h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm getting a bit tired of Volvo-baiting. I'm not a humourless person of uncertain parentage - if I was I daresay I would drive a Mercedes instead - but I can speak with conviction on the issue of Volvos, as I currently have three of them. I suppose I should be grateful that with the new designs we are assumed to be doing 90 with a mobile instead of 68 with a flat cap, but that's another matter.

I drive Volvos for the following excellent reasons:

1. I have a wife and two small children, who I value more highly than, say, the number of spokes on the alloy wheels of my company car

2. The roads are full of people driving company Vectras and Mundanes, who value life itself less than the number of spokes etc.

3. er....

4. That's it.

Actually, that's not it. Also I have a 1991 940 which has done 125,000 miles and is completely free of rust, uses absolutely no oil, and will cruise comfortably in excess of any UK speed limit (add at least 60% if in, say, Germany). It has aircon, automatic transmission, power steering and cost the same as a similar vintage Escort with none of these, and which lacks steel bars in its sidelights (a standard design feature on all Volvos, of course).

I'd take years of Volvo-baiting over a week of General Motor's Lemon driving. How bad could it be?

http://www.oknet1.net/~neverbob/gm

You won't believe it.

Takes me back to my random-stalling Carlton, which used to drive happily for between 30 and 90 minutes, then just stop for no apparent reason. Once it had cooled down it would drive on again. Rinse and repeat, ad nauseam.

This is, however, not even close to the all-world crap car you describe on your link! I'm stunned!

On closer inspection this is the car sold over here as the Belmont, a sort of Astra with a boot, and in Europe probably as the Opel Rekord. These cars are designed to last about 3 years, but some make it much longer. I can't drive them because the seat won't go back far enough (6'1") and my wife (5'4" - average height for a woman) can't drive it because the seat is too low and won't go forward far enough. They are, in short, not my favourite cars - although probably better than the Ford Escort. My bro-in-law worked as warranty administrator i a Ford dealership (who says there's no such thing as a job for life?) and in 18 months every single 3-year-old Escort failed its first compulsory safety check.

No surprise there. It's amazing that we let auto manufacturers saddle the very people who need cheap reliable transportation with the exact opposite. But I'm sure the manufacturers are aware that those who can afford these pieces of junk are the type who do not know their rights, or are less likely to examine possible areas of recourse.

Well, over here people buy Fords because every town has a garage which can mend them. Few make the leap of imagination necessary to conclude (a) why there are so very many people able to make a living out of mending these cars and (b) why it should be important that you are never more than 5 miles from a mechanic.

I have had to repair my 1991 Volvo, though. The catalytic converter only lasted 119,000 miles, and the fan belt not much more. The (aftermarket) aircon also needed a new pressure switch at 125,000, and I had to replace the rear dampers (shocks) at 110,000.

I heard about a guy who had a Citroen XM, six years old, fully serviced. The gearbox broke and he was advised to scrap the car, as the box costs more than the car was worth.

Sounds like most vehicles now. A dent runs a few thousand to repair. Perhaps a side-effect of greed and insurance premiums?

Hi, sorry for the delay - been on leave.

I think the high cost of bodywork repairs these days is down to a combination of factors:

- crumple zones, so cars squash rather than bounce off like they used to
- metallic paint, which is a cow to match
- less rust, so fewer panels sold
- lack of third-party pattern parts for modern cars (although pattern panels for your GM should be readily available)
- high expectations for insurance work - in the old days knocking the dent out and painting it would have been OK, but now we want the car to look like new again

I'm sure that profiteering by manufacturers also enters into it - like the way they tried to stop sales of pattern panels, glass and body fittings - even though for the most part they came from the same factory - on some spurious "safety" grounds.

The cost still boggles the mind. Materials that "crumple" (read: fiberglass) and 5 MPH bumpers just don't seem as safe as a large steel tank with 30 MPH bumpers. I know, I used to have a '78 Bonneville, and once got backended (while sitting still) by a new van doing 45 MPH.

The van was totaled... they had to crowbar the doors open.

My car got a busted taillight and a bent fender. I believe my rearview mirror also required re-adjustment...

It seems to go against logic, doesn't it? The bumpers on my 940 are steel girders mounted on hydraulic rams, so it takes a bit of a shunt to get within a foot of the bodywork proper, but these plastic bumpers are crap. They are all show, and just fall apart at the slightest impact. Then they cost you a fortune because they have special undercoats and metallic paint. My new car (as it will be in about 4 1/2 weeks) has painted plastic bumpers. Well, so does my V70, but that's the company's, so I don't give a toss.