Au-Revoir Focus!

[catch]

Yeah my car was three year old with 38,000 on the clock -

You bought at three year old, sorry I thought because you said you had had it two years, and you have it down as a 2005 model, I just did the maths and come up with you buying it at four year old like me. I bought an October 2005 in October 2009, so it was fours old when bought and I've now had it eighteen months. But I got it totally wrong regarding your mileage, it was not excessive at 38k.

And your relaying of the service you had at the Ford dealers when requesting a valuation. Well I'm not surprised you will never deal with them again.

Catch and many others here have bought very good cars, but then again, I think it could be as much to do with Mileage, as Catch doesnt do too many miles so that will help...

It's not the amount of miles a car does, indeed doing a lot of short journeys on cold engines [like the wife does]does more damage to a cars engine than one covering plenty of miles on the motorway sat in fifth gear at optimised engine temperature.

Truth is you got a 1.6 TDCi dog, just like hawker who also got a 1.6 TDCi dog, only his had circa 92k on the clock. And like hawker did, your also bailing out of the TDCi and buying petrol.................If only you had both bought petrol Focus's in the first place, you would now be enjoying the best to drive car in it's class bar non :) without the need to keep putting your hands in your wallet.

Last four cars I've had, three have been petrol Fords, longest I had one was nine years bought at a year old previously owned by Ford, a Mk1 1.8 GLX Mondeo, all it ever needed was servicing, and tyres and brakes renewed. Followed by a Mk1 1.8 Focus Zetec, three previous owners 99 on a T plate, bought at six years old with 57,405 miles on the clock. I had 3 years nine months of trouble free motoring other than having a wheel bearing replaced at £50 all in..............then a prat wrote it off. Admittedly 10 days prior to it being written off I had the clutch and front disks and pads renewed for £400, but it had done 79K. And I would still be driving it now, over two years on. It did not so much as drink a thimble full of oil all the time I had it.

And as for the fourth car, the Volvo S40 2.0D SE [Turbo Diesel] Now don't get me wrong I enjoyed every minute I spent, and every mile I drove in it, with it's heated leather seats,it's DTSC this that and the other.It wafted me and the wife hither and dither in complete safety and luxury, but it did not engage me like the Focus does. And you know what it was the first car that I ever had, that I started to worry about it braking down, not that it ever did in the nine months I had it. But I kept reading about £1000 services, Limp Home Modes, clogged / knackered Diesel Particulate Filters, buggered Dual Mass Flywheels.....so in the end I came home to petrol.....and back to never ever giving breaking down a thought again :)

I forgot to mention, that I took the car for a test drive on sunday and really like it, so I shall be disappearing back there on saturday and will definiately be waving bye bye to my focus... I doubt I will look back as I am driving away.

Welcome back to petrol Jeebs, glad for you that you liked the Ceed

[jeebowhite]

Thanks Catch, and yeah I look forward to petrol. The only reason I bought diesel was 1) Diesel was cheaper for petrol... 2) I didnt know that a DPF was, so didnt even realise I was walking into a nightmare...

[catch]

The only reason I bought diesel was 1) Diesel was cheaper for petrol... 2) I didnt know that a DPF was, so didnt even realise I was walking into a nightmare...

Your not on your own there jeeb, I did the exact same for the same reason, and yes totally clueless regarding the DPF. Of course on finding out, and on my low mileage, I realised with taking the servicing of the DPF into consideration, there were no savings to be had, but a small loss. And if the DMF went as well as the DPF, I would be well into the red, so I moved it one.

Besides the clutch was biting near the top of it's travel, so I could see the clutch needing doing in possibly a few thousand miles, and it would have been double what I paid to have the Focus one replaced. The one thing I learnt about Volvo's servicing is it is undertaken whilst wearing a mask, and nothing is cheap to get replaced. Where as Fords I've always found servicing and repairs to be fairly cheap.

