"Classics" as daily drivers. Truly realistic?

[freebird]

My main car is a modern, bought new ( yes, im a twat but the missus is making the payments) and, to be honest and to cut through the mounds of horseshit such as "Its dead money" "Its boring" etc etc, there IS a lot to be said for a modern. Things like comfort, handling, economy ( relative) and that everything works, or should do, you know you will get to where you want to go in it and other reasons that im trying hard to bring forwards but im fooked if i can.

Thing is Id like this to be the last modern that we buy and id like to have an older "classic" as a daily.

Ive got a P6 V8 which im working on at the mo and its bloody comfortable and, IMHO, stylish. Economy is not to great but I could live with that, it handles like shit, ditto, and, despite not being started since the beginning of December she fired up last night without fuss.

Im asking myself whether i could live with it, or any other car of that era on a daily basis. Its not like there is a novelty factor, I drove the cars that are now "classics" when they were £250 spunkers and i had to keep them on the road. Ive lived with shit handling, piss poor heating in the winter and rampant rust as it was the norm. Could i go back to that kind of driving?

Anybody doing what im contemplating or contemplating it themselves?

[wuvvum]

I reckon a P6 would make a good daily, although I'm not sure I could afford to feed a V8 on a daily basis. They're pretty good as cars their age go - decent brakes, OK handling and refinements like intermittent wipers, HRW and multi-speed heater fan make them quite useable. Main drawback is that daily use in the winter on salted roads will soon have much of the underside dissolving.

 

I've not used a true classic as a daily for quite some time, but I ran an HA Viva for eight months or so without issue, and a Peugeot 304 for a while as well. I do a lot more miles now though so tend to use something modern(ish) and economical to keep commuting costs down.

[michael1703]

DIY LPG, cheap to do on SU carbs

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SU-HIF6-LPG-M ... 337bbe97bf

 

Tanks pop up on ebay, collection only with a bit of gas in for £30 every now and then,buy all the bits off ebay and look forward to 70odd pence per litre

 

P6 is a pretty good choice as long as you keep the brake calipers in good nick, they arent like commuting in an A35, a P6 is fairly modern in my book, its got synchromesh and everything

[seacow]

I have an E30 316i - its low mileage (64k) I dont use it every day as I commute on the train but its regular. I did 400 miles on it last weekend with the family (4 of us) and it cruised like a good un and got 35 mpg - which from a cost point of view isnt far behind the 2009 VW passat diesel we normally do that in. I commented to the wife that it really wasnt that much different and certainly didnt feel like a 23 year old car. (my first car was 17 years old when I got it at the same age and my God it was different to modern cars). Yes the Beemer isn't as refined and quiet but its dead comfy, fun to drive and make me smile! Would I give up the modern altogether - no cos have a young family and do loads of miles - but as a daily yes without question. Most satifying of all is that in the 2 years I have had her the cost of purchase and running is still less that I lost on the 4 year old Volvo I ran for a similar time period. Bangernomics at its best folks!

[HMC]

Ive had phases of using a 'classic' as a daily driver for long periods, with moderns in between. A few years ago i did 10,000 miles in a year in a seen better days morris minor and loved it. Significant motorway use needs a real commitment to the cause, plus I've found im less tolerant of crap heating/ demisting than I used to be especially this time of year.

 

My cheat is to have on the button classic when im in the mood and a 'modern'- say post 1980 when im not in the mood/ it has broken

[vulgalour]

I reckon running a classic as a daily is perfectly feasible providing you always have a back up plan. One of the big problems with classics isn't that they break down - all cars do that, regardless of age - but rather how difficult it is to obtain parts if/when they do break down. With a modern, usually you can expect the part you need to be there same day, but with certain classics that's not always going to be the case.

