2012 -Your year in Shite

[CortinaDave]

Since we're almost at December I thought it worth a quick run down of the shite thats passed through our ownership this year? Heres mine....

 

 

Started the year with an L reg Toyota Celica GT bought for £450 Fantastic and scarily quick car, but after 6 months ownership the MPG in the teens if you gave it the welly plus a leaking fuel tank and impending MoT saw it passed on to a mate for £300. Its now lying in his drive with knackered brakes and a burst fuel line and no MOT so likely facing the weighbridge

 

Moved on to a C reg Orion Mk1 Ghia Auto bought in Stonehaven for £500. Great car overall, knocked up 15k in it battering up and down the motorway between edinburgh and aberdeen before selling it out of fear it would die with my heavy use. ebay saw it go to a new home for £625. I'd have another.

 

Replaced with an 02 Mondeo TDCi in a quest for MPG. Bought for £500 with a short MoT but in seemingly tidy nick it promptly got cremated by the tester and cost me £300 to get through. 50 - 55mpg was gratifying, the Dual Mass Flywheel starting its death rattle with the inevitable large bill on the horizon not so much. Thankfully a barry boy in a Corrado flew out in front of me at a roundabout and wrote it off before I had to get the flywheel done. Insurance decided it was 100 percent his fault and paid out £2,250. EPIC WIN.

 

Used the cash to spaff on a mint 02 plate 9-3 convertible from a dealer in Durham... cost £1960. Minted it is, but the engine went bang somewhere near Berwick on the way home thanks to the saab engine sludge factor and four months of wrangling went on before it was finally fixed and I picked it back up last week. Its now waiting for me to tax it.

 

Also for the last couple of weeks I've been using the A reg Renault 18 my mate bought from kinkersaab for £250. Clutch is a bit dodgy, body's covered in giffer repairs and the heater's crap, but apart from that its doing monster mpg and seems to be utterly reliable. I've got a feeling it might be a permanent addition to the drive soon.

 

Still got my Mk4 Cortina 2.0S too. It continues to rust in my parents drive while I gather that parts and the cash to get it back on the road.

[Shep Shepherd]

Started the year with The Volvo and TV2. Will most likely end the year with same.

[chaseracer]

Blingo still racking up the miles, collecting dents & scrapes. Dyane celebrating its fourth year in the garage.

 

Not a vintage year, shitewise. Sorry...

[Split_Pin]

Started the year with my Astra Coupe, Vectra and Corsa.

 

Ended with year with a 1.2 Chevrolet Aveo with horrible mpg whilst the Corsa soldiers on, very reluctantly. No money to (ever) run the Astra (again) and the Vectra totally lunched its PAS rack back in September, so thats festering in my wife's garage.

 

I'm sure 2013 will be just as jolly well top-hat car-wise as 2012 was.

[Spiny Norman]

Started the year with an old Saab 900 turbo, added a Merc E320 to the fleet in early January and still got them both.

Two quite different cars but I like 'em both.

[trigger]

Except for the introduction of the Cortina during the first week of the year, the remainder has been pretty boring really with me keeping both the Golf and Mondeo, the longest I've kept any of my cars!.

 

I'm planning on changing both of them in the new year though, so watch this space.

[phil_lihp]

Also started the year with an Astra Coupe (the lowly 1.6 version), finishing it with a worthy but dull Kia C'eed and the Nova that went from frag fodder to fully roadworthy over the summer. So could have been better, could have been worse.

[Mr Lobster]

Only movement in the fleet has been the Kangoo -

 

Started the year by having a turbo failure, couple of months later the starter decided to die and whilst it was in bits it got new front discs and pads. The final highlight of its career with us was breaking a torsion bar whilst in deepest Cornwall. RAC brought it home and a new s/h rear axle (£600 NFTW) and a fresh MOtT saw it sold on eBay.

 

Replaced by a nice but thirsty and none shite Mazda 5.

 

Predictions for 2013? Ideally I'd rather like a nice Renault 9 / 11 / super 5 / Extra van but we'll see how many £££s I have I suppose.

[skattrd]

Quite a few changes at skattrd_towers

Two Subarus have been and gone, SVX & XT

BX estate been & gone

R25 been & gone

Mistubishi RVR been & gone

 

Volvo S80 - impulse purchase in July, still here

Maestro auto - Sept purchase, still here

Bora, Reno GTA, Alfa 155, Scirocco, Saab 900, Mitsi Galant Sapporro, two little Daihatsu's, broken RRC, all still here

 

The years not over ....

