FTO AUSTRALIA

Because XJ is the searching master.

haha, well I'm going to ring them up soon, to see if we can have a look at it on wednesday, if we're happy with it, we will pay for AA to take a good look. Then if it all turns out good... well I may have a new car
but it all depends on the Ks on the engine and just the general condition on the engine first....

Sooo had a talk to the owner, I'm taking it for a test drive on Wednesday, if I'm happy with it, i will get an AA inspection done on it on Thursday.

On the down side, it has 203,000Ks on the clock...
on the bright side, he wants $2500 for it....

So I've got something to think about.....

Engine may need a rebuild or one hell of a fresh up..

Then I would be looking at suspension, hubs and bearings..

yea, i'll see what the condition of it is, what would you guys recommend to look out for in a car of the high Ks?

suspension I think it MAY be lowered already, so may have a complete new setup, not too sure on that

Technikhaus wrote:yea, i'll see what the condition of it is, what would you guys recommend to look out for in a car of the high Ks?

suspension I think it MAY be lowered already, so may have a complete new setup, not too sure on that

High K's don't really matter too much. It just depends how the car is looked after. But I would assume mounts, bushes and all those types of things..

yea, I'm just trying to think of how much it will cost me to get the car into a good running condition...
as in to see whether it is worth paying 2.5K for this then maybe putting in another K to get it up to scratch etc...
although at this time I do not know what condition the mechanicals are in.

Technikhaus wrote:yea, I'm just trying to think of how much it will cost me to get the car into a good running condition...
as in to see whether it is worth paying 2.5K for this then maybe putting in another K to get it up to scratch etc...
although at this time I do not know what condition the mechanicals are in.

Honestly.. I would budget another 3k plus ..

3K?

what are we really looking at though?

I'm guessing you would have your normals like filters and oils etc... but what else?

You could be up for anything dude,
Most things that will wear over time will need replacing - might need a new timing kit on there, water pump and or numerous other things like anything suspension related like droplinks or struts, filters, all the little things that will add up.
Then again you might find its in good condition - you just dont know.

At the end of the day its better to overbudget than underbudget.

Thanks guys,
I'm just trying to figure out whether it is worthwhile getting something like this, or getting one for ~$4.5K with ~140,000Ks....

I paid 5.5k for mine with 194k on the engine. I did not get it checked because I'm an idiot.
The day I bought it the harmonic balancer fell off and fucked my crankshaft.
Ended up needing an engine replacement.
But yeah just get it checked thoroughly if it's good then you can't complain about that price!

200k's I would be taking the engine apart. Checking all seals.. Bearings.. Cams.. Replacing sprk plugs.. Water pump.. All belts and pulleys.. Injectors (giving a good clean and looking for wear).. Then moving on to brake lines.. Discs.. Hubs.. Wheel bearings.. Gearbox.. Crank...

Then moving on to suspension.. Bushes.. Mounts.. And the neglected 02 sensor..

I am starting to look at this stuff and am only at 150k..

xj265 wrote:Came across it by looking for body kits a long time ago lol

plus hes the search king from what i can see

phi-tec wrote:

xj265 wrote:Came across it by looking for body kits a long time ago lol

plus hes the search king from what i can see

oh my bad didnt see stefs post haaha

rock_it wrote:200k's I would be taking the engine apart. Checking all seals.. Bearings.. Cams.. Replacing sprk plugs.. Water pump.. All belts and pulleys.. Injectors (giving a good clean and looking for wear).. Then moving on to brake lines.. Discs.. Hubs.. Wheel bearings.. Gearbox.. Crank...

Then moving on to suspension.. Bushes.. Mounts.. And the neglected 02 sensor..

I am starting to look at this stuff and am only at 150k..

Sure, if you want a brand new car

Seriously, for $2.5K you have to expect it will need a few things fixed, but no need to replace everything if most of it is still OK. Yes if there is no history def look at replacing the timing belt, just for piece of mind. But if there's no oil leaks I wouldn't worry about seals or gaskets too much. Same with bushes and drop links, check em, if they're still solid leave em alone. Of course a lot of your decision will come down to how much you can do yourself and how much you need to pay someone to do it for you. ie if you're paying someone, and it needs a new clutch, do the rear main seal while the gearbox is off, that sort of thing.

Get NRMA to do a vehicle check on it, they'll go over it with a fine tooth comb and give you a pretty good report. If the report is OK with no major issues buy it, if not keep looking.

How much reg is on it? Factor that into the price (ie if it has 12months, then you're only paying around $1500 for the car, bargain!).

Shane001 wrote:

rock_it wrote:200k's I would be taking the engine apart. Checking all seals.. Bearings.. Cams.. Replacing sprk plugs.. Water pump.. All belts and pulleys.. Injectors (giving a good clean and looking for wear).. Then moving on to brake lines.. Discs.. Hubs.. Wheel bearings.. Gearbox.. Crank...

Then moving on to suspension.. Bushes.. Mounts.. And the neglected 02 sensor..

I am starting to look at this stuff and am only at 150k..

Sure, if you want a brand new car

Seriously, for $2.5K you have to expect it will need a few things fixed, but no need to replace everything if most of it is still OK. Yes if there is no history def look at replacing the timing belt, just for piece of mind. But if there's no oil leaks I wouldn't worry about seals or gaskets too much. Same with bushes and drop links, check em, if they're still solid leave em alone. Of course a lot of your decision will come down to how much you can do yourself and how much you need to pay someone to do it for you. ie if you're paying someone, and it needs a new clutch, do the rear main seal while the gearbox is off, that sort of thing.

Get NRMA to do a vehicle check on it, they'll go over it with a fine tooth comb and give you a pretty good report. If the report is OK with no major issues buy it, if not keep looking.

How much reg is on it? Factor that into the price (ie if it has 12months, then you're only paying around $1500 for the car, bargain!).

Thanks to all of you for all that (inc Rock_it), it's the type of info i was looking for.
AA will be doing a check if we are happy with it on Wednesday, it's the same that NRMA do, it costs $170
Will be trying to do most of the work myself but with help from people who know quite a bit
Barely any rego on it, but it's much cheaper here than in aus, 12 months rego is $270, it's part of the reason why it's so cheap

Doing the work yourself will save you a wad of cash..

But yeah, most of the things could have been replaced at the 200k service. For all we know, this car could have a1 mechanically maintained. Which is why there is no harm in buying some high K cars..

Either way.. Good luck with the inspection. Thise things are usually very detailed.

Yep, and the AA inspection hopefully will pick up any issues, then offer him $2K, if it's nearly out of reg he'll be getting pretty keen to sell it.

Dunno if I will get it for 2....
It's advertised for 3k. And I've already got it down to 2.5k... I can only try I guess.