 

I would expect with something like the P6 the car is still plentiful enough and popular enough that parts supply isn't going to be a huge issue for those things that are likely to wear out. I've never had the luxury of a modern car but equally I've never done mega miles, the most I've asked of any classic being the 170-200 miles a week mixed motorway speed and round town in the 1.3 Maestro which isn't really too far off a modern for gadgetry anyway. I doubt I'd've been as comfortable doing that mileage in something like the Princess, but I'd certainly be up for the challenge if I had a stock of consumable spares. So it depends on the classic I guess.

[DSdriver]

My daily driver is a Citroen DS Safari. It wasn't the cheapest classic you can buy as it had a healthy dose of scene tax added to the purchase price. I deliberately didn't buy a minter because I wouldn't abuse a museum piece. The previous owner of the one I bought was a Citroen mechanic and had used it as his daily driver so mechanically it was sorted. It had also been welded up where necessary and had a cheap respray so looks OK. The wiring is a bit iffy though.

I have been using it for over a year and a half and it has been cheap to run, classic insurance, no tax and LPG plus an annual service and MOT have been the only costs so far. I think this year the bills are going to be a bit higher as the bottom ball joints need replacing and there is a rust hole in the floor of the load area. The small rust hole probably means there is more rust elsewhere but I haven't checked yet because the weather is crap.

So, even if I have to spend say a thousand this year on repairs that equates to 500 per year which is bloody cheap for one of the coolest cars in the south east.

Citroen DS21 Safari by DSdriver, on Flickr

As said above, it is a good idea to have a back up plan. Mine is a W reg Pug 206 1.4 auto which was my MIL's car and only has 26K on the clock.

[Mr Lobster]

Depends on how you use it and what you want of it.

 

My daily is an '04 SEAT Toledo 20VT and for what I want is near perfect. It gets used in all weathers and used relatively intensively. I could use run something older but I tend to think I'd kill it relatively quickly. Plus, this morning I needed to do a quick 150 mile trip and did it without issue despite some pretty grim weather. I could do the same in my R4 but with less comfort, speed and poorer wipers etc. Running a newish car is just easier for me.

 

If I was still doing 1000 miles per week commuting I wouldn't fancy doing it in anything old. Not that its not possible but that its a lot easier in a new car.

 

But its horses for courses and in different circumstances something older would be perfectly ok.

[HillmanImp]

When I got rid (crashed) my Xsara a few years back I got a GT6 as my daily driver. It was great but the fuel economy and maintenance costs broke me and I soon went back to modern(ish) cars.

 

TBH, I was not that bothered by the maintenance, it was more the fuel on long journeys. I was regularly driving around the country with mountain bikes strapped to the back and doing thousands of miles in it with crazy fuel consumption was beyond a joke.

[dollywobbler]

I prefer a fleet of classics, so I can jump in a different one if one's broken. Which is entirely possible. You've got to be prepared to do the odd bit of tinkering as well. By far the biggest problem is corrosion. My 2CV has always been one of the daily motors and it's in a shocking state. One BX is fairly rotten, the other is generally ok but needs attending to.

 

I have used a P6 V8 as one of the dailies (back when I worked in IT and therefore had money). It was an awesome feeling and the car was up to it. They were all dailies when they were new after all. Maintenance is the key. I also had a lot of fun commuting in my 1955 Austin Westminster A90 for a time though again, fuel bills meant it wasn't used every day, and it wouldn't have been much fun in winter.

[Albert Ross]

The secret is to carry spares at home. Keep gasket sets on the shelf, spare brake shoes/cylinders. a speedo cable, sealed beam units, another set of wheels, just in case... You can't have too many spares. I've been using my 1970 Land Rover daily since 2008, and whilst it HAS packed up a couple of times, I haven't been without it for very long. A dropped "hotspot" in the cylinder head...? Replaced head. Snapped layshaft on the way home? Pop it into Low ratio 4th, and then use the overdrive to give setting off/cruising ratios, replace gearbox (replacement turned out to be noisy in 1st) when at home. Snapped layshaft when reversing into the workshop to take tools home, to replace noisy gearbox? Replace gearbox at work..... Broken halfshaft negotiating busy roundabout/bridge in Doncaster? Pop into 4WD high, drive home, remove shafts, remove diff and clean out axle, fit replacements. Steering box collapsing 20 miles from home? Drive home slowly down little lanes, and rebuild the steering box using second hand parts. All of these have been fixed with my stock of parts. The only expense was fuelling up the Wife's car as a stopgap before I could get the time to fix mine in a couple of cases.

