Car appreciation... the aesthetics, the engineering, etc

Vauxhall FD Victor, T boned something and engine came off mounts and through the radiator.
Ford Cortina 1500 GT, rolled that over a Viva. Broke in half.
Triumph Stag x1 Did a South of France trip via Route Napoleon
1600 Cavalier Mk1
Triumph 2.5pi
Saab 99EMS
Saab 99 turbo, 2 door in red
Saab 900 Turbo
Triumph Stag x2
Renault 5Turbo
Mazda Xedos x1
Mazda Xedos x2
Mercedes A class
Audi A2 x1
Audi A2 x2 still got
Lexus SC430 still got
Citroen Pluriel Charleston still got

Loads of others for short times, capri 2.0JPS, imps, escorts, metros....

After the first two write offs, only the Mercedes A class really let me down after engine blew. All the others went to new owners. Except for the Lexus all practical and day to day cars.

No point in a 964 as that's really just the older Carrera with fugly bumpers, the 993 had much better rear suspension. So that would be my choice.

No...

The 964 was the big changeover. It’s coil sprung, the earlier cars were torsion bar, has power steering, ABS and much better high speed NVH.

The 993 had mild mechanical revisions by comparison.

The 964 feels fleeter of foot to operate than the 993, but is more refined and faster than the 3.2. It’s also something like 8cm narrower that the 993 something you really notice on the road. You can pick a line in the 964 and still stay on your side of the road.

Fiat 129 - overpaid for it and only lasted 12 months or so
(15 years gap of car-free life)
M-reg Saab 9000 CSE - big wafty boat super comfy but drank like a fish
V-reg Saab 9-3 - a bargain which I kept for 8 years or so
'05 Subary Legacy wagon 2.5i SE - (off James of this forum) kept 6 months before it was upgraded
'08 Subary Legary wagon 3.0R spec b - cos the prev car was so good

Not planning to change car just yet but the next one will probably be electric.

I had an Amethyst 928. Everyone was very pleased to tell me I had a pink poor man’s Porsche at every opportunity. :(

2002 - Peugeot 504 2L (argentine late version) - my dad's car. i learnt to drive in this car at 11. one of the best gearboxes ever... rwd, so my first powerslide/drift is also tied to this one. loved that thing..
2006 - Nissan Navara/Frontier NP300. "mad max". bought for a 9 month south-america trip with the gf. converted it into a camper, drove it 26k kms from the north of argentina to the strait of magellan and back up to bolivia. no issues whatsoever.
2007 - Lexus IS. dream car from 99, when i first saw it in a magazine. had to have one. loved it, traded it for the two MR2s. wanted a track car.
2009 - Peugeot 806. the whale/moby dick. for recreating the south-america camper for europe. piece of shit.
2009 - Toyota MR2 +donor car. current project.
2009 - Mazda Xedos9 Miller. bought for the compressor.
2009 - Toyota Celica GT4 CS exTTE. current project.

Tig brazing a roll hoop is sketchy AF.

Certainly wouldn't comply with the Blue Book.

924/944 are the poor mans porker

I had a 996 C4S until recently. It seemed to handle pretty well. But the car I drove most before it was a 90s AudiS2 which is hardly known for driving dynamics.

Got rid of it more because it was a tiptronic and it sucked. Sold it within a week though and didn't lose anything, so they seem sought after still.

Despite the fact my #1 car to own since I was 12 has been a 993, I've never driven an air cooled porsche so can't compare :-)

Escort Mk 3 5 door. 1.6 so did actually move, but rusty as hell and leaked like a sieve. Written off when some fucker rear-ended me into a ditch and drove off, on New Year's Eve

Orion 1.4. caught fire on the Littlehampton bypass

Peugeot 405 2.0, quite liked this but traded in for

Rover 620ti. Proper Q-car. Lent it to a "mate" for the weekend and he cooked the head gasket

Audi B5 A4 Avant V6. Tiptronic gear box which I hated

Honda Accord Type-R. Bought from a guy I knew in Jersey where it had done 7,000 miles in 3 years. Amazing thing. It was the early version with no aircon, which I regretted when I drove it back from Switzerland to London in a day in August. Autoroute cruising not a strong point. Eventually fancied a change for a

VW Golf MkIV R32. 3-door in silver. I loved this, brilliant car. Sold for a house deposit

Mondeo ST220. Fastish, but nothing compared to the golf. Had all 4 wheels and the front bumper stolen. Now I had kids so traded for

Honda Accord diesel touring. The comfort and economy blew my mind. God I was middle aged :(. Traded for a

Hyundai Santa Fe which we needed to pull the horse trailer (/golf club). It wasn't up to the job and got through 2 clutches, traded for an

Isuzu Rodeo double cab pickup. Sounds and drives like a tractor. Indestructible. Got me a

Mini Cooper (R53) as a runaround. Really like it, cheap & cheerful but plenty of fun

There was another B5 Avant V6 in there somewhere as well, which I much preferred the gear box when I was 45 not 28

The wide body 996s and 993s look great, especially the 993S which is just so fat and low, so they’re more valuable. The first time I saw a 993 Turbo on the road, I was 16 and it was black, I couldn’t believe how fucken cool it looked. It was my absolute dream car, until I got one. (A few years ago when they weren’t £100k).

