Looking at a vectra for a cheap car for a while. Circa 2001 to 2002 age, 120k ish, £600 to £800 ish.

Seen a 2001 2.2L petrol CDX model. Cruise control, leather, saloon rather than hatchback. Looks a nice car for the money.

Any experience of vectras around this age, any known issues, etc

Any help/info much appreciated.

any buyers tips

don't…

Lol, it'd be better than the one I have at the moment, mine needs more work doing than it's worth, so time to try a different one. I've driven the 1.8 16v model tears ago as a hire car that I had fora few weeks. Not brilliant but a decent motorway car.

Rust!

😉

They bad for it? My 1999 ford is doing a good job of recycling itself at the moment.

ignore all this boloks….

great cars – on my second – a 1.8 petrol – not too bad on juice 41mpg and take 2-3 bikes easy. curise in comoft at 80-90. very comfy

buying tips – listen for knocking on bushes both front and rear – not too expensive, power steering also so lock to lock look for leaks / knocks , electric windows can be a bit troublesome but its about a £40 scrapyard and pop riveter job to fix.

mines on 110k and goes really well – my dads had the diesel, 2.2 petrol and 1.8 petrol also. no real issues in 100k miles – few rear boxes on exhaust, air con pump went but he left it for a few yrs before stumping up the cash. nothing much else to report. clearly mine will **** up big style now but for £600 for a W reg FSH 11 mths mot i've already had the value out of it

For the love of God don't. Seriously, Clarkson used to take the piss, and I thought he was just being arsey, until I had to drive one, a 1.8L, and it was, quite honestly, the worst car I've ever had the misfortune to drive. It was a lease car at work, and I was wriggling around in discomfort within five minutes of getting in the car. It was slow, and just plain nasty. An STi 130 that replaced it at least had Recaro's in, which helped a lot, but I would never, ever buy one.

2.2 engine worst of lot.neighbours was never out of the garage, he was going to trade it and garage did him a deal on another. same story, after a year he binned it for a Honda. Another mate had 2 engines fail, there is/was an oil feed problem to camshaft for 1 problem and various ecu gremlins to add to the list. Why Toyota are being picked on by the press is questionable imo
Wife used to get them as hire cars till she requested anything other than vectra due to poor driving position. Something the Insignia has not improved on as she found out last week to her discomfort 😕

Personally I'd go for an Astra over the Vectra.

My last Vectra was a 2.2i of 2006 vintage, put over 70k's on in 2 years.

Not a single problem, apart from dints/scratches on every single panel (including the roof…, Thule vs hopeless user) – fast and very cheap to run – as opposed to the Mercs run by many other colleagues.

Ignore Clarkson and all the rest of the rich boys.

So worth a drive before buying to see what the driving position is like then? I'm not expecting a great car, just something to put bikes/work gear in and run up and down motorways in.

Other option is a mk3 golf gti, but not as much room in the boot.

Is a 2001 going to be a MK1 or a MK2?

I've gor a 54 plate MK2 2.0 DTI and its fine. Not the most stylish car in the World but I don't care. Bags of room, good ecomomy and it hasn't let me down apart from the alternator going.

2001 will be a facelift Vectra B I reckon.

I had a 97 Vectra and that was a pre-facelift Vectra B.

Did you know that the Vauxhall Cavalier was the Vectra A?

Personally I'd go for an Astra over the Vectra

I'm on my second Astra. The first was a 2002 and was a bit slow but well made. The latest is a 2006. Its faster and roomier but sadly much crappier. Its poorly made, unreliable, expensive to run and the most uncomfortable car on long journeys I've ever had. I'm only holding onto it as I can't afford to replace it at the moment. Rubbish drivetrain as well.

Tried a Vectra once. Never again.

driving around a mk3 astra and very much like it. Will fit two bikes easily and can probably take 4 if you really wanted but then youd have no room for the extra two passengers 😀

See tonnes of astras/vectras about so regardless of what people say they cant be THAT bad!

My 1994 Astra is a heap and up to 163k it still does 40+ to the gallon so I keep it going

See tonnes of astras/vectras about so regardless of what people say they cant be THAT bad!

They are cheap second hand and tough to kill. Apart from that I honestly don't think they have many redeeming features. But then it depends what you want from a car. I reckon if you want a cheap, well made, second hand car that will handle lots of long journeys and take a couple of bikes an old Saab 9-5 or even a Ford Mondeo is a better bet.

Big Dave – Member
See tonnes of astras/vectras about so regardless of what people say they cant be THAT bad!
They are cheap second hand and tough to kill. Apart from that I honestly don't think they have many redeeming features. But then it depends what you want from a car. I reckon if you want a cheap, well made, second hand car that will handle lots of long journeys and take a couple of bikes an old Saab 9-5 or even a Ford Mondeo is a better bet.

Servicing and spare parts are reasonably well priced as well.

Still quite soulless cars though, but I guess it depends what you want out of a car.

The spare parts are reasonably cheap. Unfortunately my Astra seems to need rather a lot of them!

The build quality just doesn't seem to be too good on modern Vauxhalls. My 2002 Astra felt bombproof. My 2006 model feels like it will struggle to reach 70,000 miles. I shan't be buying another.

blah blah blah….

for 600 notes you cant go wrong…

dozy cow at work paid £475 to get her 3 yr old A4 Serviced then a further £450 on the mot nuff said…

cheap cars of any make make sense

Granted and old Vetra is an average car.
But for under a grand it may be a good bet. For that price you just want something that works.

