Hello,mera 1.4 or 306 1.4

you done your pass plus mate ?

when I was 17 my car cost me £2100 and insurance at £2500 but I done pass plus and my insurance was £1260
 
try admiral and elephant, they've been dirt cheap for me. also put your parents or any adults as named drivers, and lie about your mileage per year!! ;) they'll never check, should bring it down a bit
 
nis2.0 said:
try admiral and elephant, they've been dirt cheap for me. also put your parents or any adults as named drivers, and lie about your mileage per year!! ;) they'll never check, should bring it down a bit
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its not lieing if you go over. the guy over the insurance said you can go over a bit to me
 
handling wise between these cars, I'd say teh 306 maybe slightly has the edge. apart from that I'd go with the almera. much more reliable, mor powerful and more than likely better on fuel. I wouldn't have had a 1.4 306 instead of my 1.4 almera given the choice. if you can, get an Si. much better interior and sportier suspension. there's no real 1.4 engined 306 equivalent to the Si. peugeot used a whole range if different engines and from 1.8 up and don't do a sporty trim model below that (except the phase 1 1.6 XS, which is not as good as the almera Si).
 
blata39 said:
well cheers lads. it is decided, almera! but i really have no clue what to do about insurance. did a quote yesterday over the phone which came to £3900 for a 1.4 equation almera. but the bird on the phone said i should give quinn insurance a try as they could knock a couple of grand off that. sounds to good to be true. ill give em a try 2moro
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Thats stupid! The best way i find is to go on all these online comparison sites, and then compare all of the quotes off of them. Then, phone the cheaper ones and keep bouncing the quotes off of one another untill they wont budge anymore! This tends to save me up2 £200 each year off of my renewal quote!
Also, IF you sign up for membership on here some insurers will give you a small additional discount for being a member of a club, plus you'll obv have the advantage of the full site facilities :)
 
sprint said:
because even when they rust you normally still get a good 15+ years out of them without needing major bodywork (ie most peoples life expectancy from a car), plus even if you spend the odd few quid on welding its cheaper than major mechanical problems
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My 3 have done both! ;) Well, apart from the Primera, it seemed oddly great at rust-resistance compared to the other two, even though it had the highest mileage and was oldest. It's a hell of a lot easier to do mechanical stuff yourself than weld too.

£3900 is quite obscene BTW, try harder! :eek:
 
Good choice with the almera :P

GO on the compare sites for quotes, do your pass plus which is easy as farting!

Definately try Quinn Direct though, every year they are the cheapest for me :)
 
This may be some useful information for you, my girlfriend was interested in getting a 306 and I posted on the 306 forum, asking about what to look for how they drive, realiability etc & I got this answer from a member via a private message

"If you want a reliable car - DO NOT GET A PEUGEOT!!!!!!! (or ANY other French, Italian or Spanish car), go for the Far East or Germany! "

That from a 306 Owner!!!!!

I've had a french car & had nothing but problems in the 18months I owned, I love the car but not the bills, I went through 4 drive shafts, engine mounts, TPS sensor, Wheel Hub... so never again!!

My last two cars have been Jap & the rest will be Jap from now on!!

OH & on insurance try swiftcover.com found them very resonable for both me and the girlfriend and its all online so no stupid call centre and 20 minute phone calls....
 
scoobysn7x said:
I've had a french car & had nothing but problems in the 18months I owned, I love the car but not the bills, I went through 4 drive shafts, engine mounts, TPS sensor, Wheel Hub... so never again!!
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:eek: 4 drive shafts was you rallying ? that just sounds insane mate
 
ive had both the almera gti and a 306 xsi the 306 as stock does handle slightly better but i would not have another 306 for a car i drive everyday the nissan's just feel a lot better to drive will come out a lot better in a crash.
but saying that 306's r cheap for parts and can be a lot of fun. but as people have said dont expect miricals from either 1.4.
as for insurance i managed to get insured on a gti when i was 18 with a crash and 3 points so a few tips if you want them.
keep the annual milage as low as you can (bear in mind the insurance companys cant really check if you've gone a bit over anyway)
put older drivers on see if it lowers the premium, putting my mum and dad on my insurance lowered it nearly £1000 ( make sure who ever you put on has over 15 years experiance and no crashes or points)
try going for the 10 month bonus excelerator but do the maths make sure you arnt paying much more a month that if you went for 12 months.

hope that helps ive also found that elephant/admiral/bell all the admiral group anyway have been the best do a qoute online then ring up the cheapest and say you have found it a bit cheaper at hastings direct or similar and see if they will lower it if not no lose.
 
ive owned lots and lots and lots of cars over my many years of driving, and ive owned/ driven almost every engined almera and 306,

i personally would avoid the smaller engined 306's the ones i mean are the 1.4/1.6 TU 8v engines, as they are gettin on abit now and arnt the best in the reliability league, but as a whole the 306's are fantastic cars and by far one of the best model's peugeot have ever produced, the almera is also a great car, although less desirable to the masses like the 306 hense you can get alot more for your money with an almera vs 306, spares will be more expenisive on the almera but the 306 will break more so i would have thought servicing costs would equal them selves out but the 306 will spend more time in the garage than the almera will

so yes the nissans rust alittle, but thats easily sorted if well looked after. 306's how ever only rust due to accident damage repairs so be carefull if you do find rust on a 306! it will be hiding something! and the smaller nissan engines are more reliable than the french offerings and really willing and feel sporty where as the 1.4/1.6 engines you will find in the base model 306's are sluggish and noisey. also the interiour on a french car will try and fall off its clips at any givern oppertunity and all though the interior in the almera is alittle boring in comparison, its very well made and will last the test of time. and depending on age i think you will most probably get air con in the almera which will genrally work! but ive persoanlly never seen or owned a 306 where the air con has actually worked lol!