Have a go in a narrow [manual] 996 and you’ll understand. They’re so much lighter to steer, turn in so much quicker and ride so much better. The C4S tramlines, fights you over every camber and rides like you’re being bounced up the road on a scaffold board.

By comparison of course. Against an Audi a C4S steers like an Elise. :)

More on that barn. Car by car tour.

https://youtu.be/Y_Wc_m06pG8

That’s still cheaper than the M96 engines are going to be I suspect.

Front suspension will be C2, with the front diff removed, so essentially it’s a C2 with a slightly wider rear track.

In other news, I have an update on my LM’s: “end of spring”, which I suspect is still within the lockdown period, so no huge issue.

I actually suspect it’s going to be over 12 months from order to arrival, but we shall see.

1. Nissan Micra K10 - 1 litre, 4 speed. Still managed to get 5 blokes and kit Glenshee on a regular basis. 1st gear needed for the last mile!
   
2. Nissan Micra K10 - 1.2 that some goon had fitted a webbed carb to.
   
3. Mazda 626GTI - clipped a curb while cornering and remodelled the roof.
   
4. Honda Accord 2.2 - with a big cone filter making induction noise.
   
5. Nissan Cherry Turbo! - home made boost controller and inter cooler from Iveco turbo daily were the choice upgrades. Written off by someone rear ending me.
   
6. Rover 620ti - first genuinely fast car. Terrifying at speed.
   
7. Saab 9-5 2.3t estate - boost turned up a lot and handling mods, this was a genuinely great car.
   
8. Mazda 6 diesel - new, boring and questionable reliability of the timing chains so swapped for a
   
9. Subaru Outback 2.5 2006 - had this for almost 8 year, it's the functional not porn, not anti of cars still got this one.
   
10. Audi S3 2001 - chipped and 3" exhaust this was really quite rapid.
    
11. Subaru Forester 2.5 XT, so much fun, speed and noise but engine blew up and sank around 4k into rebuilding before selling it (kind of coverd my costs so happy enough)
    
12. Subaru Legacy 3.0R Spec B - current car. 3.0.engine is amazing, auto box is totally fine and for £1800 seems mint.
    
    

Westfield Mazda SDV kit - built in 2010, based on a 250quid donor car, still amazing fun and puts a smile on everyone's faces!

Actually yes the C4S did tramline quite a bit, although I found the ride very good for the type of car it was.

I drove a 997.2 C2S which is, of course, quite wide, and it seemed to have lighter steering and no tramlining. Very big on the road though, even compared to a 996 widebody.

1. Austin Maestro 1.6 HLS. Not technically my car, but my mother's. However, she never had a driving licence so I was the only person who used it. My father bought it for buttons off the next door neighbours when they were going to trade it in. Crashed it once before I passed my test, and once afterwards. It ended up upside down burnt out in a field near Cambridge.

2. Renault 5 Auto. The Maestro's replacement. Bought when it turned out my mother had a conceptual difficulty with gears. A horrible car, with a faulty gearbox that wouldn't shift from 3rd until after 20 minutes' driving. Sold for scrap when it turned out my mother also had a conceptual difficulty in distinguishing between the brake and accelerator.

3. Peugeot 205 GTi 1.6. The first car I bought, must've been about 2000. Fitted 15" 5 spoke alloys, Koni lowered shocks, 1.9 uprights, big Wilwood 4 pot brakes, K&N cone filter. I think it'd be crashed at some point as one front wheel stuck out more from the body than the other, and it had steering shimmy over 80mph. Eventually a water hose sprang a leak and I cooked the engine. Sold it on eBay for £500 (with full disclosure of the cooked engine).

4. Fisher Fury Sypder Blackbird. My first kit car. Built during 2001-2002 ish when @Cycliste was working in China for a year. Killed three engines due to oil surge before fitting a dry sump and getting it to work properly. Ended up writing it off in a big crash racing at Mallory. Still in the process of rebuilding it with a new chassis, suspension, bodywork and uprated engine.

5. Fisher Fury Classic. My only convertible. Original style Fisher Fury with Elan screen and soft top, dark blue metallic paint, black leather and wood interior. 1600 XFlow engine on twin 40 Dellortos, which worked well once it had started but was sometimes reluctant to get started. Bought a rather warm 1700 XFlow on twin Webers to fit in it, but sold the engine before I got round to fitting it. I lent the car to my brother for a long weekend Se7ens List tour in Ireland - I drove the Blackbird-engined car. He killed the engine and dumped it near Loughborough on the way back. Ended up managing to put the nose of the trailer through the rear window of my father's Volvo when I went to collect it and then damaged the door and scuttle getting it off the trailer. Sold it on for buttons.

