Mother in laws Metro has just shat it's headgasket for the 7th time in 20,000 miles so it's being scrapped.

She really fancies a Tigra but thinks they are out of her price bracket but a quick search on the trader has turned up 25 cars for between £2-3k. What should I look for as I want to ensure she doesn't get another shitter or worse still another Rover

 

They're quite prone to head gaskets too mate plus snapping cam belts [which need changing every time you touch the engine - literally, Vauxhall encourage it]. The 1.4 Ecotec engines don't stand up to much abuse unfortunately.

If she wants something that shape and size, try and swerve her into Toyota Paseo.

 

What about a ford Puma, there pretty similar to the tigra, and in ur price range

 

i just sold a s reg 1.6 chequers, dealer plus one lady owner ,52kmiles
history and ac full electrics etc for 2450
the prices are all over the place,some late ones are rougher than
a bears bum,dont forget management lights,they are prone to them
no headroom in the back,but women seem to love them

 

I think paddy is being a little over dramatic, i know loads of people with C16XE and C14XE engines that have done 100K+ miles with NO problems at all with regular servicing.

 

as chip says IMo bar the old EGR and secondary air pump problems the suffer from the x14/x16 engines are very good

the cambelt does run on plastic tensioners, which as long as there changed in the vauxhall suggest time/milage are fine (40k iirc)

apart from checking the obvious, there realiable cars, they do suffer from the abs ring in the rear drums do fuck about, only other thing id check is when you shut the drivers door the window shoudl drop down to releave the pressure in the inside (yes really) as the early ones used to blow the rear window out

 

Tigra is just a corsa underneath so parts are corsa prices so if it does go wrong it wont cost the world to sort.

 

Yep, its just a corsa in a dress, like the calibra is to the cavalier, so it has all the benefits of spares and servicing for a well made shopping trolley car.

Cant go far wrong IMHO