[ruffgeezer]

Hmm I'll have to poke the old grey matter a bit for this one,

 

I'm pretty sure I was driving the Delica over the winter, along side this utterly woeful piece of dogchod:

 

Ugly, noisey, plasticy and slow, I should have called it Jordan really...

 

I scrapped that and turned a profit, and by March, I had the major service, cambelt and radiator replacement finished on the Xantia, only to have to rave the clocks out as the ABS light had gone, and when that was fixed, I had to replace 2 ABS sensors to get a ticket on it.

 

Around this time the Xsara was traded in at work, and I optioned on it for it's low miles and tidy body. It remained on the back burner until I could find a replacement rear beam, I did eventually although it is a 306 gti6 so the car still looks like a broken dog dragging it's arse on the carpet.

 

I used the ax for work throughout the summer, and save for a knocking exhaust, it was faultless for most of the time, oh and I bought a C15 "Trev" from MrScruff of this parish with about a month's mot, but luckily it only cost me £70 to see another one so I used that up until the tax expired and sold it again.

 

Oh and I bought another C15 for £100 a couple of months ago, and spent forever looking for a new bonnet for it.

 

LacquerPeel from this forum recently bought the Xantia from me prompting a week of putting the Xsara back together somewhere near properly, finishing it on the day before the Xantia was collected.

 

Cars of this year in photos:

 

1) Awful sAXo thing:

 

2) Snowplow/Ozone Wrecker:

 

3) Xantiabus "Snowy"

 

4)Trev C15

 

5) C15 "trev2"

 

6) Ax grannyshopper Vts

[RobT]

Started the year with miniMetro/Montego/BX combo. Swapped the BX for Mr skattrd's Renault 25 in June, which I then sold on in October. Bought a BMW E30 a few weeks ago which I sort of like, but also don't - mainly because it isn't shite or obsure enough to interest me But the sound almost makes up for it.

 

As for 2013, the Metro will remain as the weekend toy, and as much as it pains me the Montego will probably go unless I inherit loads of money and can get a chequebook restoration done on it! Not sure what to replace it with, but another rot free Monty would be nice.

[cort16]

I actually thought I hadn't had many cars this year until I started listing them out.

 

I started the year by buying a Volvo S80 2.9. Really nice car I got pretty cheap because it had a borked wing and indicator. It came with the wing so I had it painted and fitted it up before selling it to a mate for his grandad. I'd like another one of these as it was lovely to drive if not a bit thirsty.

 

s80 by cort16, on Flickr

 

Next I got this mega cheap 740i. Many body work issues but sounded great and was nice to drive until the autobox started playing up (it had done 200+k). Surprisingly okay on fuel for what it is and really enjoyed it.

740_1 by cort16, on Flickr

 

My Daily A6 went away. Nice car but never felt the love.

a6 by cort16, on Flickr

 

My new Merc turned up the same day.

c220 by cort16, on Flickr

 

In a similiar vain to the Merc I purchased this TR7. It turned out to be rotten unfortunatly.. I'm not feeling it and am thinking about breaking it but hold out hope of re-homing it with a friend.

IMG_2069 by cort16, on Flickr

 

Not a new car but finally back on the road after over a year getting weldeded.

arches by cort16, on Flickr

 

Finally this little Puma I bought for my Mrs as a stop gap while waiting for her new car to arrive. I bought it in a hurry and turned out to be a bit of a turkey for the money I paid and on the register of crashed cars. I felt sorry for it so I've welded on new rear arch, front wing bottom and bought a replacement door. I've no idea what I'm going to do with it when it's finished but it'll be one of the tidiest ones out there.

 

 

Oh and the tartan Honda I took to Barcelona. Not my car as such but it was registered in my name and I did drive it nearly 3000 miles

 

[CortinaDave]

Much wantage for your SD1!

[Felly Magic]

Still with the old Skoda, and was bricking it during July, when I was brassic & it was MOT time. Shockingly it passed at the first shout. I have been driving some rammel in one of my jobs, a barely legal 3 year old Citroen C2 van with a collapsed drivers seat and 180k on the clock, and knackered 1 year old Bippers with so many electrical faults it was beyond a joke. It seems Bippers last roughly 60k before they go into meltdown. Was offered the C2 for a grand. I politely declined their offer.

