Cat d

If you have access to trade facilities then it's good value.

I had a very nasty smash in 2009 (55-60 mph frontal) resulting in my car being a Category B writeoff. The insurance assessor said the only thing stopping it from being a Cat A was the fact that there was no fire.

Having seen the state of my car there's no way you'd ever have been able to repair it. Floorpan and roof were both distorted, along with every other panel. There was very little left of the passenger side front.
 
Depends really on why it's ended up a Cat d?

That's a good point to consider.

Quite often it's the interior which writes off a car. Once there's ten holes where airbags have deployed, pyro seatbelt tensioners deployed etc. the cost of fixing up the inside of even a 3 year old car can be prohibitive.
 
Category D Repairable salvage. Minimal damage, probably not structural, but insurer does not want to repair, even though it might be economic to do so. Often stolen and recovered after claim has been paid. Or it maybe a vehicle where parts are difficult to obtain so a quick repair is unlikely. Does not need VIC inspection to return to road. Notification will appear in your vehicle history check
 
The reason for asking is that I am on the market for a new car and the CAT D or C ones are £2k cheaper than current market value once fixed. I have seen some on autotrader and thought that provided the car looks to be a good quality repair might be worth thinking about. Not looking to onward sell but to use for 2-3 years i.e. buy an 08/58 plate.
 
They are hard to sell on so make sure you haggle hard and when you come to sell it you go low on the asking price.

A lot of cat D repaired cars are fine. There are also a few with patch spray work, cheap pattern panels and other corner cutting so make sure you find out the cars history and check the work.
 
I saw an ad the other day where it was a cat d cos they'd cracked the sump and killed the engine, and the insurer wouldn't stump up for a new one. If the engineer's report confirms it then that would be worth getting.
 
iirc cat d is an uneconomical repair i.e. it cost more or close to repair than the car is worth. my astra gsi was a cat d it had a slight shunt in the rear
DSC00014.jpg

as you can see the boot is less than half an inch from being flush with the wing. it took me 10 minuets to sort this with a chain and a tree and 5 minuets for my mate to weld the slight split in the seam. so in total i saved £900 of the book price, but the main reason i bought it was cause it was already modified by my mate (the previous owner and his brother the owner before him) i bought it for £600 and had nearly 2 years of fun with it, then broke it and made £500 just from the engine, ecu and gearbox, and £600+ more in other parts. so all in all a cat d really was a good buy for me:bigsmile:
 

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