6. Sylva Striker ZX9R. Was Kawasaki green, now graphite grey. Bought as a stop-gap temporary car to tide me over while I rebuilt the Blackbird Fury. Still own it. On its third engine due to the ZX9R-C gearbox being made of cheese. Once dumped all its oil all over the autoroute on the way down to Le Mans, and ate a set of tyres in 10 days during a European driving tour. Now with uprated gearbox. Need to get it on the road again.

7. VW Passat 115 diesel saloon. Dark green with a beige cloth interior. Very economical, catastrophically boring car. Ended up giving it to a friend, by which time the only panel without serious bodywork damage was the roof.

8. Subaru Impreza WRX Sportwagen SL. Blue with gold wheels. Great car, if rather dull to drive because it was so competent. Bought it with 40k on the clock, sold it with 120k on the clock, paint peeling off the bonnet scoop and unresolved charging gremlins to a friend. I told him about the electrical issues. Didn't tell him it wasn't taxed or tested when I sold it to him, as I'd failed to notice myself.

9. Fisher Fury Spyder R1. Matt black paintwork. My race car, but road legal and road registered. Used the rear axle from the Blackbird car. 2004 R1 engine. Full datalogging, sensors everywhere, extensive chassis mods. It's been sitting in my storage unit since 2014 when I retired from racing.

10. Porsche Cayman S. Black with black leather interior. Wonderful car, but attracted too much attention from the police and boy racers. Sold to my BiL, who still has it.

11. Audi RS6 Avant. Superfastwankerbarge. Currently needs new brake pads, a service, and someone to fix the dry sump output shaft oil leak. Fast as fuck, thirsty as a fish.

12. Morris Minor Traveller. @Cycliste's first car, and was going to be scrapped by her father unless I took it on. @Cycliste and I had it completely restored in its original pale blue colour. Doesn't get used a lot at the moment.

Think that's it. I've still got the Audi, the Minor, the Striker, the Fury Blackbird and the Fury R1.

Rover 620ti ftw

I remember driving in it to the Lakes, my mate was driving & the rear tyre had a full-on blowout at about 90mph in the fast lane of the M6. It was about midnight so not much other traffic but still reckon how he got it safely to the hard shoulder was the best bit of real-world driving I've ever seen.

I'll get upset at how shit my car history has been if I think about it for too long...

2004 Mini One D - really highly specced and comfortable to be fair.

1997 Mini Cooper S John Cooper Works Spi - a shining light of fun and madness in an otherwise bland sea of dull.

2006 Mini One D - again extremely high spec and pleasant to be in.

2007 Ford Transit Connect - yeah.

2007 Land Rover Discovery - actually loved this but it was a disaster, four engine rebuilds.

2008 Alfa Romeo 159 Sportwagon 2.4JTDM - currently still in my possession but Irish Government decided to make it painfully expensive to register on Irish plates in the time between me buying it and completing registration, sadly for sale.

1992 Peugeot 309 - first car, bought for £350 from a car auction in 2000. 1.6 manual, loved driving it although it leaked oil like a champ. My dad snapped a head bolt in the block when we changed the head gasket (to stop the oil leak) and we had to strip the whole thing to take the block to get the bolt end Lasered out. Still some of the best time I spent with my dad rebuilding it all. After that the fuelling was fucked and it would cut out at the worst times imaginable, midway across junctions etc. Left it to rot then sold it for scrap. still think about buying another.

Then drove a slew of my dad's company cars, the best being the rover 620 he had, fastest I've ever driven in a car, over 120 on a midnight trip to the coast.

Then 1999 Toyota Yaris 1.0 awesome reliable workhorse, easy to work on, loved being thrown around corners, actually belonged to my partner but I drove it all the time. Great camping trips around Europe with all the gear and two bikes in the back.

Then a rover 25 left to me by my grandad, less said about it the better. Immobilizer would come on randomly for an hour or so then go off. Gave it to charity.

Then 1991 Volvo 240 2.0 torslanda. Bought for £650 then sold for the same after 5 great years of driving, easy maintenance and reliability. And so comfortable! Still miss it. Still look for it on eBay. Sold it as it had rust I couldn't fix in a financially viable way.

Then 1999 Toyota RAV4. 2.0 three door, like a radio controlled car to drive. Cambelt snapped after I had it a month :(
Took it apart and fixed it, but then couldn't trust it and traded it for...

Citroen Berlingo 2005. Easy to maintain, frugal, euro 5, great load capacity. Perfect for camping. Hate it. Hate driving it. Should sell it really but can't be bothered to engage with it in any way.

Next car- might not buy another car. If I do it'll be another early 90s relic.

Whomever invented those shitey plastic clips for securing interior panels is a fucking cat rapist and deserves to be tortured then have their body dumped at sea.

That is all.

[edit -pearoast]