 

Took the Skoda to Daverapid's place for a new water pump & stat & service. Took 3 goes to get the right bloody pump, even with the chassis number. Then it was a barsteward to get the pump off, owing to the lack of clearance twixt the pulley on the pump and inner wing. Ended up having to drop the engine for what should have been a 10 min job! Dave and your mate, you are stars, and grafted for a low price.

 

Now noticed that it's losing coolant again though, and the mayo is back, so think it could be signs that it's omfgheadgasketfailure

[DodgyBastard]

Started off the year with,

 

 

This Polo breadvan

 

 

This E30 which went off the road in January

 

 

And this Polo coupe

 

 

Bought this Panda in Feb but never got used/put on the road

 

 

The Polo coupe head gasket went so sold it on for very little, the matt black breadvan I scrapped and replaced with this silver polo coupe

 

 

Bought this Polo saloon in April

 

 

 

Sold the silver polo coupe then bought this e30 318is in June/July

 

 

Took the engine from the 318is and put it into my e30 touring

 

 

 

sold 318is back to previous owner who swapped the shell for an e34 530i which I kept and had use of,

 

 

Sold Panda. Bought another Polo breadvan

 

 

 

And that's been about it...

[mharrell]

Just a handful of changes this year:

 

I finished converting one of my two-stroke 96 sedans into a race car for the 24 Hours of LeMons:

 

 

and took it to a race in July. We brought home the Index of Effluency trophy:

 

http://blog.caranddriver.com/lemons-pacific-northworst-the-winners/

 

As I mentioned earlier, I also picked up a 1983 Austin Maestro Vanden Plas a few weeks ago:

 

http://bringatrailer.com/2012/08/20/non-usa-1983-austin-maestro/

 

but have sold my 1937 Plymouth P4 sedan. I just put about 750 miles on the Maestro over the long Thanksgiving weekend.

 

The most recent news is that I'm awaiting the arrival of my second Lyman Electric Quad, shown here being loaded onto a truck for shipment from Arizona:

 

 

With any luck it won't arrive the same weekend I plan to be in southern California as a co-driver of this 1959 Humber Super Snipe in the upcoming LeMons race on 8-9 December:

 

 

Barring the unexpected, that should see me through to the new year.

[mk1_4dr]

Much wantage for your SD1!

 

+1 Your SD1 is pretty darn hard looking.

 

I started the year driving a Nissan Note hire car

 

 

There was also the freshly crashed escRot, now looking less like this:

 

 

and more like this:

 

 

 

Also in the yard was my 3rd generation Prelude, unfortunately suffering from a snapped-timing belt, 12bent valves and a multitude of other niggles, causing it to be far from economical to repair added to the fact I was out of the spannering game for a number of months while my lower back got better. Gutted as it was quite a nice car.

 

 

 

Finding myself needing a reliable daily, it made possibly the stupidest car purchase of my driving career and bought a Mk2 Golf GTi 8v.

Hateful, unreliable, noisy, harsh, but conversely it was rather nippy and an absolute hoot on the right road. Decent on juice too.

Bought for £750ish and I must've spent the heavy end of 1.5k on the chuffing thing. I try not to think about it.

It did look good though.

 

 

 

And then mid-June I was contacted by the infamous KFW about a Chrysler he'd spotted moodly sitting at the back of a unit in Leigh near Manchester.

I didn't hang about and within a few days I had the Whale sat outside my house

 

 

 

And when i realised that I'd spent at least £1300 in 3months on fuel, I figured I'd had my fun and it was time to move it on.

But what next!? Well, I took the only logical step and bought a turbocharged 2.3 Volvo 940 estate, just what the single chap around town needs.

 

 

I can't actually see myself buying anything else iminently, but next year will be the year of the phoenix IE: escRot will be back out and about *crosses fingers and toes*

[Cavcraft]

Not in order because 'new' Photobucket is effing rubbish:

 

 

Had this for about 2/3 days. Everyone's favourite* car, this was a 1.7 diesel

 

Had this about a week at most. I can't remember what happened to it, pretty sure it went for export though:

 

Still here, will get taxed and used one day:

 

In fact Photobucket is now so shit it's going to take several months to try and get all the pictures on the thread probably.

