Ford tops MOT failures

[Bentley boy]

I've been put right off buying another with the trouble I've had with the last 2 Foci

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8456116.stm

[smokie]

Too many unknowns to be of much value. E.g. we all know that Fords are more likely to be high mile thrashed and uncared for repmobiles.

Ncap ratings are probably a better thing to go on when buying..

[Lord Steve]

.....on the other hand the vasy majority of "repmobiles" have a very full service history over their admittedly high mileages.

[Lorry]

I see that the Rover 25 came out quite well

[redstu]

I think the useful data is in the spreadsheet, once you have taken away failures for things that are not related to build quality such as windscreens, number plates , tyres etc it should be possible to do a like for like comparison within similar car groups.

[landman]

Headlines yesterday actually stated that French cars were the worst.

And yes, I am a Ford driver 

[dukla]

Glad he dug the data out, but yes lies, damned lies & statistics ...

Would be curious to see number of passes as percent of the number sold in that year. Again not perfect due to mileage/servicing/care but may be more useful which bangers have an Eveready bunny in them.

Would also need to resolve the 'spurious' failures. My daughter's Polo failed MOT in Reading - excessive corrosion on brake pipes and significant corrosion too close to suspension mounting point. As it was early for the test, she took it back to Bristol and checked it in for repairs/MOT. That garage said they would test first, and promptly failed it on emissions - "needs a new cat". After I confirmed the cat was new 9000 miles/18 months ago they figured they could try some snake oil in the fuel tank to see if that would help clean the engine. For £20 it duly passed the MOT.

1) The car did 4 miles between drop-off to pick-up - that snake oil is amazing.
2) They did notice brake pipes but did not think excessive
3) They agreed rot in sill was irrelevant to suspension mounting.

Bottom line - I figure it is worth trawling a couple of of MOT stations (as long as a car is failing) to find the cheapest snake oil. Especially as I had checked the car over myself in the first place - my skills run to most of the maintenance but not flaring/replacing brake pipes!

[smokie]

Emissions on an under-used car can often be cured by a fast blast at high revs for a few miles. Crap apparently builds up in the cat and if it doesn't reach a certain temp regularly it doesn't burn off.