Spiny Norman

Yes please if we're talking Renault 16.

If it was the Volvo in the picture then yes. You'll go through a phase where things that were just hanging on for the odd pottering ramble on a Sunday let go but once you've replaced a few bits and bobs (usually rubber stuff) overhauled the cooling system and and rebuilt the carb so it starts and idles properly then there's no reason why a 40 year old car can't be used as a daily driver. A few years ago I had a 60s Volvo Amazon, an 80s Vauxhall and a late 90s Rover and for a few weeks in the depths of winter the Volvo was the only one working. Luckily there was no ice or snow so no salt on the roads but it coped just fine and the heater was superb!

Always thought D Merit summed up a base model diseasel Corsa B nicely. Or the hopefully titled Fiat Uno Start. Please...

If you look through the glass on the Lada you can see the driver's door quarterlight, and you can also see it looks like a saloon rather than a hatch. Pretty sure it's an Audi 80B1, available as a 2 door saloon with twin headlamps, and the slim bumpers with rubber end caps seem to match up. Probably some 'Ossi' has nicked the fancy chrome grille adornment for his Trabbi...

1954 A40 Somerset in the work's car park this evening.

I passed my test in a terracotta Mk1 1100L in 1982, and that was the last time I drove one. I've been in a few but I honestly can't remember ever driving one as a full licence holder.

But it's not about helping the environment, it's about maintaining the global car industry and restricting mobility for the regular punter. If it was about the environment they'd be taxing cars by weight and by the amount of fuel they used. It's not rocket science to understand that a 2 tonne vehicle needs more resources to both build and drive than the 700kg a Citroen AX weighed. As a great man once said, "just add lightness".

It's hilarious. My mate's tractor engined 62 plate Astra 1.3, done about 70k miles, serviced on the dot and bought because it does a bazillion MPG (despite him now working from home when he's lucky to do 3000 miles a year) and tiny tiny CO2 is persona non grata in Glasgow's LEZ while my 18 year old gas guzzling Saab Aero turbo is quite welcome to wend its way through the mean streets of the inner city, leaving a trail of unburnt hydrocarbons in its wake. Never mind, all these folks like my mate who are now having to consider chopping in their well maintained, tiny mileage fuel sipping shopping cars to buy a new 2.5 tonne EV full of nice things like newly manufactured plastics and batteries fresh from the cobalt mines of the Congo, can rest easy in the knowledge that they're being "green" and "eco" and saving the planet properly this time. Really...

Not the first time I've posted this shot of the velourious glory that was the inside of both my Vauxhall Royales. I'll leave the green Monza version for someone else.

£850 for a new Hoover*? Think I'd just buy a new carpet instead.

I went a few years ago, it's a fantastic place to while away an entire day.

That is rather splendid, P6s are bargains in the classic car market.

Never mind contributions, there should be a tax on some of the cunts that fill this place up with their pointless spew...

Customer came in and handed me this last night for helping him out a couple of weeks ago. Looks like the good stuff. 😎

Aye, mine could spin its wheels at 50 in kickdown before I got new tyres...

Also liked for the P J O'Rourke reference...

It's good that they didn't want to ruin the USP of a 2CV and add half a ton of batteries to it but the range is pathetic and the performance seems little better than a standard car's. I just don't see the point, half the fun of a 2CV is husbanding the maximum you can from it, eking out every last horsepower. perfecting every gearchange, scaring the bejezus out of passers by and passengers with comedy angles of roll, and mastering the lost art of going fast in an underpowered car by never going slowly, and having to do that in a whining EV that has all the disadvantages of the breed and none of the good stuff really doesn't appeal. Yes to the all new metalwork and everything else. Also yes to an uprated 50bhp 652cc twinpot, and yes to a car that's ULEZ compliant anyway due to its age.