The one thing I do miss though is the mid range poke of the Volvo's 2.0 turbo diesel engine. I definitely don't do the overtaking I used to do, in this 1.6 Focus ............but I might just treat myself to a Mk3 petrol turbo, after somebody eats a great deal of the depreciation for me :D

I bet it will seem like forever the rest of this week dragging by

[jeebowhite]

Definately is! Looking forward to Saturday for sure :) :P

[jeebowhite]

Well picked the car up on saturday, was disappointed to leave the focus behind, but the Cee'd is a good car! disappointed by the loss of MPG (good ol' petrol!) and miss the turbo but overall not found anything with the car I dont like (other than a loss of 40 litres in the boot). IMHO the Cee'd (so far) seems to be as good as the focus on handling, and performance (as far as the petrol goes) so im quite happy, dont feel like I have lost too much in swapping, all in all a fairly new car for a tad over £5000 I am quite happy so far! so I would recommend the Cee'd as a potential candidate for anyone who is looking at moving away from the blue oval!

[catch]

Really pleased for you mate,

not a lot you can do in regards to MPG when migrating back to petrol. As to the turbo, well get saving the pennies and I can see you sat in a Mk3 Focus 1.6 SCTI in a couple of years. :D All that lovely turbo acceleration, and returning the same mpg as you get with a non turbo Ceed.

As I suspect you will be able to pick them up second hand at reasonable money. And being petrol they will be very reliable. Take my petrol Focus, five and a half years old and nothing ailing it, other than the washer jets needed upgrading, at £26. And I cannot see anything on the radar, failing components wise in the next six months, making it six years old, and out of warranty [if it were a Kia Ceed, well the latest variant]

Anyway jeeb, for now you enjoy that peace of mind your obviously getting with the outstanding 5 years warranty left on the Ceed. But I'm betting your diesel pain will dim to be a distant memory, and you will in time return to the Blue Oval .................there again I could be totally wrong :D

[jeebowhite]

lol, yeah 6 out of 7 years warranty left is a god send and who knows I may return to Ford, but for now, I am enjoying my Cee'd more than I ever did the ford lol!

[catch]

lol, yeah 6 out of 7 years warranty left is a god send

Sorry yes it's six years left on the seven year warranty, does anybody give six? I know Toyota, Chevrolet and Hyundai give five.

and who knows I may return to Ford, but for now, I am enjoying my Cee'd more than I ever did the ford lol!

Well with the trouble you had, that would not be hard to do would it

Anyway jebb, you keep us informed how your finding the Ceed compared to the Focus. I mean apart from the obvious, it not being a pain in the !Removed! like your particular Focus was. Because there are obviously thousands of Focus 1.6 TDCi owners out there well suited with their motors. I dare say if you had bought a one year old Focus 1.6 TDCi so would you have been. Anyway you have my special dispensation to tell us all about you Ceed on the Focus forum :D

[jeebowhite]

lol Thanks Catch - I suppose it is strange talking about a "competition car" on the forums, but then again, I dare say I am one of very few, if not the only one, who may end up buying a FOC sticker, and putting it in the window of the Cee'd!

[catch]

lol Thanks Catch - I suppose it is strange talking about a "competition car" on the forums, but then again, I dare say I am one of very few, if not the only one, who may end up buying a FOC sticker, and putting it in the window of the Cee'd!

Jeeb, having re read my last sentence in my last post, and me teasing you about petrol Foci, it may sound like I'm saying " it's not on you talking about Ceed ownership on a focus forum"

Well if you read it that way it is not what I meant, I really am interested in how you go on with the Ceed mate. I mean there are many Oval badge guys saying the new Mk3 Focus is a look alike Kia Ceed So we might as well hear how you an ex Foci owner gets on with the Ceed.....so don't go wandering off :D

And it's time you updated your avatar to display the Ceed :)

[jeebowhite]

lol, Dont worry catch I didnt take it as anything negative! I know you guys enough that I can see when a virtual b*tch slap comes my way :P

And I agree with the comment on the mk3 Focus vs the Cee'd, I parked up yesterday outside work and a mk3 focus parked up opposite, didnt have the phone out quick enough so couldnt take a comparison shot, but they do look fairly similar!

So far all is good with the Cee'd, I found a "marginal" disappointment, in that I found the wind catches the cee'd more than it did the focus :( so when going a little bit quicker, it does get blown a little more than the focus did (I suppose thats as much to do with weight, as wheel base and suspension) but so far, its all good, I cant find anything in the Cee'd to really criticise, and I still stand by my earlier comment of the Cee'd is a good contender against the Focus!

As for the Avatar, I have a few days off this week, Im hoping to get a few pics, and probably will sort that out, unfortunately my son requires a lot of attention at the moment, so the pics will take a little longer than usual! hopefully it wont be too long though!