[pandarus]

Mk 1 MX-5 was an awesome daily driver.

 

You need a bag of sand in the boot this weather mind.

[Cavcraft]

Of course you can drive a 'classic' every day. I had a Morris 1000 I used every day for work (8 mile through town or 10 mile up bypass commute) and it was brilliant.

[skattrd]

The oldest thing I've used as a daily have been 80's VW's which were absolutely fine, not really classic though. I put 70k on a mk2 Scirocco in 2yrs followed by 10k on a mk2 Jetta and the same on a mk1 golf, all without any real issue. I do like 80's German motors.

If you're looking at cars from the 60's/70's I'd just make sure they are in good fettle and have some modern niceties like electronic ignition and a brake servo.

[HillmanImp]

One BX is fairly rotten, the other is generally ok but needs attending to.

 

Whilst they are considered classic I don't see the BX's falling into this thread myself. Driving a car from the 80's (your 2CV excepted obviously) is a million miles away from a 60' of 70's car IMO.

 

My Audi Coupe, the Saab 900 we both owned, my old Scirocco now owned by Barefoot and the Audi 100 Avant Volksy now has are all 'classic' but are easy going compared to running my old DAF for example as the heaters nearly work in the later cars, the ride is comfortable, there is some sort of sound deadening to take away engine noise, they have POWAH (with the exception of the Audi 100), the seating is MUCH more refined, they have power steering and there are things like clocks and stereo speakers and reclining seats etc etc.

 

Not saying they are not classic, they are but they are easy to live with compered to cars just a few years older in my experience. My Audi Coupe is considered a classic for insurance but its like driving a modern car which is why i use it as my daily (sort of - I tent to try and run or cycle to work as its fucking thirsty).

[eddyramrod]

Ahem...

These two have been sharing daily-driver duty (apart from enforced rentals for a few weeks) since June, when I sold my 10-year-old pickup. 1972 Granada, 1983 Metro. It's definitely, I would say always, a good idea to keep more than one if you possibly can, so you've got one to hand when the first one breaks/needs MoT/hasn't got a good enough heater for the weather outside.

However: I haven't had the Granada for a few weeks, while it has MoT surgery, so I was using the Metro every day. My commute is only 4 miles each way, plus a bit of round-town action, and I like to think I can drive in a manner befitting the machinery. It's still broken. Daily use after an 11-year layup has seen several things break in such quick succession they might as well be all at once. With this in mind I went out and bought a modern. As we all know, "Modern" to me means a scrap-value 17-year-old Peugeot. It's easily the plushest of the three, at least as powerful as the Granada, reliable enough and gives me all the heating and suspension the other two don't. This does now mean I have three cars, when I live in a little terrace like Coronation Street, with no driveway, garage or yard to park in...

Economy? I don't worry about it. Simply not an issue. I've got to get to work, so I've got to have a car. If I'm having a car I like it big, powerful and comfy. There seems no point in anything less. If that means I use more petrol, ok, I use more petrol. I don't drink, I don't smoke, I have to put my money somewhere!

So, if you have room to keep a minimum of two classics, or a classic plus a modern backup, then yes, do it, and use the classic as often as possible. That is what they're for, in the end! But there will be times when you have a specific need for a modern. Learn from my mistake, don't try to ditch them altogether.

 

VA: given the choice of a 1.3 Maestro or a 1.7 Princess for a major trip, I'd choose the Princess But maybe that's just me...

[Lord Sterling]

I don't see why not. These cars were built to be used daily albeit 20/30/40+ odd years ago, so simply maintaining it shouldn't deter it from doing what it was built for.

