How much will that beater cost to repair?
If the term “beater” (referring to a less-than-cream-puff used vehicle) isn’t Canadian, it should be.
In what other country do countless consumers seek out the roughest used rides they can find to keep their precious main vehicles from suffering the worst that winter can throw at us?
And when our offspring finally leave the nest for post-secondary education, it’s often behind the wheel of a student beater. But when we head out to beat the bushes for a beater, what should we be looking for? The cheapest? The most feature laden? The best fuel economy?
How about how easy and cheap it is to fix? You’re probably buying something about 10 years old, which means it will likely need a repair — or two or five — fairly soon.
If it’s in the hands of a student living away from home, knowing how welcome it will be at local repair garages should be checked. You should also find out about how much those almost inevitable repairs will cost.
It’s a popularity contest: An easy way to shorten your beater shopping list is to check the top 10 most popular vehicles from the model years you’re looking for. Mainstream high-volume vehicles bring a lot more choice when searching for deals on repairs. This means that local independent shops or regional/national chains can offer several different options for common repair parts.
Checking prices on parts used to be a tedious phone process, but now many aftermarket chains, such as Canadian Tire and NAPA, for example, offer online catalogues with pricing. Run a search on consumable items such as brake linings, rotors and drums. Also check some common electrical components such as starters and alternators.
Pay attention to the tires: If they’re 18 inches or bigger or have a side wall sizing below 60 (that’s the number in the middle of the code on the tire’s side, after “P225/” and before “R20,” for example) they’re going to be much more expensive to replace.
Avoid fully loaded rides: The more gear the factory put in — power sun roofs, power liftgates, electronic features and the like — the more there is to go wrong.
Unless you or your student lives in the subtropics, avoid older vehicles with air conditioning unless you can bypass the compressor. As most vehicles use a drive belt to power more than one pulley, when an unwanted A/C compressor clutch goes, you’re stuck at the side of the road.
Aftermarket parts sources list their solutions to this as “A/C bypass pulleys” or kits. In some cases where a bypass or dummy pulley isn’t available, a shorter belt can be installed that doesn’t turn the A/C pulley.
Driving.ca