[Richard]

You have the option to go back to the old Photobucket, it's a link at the top of the page.

[messerschmitt owner]

started the year with this lot!

 

Citroen XM 2.1TD hatch

Citroen BX 16TGS Auto hatch

Fiat Punto Cabrio

Fiat 125Bis

Peugeot Vicacity

smart roadster

Messerschmitt Kr200

Bond Minicar MkD

Mercedes 416CDi Rimor 747TC motorhome

 

finished the year with

 

Citroen XM 2.1TD hatch

Citroen XM 2.0TCT estate

Fiat Punto Cabrio

Fiat 125Bis

Peugeot Vicacity

smart roadster

Messerschmitt Kr200

Bond Minicar MkD

Leyland Autosleeper camper

 

I've saved since April £3800 in finance on the motorhome - just as well as I am ready to do a clutch change on the smart and the fuel consumption on a 2 litre turbo dwarf planet is astronomical.

[Jimcit]

January - stared at the Golf Cabrio in the rented garage - it's SORN waiting for a roof to go on - I'll wait for the good weather to do that.

 

April - Steering failed on the Acadiane on a roundabout (scary!), spent a fortune on misdiagnosing the problem, thought it was fixed, drove it to get the arse welded up - little bit more solid. Driving back from the repairs, parking outside my flat, steering fails again - turned out the actual column was shagged, luckily it decided to fail outside home (still, had to physically pick it up by the bumper bar to move it into the parking space!).

 

May - some good weather, moved house - got a garage! I'll put the Acadiane in the Garage so it'll rot slightly less. No money to sort the Golf out, don't worry, I'll get round to it. Went camping in the Acadiane in the rain - stared at Acadiane from tent.

 

 

June - Lots of work prevents me from doing anything to cars. I visit the Golf, it's still in the garage, but it's a bit rainy, so I'll sort it on a sunny day so the new vinyl roof can warm up a bit.

 

July - go to Germany for a 2cv event in the o/h's 2cv, car still doesn't have most panels fitted on the morning we are leaving (incident with some oik falling through garage roof last year required extensive repairs), so a rapid rebuild, drives fine to Dover, suspension collapses leaving the ferry. End up going to 2cv event in a rented Skoda because despite being provided with a part, it takes the Citroen garage 10 days to fix the thing.

 

August I spend mostly on holiday, go to a few shows in the Acadiane. Also got to drive a DS - happy chappy and now I want one more.

 

September - damnit I really need to sort that Golf and sell it. Blame weather.

 

October - fitted a muff to the Acadiane and spent most of the month thinking of ways to slip this source of humorous innuendo into conversation.

 

November - crap, the Golf is still in the rented garage at the other side of town. Need to do something with that.

 

[dollywobbler]

2012 started with the ex-Minimad Peugeot 309 1.3GL and my 2CV...

 

Plus the Mini, which I can't find a timely picture of, and the shambolic BX Mk1 estate.

 

The Peugeot wasn't really doing it for me, so I flogged that and in typical fashion, actually picked up my new motor before the Pug had actually gone. The Maverick was a VALUE buy with knackered brakes.

As purchased.

 

I took the 2CV to Precott Hillclimb in May. Great fun!

 

On the return trip, I saw these digits arranged this way for the second time in my ownership. 100,000 miles!

 

Then things started getting silly with the return of an old friend.

 

That forced a rethink and so the BX Mk1 was punted on to a friend in August. , He's worked really hard to improve it since (it still looks dreadful but it is a lot better!).

 

In typical fashion, I didn't quite manage to reduce the fleet as I went out and bought this on the same day.

 

Then, after using it to drive to the ICCCR in Yorkshire and a CCC run to Bletchley Park in September, I decided the BX Mk2 estate was really a bit too ropey and SORNd it. Then I bought yet another BX, this time a Turbo Diesel.

 

I absolutely love it. Then I seemed to have no money. The Mini left us over the summer, but then the Bluebird and Maverick quickly disappeared this month. The new BX and 2CV are our sole vehicles, while I ponder what to do with the BX Mk2 estate.

[HillmanImp]

Started off with the Imp,

 

the Audi 100 Avant

 

 

and the GT6.

 

 

Bought the Lancia Fulvia off A60Rod.

 

 

Then I bought the Council Estate 740 from Sam Glover whilst drunk.

