fazza
Member
Registered: 7th Feb 08
Location: Plymouth
User status: Offline
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been thinking about getting one, what are peoples opinions on them?
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Planty02
Member
Registered: 5th Mar 05
Location: Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent
User status: Offline
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lovely looking motor, but have a reputation for weak engines (i.e. need rebuilding every x thousand miles) IIRC
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Rob126
Member
Registered: 18th Feb 05
Location: Mellieha, Malta Drives: Corsa D 1.4
User status: Offline
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quote:
Originally posted by Planty02
lovely looking motor, but have a reputation for weak engines (i.e. need rebuilding every 50-60 thousand miles) IIRC
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Superlite Ltd.
Member
Registered: 9th Jan 07
User status: Offline
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Brilliant 
and i think rotoray engines are great myself, providing you keep watch of your oil level. They rev so much faster than piston engines
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fazza
Member
Registered: 7th Feb 08
Location: Plymouth
User status: Offline
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yeh they need rebuilding every 60k so i am told
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Rob126
Member
Registered: 18th Feb 05
Location: Mellieha, Malta Drives: Corsa D 1.4
User status: Offline
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you'd actually be safer buying a recently built one
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jambo166
Member
Registered: 27th Nov 06
Location: WHITBY
User status: Offline
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cheap tax goes through as a 1.3 bit ov a bonus
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fazza
Member
Registered: 7th Feb 08
Location: Plymouth
User status: Offline
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sounds good to me, hold there value as well by looks of things
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Daimo B
Member
Registered: 20th Mar 00
User status: Offline
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Great cars.
One of the worlds best engines.
Fragile though, rebuilds every 70k (factory spec) and even less if modified.
Can be built for silly high power, esp if going to 3-4 chamber setp (2 as standard I think).
Not cheap tax, even though its a 1.3, its classed as a 2.6. Don't ask me why.....
Drinks fuel like a hooker goes through KY jelly.
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Kurt
Member
Registered: 23rd Oct 05
Location: Hi
User status: Offline
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two words.. rotor tips..
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fazza
Member
Registered: 7th Feb 08
Location: Plymouth
User status: Offline
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yeh av herd but they look awesome, few mates have scoobies but i want something different when i eventually sell mine
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Martin_C
Member
Registered: 27th Jun 03
Location: Ayrshire, Scotland
User status: Offline
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a mate had one, and with a bit of work it was bloody fast, handling is awesome! quite small inside, i'm 6ft2 and didnt feel comfortable as the door cards etc are close to you.
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scoob
Premium Member
Registered: 16th Oct 03
Location: Beverley, E Riding of Yorkshire
User status: Offline
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there ok
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byrnie_2004
Member
Registered: 11th Mar 07
Location: Marple, Greater Manchester
User status: Offline
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there really nice, wouldn't know where to start fixing a rotary engine though.
whats the insurance like on them?
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Timbaland
Banned
Registered: 20th Jan 07
Location: Glasgow
User status: Offline
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They catch fire.
Alot.
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jamie_OB
Member
Registered: 7th Feb 08
Location: middlesbrough
User status: Offline
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really great looking cars and my mates is only got 63k on it and has had 2 rebiulds
[Edited on 25-02-2008 by jamie_OB]
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AndyCorsaSport
Member
Registered: 12th Feb 06
Location: Horsforth, West Yorkshire
User status: Offline
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My mate had one, like said, need re-building at 60k. Was very fast, butvery expensive to run. He had the 1.3 Turbo so works out 2.6 Twin Turbo.
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Welsh Dan
Member
Registered: 23rd Mar 00
User status: Offline
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Unlike a lot of people here, i've actually owned two of them, so I have a vague idea as to what to expect as opposed to just things that i've heard .
Firstly, they are very EXPENSIVE to run. On my first (standard one), I was getting roughly 120 miles to a tank when using it around town (although I do have lead boots), with the mileage getting to about 240/250 when using open road/motorway. Given thats a 75 litre tank, it was usually in the 8-12mpg around town, with it getting 16-18mpg driving like Miss Daisy.
If they're looked after and are serviced religiously, they aren't too bad when compared to most other cars with the same sort of performance (bearing in mind that when it came out, it pretty much matched the performance of most of the supercars). They need the oil changing every 3k and plugs every 6k, as well as the oil levels checking pretty much every day as they burn a lot of oil, due to it being burnt as part of the combustion process. It also needs to be run on decent mineral oil, rather than Synthetic or Semi-Synthetic. With regards to rebuilds, a standard, well looked after one can get 120k miles (although 70-80k is the general mileage at which they can need rebuilding and it isn't unheard of to have a low mileage engine go pop), and an abused one could only get 30k. Its not a case of it needs rebuilding at X miles, as it only needs rebuilding when it loses compression (due to knackered tips, side seals etc). Rebuild parts are about £800, assuming that you use the bare minimum parts and that you do not warp the housings (equivalent of a normal engine block). If you warp the housings (usually as a result of the engine overheating), you'll be paying about £300 for a new one, and you need two. If you want to pay someone to rebuild the engine, don't expect much change from £3k. They are fairly easy to rebuild yourself though and theres plenty of information available to do it if you're handy with the spanners.
Insurance is going to be expensive. Its a group 20 import and realistically, you aren't going to get a decent quote these days if you're under 21. When I was 20, I was paying £1388 TPFT (on my first standard one). The following year, the prices all went up dramatically and so I couldn't get a quote for under £2k. When I had my second one (when I was 22/23), the insurance was down to about £900TPFT. In a Plymouth postcode, its not going to be cheap.
Tax wise, it is taxed and insured as a 2.6, unless it was registered sneakily as a 1.3, in which case it would be taxed as a 1.3, but still insured as the 2.6. The vast majority are registered as 2.6s (my first one which I registered was shown as a 1.3, the second which I bought in the country already was a 2.6) and its nigh on impossible to get the DVLA to change the registered engine size from 2.6 to 1.3. It is two 654cc chambers (1308cc), but theres never been an official reason given for it being registered as a 2.6.
Tuning wise, they're very tunable although its not just a case of fitting an exhaust/filter/upping the boost on it. One or two minor mods are ok, after which YOU MUST fit a remappable ECU, with the most popular one being the Apexi PowerFC (about £500, +£200 mapping). Power starts at 255bhp unless you get a later model, but 350bhp is fairly easy. If you want to spend a bit of money on the engine, upgrading the turbos, fuelling, porting the engine, you can get big power. My second one had about 4-5k spent on the engine (although I did a lot of the work myself) and made about 460bhp. The owner after myself rebuilt the engine and had it ported, and its now making 550bhp. As long as its mapped properly and looked after, it shouldn't be much worse than a standard engine.
Pics of my two....
The first, standard one.
The second one, which started off red.
And ended up yellow/orange
After most of the engine work was done.
After the engine had been polished and cleaned.
I forgot to add, both of them were featured in magazines too. The black one was in J-tuner, after the new owner spent a fortune on it putting a wide arch kit on it, and the second one was featured when the new owner did fuck all other than changing the wheels and rebuilding it when it blew up, and claiming he did all of the work, the lying bastard. 
[Edited on 25-02-2008 by Welsh Dan]
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