Buying new car vs. maintaining an older one.

[white exec]

Plastic headlights do not survive exposure to bright sunlight - 000 000's of cars here with yellowed and matted lights, impossible to completely polish out.

I agree this is an issue on cars with older plastic headlights, but I've not seen it being an issue with post 2010 cars.

I don't think the polycarbonate used for plastic headlight fronts has changed that significantly.
Quite possible that "post 2010" cars just haven't been exposed to UV for long enough for the irrevocable damage to take place; it takes a few years for this to begin to show up.
But are we really saying that headlights (at up to €500 a throw, if with sealed fronts) should be replaced after this time? Perhaps we are.

OK, northern Europe doesn't get the intense and virtually daily high UV levels we do here (Mediterranean), but it can't be too much to expect cars to survive something as predictable as sun in Spain, can it?

[myglaren]

....although the driver's interior door handle did snap off on Saturday

They all do that sir.

Fixed at long last - ran out of excuses not to do it.

Easier than expected although getting the door card back was a bit tricky.

Took the opportunity to spray lots of white grease on the window winder mechanism/wires.
Also took the window controls to bits to clean the contacts - was easy the last two times I did it but reassembly a pain this time - the membrane with the carbon pads in it had 'grown' and wouldn't realign properly.
That took longer than the door handle.

Also found lots of pins in the bottom of the door card?

Car goes much faster now

Found a spare wire in the door - would that be for the lights in the bottom of the door, if they were fitted?

[GiveMeABreak]

Pins - as in needle type pins? Not sure about those Steve - unless the last owner was a seamstress!

As for the wire - if it is near the bottom middle, then probably for the puddle / kerb lights, or for the anti intruder 20,000 volts taser

I'm thinking of getting one solely for those people that 'trolley' your car doors with their supermarket trolleys. Had one the other week. Got back to the car almost the same time to see a bloke's door resting against mine - I said "thanks a lot" - to which as I moved it off, he said "wasn't me"! I gave him a mouthful and drove off later to scrape and polish off his white paint!

[myglaren]

I'm presuming they were there to poke out the washer jets but how they ended up there is a mystery.

Mine has so many dings and scratches I don't worry about new ones - got a nice one a couple of weeks ago when a car transporter wanted to occupy the space I was in - I really must nail the bumper and wheel-arch liner back on. Too hot today!

[GiveMeABreak]

It's my OCD I suppose - I spend a lot of time polishing and cleaning it - so I hate it when some ignorant couldn't care less attitude types can't be bothered to respect other people's property.

I have to admit, his missus was rather on the large side and blocked the aisle in the supermarket - so we already had a queue where nobody could pass her as she was piling up the trolley with more cakes. Aldi doesn't exactly have a lot of room in the allocated parking bays - so I normally tend to park opposite the main road in the carpet place car park and wheel the trolley across the road because of this issue. On this occasion I was in a hurry though and sure enough guaranteed a scratch, so out with the Mantis paste.

[myglaren]

Mine was pretty much out of shape when I bought it and I haven't done anything to improve it other than clean the inside, none too successfully, but it is far better now although you may be inclined to doubt that.

[daviemck2006]

That’s one good point about having a disabled badge, I get bigger parking spaces and less likely to bash or get bashed. I need the door fully open to get tn and out nowadays. I only use disabled or end spaces.