Mate has offered me his y reg 2001 Rover 25 1.4 5 door Petrol in gold for £650 its done 78,000 miles and has some service history. I was thinking of getting this for use as a school run/shopping car but unsure as Rover is no more and worried that if I got it that the parts may be hard to get if ever it needs anything.

But then i suppose people buy escorts and they dont make them anymore but then Ford are still in business.

Seems quite cheapfor a Y Reg - Just wondered what your thoughts are on this, maybe you know someone that has one but I am looking for advice on it.

Edited 22 April, 201016 yr by justinbarrow

Ooooh sounds cheap......

Rovers are commonplace and I'm sure generic parts shops stock parts for these.

Finding general wear/tear items for my Favorit was a breeeze.

Finding similar bits for my Alfa........erm lets not mention that right now!!!!

Sounds expensive!

good cars, but they suffer from head gasket failure, and gearbox failure, other than those two common faults they're good cars, but because of the head gasket weakness, it is essential to have it serviced frequently,

parts are easy to get hold of, as the parts manufacturer for rover was a seperate company and was unaffeced by the companys closure, and has carried on trading!

These can be sound little cars. The you'll struggle to hear their best asset above the shouts of "Head Gasket Failure", but the best asset of the smaller versions of the k series engine is that they are very economical fuel wise.

HGF can and does occur, the good news is that the worst affected engine is the 1.8 version and the 1.4 is significantly better, and also, the latest version of the gasket, to all intents and purposes, solves the HGF problem on these engines.

Parts shouldn't be an issue, my GFs old man runs one of these and when i need obscure parts i get them posted from Rimmer Brothers (popular rover parts specialist). For common items i just use the local factors (Unipart mostly -- he likes his services kept cheap).

For this type of duty, i wouldn't hesitate to pick up a looked after rover 25.

P.S. he never changed his oil for, as best i can tell, 36,000 miles at one point, although he says he did top it up (i later saw it was W5 branded which is Lidl's own label and it was completely the wrong grade)

Mate has offered me his y reg 2001 Rover 25 1.4 5 door Petrol in gold for £650 its done 78,000 miles and has some service history. I was thinking of getting this for use as a school run/shopping car but unsure as Rover is no more and worried that if I got it that the parts may be hard to get if ever it needs anything.

But then i suppose people buy escorts and they dont make them anymore but then Ford are still in business.

Seems quite cheapfor a Y Reg - Just wondered what your thoughts are on this, maybe you know someone that has one but I am looking for advice on it.

If you head to RoverTech there are many members on there that will help you out. http://www.rovertech.net/

I'm friends with a few members on there!

Hope this helps,

If you head to RoverTech there are many members on there that will help you out. http://www.rovertech.net/

I'm friends with a few members on there!

Hope this helps,

Daughter had one( W REG) -to loud shouts of Head Gasket -and yes -twice .Other problem s - 10A fuse ( under bonnet ) for immobiliser -( was 5A on first release) , sometimes gets tired, and hers had a tenancy of getting fuel problems of parked uphill with low tank .

Its prob so cheap based on that it has not gone through its head gasket yet.

every car has problems, as long as you maintain it you will be fine.

Iv had a rover 25 and a zr over a 4 year period and neither of them suffered from HGF (i did 25k in one and was on 80k and 17k on another which was coming up to 100k)

78k for a 01 plate is pretty good

for price you cant grumble at all tbh, nice little runabouts

parts are available, ebay/scrappies/forums/motor factors etc

panels are getting hard to get hold of though

From what i found, when you ask this question on a forum, you will get a lot of people commenting who havent owned one and are just going on hearsay.

Id rather have a rover over a peugeot any day!

Edited 23 April, 201016 yr by vRShafz

Sounds expensive!

I agree, an 80k rover with a k series, isn't worth £600, more like £300.

Solid yes, £600 no.

I'll put an exception on this, if it has a full years tax, an MOT for close to 12 months and 4 new tyres. In that case it might be worth closer to £600, because you could cash in the tax, sell the 4 tyres and have the rest of the car sold as parts.

Edited 23 April, 201016 yr by cheezemonkhai

Go for it, Rover 214s are excellent cars. Me and my Dad have one as a spare car and its great. Paid £550 for it 5 years ago and it never lets us down. Head gaskets aren't an issue if you look after the car and service it porperly. Parts are easy to come by and the cars are easy to work on.

Im driving mine a lot at the mo as the Skoda is broken again and it does everything I could ever want from a second car

Go for it, Rover 214s are excellent cars. Me and my Dad have one as a spare car and its great. Paid £550 for it 5 years ago and it never lets us down. Head gaskets aren't an issue if you look after the car and service it porperly. Parts are easy to come by and the cars are easy to work on.

Im driving mine a lot at the mo as the Skoda is broken again and it does everything I could ever want from a second car

That's the point though isn't it £550, 5 years ago .

Might be a good car, but if it was £550 5 years ago, even a newer one isn't going to be worth >£600 now.

Go for it, Rover 214s are excellent cars. Me and my Dad have one as a spare car and its great. Paid £550 for it 5 years ago and it never lets us down. Head gaskets aren't an issue if you look after the car and service it porperly. Parts are easy to come by and the cars are easy to work on.

Im driving mine a lot at the mo as the Skoda is broken again and it does everything I could ever want from a second car

My father in law has an R reg 214 and that has just had HGF, he has had it about 10 years and had it regularly serviced, it was a fleet car before that.

go for the 216, it has the Honda engine.

I had 2 x Rover 414's with the K series engine, neither of which gave me any problems at all.

I then bought a 200 with the 1.6 K series (big mistake, 2 head gaskets in 4 years & only 46,000 miles - neither repair covered by a warranty!!)

go for the 216, it has the Honda engine.

so is the 214 and 218, the 1.6 is a bored out 1.4 and the 1.8 is bored out 1.4 also, so the heads are more prone to go on the 1.8 which is a lot more power through basically the same engine.