crazy, Who would pay $7500 for an 850 with repairable write off on it? It had around 100k on it and was otherwise immaculate but still not worth $7500. Anyway she got he new car for free and had $5500 to blow on a holiday.)
jamesinc
I generally think people place far too much value in kilometers driven. You find plenty of high-mileage Volvos that only ever have the usual servicing needs, and you find plenty of Volvos down around the 100k mark with suspension and transmission issues.
ICEDVOVO
That is true James. But I know which ones I prefer. The interiors on the low k cars almost always look like new and there is a tendency when a car starts to look shabby it gets treated as such; services are prolonged or skipped altogether and the car is beaten to within an inch of its life and then flicked on when some major and unavoidable expense occurs.
Point in case is my eldest daughters C30 T5 . Was immaculate with just 45K , purchased off a well known ABC announcer, did our inspection in the ABC Ultimo porte cochere! In the first year she looked after the car very well, then she scuffed it badly on a concrete column and wouldn't get it repaired "it's not that bad" and then backed it into a letter box "you can hardly see it" and has now filled the car with mountains of s**t - wrappers, food stuffs, receipts,books, papers, even a Christmas tree. Scratched CD's loose from their cases all over the footwell. Plastic bags wedged up into the passenger footwell blocking the aircon air intake. You can peer in through the glass fastback and see another pile of s**T in there. The car stinks and I refuse to drive it. I refuse to service it now. I've told her how to check oil but whenever I look it's on empty. She somehow knows how to drive on a yellow fuel light for days on end, filling up when it must be down to its last litre. I can hear the drivers door strap has gone by the noise it makes but I am not going to fix it. The front tyres are probably bare, I told her to get them rotated a year ago. The air con guy told her to come back 18 months ago to get some sealant added but she CBF going there to get it done and the aircon failed entirely at the beginning of summer and she has been driving it like that since. She was driving without insurance for 2 weeks. The list goes on. So upsetting to see such a great car run into the ground in just 3 years. And this was her "dream" car. But there are so many girls out there just like her. They shouldn't own cars.
Spac
The obsession with kays travelled is basically because people have no idea what they are looking at.
And the idea that a 96 year old is winding the odo back on a low value 850... Because that would be so worth it... *rollseyes*
I also love the 1970s Japanese cars with 5-digit odos that are always advertised as having <100,000km, regardless of all the other signs.
egads
Yup, how every old Toyota is a one owner, granny driven, under 100k kms car.
PaddlerEd
I managed to fix my odometer in the Landcruiser by pulling it all apart on the bench. Only 5 digit odometer and I reckon it is on its 5 time round - too good to be many more than that round the clock.
ICEDVOVO
Low k cars can also suffer from carbon build up.
If the car has been driven too sedately or frequent short trips it can be a problem.
Engine never gets a chance to properly heat up an burn off the carbon.
My son worked at Trivett BMW for a while and a few 335i came in with carbed up everything.
Solution was for the mechanic to take it for a hard drive and tell the customer to change their driving style!
Major Ledfoot
^ The carbon isn't as much of a problem as the acids created as a result of the combustion process.
When engines don't reach full operating temp, they don't have a chance to boil off, and so these corrosives sit in the sump oil.
Which is why cab engines seem to last forever, since they're always on the go... and why the internals of old, low mileage engines are often cactus.
ICEDVOVO
I think I've seen odometers with an extra digit hand written in and then crossed out with another number
ICEDVOVO
400000 km is too much.
I should have had a look at the car as it was literally 15 minutes away.
I would love to have heard what it sounded like.
Maybe we might if it comes to a meet.
I've never heard a car with over 200K on the clock.
Spac
Teh Wagon (84 245GL) had 550,000km on it and was still running great when the auto died.
Our '06 Mazda 6 has 365,000km on it and shows virtually no sign of the kays it has done. Just about to give it to my dad because it is going to be impossible to sell with that many kays despite the fact that it drives beautifully.
240
Have to agree with James and Spac that there is too much emphasis placed on the km driven, particularly when it makes people place less emphasis on things that are actually important (like, has it been serviced properly...)
I know people who don't do a heap of driving so own cars with fairly low km but they don't maintain it properly, so IMO the low km are irrelevant.
Also when discussing old cars like 240s and 850s, they're all of an age now where components are failing because of time, regardless of km. So a 240 with 200,000km will likely need the same amount of work to get it running perfectly, as one with 450,000km.