There may not be much point to this one since your chances of finding one have always been slim, and nowadays I suspect they're anorexic, but here goes. The only other coupe I've ever owned (I know some people call 3 door Saab 900s coupes, I'm not one of them), the Toyota Paseo 1.5ST. Bought on a whim from a serial Toyota botherer, he had a minty fresh early Corolla in the drive and a Ph2 Supra turbo round the back, this wee car was in lovely condition and looked a wee sweetie. ❤️ Typical mid 90s Japanese driving experience, maybe a little more 'raw' but it all slotted and slid together nicely. The engine only had about 90bhp but the thing weighed about as much as a cocktail stick so it got up the road pretty well and the handling was quite decent for something that was mostly sold as a basic starter car for US college kids. It felt a bit cheap inside but it was a cheap little car, undercutting the Tigra by about a grand for the couple of years it was on sale in the UK. It was noisy and in mine the gearbox whined a bit but it was a nice short shift and low geared to make the most of what little oomph was available. 20mph/1000rpm in top made it a bit frantic at motorway speeds but it never sounded rough or strained and was always on the boil. It was tiny inside, the seats were thin and pretty uncomfortable although the driver's side in mine had partially collapsed and spares were unobtanium so I put up with it, I'm rarely in a car for more than an hour at a time anyway. I did once manage to squeeze myself into the back to clean the rear screen but I didn't repeat the experience. OK for small kids maybe. Boot was barely adequate too although the back seats doubled as storage space for soft bags if needed. Very good on fuel, averaged 40-ish no matter how or where it was being driven. In town you could drive on the little motor's decent torque and at speed it really wanted a sixth gear for economy. I liked it.

After doing two positive reviews of cars I've had recently that I loved, I'd decided to pick one of the three cars I've owned where I've hated nearly every minute with and was trying to choose between a Rover 620Ti or the Volvo C70, so here's my take on the hopeless fat Swedish slug. Volvo C70 - A counterpoint. Pros: Looks good from the rear three quarters, that C pillar looks like a Maserati, from the front it looks like the V70 you should have bought instead. Dynaudio stereo is one of the best I've ever heard in a car. Front seats were supremely comfortable, a very nice place to wait for the AA to arrive. Cons: Everything else. I liked Volvos before I encountered the C70 but IMO they're one of the most ill-conceived cars I've ever encountered. Granted mine was the 170bhp non turbo version but I can't believe an extra 50bhp would make the difference, these need 300bhp but the chassis wouldn't stand it. The power to weight ratio is no better than a 1.8 Focus because they weigh as much as the moon, managing to be heavier than the V70 estate version despite having a quarter of the carrying capacity. I must have been too busy enjoying the stereo to hear this famous 5 cylinder warble that people go on about as if it's some kind of budget Audi Quattro, I just remember the engine sounding rough and strained as it tried to haul 1600Kg+ up motorway inclines in 3rd gear. Couple of years ago I ran the 850 estate of many Shiters and to be fair it had a nice thrum to it but it did have a hole in the exhaust. Combine that with a gearbox that must have been shared with the diseasels because it was far too high geared for such a gutless heavy car, I've never used full throttle in a car so much since I drove a 2CV. I had to move the seat forward an extra inch so I could comfortably access the bottom of the throttle pedal's travel. Diseasel repmobiles wold leave it standing. The gearbox itself was horrible, long throw and clunky with a long travel clutch which might have been OK in the workhorse estate but felt really uncouth in what was supposed to be a prestige coupe, and it had a really cheap nasty plastic knob. This was a car that cost its first owner the thick end of £30k and in typical Volvo style some of the interior fittings were no better than you'd find in a Kia. The steering was numb and lifeless and yes, the turning circle is a joke. I've driven large vans that could turn in tighter spaces. The ride wasn't bad to be fair, all that weight had the occasional benefit I guess, but the handling was that of a large heavy and not very well sorted car. The Saab 900LPT I had at the same time felt like a Puggy 106 on the twisties by comparison and with less power would leave fatty boom-boom wheezing when it came to the straight bits. All in all it was a frustrating disappointment. If they'd done more than simply plop a pretty coupe bodyshell onto the V70 estate they might have had a better car but in terms of driving dynamics it was hopeless. The back seats were useless because no bugger could get into them due to the front ones having backrests a mile thick and very little movement, you couldn't see out the back of it, car parks were a nightmare because even if you could twenty three point turn your way into a space there had to be nothing next to you because the huge thick doors needed a good six feet to open into before you could get out. Fuel economy was mid 20s which I don't mind if a car has something to offer in return but this didn't. TBH it was quite impressive given how hard you had to drive it to keep up with the traffic. And then the famous Volvo electronic throttle failed. Tow to Volvo main dealer, £500+ for a new one plus coding it into the car, ball park total a grand. I had the money but hated the thing so much I just phoned the scrapman, when its weight came in handy again.

