Again, I think a lot is down to driving style. Throw it around at a lot and expect it to wear early, drive normally and only motorway miles means little wear.
Not my cars (I wouldn't be daft enough to have one), so can't play that chestnut... ...unless everyone drives like me, in which case I'm normal
If the requirement is for it to pass an MOT, then as I said in my post on the front suspension, it will likely last 150k before it starts failing, unless MOT tester is blind. Some people's requirement is for a tyre to be black and round, and begrudge the inconvenience that it might have to be legal to get an MOT. Same with bush wear as well.
When I got the Jag, it had been MOT'd 3 months previous, yet 2 of the front bushes weren't just worn, they were properly shagged. That shagged, that they couldn't both have failed in those 3 months. It was the first thing I noticed when I test drove it.
I think MOTs haven't moved on much from Morris Marina era. Now, even your 160bhp soot chucker is 3 times the power, and most cars an awful lot more powerful, so I think MOTs should be tightened a lot more....
Mrs TB once owned a Metro, which I affectionately called the thrashmobile... ...I quite liked that car. It was always serviced and MOT'd by a garage due to time constraints. Anyway, one day, I was just finishing work, got a phone call from a payphone (before mobile phones were affordable), it was Mrs TB saying the car wasn't right and was pulling under braking. I told her to be brave, and nurse it home, thinking it was a slight brake pull. I get home, and she still isn't back. Then I get another call from her (she'd made it to the next phone box
), saying she really didn't want to drive it further. So I jump in the car, go tearing out to where she was, throw her the keys to my car, jump in the Metro, and start bombing home, thinking she was just being a girl. First time I had to brake - a sharp left corner - I hit the brakes reasonably hard, and the car just spins
. So nurse it home very gently, jack it up, it was a bush had obviously split some time ago, but had now completely separated
. Checked every other bush on the suspension, every single one was split and needed renewing. Yet had passed an MOT a few weeks earlier.
Car was scrapped, as the only viable way for me to change the bushes was all new components, as no access to press etc. Replaced with a 1.2L Nova, which wasn't anywhere near the car that the Metro was
. But was cheap