25 February 2007

Buying a new car

Just before Christmas, my Peugeot 206 let me down - it started misfiring or randomly stalling. It took a few weeks and several hundred pounds to fix it - a stuck injector. I was already disappointed with this car - it went well enough but seemed to have a few electrical issues: central locking failed after two years (I had to fight to get it fixed under warranty), A/C made the engine almost stall in stop/start traffic, A/C + fan switch would stop working one day and work fine the next, and finally the alarm system kept going off, waking me once in the night.

So I traded it in, and bought a Honda Jazz, with a 1.4 CVT engine. It's my first automatic, and my first five door car. I was a little concerned that it might not perform too well - was 1.4 too underpowered? That doesn't seem to be the case - its a quiet efficient engine, and a real pleasure to drive.

The salesman did tell me a few wrong facts about the Jazz: I asked if when the immobiliser was switched if there was a red light flashing on the console - there isn't, the salesman said he thought there was. Also, on the day I picked up my car, he said it had an electric heater to help clear the windows in cold weather - this simply isn't true.

Some options on the Jazz puzzle me - why the continuous rear wash wipe unless you buy a sport model? Why not offer it as an option?

I had planned on buying a second hand car perhaps a year old or younger... the Jazz brand new was more or less the same price as a year old model, so I went for a new one.

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