Faults:
When the car was purchased it had been left standing outside for just over a year, which has taken it's toll on the car. Much of the work I have had done on it was because of this. So far, I have had:
4 new tyres
New front brake pads
New radiator and top radiator pipe
New exhaust
New cam/timing belt
New alternator belt
4 lines in the rear window demister had to be repaired with silver conductive paint.
I also had the oil changed, but this was a 'just in case' measure.
Apart from that little lot, nothing has gone wrong with the car in the 800 miles of heavy driving that it has got so far, and nothing looks likely to either.
General Comments:
People often slag the revamped Metro/100 off and, really, it's unfair. The body looks similar to the old Austin Metro, and the interior is even more similar to the old Metro, but looks are only skin deep.
Inside, this is a totally different car. It has had numerous improvements and refinements, the most significant of which is the new K-series engine.
My car will comfortably cruise along for hours and hours at 85, can be easily pushed up to 90, and if you really rag her hard she will go all the way up to 96 - which isn't half bad for an 1120cc 8 valve single point fuel injection engine. 96 is also it's published top speed - so it's nice to know that she can still get up there after 7 years.
She's very responsive and can get you out of trouble just as well as some more powerful cars (so long as it's under 90MPH trouble).
You wouldn't usually think of a Metro as a motorway car, but so long as you are comfortable with driving at sub-100 speeds, this one is fine for 1 or 2 people.
It's very economical to run, which when cruising on a long journey will give you over 200 miles in exchange for £10 of petrol. When making short journeys locally, this does of course drop, but you still get about 150 miles for £10.
The front seats are big and comfortable, and with the rear seats folded down you can fit a huge amount of stuff in the back.
There may be no air conditioning, but the ventilation is fine and with the sunroof open you can still get a nice cool draught going through the car.
About the only problem you will have on the motorway is the fact that the fuel tank isn't terribly big and will only hold around £25 worth of petrol, so if your trip is particularly long you will need to refill at some stage.
There is, admittedly, not a lot of room for rear seat passengers, but this is hardly a family car is it?
The remote control central locking gives the car a nice bit of respectable style, as does it's metallic kingfisher blue paintwork.
About the only gripe I have with the car is the crappy factory fitted sound system. A bog standard radio cassette (the bottom of the range one in the 1995 Rover range - no Dolby on the cassette or RDS on the radio) connected to 2 low powered door mounted speakers is not what I'd call high performance. They could at least have installed cabling for the rear speakers (there are rear speaker grills provided) to make adding them easier, but they haven't. But as I rarely like to have the radio loud in the car, this is only a minor problem.
