It has been said many times that the P38 is unreliable, and I like others have had numerous problems with mine - thankfully most of them relatively minor and easy to fix. (A big thank you to forum members who have helped me fix some of them.)

So, I thought I would share with you the list of items that have been replaced on our 6 year old VW Transporter Shuttle in our 5 years of ownership:

Gearbox
Clutch
Dual mass flywheel
NSF anti roll bar link rod
OS driveshaft
PAS pump (twice)
NS and OS door seals (NS twice)
Steering UJ
Side window
Heater control
Step lights
Rear engine mount

This is for a car that's only done 65K miles and is still on its original battery...

My P38 is really reliable





When its not broke.....:hysterically_laughi

You must be really chuffed with the battery.

G~

My 12 year old P38 has done 130K miles, I have the full service history and bills. It is on it's original engine and gearbox, the airbags appear to be the originals too. I cannot see any sign of major components being replaced on the service history other than the head gasket on bank 1 was replaced at 80K miles.

About 30K miles ago, a month before I bought it, it had a new rad.

My expenditure in 30K of reliable driving:
£90 New battery (not required but I wanted a new one due to the constant drain put on the old one by the old RF receiver.)
£141 RF receiver
£150 Spare key fob
£250 Blend motors fitted (IIRR) (too busy myself!)
£90 Front airbags (not fitted yet)
£??? Two full fluid and filter services done myself.
£41 MAF sensor (reading the ODBII data at the last service the flow figures were out of spec)
£360 Four new GG AT tyres (not actually required but I don't like mixed sets!)
£175 Specialist transmission service (something I always do whenever I buy a s/h automatic car)


Now I wouldn't be surprised if the engine blew up tomorrow - Rover V8s aren't exactly renowned for racking up interstellar mileages - but I think it has done pretty well. It is my daily driver and I have been able to depend on it. Even if I threw it away I think it has done well - enjoyable Bangernomics.

For a car of the age I'm very pleased - it's much more niggle free and reliable than my 89 classic 3.9 Vogue SE which I bought when it was only two years old and was nothing but trouble 'til the day I sold it.

The only rust anywhere is on the bonnet edge when someone has tried to lever the bonnet open with a crowbar. I have seen plenty of 12 year old Mercs scraped for rust issues - my car is mint underneath. It now has a few bramble scratches where I've greenlaned and off-roaded a bit - the bodywork was almost as new when I bought it.

Not bad at all for an old car.

Lots of niggles on mine but I've had 3 years of reliable motoring, will have to bite the bullet and change the autobox soon but still cheap motoring compared to a nearly new Xtrail.

Datatek said:

Lots of niggles on mine but I've had 3 years of reliable motoring, will have to bite the bullet and change the autobox soon but still cheap motoring compared to a nearly new Xtrail.

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My ex's father's X-trail diesel went through two engines in under 40K miles from new. He replaced it before the warranty ran out with a new Freelander TD4, I only knew him for another year after that (dumped the bird) but in that time his Freelander had been trouble free - he swore never to buy another Nissan! How's that for role reversal? PS he liked the X-trail while it was going but he loved the Freelander.

Tlc is the key not just in matainance, how you look after drive example,sleeping policemen, the one lying on the road, braking and alike the more you strain the more you wear bushes parts ect forethought is the key IMO .

StuckAgainSteve said:

My ex's father's X-trail diesel went through two engines in under 40K miles from new. He replaced it before the warranty ran out with a new Freelander TD4, I only knew him for another year after that (dumped the bird) but in that time his Freelander had been trouble free - he swore never to buy another Nissan! How's that for role reversal? PS he liked the X-trail while it was going but he loved the Freelander.

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I dumped the Xtrail before the warranty ran out, without the warranty it would have cost me around £3k in 11 months. Useless for pulling the caravan too.

He didn't even tow anything with his! Can't remember what caused the engine failures - twas a common fault at the time I believe. This is heresy of course because Jap cars can do no wrong! I must admit I've never had an engine failure with a Jap bike though.

StuckAgainSteve said:

He didn't even tow anything with his! Can't remember what caused the engine failures - twas a common fault at the time I believe. This is heresy of course because Jap cars can do no wrong! I must admit I've never had an engine failure with a Jap bike though.

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Nissan ain't really Jap anymore, Renault are in charge. The engine failures were a software problem related to control of the variable vane turbo. It was cured by a software update.