 

I drive a 1990 Rover Sterling and use it (almost) everyday, it's comfortable, fast and stylish in my eyes. Consumption-wise it's fair, not quite up to modern standards but I live with it. So far its been superb in the OMG SNO KAOS.

 

Fair enough, it's not a 60s/70s car and it is alot easier to live with, but it's an example of a 20+ year old car which is use on a daily basis and I have seen a lot older cars used as dailys and even workhorses.

 

My car not everyones cup of tea, I am very aware of that, but then I don't buy cars to suit other peoples tastes or 'fit in'. You should go and drive what you want to drive rather than what you are told is "acceptable" in the modern world.

 

My car:

 

[bub2006]

I used my 91 h plate robin every day since I bought it in September. Done over 7k since. Admittedly it has electronic ignition and electric fuel pump. Not the most comfiest or quietest but its never failed me. I do change oil regularly. The economy rarely drops below 55mpg even town driving and driving like a loon. 74 quid road tax and larger boot than most city cars.

[Lankytim]

Anything from the late 80's or early 90's onwards would be OK as a daily, but be prepared to bin it if it blows up or rots away. Anything older is a massive pain in the ass to keep reliable and on the road. The older you get the more difficult it is. Especially if you plan to do big mileages.

 

Not the Autoshite attitude to motoring, but for a daily you want something you can just jump in and drive without even thinking.

[bub2006]

Never have to worry about rot on the robin. Galvanized steel chassis what has also been coated by the previous owner

[retrogeezer]

Been using my £400 1988 Bluebird every day for the last 3 1/2 years with no issues.

[Des]

Totally realistic, been doing it forever, allsorts of old chod between 10 to 50 years of age, maybe I've been lucky but have never been let down, insomuch as have always made it home. You need to buy carefully, I kind of cringe at the 'classics' tag, to me they're old cars and I like old cars, some clapped out heap doesn't become any more useable when they reach the status of 'classic innit' just overpriced maybe . I've avoided anything restored or rebuilt, and waited for something low mileage, although this takes lots of patience. Maintenance is your friend, and if anything should go wrong can usually be sorted by hammering a smaller wotsit over.

[Spiny Norman]

Depends what you're calling a classic I guess.

 

My daily driver is a 20 year old Saab 900 which to some probably qualifies as a classic, but to me it's just a fun cheap set of wheels.

Apart from Glasgow's roads doing their best to shake the thing to bits I don't have to make any allowances whatsoever for the fact I'm driving a 20 year old version of a 35 year old design. (Itself based on a car from 1969..) Being the turbo version means it's not even slow, a point I really enjoy making when jonny fuckwit in his Diseasel 'prestige' car tries to hassle me.....

 

I drove my Volvo Amazon as a daily a couple of years ago when cars 30 years younger than it decided it was too cold to start, never had any issues with that either, although it was a bit loud on motorways and you were aware it was an old car but it was the 2 litre twin carb one, so again it had a decent turn of speed so I had some fun surprising a lot of twats who thought they were going to be held up by the old banger...

[Angrydicky]

My current daily is a '59 A35. Fortunately I don't do a huge mileage, but it does live outside and is used in all weathers.

 

 

It's quite practical really. Very good on petrol, reasonably reliable, fun to drive and cheap to maintain. I change the oil every 3000 miles and grease up every 2000. Obviously it is a bit of a pain on longer journeys as it doesn't really like going above 50mph, but that's all part of the fun. My A55 Cambridge was much better in this respect as it would cruise at 60mph happily. Sadly it was very rusty and had had years of MoT welding (shit plates slapped over the rust) before I got it so I'm currently rebuilding it. I've also done a fair amount of welding on the A35 so it's now very solid, and it's well rustproofed so I intend to keep it that way. It's standard apart from an SU carb, 1098 engine from a Minor, electric fuel pump and radial tyres. You've got to be prepared for weekly tinkering sessions, things will break and drop off and if you don't keep on top of the jobs soon you have a car that really isn't fun to use anymore.

