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The very worst of the bad old days of Alfa Romeo's questionable build quality are behind us. At its worst, brand-new Alfas were rusting within in their warranty period and the electrical systems were a total mess. Many owners swore off the brand at that point, not willing to be caught out twice.

In the intervening decades, however, overall quality has improved dramatically. Of course, this has been an industry-wide phenomenon, not just an Alfa Romeo one, and is the result of better design, metallurgy and materials. Not to mention the increased use of robotics to physically build the end product. For all that, though, there's still some suspicion – if not resentment – towards the Alfa Romeo badge.

For the record, Alfa Romeo was ranked number one in the luxury segment in Sales Satisfaction Index for 2022 in the USA in the annual survey by JD Power. The survey is one of the more credible quality surveys and placed Alfa in first position (up nine places) from the 14 luxury brands included in the survey. However, the fine print is interesting, because the SSI result is based on the buyer's experience of six factors; delivery process, dealer personnel, working out the deal, paperwork completion, dealership facility and dealership website. Which is a different thing to actual vehicle build quality and reliability.

Early this year, Hyundai issued a recall for some Konas built between 2020 and 2022 to deal with problems with the eight-speed dual-clutch transmission which could cause a loss of drive and, therefore, a dangerous situation on the road. So the first check would be to see if your car you're looking at is affected by that recall (a Hyundai dealer will be able to tell you by looking up the car's VIN). If the car is one of the affected ones but the recall's fixes have been applied, then you have less to worry about.

The Kona's engine problems, meanwhile, were another cause for a safety recall after it was discovered that a batch of Konas had defective piston rings which could cause early engine wear and possibly even a fire. Again, these problems were being fixed by Hyundai, but you need to check whether the example you're looking at buying was one of the affected ones and what's been done about it by the previous owner.

The Mazda CX-3 of the same era has not been without its recalls either, including one for a suspension joint that could fail, but overall, the experience of owners suggests the Mazda could be the less risky bet. Again, though, check the service and recall history of any car before handing over the money.

Okay, first question: Did the sensor damage happen before or after the failure of the alert? If it’s the former, it’s a fair bet the crunch has broken the sensor in question and led to the whole inter-linked system failing.

If the problem happened before the bump (and caused the knock because it didn’t warn you of the looming barrier) then you need to investigate further. An auto electrician should be able to test the system and its circuits and tell you what the cause of the problem is. It could be anything from the wiring to a blown fuse to the sensors themselves having failed. Living on the very edge of the vehicle, these sensors have a pretty hard life with every tap and bump to the bumper potentially damaging them or their circuitry.

Luckily, your car is in the clear, and the LW Model Focus was the one with the hugely problematic dual-clutch transmission. In fact, these gearboxes were more or less ticking time bombs and more than half of them suffered – sometimes multiple – failures requiring replacement units. Ford was taken to task by the ACCC over its handling of the whole thing and was forced to quickly revise the Fiesta, Ecosport and Focus ranges. Which is why your car, the LZ model, has a turbocharged 1.5-litre engine and a conventional automatic transmission which is not only a better thing to drive, but also vastly less likely to fail prematurely and expensively.

Ford made the switch to the LZ model in 2015, largely as a response to the fearful reputation for transmission failures the LW model had gained. Our advice to anybody shopping for a Ford Focus (or Fiesta or Ecosport) is to absolutely avoid any example with the dual-clutch gearbox. Its demise will be a question of when, not if.

The 2015 model Jazz was recalled for a CVT transmission problem which could see high internal hydraulic pressure cause an internal shaft to break, at which point the car would lose all drive. However, your 2005 model Jazz was not fitted with a gearbox with the same potential problem.

Even though there was no recall for the 2005 Jazz's transmission, those with the CVT transmission could suffer shuddering problems which were linked to depleted additives in the transmission fluid. The solution was an improved fluid which was added to the gearbox once the old fluid had been drained and the car's ECU reset. While Honda dealers were performing this change, the problem was not deemed to be a safety issue, so no recall was issued.

The Australian Federal Government operates a website that lists all recalls for all makes and models officially sold here. It makes for some interesting reading. You can find it here.

It will depend on the make and model, but most cars with automatic headlight dipping can be configured to turn this feature on and off. In many cases, the high-beam can be switched to automatic by pushing the indicator stalk away from you, or selected manually by pulling the stalk towards you. Other brands and models have a variation on this theme. In other cases, you may be able to scroll through the car's info-screen menus and enable or disable this feature.

I know what you mean about this, and the reflection from a road sign or the light from the dimmest street light causing the car to automatically dip its headlights (even though no other cars are around) can be annoying, not to mention a safety issue. It's worth noting that, like any other car function, some makes do a better job of calibrating this system.

Being a Japanese car (Japan drives on the left as we do) the indicator stalk is on the right of the steering column. Most drivers find this is a more natural place to have them, and this is probably down to muscle memory as generations of Australian cars had the indicators to the right of the column as well.

That said, many European cars place the indicators to the left of the column, but it's surprising how quickly you'll adapt to that. Many Australians had their first taste of indicators-on-the-left in early air-cooled Volkswagens. This was more of an issue when cars had manual transmissions and you needed your left hand to change gears while hitting the indicators with your right hand.

While it's true that super-low mileage can make a difference to a car's selling price, when it comes to mainstream cars like the i30, the difference may not be as much as you expect. Rare, old and collectible cars really benefit value-wise from low mileages, but a 10-year-old Hyundai really doesn't fall into any of those categories. So while it will make the car worth more, don't be surprised if it doesn't make thousands of dollars' worth of difference.

On the flip-side, many car buyers don't like cars that have travelled very low annual distances. Cars don't like sitting around, and a car with very low kilometres could have problems with dry seals and gaskets, flat-spotted tyres, and a build-up of condensation within the mechanical bits and pieces.

The 1.8-litre non-turbo and 1.4-litre turbocharged engines in the 2014 Cruze will run happily on 91-octane petrol. The more highly tuned 1.6-litre turbo engine in the SRi, SRi V and Z Series models required a minimum of 95-octane fuel. There's no problem using 95-octane fuel in the engines designed for 91 fuel, but you probably won't gain anything in terms of fuel consumption or performance. The only thing that will happen quicker will be the emptying of your wallet.

There's no problem mixing 91 and 95-octane fuel in the cars designed to run on 91-octane petrol, but the 1.6-litre engine can be damaged by using anything other than a fuel with a minimum octane rating of 95.

This sounds very much like a fuelling problem. Since a diesel engine has no ignition system (beyond its own compression) any fall off in performance can often be traced back to the fuel system.

The best bet is to take the vehicle to a diesel specialist that knows this make and model and will have either seen this exact set of symptoms before or will be able to make a logical diagnosis rather than just changing random parts that may or may not be the cause of the problem. Things that are likely causes, however, are the fuel filtering system, fuel pump and injectors. But don’t rule out something simple like a bad batch of fuel that is playing havoc with the entire system.