Advice on MOT advisories

Buying a ‘5 and Insurance advice Buying Advice
2

Hi all,

I’m going to look at a UK car with the following advisories on it’s last MOT

  • Offside Rear sill corroding
  • Offside Front floor to sill corroded,but not within prescribed area.
  • Offside Rear Brake pipe slightly corroded to flexi (3.6.B.2c)
  • Nearside Front brake disc corroding
  • Nearside Rear Shock absorber has a light misting of oil (2.7.3)
The usual stuff, except I haven’t seen number 2 before 
  • Offside Front floor to sill corroded,but not within prescribed area.
Is this area another normal rust spot (along with the others), and is it easy or expensive to sort out ( I realise it’s hard to say without seeing it in the flesh)

 

Thanks

 

Carl

3

Hi Carl

You don’t say what MK of MX5 it is but that would only make the potential sill repair more difficult if a MK2 rather than MK1.

Rusty brake disc should be checked to see if cleared     

Brake pipe may need replacing but could just need cleaning up and waxoiling

If the shock absorber is misting, the seal has gone so at least one shock required.

The main issue here is the rust, how much it will cost to weld and whether the car is worth it.

Put up some pictures if you decide to view.

If it is a MK2 pay particular attention to the front chassis rails as MOTers still miss corrosion on these. Corrosion in this area will cost a lot of money to put right. 

4

Hi Rhino666

Forgot to say it’s a MK1, just going to have a look at it now, will report back later.

Thanks for your reply ???

Carl

5

A few pics (hopefully) for perusal. She’s a bit crusty, drove well with no horrible noises, although the brakes are quite wooden !!

A couple of pics I forgot to take, nearside wing has rust at the front corner, and offside windscreen pillar has a rust patch on it

6

Unless you are on good terms with your bank manager walk away , unless the car is being given to you free even then id have to think about it

7

 

 

+1 to that. 

 

8

Too rusty IMO.

9

Leave it alone

10

Couple hundred for spares or an intensive ground up restoration “project”.

Pity. Looks like a rarer Merlot Vin Rouge. 

3k upwards…at a very conservative guess… to get it even near to as it was. 

Probably a candidate for scrap though.

11

Thanks for your comments everyone, my first thoughts when I looked underneath was along the line of ‘oh god, here we go again’ !!!

It seems that anything fairly local to me is a rust bucket, and anything that looks half decent (which may not be the case when you see it in the flesh !!) is a 3-4 hour trip away, or costs £5K !!

cheers

Carl

12

Carl,

Sorry about the result, but increasingly, it’s becoming far more adviseable to hunt down a provenanced “Club car”…and I’m not just referring to this OC Forum.

Were I in your situation, I’d not think of any other route now. Still no g’tees, bu the batting average would rise.

13

Sorry it didn’t work out - but if you keep looking and are quick to act when a good un crops up you’l be ok. I recently came across a good mk1 for £950  local to me - it sold within a day , Colin 

14

ScottishFiver

You’re probably right, I like the look of the 1998 MK2 for sale on here by Simon C, but nearly £4K for a MK2 is beyond me !!

 

colindash

That’s the way to do it alright, I’ve missed out on a couple of good ones because I can’t get to View until the weekend, by which time (not surprisingly) they’ve gone !! 

Getting a bit desperate now…as you can tell ??

Carl

15

Only just seen the photos.

There is a lot of work there and that rear sill looks to have been repaired before.

I have a welder but that would be too much of a labour of love for me.

It is only the rust that would put me off, not just the sills but also the wishbones and other suspension looks very crusty.

If it has a long MOT and is offered  to you for around £300 buy it to drive and enjoy for the summer.   

16

No car is unsaveable:

  1. The general crustiness of the wishbones etc wouldn’t be to off putting to me.
  2. As said, the rear sill has been filled. I would budget £1400-1600 to have both rear arches, sills cut out, attendant repairs made to the inner sills.
  3. Floor pan might just need wire brushing and treatment, rather than welding.
  4. Front wings; used wings aren’t worth messing around with. Good ones are hard to find, and the specialist breakers are asking too much. Genuine Mazda wings are £150 each, pattern wings are around £100 (Taiwanese, I’ve heard it from some sources that these appear to be made from old Mazda tooling, so fitment is pretty good), easy DIY fit, £100 to paint.
  5. Windscreen rust is difficult; it might just be a stone chip thats spread. Or rot following a windscreen replacement. Aftermarket windscreen seals are smooth.

Bodywork repair costs aren’t as uncontrollable as you might think, because on the MX5, there isn’t that much bodywork. You can easily see pretty much the entire structure. With other cars, the creeping costs are because you can’t see so much of it. With the Mk1, the worst case scenario costs can be easily costed out, and then balanced against the purchase price.

If nothing else is up with the bodywork, you are looking at £2000-2250 to sort out, including a scrape down and underseal of the underside. Whether that’s worth it depends on the price of the car to start with. if the rest of car is good (especially that trim), and it hasn’t got a bazillion miles on it, if its a £1000 or less, it might be worth saving. As it has a ticket on it, the work doesn’t need to be done immediately, but can be done in stages. Allowing £500 to attend to any mechanical issues, you are in for under £4k, in the knowledge that you have a good car after that work.

You can spend £2000-4000 on a car, but you really might not know how good it is. That “rust free, never welded” car might be a ticking time bomb of red dust. That “recently repaired” might be either fill and skim, or proper metal repair.

Have a look at how a pretty rusty Mk1 was dealt with:
http://thrussingtongarage.co.uk/mx-5-restoration
http://www.motorpunk.co.uk/articles/total-restoration-of-one-of-the-oldest-mx-5s-around/

I’d be interested to see what that S-Special 2 that has appeared on the forum goes for.

17

That S special 2 has got the RS Recaro seats in it, and the seller wants £3k for them alone. 

18
19

Thanks again everyone for your comprehensive replies, it’s most appreciated ???. It’s going for in excess of £1300 at the moment, I think someone is going to be a bit peed off, but I can’t believe you wouldn’t go for a look first.

 

Anyway, I’ve been to look at another MK1 today, which looked a hell of a lot better all around, it has only had a small patch to offside sill, the only downer is that as it’s SORN, I couldn’t drive it, also the seller has only had it for a few months, however it has a years MOT with only the following advisories, which aren’t bad at all.

  • Exhaust has a minor leak of exhaust gases (7.1.2)
  • Front Brakes imbalanced requirements only just met. It would appear that the braking system requires adjustment or repair. (3.7.B.5b)
  • Track rod end ball joint dust cover deteriorated, but preventing the ingress of dirt both (2.2.C.1c)
  • Offside Front Shock absorber has a light misting of oil (2.7.3)
I suppose I need to make a fairly quick decision, before I get beaten to it again, just don’t want to buy a horror story.

It’s priced at £1500 !!

Carl

 Just seen that the Merlot I took pictures of, went for £1750 ???

20

Hi Carl

heads up, there is a mk 2 1.6 Angels in silver, £2000, on the Solent forum

if you have not seen it