Purchase – Astra 1.6 Design

This was a ‘chance’ purchase as I managed to get between the previous owner and the scrap man…  Yep, it had been sold for scrap, but the dealer didn’t show up and so I bought it instead.  It’s rust free, pretty much free of marks and dings, low mileage and a nice spec, with half leather, front and rear electric windows, automatic lights and rain-sensing wipers.  What’s not to like?

So there’s a reason why it was going for scrap – it was a non-runner, months out of MOT and had been parked under a tree for at least a year.

Here’s what it looked like when I bought it… (click the pics for full screen versions)

Anyway, A deal was done and my first job was to replace the battery and see if it ran, the starter motor seemed to be stuck to begin with as there was only the ‘flat battery click’ from the solenoid, but after a few turns of the key it started straight up and ran smoothly.  Forwards and back in its parking place showed the wheels went round, gears and brakes worked.  A quick check of lights showed no faults too, so could I really take it for a test?  Next job then was to clean the windows and insure it so I could get it to an MOT station.  The brakes were a quite growly on the way to the test but cleaned up well and worked smoothly by the time it got there.

MOT required a set of wiper blades, new rear wheel bearing (no photos) and a good run up to temperature for the emissions to pass.  Of course, once road legal, it got a quick wash on a snowy day and actually looks very presentable.

After…

There’s also a job list that will effectively be my journal owning and maintaining it, I think it is a good candidate for a ‘bangernomics’ assessment of what it costs to own and run a 10 year old (almost scrapped) car.  Compare that perhaps, with the depreciation each year on a newer car…