Stage 1 V8

Well.. I'm starting to think that my ownership of a Stage 1 may already be coming to an end.

As a 17 year old, running a V8 isn't the most cost efficient shall we say, and it has now got to a point, where I am running out of money.. and fast!
Only thing is, I dont know if I have the guts to put my beloved Land Rover up for sale.

What should I do?? There are many pro's and con's to buying a normal car instead.. the head says sell.. but the heart says keep!!

How much are Stage 1's really worth? Mine is in rather good condition with 6 months tax and MOT. Lots of bits been done to it, and it hasnt been messed about with or anything. ( I know thats a bit brief, so i expect a rather vague answer!!)

Cheers.. Ollie

If your heart says keep it then do it. You will always regret it if you sell.

But, the thing with something like this is that there will always be ongoing maintenance. There will always be costs that have to be met and unfortunately they will not go away.

My first car was a Morris 8 Series E like the one below. When I went to uni. it was sold to help cover the costs. A couple of months later the hippies who bought it put in a ditch and wrote it off.

It was completely original except that I had replaced the floor boards because the originals had been eaten out by borer (yes, made of wood).



Or this, but it was all in black.

cant help with price...but have you considered gas?
I was in the same possition 2yrs ago with my S2, converted it to gas (costing about £500 to do) and now cost wise it returns equiverlant of 40mpg,

only you can work out if its sensible to keep it
What will a car that you may be considering cost you - say the price you could get for the stage 1 ? say 2K
in 3yrs it will be worth £500 tops
in 3 yrs your stage 1 will be worth 2K still ...asuming its not about to fall to pieces with lots of rot
so the car is £1500 down ...so if you spent 500 converting to gas youd still be £1000 up
what does your stage 1 cost to tax and insure a year ...and the car?
how many miles do you do a year? ...fuel cost for both
id guess a car will be arround 40mpg ...so not much in it

what work is your stage 1 likely to need in the next 3 yrs and however many miles ....if its reasonably solid you wont need much (my S2 did 15k last year and i only spent about £200 on mot, servicing etc...didnt need anything else, other than improvements ive made and fixing silly things i did ...like running it for 15 iles without water , such as tidying up things the po didnt do well, but worked so didnt reay need doing (just got bored)

after doing this i found over 3 yrs i would save quite alot by running the S2 , even last year using it for 15k miles it wasnt worth the cost of another car for doing most of the work(for me it was the almost identical running costs, the fact the S2 is going up in value and the proce of insurance on a car that meant it didnt make sense...for the same reaosn a modern car wouldnt be cost effective over time either ....(probably would as i woulnt spend money on improving it that dont necessarily need doing...but if money was a problem they wouldnt be done))

on the other side, any modern car would have been a much more comfortable, more relaxed , quieter and easier for driving and can cary more people (assuming you dont have a SW) ...driving with ice on the inside of the roof at midnight n winter isnt that much fun....but i find modern cars quite boring to drive...when i had insurance on another vehicle i always used the series anyway

i would guess if your stage 1 is in a good solid condition , and not about to need alot of work and reasonably correct then you could be looking at up to 3000, maybe more with a galvy chassis ...post some pics will help

umm...ended up with quite along reply
hope that helps...or gives you soem things to think about

another option could be an engine change....
a TDI and gearbox form a 110 should go in, for similar outlay to a gas conversion and similar running costs ..insurance may have something to say though ...and defeats the point of a stage 1 V8

What ever else you get it'll depreciate super fast and spares and repairs will be more than the stage 1. The fuel is expensive, bit that's a fair price to pay A europlastictasticboringbox may be more economical but the spares etc will rub out that difference pronto.

Also for the value of your stage one you'll get a shed... it may be worth decent money in the LR world but in the modern car world it isn't.

Drink less bear - spend the savings on unleaded.

Sorted.

from a car point of view, probably the cheapest way would be a motor auctions an buy something cheap with t&t and run it till one of the runs out, if it gets another tesst great, if not scrap it an dget another....had a friend did this and got through 6 cars in 2 yrs, never paid more than £50 for one, as soon as it broke got another ...over the time it cost him £300 + insurance and fuel...but you have to be happy driving arround in an absolute shed that will go wrong at some point

hehe, did that for a while until I got a Mazda ute, B1200 or something. Damn thing wouldn't die

Thankyou all for your replies.. they have given me alot to think about!!

I am going to uni in a year anyway, so whatever i have got at the time i am going to have to sell.. whether its the stage 1 or a normal car.
I have got a fair idea of what car i would go for, and if i got around the £2000 mark for mine, quite a nice car it would be.

Like someone said, i cant remember who!, there is always the maintanance cost of having a Land Rover, and there is always 'bits' that you could be doing. I very rarely even have an evening spare to tinker with the Stage 1, and I just dont want to neglect it, and see it deteriorate because im not doing anything to it.

Although mine has got 7 seats, and isnt a SW, i very rarely use all of them, so a car with just 5 would do me well.

Another reason i have thought of for sale, is that none of my family live near here, with the closest ones being about half an hours drive, which is a bit of a shock to the wallet.

I think i have got alot of thinking to be doing!!!

LPG, it makes a massive differance

I was looking at the 2k market for a frend the other day, some nice cars that are comming towards the end of their relyablity curve

Land Rovers are realy cool at UNI whish I could have taken one of the ones I had access to

Aidan

A few thoughts:

When I headed off to uni (St. Andrews), my mother suggested I sell my Stage 1 (as some of you will remember - is the current owner on here, perchance?), I took her advice, as she certainly had my best interests at heart. Within a week of uni, I missed my wheels, and so bought another cracking car - a P3500S, that is, the V8 with a manual gearbox.

Now, I am going somewhere with this...

Although the P6 was 'way cool' (girls loved it) it had the sort of problems inherent in any older car; i.e., it needed the carbs balancing from time to time, the gearlever snapped twice (not actually that uncommon on those cars) - so, although well maintained, and cheap to buy spares for, did rack up a few bills. You will have this same problem with your landy, however well you maintain it.

This was confirmed by my girlfriend recently. She had a TDi 90, very well sorted and generally reliable. However, it was slow, thirsty, and still had problems... that is, in comparison: I was ambling around in a Citroen Xantia TD that had cost me 500 pounds; I ran the car for an entire year without having to spend a penny on it, only having to fill it up once (a real 60mpg from these engines); at the end of its MoT, I broke it for spares, and got back almost all of my money.

Also - the point I'm (finally) making is this: while the 90 was undoubtedly cooler (by far the better car to roll up to polo matches in); the Citroen was far more comfortable, easier to load up with beer, never went wrong, was cheaper to insure, and, to be honest, having any sort of car at university is cool enough in its own right.

Summarise: sell the landrover to a good home (that is very important), buy a cheap eurobox for a few hundred quid, ideally with a year's MoT and tax, and run that; you'll save many pennies.

Just my two cents' worth.

'Skye Stage 1' thanks very much for your post.

I completely agree with what you said and it would save me alot of pennies. I just dont think I would be able to see my Landy go, especially if I didnt have confidence in the new owner, and that they were going to look after it well.

Guess I will have to see what the future brings!! lol

Ollie