My dad had one from new, well used, properly maintained.
The garage offered £300 quid trade in so he gave it to me as a motorway commuter car to save my other car.
I did 45k in 2 years bringing it to 167k, it never broke down and only needed a new battery and routine servicing. Failed Mot on Catalytic so scrapped as I didn't need it anymore.

This was a 1.8 petrol and dig 40mpg on runs.
Dull but works, the newer version is awfull by the way.

Personally, I'd go for the equivalent Mondeo over the Vectra. The Mondeo will edge the Vectra on handling, a Passat will have either on build. 1.8T Passats are very cheap for what they are, but again, not earthmoving.

Vectras are just not great cars. Fine workhorses.

There were issues with the timimg chain on the 2.2 engine, a possible recall. Even timing chains can snap.

I'd avoid… Unless it was in good nick for giveaway money.

I've driven a few of these, plus a number of Astras of varying ages. They all seem to have a seriously compromised driving position, something Volkswagen got absolutely right with a 1983 vintage Golf. Vauxhall's seats are unsupportive and the offset steering wheel had my back aching within twenty minutes.

I'm generally fine with other cars I've driven like Fords, Alfas, Volkswagens etc but I really struggle to get comfortable in Vauxhalls.

I like Vauxhall, always have, but I had a 2001 Vectra, 2.2 and it was terrrible, kept it 12 months.. it's going to kill you on tax and on fuel consumption, I'm sure mine was either being syphoned or there was a hole in the tank

I had a 2001 vectra which a traded in a few years ago with just under 120,000 on the clock. It was faultless in all that time we had it, it was well looked after and didn't need any major work in the time we had it apart from usual serviceing and still looked good when I px'ed it. But it did strat to fel as if the engine was on the way out. No rust on it at all btw.

I'd go for a Saab 9-5. For that money you will get a pretty solid car. The 9-5 is based on the Vectra platform and shares many components with the vectra but is arguably a better car. Cheap bits can be had from German and Swedish. They also have the best seats of any car I've ever driven.

thanks for all the replies, still thinking about it.

Other options are:
Volvo
http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201020359277995/original-id/201009353694148/associated-ids/201018358086848%2C201018358157083%2C201020359277995%2C201021359861661%2C201022360201525/usedcars/postcode/ne97qn?logcode=a

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201034366719507/sort/priceasc/usedcars/price-to/1000/make/volvo/page/1/postcode/ne97qn/quicksearch/true/radius/100?logcode=p

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201033366319486/sort/priceasc/usedcars/price-to/1000/make/volvo/page/4/postcode/ne97qn/radius/100/quicksearch/true?logcode=p

SAABs look good, but a turbo engine has a lot more to go wrong than a N/A petrol doesn't it?

I don't mind changing stuff like brakes / shocks myself but engine/turbo is a bit beyond me. Any idea what the lifetime of a petrol turbo engine like the SAAB is?

or these http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201034366788226/sort/priceasc/usedcars/price-to/1000/model/passat/make/volkswagen/postcode/ne97qn/page/1/radius/100?logcode=p

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201029364031391/sort/priceasc/usedcars/price-to/1000/model/passat/make/volkswagen/postcode/ne97qn/page/1/radius/100?logcode=p

Changing turbos is easy, provided you can get at the thing.

Saab 9000 or 9-5 turbos are pretty tough things, provided you've not turned up the boost. Go for the LPT version and you should be fine. Mine was at 118k when I got it and 160k when it died (fixable, but not economic to put new shocks, a full exchaust and new brakes on a car worth £300). Engine was still absolutely fine, did an average 36ish mpg with no real attempt to dive uber-economically. Long motorway runs were closer to 40mpg.

Volvo turbos are equally rugged – the 2.5T is a really good lump. I know of a chauffeur who swears by them and changes cars at about 250k. Hasn't had a turbo go ever.

quite tempted by the T5,although I think my insurance may go up if switching from a Fiesta to a T5!

They seem like good cars, but I went and saw a fair few and all but one of them was infested with tinworm (the one that wasn't was more expensive with a lower spec, funnily enough) Course, the same's going to be true of most decent milage cheap cars but they were worse than the average. Eventually I gave up on them entirely, I really like 'em as cars (we always had Cavaliers when I was a kid) but it was just taking up too much time trying to sift out a good one.

Ignore the bad talk. I bought a 2001 (old shape) vectra diesel cheap as a budget A-B car for under a grand. I expected it to be rubbish but it's prefectly fine for the job. One advantage of being unfashionable is you get more car for the money. Parts are cheap and seems reliable. Can't comment on a petrol, mine is diesel 2l.

I have a 97 (r) vectra I got it on 145k I've had it two years it's now on 172k Its just had motorway use mainly, no major issues,it's slow yes but who needs a fast car! I've maintained it regulary bits are cheap ie fuel filters biggest outlay was a new ball joint, still going strong and will be sad to see her go on the weekend, only thing I have found is the interior is starting to fail on me seat now feels like you sat in a bucket and other bits are wearing out other than that it's fine!

Mines a 1.6 petrol