I think the fact that people are so obsessed with buying new cars every few years also contributes to the "high km = bad" mentality.
ICEDVOVO
I've learnt something today.
Next time I look for a car I'll give the low k cars a wide berth and look for one that;s done 550000km instead.
It will obviously be in far superior condition to the low k cars and is bound to have had one conscientious and fastidious owner who have replaced and repaired every conceivable component , kept the bodywork and interior in showroom condition and recorded every service in the logbook and also somehow managed to avoid every other idiot on the road in its 550000 km of travel.
Can't wait to see my mechanic's eyes roll when I show him this thread.
Time to close it James.
240
Don'y know what you're getting at; nobody is inferring that high km cars are superior - rather, that there is nothing intrinsically superior about low km cars and that other factors are more important.
(That being said, if you're talking about cars that have done 550,000km, it is a sign that the owner has been doing something right.)
timbo
I bought my 85 240 off the original owner, my boss had serviced it since new and it had just on 400,000kms. I even drove the original owners daughter to her wedding in it. Only problem was the fact that he polished it too often
jamesinc
Yeah no one here is disagreeing with you, we're all just saying that km on the odometer isn't always representative of quality.
Can't argue about interiors though, high mileage cars rarely have mint interiors.
PaddlerEd
jamesinc;133559 wroteCan't argue about interiors though, high mileage cars rarely have mint interiors.
The drivers seat in my V70 was best described as well worn... The others were hardly used. Reps car for the first 125,000 miles/3 years of its life... I got it with about 170,000 miles at 7 years old, and ran it for another 3 years/50,000ish miles. 10 years old and 225,000miles, it was great.
Major Ledfoot
ICEDVOVO;133556 wroteNext time I look for a car I'll give the low k cars a wide berth and look for one that;s done 550000km instead.
It will obviously be in far superior condition to the low k cars and is bound to have had one conscientious and fastidious owner who have replaced and repaired every conceivable component , kept the bodywork and interior in showroom condition and recorded every service in the logbook and also somehow managed to avoid every other idiot on the road in its 550000 km of travel.
If it's one of Irv Gordon's cars all that is likely to be true.
deleted_user_2040
Boxy, your attitude towards the discussion is too pretentious. Ie not based upon factual events. Every car is different, every driver is different, and every mechanic is different. Try talking to Seldon Cooper's or Irv Gordon's mechanic about high-mileage. Your viewpoint on the distance a car has traveled vs the quality of it's repairs and durability (even though both cars have only had the single owner) is way too loose.
Had you bought a brand new car in 1966, and driven it 5 million kilometres, you would have a very different understanding that just because a car has done over xxx,xxx kilometres, it is now a shit box and worth nothing. So don't buy it.
You have to think a bit more logically about each car you come across based on the owner, maintenance records, overall condition, drive quality etc
As this has been mentioned before, if a car has low kilometres, it's not a sole reason to buy it JUST because of that number on the odometer. It's a car as a whole, and equal consideration has to be given to all areas of the vehicle.
Believe me I have seen some crap cars with low miles on them.
ICEDVOVO
Pretentious? Do you own a dictionary?
I can assure you I am many things, but my contribution here has not been "pretentious" but the logic has proven to be a little challenging for some people.
Machines wear. The longer you use a machine the more its components wear.
Change the oil every week and it will still wear.
Metal rubbing on metal at high speeds and high heat = WEAR
Yes there are FREAK cars that have done a million miles.
It defies logic that a well maintained high mileage car can be just as good or somehow better than a well maintained low mileage car. A car that has done 500000 ks has 5 times the engine wear than a car 100000ks.
Car manufacturers like Volvo engineer their cars for a long lifetime but that lifetime is highly dependant on regular maintenance. Most people don't maintain their cars and skip service intervals so the
That is why public consensus is tipped in the favour of low kilometer cars. It's an opinion based on common logic and wisdom ; not some romantic notion that its "an oldie but a goodie" or that it's somehow better because it somehow survived 500000km.
Of course there are DUD low k cars. But there are a hell of lot more DUD high K cars.
So if you are looking to buy a car logic would have you look for a low k one first with a good service record. But if an immaculate high K car with an excellent log book and service record was available for the same price would I look at it? Of course I would. But very carefully.