Roomster buying advice

[Tommytig]

Hello, I’m new to the forum and I’m not yet a Roomster owner. I’m looking for a little advice on buying as I’m finding the choice a little baffling as sellers seem to list things all a little differently and I can’t work out how the models differed as time went by?

 

if I list my situation…..

I’m thinking petrol as we only do about 8k per year and most is not motorway.

We go camping every so often and my wife needs to carry things for her job, hence the need for space.

I like to do basic servicing and repairs

My budget is £3500 max

 

We’ve had Two Renault Scenics for the past 20yrs which give you an idea what we need in a car. They have been great but I don’t like the MK3’s and fancy a change really, always thought the Roomster looked great and it seems very practically thought out. I’d also heard bad things about VAG group cars but having owned a cheap 2007 1.2 3 cylinder Polo for two years now it’s been a good little car.

 

any advice would be great, Tom

[SurreyJohn]

Had a roomster for 8 years, but sold it about 9 months ago as no longer need 2 cars.

 

Was a great car, we had a 2012 1.2tsi 105 petrol DSG.  Ability to slide and fold rear seats and even take them all out (can even leave middle one out, and move others inwards), very flexible.

 

Older ones specs were 1, 2, 3, but later basic, SE and scout.  The SE had glass roof, scout bigger wheels and plastic look rugged parts.

 

The engines varied over the years, plenty of power from 105, but some were lower power and might struggle when loaded.

 

Faults were DSG dual clutch unit at 2 years (fixed under warranty), blower fan resistor went after 6 years (cheap to replace) then about 8 years had tailgate wiring loom problem.  the wiring looms often give problems near hinges in doors too, with wires fraying.  Only really troublesome part.

 

Car helped us move home and was great, miss it occasionally but not easy to justify keeping it when only used rarely after we both retired and hardly ever needed to drive to different places at same time.

 

[ChrisTids]

We bought our first Roomster in 2014, a 1.4 TDI Roomster 3 with 110K miles on the clock> The Roomster was never very highly specified but the 3 had things like a glass roof etc. Apart from some typical VAG electrical issues in the drivers side and passenger doors it cost very little to run and clocked up 160K miles until it was written off almost 2 years ago, it was a big shunt and we walked away from it thanks to the basic strength of the bodyshell.

 

The replacement is a 2011 Roomster SE petrol TSI. The trim levels changed when the Roomster had a slight facelift in 2010/11 so the SE isn’t at quite the same level of trim as the 3, at the time I would have liked a SE + as this has trim levels more akin to the 3 but nothing was available at the time. Having said that we happily drove around France in the heat of last summer clocking up 1500 trouble free miles.

 

The only bits of buying advice that I can give apart from checking that all the electrical items are working including the door locks is that the rear brake callipers start to not work properly, if this is the case don’t mess about with them and just replace the units. Also check for rust around the rear number plate lights, not an issue on our first but has been an issue on our second.   

[Tommytig]

Thanks for the replies Chaps👍🏼 so electrical issues seem common? Is it mainly in the doors, windows and locks?

[ChrisTids]

It can be the door locks or just not enough slack in the cables in the belows between the body and the door so the wires snap over time. Our second Roomster seems to have less issues with the actual locks but it did snap all the wires to the rear hatch.  

[Tommytig]

Ok👍🏼
Been looking on Autotrader and ebay etc.  Interesting that the diesels don’t command a premium, is this since ‘diesel gate’ and big price hikes in diesel ?? I’m still erring towards petrol though.

 

If anyone could briefly explain the petrol engine range?

from what I can work out there is a…….

 

3 cylinder 1.2 normally aspirated ( would this be the same 3 pot in my 2007 Polo?), camchain

 

4 cylinder 1.2 TSi, is this turbocharged? Cambelt?

 

4 cylinder 1.4 turbo? Cambelt?

 

4 cylinder 1.6 turbo? Cambelt?

 

any opinions of these engines would be great👍🏼

 

 

[Tommytig]

Done more reading on these engines.

Is the 1.4 known as the ea111? With a camchain?

 

Still confused as to which engines are the 1.2 and reliability seems ok but camchains only seem to last 60k? My 2007 1.2 polo 3 cylinder has 112k and is on it’s original camchain and seems ok though.

[edbostan]

The 1.2tsi  engines 4-cylinder are chain driven and turbo charged. The 1.2tsi came in an 86bhp unit and 105bhp power units. 86bhp enjoys a lower insurance group. Mine is the 86bhp SE model registered in 2013. This came with rear parking sensors, rear disk brakes, alloy wheels, tinted rear glass. electric windows front and rear, and panoramic roof. I have owned it for 9 years and it has never let me down or has given me any problems.