 

I also have a very nice '58 A35 which I keep garaged but it does get pressed into service occasionally when the first car "fails to proceed" etc. I really do think it's essential to have a spare car, preferably a fleet of them if you don't have a modern.

[freebird]

Food for thought there, thanks for the feedback.

Ive actually considered going the "classic with a back up route" which seems to be the ideal solution really.

Maintenence isnt a great issue, lets face it, proper old cars are proper old basic, you can at least lift the bonnet and see something that looks like an engine, Id never even attempt to get my hands dirty with a modern, id shit myself, to be frank.

Im almost certain to go the V8 P6 route for a classic, whether its this one or another. For the age of its design its old but drives so bloody smoothly its ridiculous.

I dont quite know how but i got to looking at Rover 800s/Vitesses the other night ( as the seeds were being sown for a two car jobbie)and, blimey, some very seriously good ones for stupid cheap money. Thats got to be a get in quick before prices climb stupidly thing.

Basically, I could run two cars and still do it cheaper than running an ultra modern.

Im lucky if i cover 10,000 miles a year at the mo, another reason why its completely daft shelling out loads of money on a new car. Having said that, wifey pays and, as much as she loves the Rover, shes a fuggin snob, unlike my daugter who will NEVER part with her 92 billy basic, no PAS, windy up windows, Starlet. She gets the crack

Des, I dont like the word "classic" either as i dont think there is much out there that can genuinly use that label but I just use it to define the old world car from the modern souless, faceless shite thats out there.

Cheers fellas.

Edit: Anybody that runs an A35 as a daily is somebody I bow to!!

[cort16]

I could maybe be arsed if I was doing 10 or less miles a day but I do 60 a day and 20k a year. I agree anything mid 80's onwards that's looked after will do the job with minimal agro. I had an 86 525e e28 5 series and that would have made a great daily and had a great ride, was well sound proofed and would see late 30's mpg. It was pretty dull to drive and quite slow though.

I usually take my SD1 on my commute once a week and it's always been fine other than the mpg. I dunno what the result would be after 2000 miles in a month mind you other than being bankrupt and having hypothermia.

[catsinthewelder]

I'd say it's pretty essential to have plenty of time and space to sort out the problems as they present themselves. Currently the supposidly daily driver Austin 1100 is sat at the back of the drive in bits being slowly welded up while the VW sits in front of it on SORN waiting it's turn with the toolkit.

 

This means that I've got no space to work on the BX which is driving me nuts with funny noises at the moment. It's almost got to the stage of paying someone else to fix one of them and to me, that is really not the point of running classics

[Split_Pin]

I think it depends on your priorities.

 

Using any older car year-round is fine if you keep the underneath meticulously clean and are prepared to spend a little extra time on maintenance and repairs as required.

 

I totally agree with the back-up car theory however, or if not that, then a decent public transport link to hand whilst you are waiting on bits/weather clearing up.

 

That's why I'm so attracted to a Rover 75 with solid proof that the OMG HG/Clutch/Belts have been done already. It has a distictive character yet is rust resistant and comfortable enough to be able to use it freely in the winter months.

[CortinaDave]

I ditched my moderns to alternate between two mk4 cortinas at one point. It worked , although I do a Lot of miles so could see the deterioration in the cars quite quickly and had to constantly keep an eye on maintenence.Plus much as I love them, when you're staggering bleary eyed to the car on a January morning for a 4am start - a cortina is really not that appealling.

 

The C reg Orion I had recently was well up for my 70 odd mile a day commute though, as was the diesel Renault 18.

 

Ideally, go the classic plus modern backup route. That way it's win win

[Largactil]

Ideally, go the classic plus modern backup route. That way it's win win

 

 

 

That said, I've covered x10 the mileage in the Pug vs. the S2000 over 2012 - I'd agree that the key is getting a late 80's / early 90's car if using as a daily beater.

 

My 205 is well maintained, but it's still 23 years old - Despite this, I wouldn't think twice about loading it up and driving 1000 miles in it right now.