 

 

At this point I realised things were starting to get out of hand. So I sold the Council Estate to Scooters.

 

But instead of selling more cars I instead bought an Audi Coupe

 

 

I then sold the Audi 100 to Volksy where it instantly fell to bits.

 

Currently have the Lancia up for sale but its still here.

 

Imp is still being ignored whilst I turn my attention to playing on the Playstation instead of putting new sills and sill strengtheners on the GT6.

[beko1987]

We started the year with these:

 

 

My girlfriends 2002 1.2 corsa, which was needing imminent camchain attention, as well as numerous other bits

 

 

and my Puma, which still had it's exhaust leak-free in the new year.

 

Chopped the Corsa in for the Meriva, since our baby was imminent

 

 

Pictured 20 minutes after we picked it up, with the 3 remaining halfords wheel trimz, which got chucked in the bin about 20 minutes later when we got to my mums house for a proper look around it.

 

and of course, the Puma turned into

 

 

which so far has been trouble free, but needs some bits doing to it before the MOT in Feb.

 

Likely to stay like this now until next August, when I get my bonus again, and can upgrade the ZX to a Xantia or similar!

[ayrshirelad]

Nothing exciting purchased this year. Well i acquired me Maestro as a project which still is awaiting work, and the Omega as the daily. Having passed her test with a bit of work said Omega is doing the daily work. Peg the Ital s restoration has restarted, with both front wings off and welding work nearly completed on inner wings. N/S side sill and front valance also being replaced and new front wings put on. Then will be going for her Mot. Brakes having been sorted.!

[AndyW201]

Not a vintage year really.

 

Started off the year still driving the 190e. 2.6, 6 cylinder, 166bhp. GR-72 for an economical 30 mile a day commute! But a right laff to drive, sounded great and surprisingly nimble with it's factory sport chassis pack.

Almost by accident, I came by a 106,000 mile Astra mk4 1.6. Straight away, it started making more sense as a daily with it's near 40 mpg. Not in bad nick for a highish mileage Vauxhall (tappy engine notwithstanding...) and in fairly desirable* SXi spec. The Merc wasnt getting used as it should, so was put up for sale, and it went to it's new home last week

.

The Astra failed it's MOT a fortnight however, so it's sat on the driveway in disgrace at the moment, until I get arsed to change the rear springs, drop links and all the brake pipes. Considering the car's all original and never been touched underneath, it hasn't done badly. (I guess in the interests of balance and fairness though, I have to say ALL VOXALLS R SHIT etc).

I'm a lover of old German crap though, so once it's MOT'd it'll most likely be gone in the new year. Since joining on here, I've had my eyes opened to all sorts of possible shite dailies, especially through the ebay tat thread.

 

But knowing me, I'll likely end up with another 190...

 

2012 term, C-, must do better, etc

[brickwall]

*Started with Rover 25...warped the cylinder head a few weeks back. Cost £175 two years ago went to breakers at £120

.

* Accident damaged C70 Convertible still looks good and will get another summer

 

*92 Range Rover near completion. Looks to be a keeper in the medium term.

[Cavcraft]

You have the option to go back to the old Photobucket, it's a link at the top of the page.

 

Aye, but the bastarding link doesn't open on Windows 8. Reading on the internet somewhere today it looks like the old version is only available for another month too.

I think I'll just transfer everything out to somewhere better to be honest, the new PB is rubbish.

[jonny69]

No exciting purchases this year. I decided to move my hotrod on so I waved goodbye to this in July:

 

 

I got my Anglia back on the road in April though, so I wasn't without a car. The big engine is in bits due to some shoddy work carried out by Specialized Engines, so I've been using a knacked standard 1200 for the time being. Seems to go ok though and I thought it performed well on the climb at RRG. I also put the 69's back on the doors after a long period of absence:

 

 

 

 

Two 'incidents'. I lost control of the Anglia going over some busted up road near Brighton and bent the front of the chassis up. I was majorly pissed off because I was genuinely just driving along minding my own business when it happened. This was fixed on the insurance because it was well mangled and way outside my capabilities, but the council involved would not accept liability so the old premiums have gone up since. Then I was in a shunt coming back from RRG which cracked up some of the glass on the flipfront. Otherwise, the car is holding up well and I'm planning to swap the bigger engine back in during April.

[messerschmitt owner]

I have Flickr pro. It's easy to use.