Ford Reviews

There are a lot of variables here. One person’s idea of fully restored can vary enormously from somebody else’s. Is the car in mint, factory condition, or in good driving condition? Is it modified in any way? Is it a weird or undesirable colour? Does it have competition history? These are all things that will make a huge difference to the asking price.

Classic cars will make better money if they’re in standard form and with all the desirable options fitted, including a manual (versus automatic) transmission. But even then, the post-Covid market for such things is pretty volatile and even something like another Trump tariff announcement (affecting superannuation values) could send prices tumbling.

However, as a (very) ball-park figure, a good condition, unmolested Capri V6 GT from 1972 should start the bidding around $50,000 or $60,000.

The news here isn’t great, and this model Laser had just a single airbag (for the driver) in any of the forms sold in Australia at the time. So, even though the Laser represented a fairly dependable package and is now a very cheap second-hand car to buy, it can’t really be recommended for younger drivers on the basis of that limited safety package.

Even anti-lock brakes didn’t become an option for the Laser until the April 2001 facelift, at which point a passenger’s front airbag became optional in the entry-level LXi and standard on other variants. So the later version is a much safer car all round provided the original owner ticked the boxes for ABS and the second airbag.

The symptoms here point to a stuck flasher relay. This is the electrical component that not only powers the indicator lights, but makes them flash (and produces the steady clicking sound you hear when the indicators are on). The contacts in these units can become stuck at which point the lights can become stuck on.

Why does it still happen when the ignition is off? Because the flasher relay is powered up even when the ignition is not. That’s so you can have the emergency hazard-warning lights flashing even though the vehicle is locked and the keys in your pocket. A new flasher relay unit should fix it.