A car I know many folks on here have had experience of is one of my favourite shite purchases over the last few years, I've had three of them ranging from £50 to £600. Step forward the wonderful K11 Micra. ❤️ 75% of my driving is round Glasgow, and as a town car the K11 reigns supreme. Like any decent small hatch it's easy to drive, easy to slot through congested city streets , economical ( I once got one down to 29mpg in the depths of winter doing nothing but sub 5 mile runs for a couple of weeks but 40 was more common and 50 was possible on a run) easy to park and provided enough creature comforts that I didn't feel I was slumming it too much. The small revvy twincam engine meant that you could always beat something much more powerful but heavier off the line and I was often across the junction and changing into second before the two ton SUV I was alongside had even started moving. They have their faults; rust like any 90s car, neglect from a thousand takeaway deliveries, disintegrating gear linkages being the most common but sadly the wake up call for me came when I lightly tapped the rear corner of a Datsun Cashcow that had pulled out in front of me and completely wrecked the front of the car. In a world of dummies driving huge SUVs badly they offer very little in the way of crash resistance and I just don't feel comfortable in something that folds up that easily. They were fun while they lasted though, proper cheap shite motoring.

2005 Saab 9-5 Aero saloon. Straight away let me say I think the estate looks better and is probably the one to have but the boot in this is huge so... Even though it's old enough to vote it still feels well screwed together and safe, and inside it's a very nice place to be and supremely comfortable, even if the 'sporty' Aero suspension sometimes isn't terribly happy on Glasgow's shit roads, but I hear it rather than feel it. It's my favourite types of car, a big comfy 3 litre automatic luxoabrge, except it's not a 3 litre. It's a 2.3 that feels like a 5 litre V8 thanks to the previous owner spending £££s on a Stage 3 Nooobtune upgrade. Hit the sport button and it's comedy fast. I had some fun the other day joining an uphill section of dual carriageway coming off a roundabout with a 71 plate Porsche Cayman nailed to my back bumper, he no doubt expected this old grey shitbox to move out his way. I suppose I did, just not in the direction he anticipated... It's not especially cheap to run, next year's tax will be a bawhair away from £400 and it averages mid 20s mpg round town but it's surprisingly cheap to insure, like most Saabs. Annoyances? Not much and mostly little ergonomic flaws which grate in a Swedish car. Despite being huge inside there's bugger all easy to get at stowage for phones, wallets, bits etc. The door pocket's tiny and everything else needs a lid opening. A big bin on the centre console would make all the difference. The stalks are made of smooth slippery plastic and could do with being rubber coated or at least a better shape. Far too many switches are hidden from view behind the too big steering wheel which does adjust but not far enough in for my liking and the auto wipers can GITFS, they're so bad it might as well just have two speeds with no intermittent wipe at all. But all in all, not really shit. I've enjoyed it.

My Saab has the fewest broken things of any car I've had in years and the few that are present are in the 'It's old enough to vote, it's entitled to a few minor issues' category, everything important works. This has been Glasgow's Hot Week for the year so the 'Just needs a regas M8' aircon's flow of tepid air is noticeable but since I rarely have a car with working AC I DGAF and just drive with the windows down. The parking sensors give up the ghost when I'm backing up to something expensive but work fine approaching builder's Tranny vans and walls, and the driver's door window rattles a bit but works fine.

Pretty sure we got those Civics here in the late 70s. Great thread Eddy, looks like you're having a blast. 😎

A mate's car. Can't remember the last time I saw one of these.

Bod was great! 😛