Vauxhall Zafira Comfort 1.6i > Reviews > Second hand 1.6i

Author's product rating:   

Safety	Good
Comfort	Excellent
Road Handling	Excellent
Security	Good
Looks	Good

Advantages:	Elevated view, seating flexibility, reasonable fuel consumption, fair insurance rating .
Disadvantages:	Interior blandness .

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

We purchased this vehicle 5 months ago second hand. The Zafira is very popular among people buying under the mobility scheme so the advantages of buying one of these second hand is that they tend to be low milage and have a full dealer service history. We were fortunate in that our one was three years old but only had 15,000 miles on the clock. We purchased from a network Q dealer in the area and had some minor work done by them ( 2 front tyres and a wiper blade). The only problem that we have had is that there was a noticeable distortion of the windscreen directly in the drivers line of site. Apparently this is not an MOT failure. This was confirmed to me by a friend who is an MOT examiner. However, the garage replaced it free of charge (many kudos to them). The replacement still has a slight distortion on the passenger side by this is acceptable. This may be something to be aware of if you intend to buy second hand.
My wife is the main driver and has declared her undying love of this vehicle to the stage that she wants one for our next car.
Both my wife and myself are around 5ft 10 yet we both have several inches of clearence above our heads (handy for when bufont hairstyles come back into fashion) when seated in the front or back.
One of our children is 4 and still in child seat. The rear leg room is such that when she has muddy shoes the only way the she can reach the back of the front seat is to try to slide out of her child seat.
We have used the flex 7 seating in several ways all to great effect. The standard boot space is easily large enough for the average 4.2 family and associated luggage.
Other ratings have covered all the motoring aspects so I hope to pick up on some of the finer points.
With the older models there is no 3 point harness in the middle of the centre seats although this has now been adressed by Vauhhall.
The wipers have been designed for left hand drive so do not clear the whole side of drivers vision for right hand drive.
Air con is very good in front seats although there is only foot mounted blowers for centre seats and none for rear seats.
Luggage cover is easily removed but there is no dedicated space to stow when used with rear seats up so tends to be crammed in wherever possible.
Car is fairly quiet when driving even at motorway speeds allowing conversation without shouting.
Fuel economy drops drastically when going over 75mph but remember that this is a large vehicle. When driven sensibly 70-75 on long journeys we returned 35mpg, not bad for a 1.6.
Reversing takes some getting used to as it is difficult to define where the back of the vehicle is but then again all the mpv's have this problem and is now being overcome with the use of parking sensors.
Despite all these niggles this is a great car the even Jeremy Clarkson likes and that is saying something.