MantaGTE85

About 7 years ago, a colleague's red Seat Leon (KU54VDC) had an advisory for 'offside front lanky dickhead driver'. He p'exed it soon after and the car ended up scrapped with nothing wrong with it.

Indeed. The mk2(b) Chasseur was a nice looking car with its GLS alloys and rear spoiler. I would have chosen the Sapphire version in Tasman Blue. Also, for about 3 months after the Mondeo came out, Ford dealers were still trying to shift unsold examples of the Azura edition. They were something like 9 grand each. Petrol versions were also running Pintos. And with compulsory cat converters post-J-reg, the performance on these would have been very interesting. I know my old CVH-engined pre-facelift K reg Escort 1.4 LX certainly was!

I can't make out the mileage reading where it shows the Mondeo's dials on the top of page 15, but I'm trying to work out if Car Choice borrowed K23FMC for test BEFORE or AFTER Autocar used it for driving 12,000 miles to Japan and back in one week. Sorry, l'm nuts like that. I've just found out it's also a 1.6 not a 1.8.

Nice. It was so long ago, I think I had the May 1993 issue, that came with the Cheap Fast Cars supplement that I read to death. The problem pages (Sticky Fingers?) were a fun read. Also, I can't believe how quickly all these cars depreciated compared to now.

Thanks for the memory! I think I remember owning a copy of that Car Choice magazine. Didn't the cover feature a 4 year old XJ40 up for £7995, or something?

Agreed. It's awesome. My grandmother had a 1985 Fiesta Ghia with the same head unit (B608COO I know you are out there somewhere).

Didn't Crusaders have chrome bumpers? I thought only base Cortinas had black.

The RAV is absolutely pristine. I like the colour. I can't see any rusty flakes among the mud that came down from the inner arches, which is very good news. Well done.

It looks to be getting in much worse shape around the sunroof since our favourite tea-and-cake-loving YouTuber sold it 4 years ago. A great shame. I still can't get my head around Rover selling a really nice executive car based on the Honda Legend with an Austin Ambassador engine up front. I wonder how many carb-fed 820s were actually sold.

And painted handles, side mouldings and mirrors. It's been dressed up to look a bit more like a '95 Ghia X. I'm sure its colour Cayman Blue was superseded by Petrol Blue at that point too? Mind you, I do like how the angle of the window handles align perfectly with the rear edge of the front speaker grilles on these base versions, when the windows are closed.

That Land Rover would be a 200 Tdi. 212,000 miles when tested last April. It's had lots of welding, but still looks in great condition. Very straight.

286,000 miles when last tested in July 2009 - an almost-consistent average of 30,000 miles a year in its lifetime on the road. Of course, 'nothing for one of these', as the dodgy sellers say. What is strange is that, while this obviously came off the road some time in 2010 and has been parked up since, DVLA say the logbook was last changed in May 2012. How can this be possible?

I've got 'Bartender and the Thief' by Stereophonics stuck in my head reading this thread.

Was the 50k Mondy advertised as 'Local Car'? It amazes me how so many low mileage 'performance' cars were just used every day as workhorses, only slower! Motorway driven cars are always going to be much better in every way.

My doctor has two big dogs, three children under 5, and drives a fucked '04-plate Multipla. Worth buying, should he sell it?

RED HOT FLAG!!! That bugger has been caning it to (almost) oblivion. You should never buy anything if the seller at any time talks bollocks about its performance. MPG is more important than MPH.

I recall the LX seat and door card material to 'look' quite plush, like on my white 1992MY Escort 1.4 LX. But in reality, the seats always felt ice cold and very very hard. Was your Orion a 1.4 or 1.6?

EFi's still had 14 inch round Shreddies for two more years so newest were D reg (pre-October '86). For the 1987MY, alloys became optional. The new alloys (where fitted) were a plainer, flatter face design similar to the Montego GSi. The cross-spokes came in from October '88.

Rear floors look solid.

A-Plus, well done!!! What was the difference between the original A Series and the newer A+ Series? Does A+ make it some kind of lean-burn unit like some later CVH's were?

That Mini did very well to manage 16 years on the road. I can't help myself looking up old registrations on DVLA. The Mini apparently became black at one point before its last tax ran out on 30th June '84.

I'm trying to think what car those alloys belonged to before ending up on that Corsa A? They're not GM ones that I recognise. It's a nice find though.

I can remember at one time in the late '90s, my Art teacher told us that her dream car was a deep blue smoll Mercedes with a hard roof that folds in.

Anyone knows about cars could easily be fixed and back up running. I don't think I was ever broken, and I don't run.

Nice pic! Top feature is those Porsche-engined (not golf-engine) Seat Ibiza 1.7i Sportline alloys!