so in summery:

306 is a good car but only worth buying the gti6/meridian models as they are well equiped or the brilliant d turbo engine, but all of these models are out of your £700 pound price range.

the almera will be strong well built and fun to drive, spares will be more, but much more reliable and i believe it would be a great first car :)

good luck with your car search

steve
 
d0b0 said:
ive had both the almera gti and a 306 xsi the 306 as stock does handle slightly better but i would not have another 306 for a car i drive everyday the nissan's just feel a lot better to drive will come out a lot better in a crash.
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The n15 was pretty dodgy in the the ncap ratings, 2 star I think. You crash you break your legs was basic idea, but I doubt the 306 is much better
 
Almera all the way! My first car was the 1.4si, had it just under 2 years and it gave me no problems at all... think the only thing i spent money on was tyres! very reliable!

I was 18 and my insurance was £1200 for the first year (RAC) then £650 second year (Quinn Direct). Quinn seem like a good company because they specialise in younger drivers!
 
Cam said:
The n15 was pretty dodgy in the the ncap ratings, 2 star I think. You crash you break your legs was basic idea, but I doubt the 306 is much better
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i supose i can only commnet on the GTi model but ive had a crash in it and it stood up very well along with other GTi's on here i have seen after crashes they all seem to have been good, no serious injurys.
 
Darren198712 said:
:eek: 4 drive shafts was you rallying ? that just sounds insane mate
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Just normal abuse :P , mind you had front upper & lower strut braces on & bigger alloys so probably put a bit more strain on them than normal, replaced two and then just before I decided to sell it needed another 2 (thats when I sold it) that added to the fact the local citroen gararge refused to work on my car again because I had the nerve to complain about there Shite service :eek: ...


Used to be able to drop the clutch at 2500k in first and it would just go no wheel spin or nothing just griped & went, looking back this probably wasn't a good idea as after doing this a few too many times I managed to brake the engine mounts :O , like to think it was cheap engineer rather than my over ethusiastic driving :P ;)
 
Cam said:
The n15 was pretty dodgy in the the ncap ratings, 2 star I think. You crash you break your legs was basic idea, but I doubt the 306 is much better
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yeah I remember being suprised at the N15 being quiet poorly rated in the NCAP tests, but you're right the 306 is only marginally better by 1 1/2 stars.

comparison

The Almera's real let down is driver protection, whereas the 306's is pedestrian safety. At least that gives us a better idea which car to choose if you fancy swerving at those chavs on the pavement ;).

These are both the 5 door models though, 1999 Almera 1.4 GX and 1998 306 1.6 GLX. can't find anything on the 3 door models.

one thing that surprises me is that the 306 is stated as being 1110Kg kerb weight, with the almera at 1140. only 30Kgs here, but the 306 GTi-6 is fair bit heavier than the N15 GTi so I expected similar models lower down to show the same trend.

Another thing is that the safety trend is exactly the same with the N16 and the 307. 307 is better for passengers than the N16, but worse for pedestrians (click here). Both are major improvements over their predecesors tho.
 
What can I say, they ran out of chances with me, to the point where the wallet-ache has been so bad, that I won't have another Jap car unless I can afford something like a r35 GTR. I swapped my Primera for a Xantia, how much faith I had. ;)
 
lol... citroen... peugeot's worst kept dirty little secret ;).

as far as reliability goes, mechanically you can expect as much reliability from a pug as you can from a nissan (except for the timing chain vs timing belt differences, where nissan's only downfall is the hydraulic tensioners). Electrically, peugeots are a bit of a let down. they're just quite lazily put together. when they work, they work brilliantly but when they go wrong there's a million and one things that could be wrong. Usually quite simple fixes though, and yes the aircon in a 306 isn't one of its finest points (no, mine doesn't work but that doesn't matter since I plan on swapping the pump for an eaton M45 later this year).
 
My old V6 had electric almost-everything and it all worked. ;) And yes, I fell victime to a stretched timing chain as well, one of my highest ever bills. The chain and tensioner themselves were quite cheap (about £27 for the tensioner and about £90 for the chain), but the amount of labour involved OMFG. That was one of the first tipping points for me, a chain is MEANT to be an advantage, but when it fucks up, it becomes a huge and expensive disadvantage...:(
 
Never go french. I have owned 7 Nissans now and the worst I have had to replace is a clutch on a 17 year old D reg Sunny. I now have Almera GTi and in one year have done 17,000 miles and have not been in garage yet or any maintenaince other than oil change and filter. These cars are near enough bullet proof and if its money you are worry about spending the only option is jap.

I hate french i had a shite Citroen ZX and had 4 major problems in 3 months so got rid.
 
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