Up-sizing
The Saph’s gone, but it’s been replaced by something equally uneconomical!
Spec Standard ST220 ■ Wolf pack extras ■ all the toys
Well, the Saph’s gone. I had some great times with the car, and I’m confident the new owner will love it just as much as I did. But in truth, it just had to go. It’s a perfect car for summer time hooningabout, but when you have to rely on it for everyday duties, things like it taking 20mins to de-mist the windscreen (it was heated, but only two lines of elements worked), the wipers sometimes working and sometimes not, and the switches operating when they feel like it and not when you tell them to, can all get a bit too frustrating to live with. Fair enough, they’re all fairly easy fixes, but when you have lots of ‘little fixes’ to do it can dampen your enthusiasm, and that’s exactly what happened.
Plus, like I said last month, I already had my eyes on something else – a Mondeo ST220.
As a flagship model the ST220 was loaded with gadgets as standard, but I wanted one with all the bells and whistles. Ever since driving the new Mk3 Focus ST and Mk7 Fiesta I’ve had a craving for as many driver aids and gadgets as I could get, so any ST220 I would buy had to have as many optional extras as possible. But the main criteria was colour and trim – it would need to be Performance Blue with black leather, nothing else would even get a second look.
Initially I was actually looking solely at hatch models, but then I saw this estate version on good old eBay. The more I thought about it, the more an estate version made sense – it has the same performance as the hatch and saloon models, but with the added practicality of the simply enormous load space.
Furthermore, this particular example was the right colour, with the right spec interior, and had been fully loaded from the factory. Xenon lights, check. Auto wipers, check. Folding mirrors, check. Parking sensors, check. It’s got the lot. Someone has even specified something called the ‘Wolf pack’, which basically includes a set of aftermarket aluminium pedals, gear knob, handbrake cover, and carboneffect trim panels on the B- and C-pillars. Chintzy, yes. But it proves that whoever ordered it from new must have ticked all the boxes on the ‘options’ sheet.
It got better too, as after speaking to the seller I learnt that the car had just had the very expensive clutch and DMF replaced (at a cost in excess of £500) – another massive bonus.
I knew there had to be a catch somewhere, and when I went to view/buy the car it all became apparent. The guy selling the car was a mechanic… but for a waste management company. He spent all day working on bin lorries, which meant he, and ultimately the Mondeo, stank like a bin wagon! On top of that, he must have smoked about 500 roll-ups a day too, judging by the inch-and-a-half of fag ash that had collected around the gear gaiter. I’ll be honest, it stank that bad I nearly walked away from it.
In fact, I was about to drive off, when I collected my thoughts and went through the facts; it was the right colour, had all the options, had just been fitted with a new DMF, and was clearly being driven everyday (a point reinforced by the sheer state of the interior and the fact the owners’ work boots were rolling around in the boot!)
So, I used the smelly interior (along with a scrape on the front bumper and slight smell of burning oil) as good bartering points and managed to bully the price down to one I was happy with. The car was mine. I owned it.
I’ll be honest, the first five miles I drove it after parting with the cash scared me witless. Frantically I pressed every button, flicked every switch, and had a hawk-eye on every gauge, as I realised I hadn’t actually checked half of the things I was meant to before handing over the money. Thankfully everything worked. Well, almost everything. And despite the smell, the more miles I covered the more confidence I had in the car, and the more I enjoyed driving it.
Back home, the first thing I needed to do was get the thing fully valeted, so I speculated £50 and sent it off to the valeters. I also took a trip to the workshop to investigate the couple of faults I’d found.
The parking sensors weren’t working due to a corroded and broken wire, which was a nice easy fix. I had also managed to negotiate a full service kit in with the sale too, so I replaced the oil, air, and fuel filters too – again a nice easy job. I also investigated the slight smell of burning oil, which I now believe to be a worn crank seal. After thrashing
it, a small amount of oil leaks on to the crank pulley and is thrown everywhere. Then when stationary again, some of this occasionally drips on to the hot exhaust and causes the horrid smell. It’s not a big job and the engine doesn’t appear to use any oil, so this can wait until next month.
Other than that, the car is perfect. I‘ve since covered around 1000 faultless miles, including an epic 700mile round trip doing the obligatory Christmas family visits, giving me the opportunity to give the Mondy a thorough a test. And I can report it’s passed with flying colours! I really like this car! And I can’t wait to get stuck in to some mods…