my first car

edijs

edijs

Programmer
I have finally decided to go for it and buy a car. It's not that I just like do drive (I DO like to drive very much :P), it will be really useful. And by now, the prices on public transportation have gone up so much that driving a car is almost the same or even less (!) money, plus, it's much more comfortable and fun.

Anyways, so what I'm looking at (and I'm getting it 100% by the end of this month), is this: Ford Focus Universal with a 1.6 petrol engine, built in 2005. Previously it was used by a goverment facility, thus has been maintained as necessary and all the stats (like driven kms and stuff) are 100% true.

What I wanted to hear from you guys is - have you heard anything about this model of cars - how's the driving, etc ...
 

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i'm in UK & i have nearly the same model Ford Focus Estate 1.6 LX with automatic gearbox, & i have no complaints about it, but the front tires wear down quicker than the rear ones, so, i'd recommend swapping the front & rear wheels around about every 20k to 30k miles

Edit: but mines silver & 2k6 reg
 
It has actually been reported that Ford (well, at least the Focus of them) is having a regular problem with the front half-axises. That might be why the fron wheels are faster worn down. But thanks for the advice!
 
Looks nice, quite a popular car over here, and I heard that Fords are easy to repair should they go wrong... ;)

I wouldn't go for an automatic any day though... I could drive a manual car when I was 10 :D (around someones farm in my Granddads car). Automatic cars are sluggish and use more fuel (so I'm told).
 
Reason i was asking is because the manuals in those focuses are rock solid, but i can't remember if the autos were just ok, or if they have problems??
 
talking about rock solid, I had been driving my parents VW Passat (1999) and it had areally smooth transmission box, but this ford has a "dard" one, ie, i have to use quite a force to move the stick around, but that's prob because it's not that used.

btw, what's the avg. KMs per year in your states (mine is 20k)
 
So, I got it at last. And one week in - I could say that for a first car it's quite okay. Since it was deployed as a "work car" previously in a goverment facility, it wasn't taken care of in the sense of drivers not choosing to avoid pits but instead going right into them "just because the car will be fixed by the state anyway". So, sure, there are some weird problems. For one, I don't know if it's common to Fords, but the supports for the brakes were bad and didn't squeeze the break-blocks to the brake disc evenly and I had to change the supports, the blocks and the discs. Also, there are some funny noises and the gas pedal as well as the engine are acting funny, but I hope that with time and care, that will go away or isn't bad as such. But overall speaking - I am really happy to be a owner of a car and it does actually give all the comfort, and is certainly worth all the money I'd be giving away for worthless crap (sorry for that)...
 
Hi there. I'm a newbie on this forum,know a bit about computers,but more about cars.I'm a petrol head and drive private hire for a living.Mileage approx 100,000 per annum. I would NOT advise swapping front to rear to eke out mileage on a front drive car.It would unbalance the handling due to the different wear patterns generated. With normal driving,I would expect about 25,000 from the front set and maybe 50,000 from the rear. The Focus is known for being a fine handling car and entertaining to drive. Nice choice for your first.
 
thanks, Catweasel. I wouldn't flip the tires anyway as I can regulate the front wheels in a service or something so that they are teared down more evenly and I will change the whole set once it comes to it. But as this thread came up again, I got one lame issue - before you ask - i got the car to a proper Ford service. So, the issue is that recently the engine started to get hickups and the Engine icon on the panel started to flash and/or simply stand still... disturbing. Some technicals said that that's a sign of the exhaust probe to starting to fail and I hope it's just that. Today it will be checked out to see the real problem :( . Has anyone had a similar thing?


UPDATE:
Turns out it wasn't the probe. It was that the igniting candles (i dunno if that's the right english technical term) and the electricity wires connected to it had water gotten inbetween. Had to change 'em all. Sadly, the servicemen said also that some Induction something might be faulty as well, but we'll see when I get the car... I wanted to put a armor plate under the car so that no cr*p will be thrown up under the hood while driving, thus eliminating wetness and other stuff.
Damn... i guess one could write a freakin' poem about car problems... :D the world is a hostile environment for such precise instruments as personal cars...
 
Yeah, but it doesn't seem that way nowadays - as the recession has hit Latvia hard. The country is in pain and prices drop accordingly. Now, for the money I bought my Focus, I could buy a newer Mondeo :D .

But, of course, the incomes have dropped accordingly as well, thus making all of this all the same.

This was a good deal, though. Of course, as any more or less low-end car, it's having several problems at the same time, weird sounds and so on. But, it's my Ford and is the best thing that a guy (realistically) can dream of when in my age and in my situation - a IT Major student and humble employee (plus, there's that mentioned hardcore recession).
 
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