So far not disappointed, and actually, I have been so impressed by the car, it actually made me shout "WOOOOOOO" in the car! Yes, "WOOOOOOO" never did that with the Focus?!? I came around a nice corner on a motorway sliproad at 50, and planted my foot down and actually got the same response as I did from the Turbo in the Focus! I was impressed indeed!

Anyway, I will of course update the Avatar soon, and I will expand this particular thread further with updates on the Cee'd rather than spreading it across the boards!

[jeebowhite]

HAHA = I just found my Focus on the tintyweb :) For anyone who cares to see - take a look at it! this is more useful if you live in Meddway, Kent!!!

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201114383771722/sort/priceasc/usedcars/fuel-type/diesel/quantity-of-doors/5/maximum-age/up_to_7_years_old/body-type/hatchback/colour/grey/engine-size-cars/1-4l_to_1-6l/transmission/manual/price-to/8000/model/focus/make/ford/postcode/me72ne/page/1/radius/60?logcode=p

[akingcool]

why were you even searching for a focus again? :P

[jeebowhite]

I was sad lol and was looking specifically for mine :) I wanted to see how they advertised it and what sort of profit they were hoping to seek from it! I found out they put 2 grand on top of part ex price (no surprise) and they took the specs of the Titanium X car, and used it to describe my old one! (i.e. Perimiter alarm?!? I dont think so!) lol, plus they said its a spacesaver spare wheel! its all lies - its a 205/55 R16 V - Same as rest of the wheels - all it takes is a look in the boot and they would know

[jeebowhite]

For anyone who is interested: http://www.fordownersclub.com/forums/index.php?app=gallery&module=user&user=10869&do=view_album&album=587 pictures of my Cee'd!

[catch]

it stands well mate, nice easy clean alloys, non of those 20 /30 fins to clean independently like on the Mk2.5 Focus Titanium. Is it disc brakes all round, or like on the 1.6 Focus on the rear.......drums

[jeebowhite]

it stands well mate, nice easy clean alloys, non of those 20 /30 fins to clean independently like on the Mk2.5 Focus Titanium. Is it disc brakes all round, or like on the 1.6 Focus on the rear.......drums

Discs all round :) making maintenance a hell of a lot easier!

Will do some interior pics and upload them later!

EDIT: Just wondering, why although I have updated my Photo / Avatar my Focus is still my picture :|...

[catch]

EDIT: Just wondering, why although I have updated my Photo / Avatar my Focus is still my picture :|...

Not this end, when I replied to your first post today it was your Ceed in your avatar.

[jeebowhite]

Not this end, when I replied to your first post today it was your Ceed in your avatar.

That was me being a moron, and was put to rights by DanGull! it would appear my internet cache didnt clear... all good now :)

[jeebowhite]

So for anyone who is interested, I have had the car for 1500 miles now and thought I would post a review on how I found it so far.

Car is now 56 weeks old, has covered just less than 22000 miles in its lifetime.

Faults:

No Faults or problems on the car.

Handling:

So far the car handles brilliantly, throwing it around slip lanes on roundabouts at 60mph it handles as well as the focus. Power responsiveness on the out of that replicates the power of the focus well and has no noticeable lag, even compared to my TDCI.

Economy:

So far I have done three tanks, first was combination of foot down all the way, and some gramps style driving. Managed 360 miles out of the tank, even with 45 miles estimated remaining on the tank.

Second tank was gramps style driving, estimated 425 miles, and achieved 387 with 40 miles left on the tank to go. Fairly accurate trip computer

Third tank, averaging 70 - 80 (where law permits) so far clocked up 197 miles with an estimated 200 miles to go. It seems that a 30 mile journey currently costs around 45 miles of fuel according to the range on the trip computer, so there is some cost to the foot down approach. There is no granddad style driving at all on this tank!

Currently averaging 36 - 52 MPG dependant on driving style / speed. Currently costing around 18p per mile!

Capacity:

Plenty of leg room under the steering column, with a good amount of leg room for rear passenger, even with the driver seat quit far backwards, the Mrs can sit in the back comfortably. Boot is lacking compared to the focus, missing 40 litres, so that’s a disappointment, but so far, not had any issues squeezing in the little ones buggy and the shopping from the town!

Not quite storage capacity, but when the doors are opened, they open to about 80o wide, leaving more than enough room for the Mrs to get out of the back carrying the little one, without squeezing anywhere.

