mx5cartalk.com

A friend showed me this for sale listing;

https://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/north-h ... 1202544341

The photos aren't much chop although what starts to fall apart after that long, is metal fatigue a thing for these cars?

Metal fatigue? Are you joking...

No i'm just clueless (which is why i'm asking). Could you go 1,000,000,000 kilometres? Surely there's a limit, is 552 000 approaching it?

lol... metal fatigue there are mx5's in Japan and US of A that have roughly double the mileage than that or are approaching 1,000,000km... i would say the worst thing it can be affected by is sill rust but thats the bare minimum, really just depends on how well they were looked after IMHO...

Edit: Btw it looks like a clubman... so someone better snap it up at that price!

My gfs NA had about 450,000km before it got pulled apart.

Other than the usual things that wear etc the only real unexpected stuff that wears out is things like steering wheels, door handles and stuff from years of hands rubbing.

I can only imagine how much the dealer paid the owner for it...and now asking $5990

https://www.gumtree.com.au/s-ad/north-h ... 1202544341
May be 552000 is a typo, not that I'm suggesting it's 52000. FWIW, there was a Silverstone NA8 with about 350k kms for sale in Mornington Vic on here a few years ago - IIRC, seller wanted $3k-$4k for it & it was for sale for ages, if indeed it sold at all.

The OP is kinda right, though. Anyone who has owned a car for a long time and a big mileage knows that eventually you are constantly replacing things that are just worn out.
My 23 yo Nissan Bluebird (only 200,000ks) was a case in point of a quality product that had been obsessively looked after but had just reached the point where one thing after another would fail and the ongoing maintenance was not financially justifiable (unless you were doing it all yourself).

Rocky wrote:My 23 yo Nissan Bluebird (only 200,000ks) was a case in point of a quality product that had been obsessively looked after but had just reached the point where one thing after another would fail and the ongoing maintenance was not financially justifiable (unless you were doing it all yourself).

My 2008 Golf GTI was the same, except it only had 70,00km on it. I was warned not to own a German car beyond 5 years old, I didn't listen and at exactly 5 years old it commenced a self destruct sequence. In hindsight I should of done the world a favour and set it on fire.

Made me laugh, Wolfgang.
I am a serial offender for keeping cars a long time. I only buy cars I really like and then have trouble moving on.
A GTi is high on my list as a replacement for my current Mazda 6 Hatch and IF I bought one it would almost certainly be owned for more than 5 years.
Maybe I should substitute a Toyota Corolla Hatch.

Rocky wrote:Made me laugh, Wolfgang.
I am a serial offender for keeping cars a long time. I only buy cars I really like and then have trouble moving on.
A GTi is high on my list as a replacement for my current Mazda 6 Hatch and IF I bought one it would almost certainly be owned for more than 5 years.
Maybe I should substitute a Toyota Corolla Hatch.

I think I might of had the post Oktoberfest built car, could explain why it was a trade in at 18 months old and 12,000km. Having spoken to other owners and the VW mechanic I used, mine seems to have had more problems than most. For example... the ABS module started to fail during the self destruct sequence, mechanic said he had never seen it happen on any VW of that era. If you do buy one get a manual, the DSG gearbox started to play up in mine and was going to cost me $7-8k to replace.

Yeah, I couldn't imagine not getting the Manual gearbox in a GTi although as the Missus says, we are now old retirees and swapping cogs round town is starting to lose it's attraction. As long as I have a sports car I will have a manual, however.
It does sound like you might have got a 'trouble-prone' vehicle as I haven't heard too many horror stories for non-DSG vehicles.
They are around - my Son's boss got a new Subaru 4wd that was an absolute lemon. They jerked him around something chronic. The vehicle should have been replaced with a new one as it was just a collection of faults on wheels.

Rocky, you have no traffic so a manual would be fine around town. When I rarely drive in peak hour in Melbourne I don't need an automatic, I need a helicopter.

Ahh- I have met a few blokes with old Toyotas and in fact later ones as well that do stratospheric KLMs. One guy with a 40 series LC said that you could get 850,000 klm out of a diesel. Still these are essentially under stressed and slow and built really like trucks and a slog in buy cities. Bruce is right about cites like Melbourne- too much traffic and autos have been Australias choice for decades. I not really sure why we need dsgs when they are so criticised.

You are both right about manual gearboxes for cars that live in Regional areas. The traffic is never so thick you can't manage a manual. The only time I ever think about automatics is when I am creeping along in capital city traffic - and I don't intend to do any more of that!
Also as you get older a manual is more "brain-fade" proof. You see a lot of news articles about old folks who jump on the gas when they meant to step on the brake. Easier to do in an automatic.
MM, I'm not sure why we need DSG gearboxes at all. Maybe there is a case for them in a racing car but they just seem like another unnecessarily complicated device in a daily-driver. I will never own a car with one.