Plenty of space in the bonnet, maybe I should put some pictures, but there is plenty of gaps to get your hands in and fiddle, without slicing ribbons into your fingers!

Functionality:

Trip computer is split into Total ODO, Trip A ODO, Trip B ODO, Miles to Empty, Average Speed, Average Fuel Consumption, Live Fuel Consumption (I think that’s everything!) so no different to the focus handbook (although most the MK2’s came without the Live readout, although they should have had it!!!)

Stereo is good quality, built in AUX and USB connection as standard. Has a clear display, easy to use buttons, steering controls, overall only used half the functions but impressed none the less!

Access to Fuse Box is on the driver side, got to open the driver door, and then slide out the panel that sits between the door and the side of the dash to get access to the fuse board. Easier to get to than the Focus, but not brilliant if you need to change a fuse on a motorway!

What do I miss?

So Far, I miss the turbo as it was always fun to have it kick in, but the power of the engine is an extra 9 bhp, so other than losing a bit of torque, there isn’t much loss of power. (Also I was hoping to up the power, but without a diesel you can’t really use a tune box over a remap, so there are fewer options for upping power at a lower price!)

I do miss the big boot, may need a roof box when we take the little one away on holiday, or if we go with the in – laws, we might have to get them to turn there hatchback into an estate with the seats down, and load them up!

Fuel Economy has suffered slightly, but still getting as many miles out of the petrol as if I still had the focus, most likely the focus needed a good sort out, and I just gave up in the end!

Overall I am overly happy with the car, and I have yet to regret buying the car over keeping the focus! I have heard a few people looking at what alternatives they may choose over the focus, so I hope this is something that may sway people to believe that the "Reasonably priced car" - really is reasonable only in monitory value, but is !Removed! good otherwise!

[catch]

Good feed back jeeb,

and like they say on Top Gear it sounds like it's a decent car. You cannot knock the mpg your getting really. Just got to say Bank Holiday Monday, I reset the trip comp on the Focus, I'd just left the town I live in heading for one 15 miles away, but with one just up the road 9 miles away we had to pass through. Its a queue job at the best of times getting through that place, never mind Bank Holiday Mondays. Anyway driving like a granny on a country A road, and until I hit the tail back entering that town, I achieved 55 mpg, !Removed! amazed I was. Mind you I have that BK44 injector cleaner in the tank right now, so maybe that has something to do with it.

And the Ceed sounds nippy enough considering it's not a turbo diesel or petrol for that matter. Yes the boot is a let down, mind you it's a let down in the new Mk3 Focus as well. So considering the seven year transferable warranty on the Kia, for peeps thinking of buying a Mk3 Focus petrol [non turbo] it may well be worth seriously looking at the Kia Ceed as well, and letting them slug it out.

[jeebowhite]

55MPG is amazing for a petrol (I see that on ocassion, but that is true granny style driving on a motorway!) but the cleaner does seem to be doing you some good!

And I would definately agree that the Cee'd can be some very good competition to the MK3, I appreciate this is a FORD owners club, but I think with the amount of people who have to pop back and say "I have another issue" its worth showing that their is some good competition out there, for a great deal of value for money (sadly I think FORD now lacks this!)

If anyone is interested, I will keep this thread updated (I wont take over the entire forum making it a kia house lol!) But after seeing the poll previously and the interest in other vehicles, I think its worth keeping some information flowing freely :)

[Marky04]

When we were looking for a new car the Cee'd was on our list but after driving the Cee'd then driving the Focus there was no competition

[jeebowhite]

Fair point Marky, out of curiosity, What was it on the drive that did sway you to the focus? would you say you were feelin bias towards the focus at all?

[catch]

What do I miss?

So Far, I miss the turbo as it was always fun to have it kick in, but the power of the engine is an extra 9 bhp, so other than losing a bit of torque, there isn’t much loss of power. (Also I was hoping to up the power, but without a diesel you can’t really use a tune box over a remap, so there are fewer options for upping power at a lower price!)

A couple of years down the line you will be able to get one of these mate,

And I dare say being a turbo, I reckon you can slap a tuning box on it if you want to

I do miss the big boot, may need a roof box when we take the little one away on holiday, or if we go with the in – laws, we might have to get them to turn there hatchback into an estate with the seats down, and load them up!

Well then you will not really miss the 20% loss of boot space in the Mk3, when you come back to a Focus :D