Is autoshiteing genetical?

[Junkman]

I think it runs in my family.

My mother never drove anything else but Renault 4s, and she had a Citroen H van for her business.

My father started his driving career in 1961 with a 2CV.

He traded it in for a Renault 16 as soon as it was released in 1965/66.

He then bought a new 16 about every three years, until the production ended. He had five altogether, the last one was a TX.

Since the R16 was no longer available, he bought a R20 TS in 1980. Shortly after that my Sister and shortly after that I moved out, so he no longer had the need for a family car, and bought a Fuego next. Around 1986 he bought his second Fuego, and since he didn't drive that much anymore, he kept it until the early 90s, when he bought a 1989 Chevrolet Caprice Classic Brougham, his first used car ever. Although the Chevy appeared very good when he bought it, it only lasted until 1996 when it succumbed to rot practically everywhere. He then bought a 1992 Cadillac Seville STS which he had until last year, when it was destroyed in an accident.

 

 

What did your parents drive during your formative years, and did it rub off on you?

 

[Conrad D. Conelrad]

Always loved cars, but no idea why. As soon as the family car hit its fourth birthday, it vanished and was replaced by another brand new mid-range Ford. No one I knew, family or friends, gave a toss about cars. 

[stuboy]

my dad drove many cavalier mk2's i went on to own 9 and strip and sell parts on as a sideline

[STUNO]

There are no shite type genetics anywhere in my family. As above my father always bought new and replaced it after a year or two. Mother owned 2 Heralds and an Allegro but at the time they were just smaller cars, and then went on to a succession of Corollas. Dad's were Vauxhall Velox then Ford Zephyrs Mk2 & 3, then a Super minx, Hunter,Datsun 180B and a list of Toyotas.

So I guess that stuno as just a genetic oddity.

[Madman Of The People]

Wait, your dad bought his Renault 16s NEW?!?!?

 

Heretic!  Buying new runs against the whole shite philosophy!

[Lacquer Peel]

My dad had an Austin 3 litre and a Mazda RX-4 in his early 20s. The first family 'car' I remember is a broken-down air cooled VW T25 van.

 

Yes.

[Guest Breadvan72]

At my very strict school in the 1970s, the rule was:  late three times in one term = one detention for every time late thereafter.  My dad negotiated a special dispensation whereby we could be late five times a term before incurring a penalty, on the grounds that he always had a crap car.

 

My dad started on a lathe at Joseph Lucas in the early 1960s, after taking shelter from navvying on the M1 one winter, and, via night school and stints at Rootes Chrysler and most divisions of BL, ended up in charge of a Unipart factory making exhausts in the 1980s.  

 

My dad's first car was a Morris 1000 Traveller that he drove all over Ireland in 1969 without a clutch.   He had some truly fucking terrible Avengers and Hunters and other shitboxes in the 1970s.  Chlldhood memories are of dad lying under some brown car in a pool of oil on the drive while saying "cunt" a lot, and of waiting for fucking hours to be collected by him from some kid activity, as he had broken down again.  

 

My dad had a brief interlude of reliable motoring when he took to buying ex police panda cars - light blue Anglias and Escorts with holes in the headlining.  "It's got cop tyres, cop shocks, cop motor.  Is it the new bluesmobile, or what?"

 

The only new car that my dad has ever had, excluding company Princesses, SD1s and Montegos late in his BL career, was a Skoda.  The car that he loved the best was a Granada Ghia Estate in puke green that he used as a truck when moonlighting as a fitter out of curry houses.  It had so much fake wood in it that world sticky back plastic stocks fell to record lows and Blue Peter was at risk of cancellation.    Its autobox consumed approx 237 litres of fluid every 3 or 4 miles.  

 

The first car that I did an alleged 100 mph in was my dad's utterly shit D reg Montego 1.6 HL.  My dad then got one of his BL mates to fix me up with an E reg Rover 216i Vitesse as my first post L plate car.   I fucked it up beyond belief in 6 months and then traded it for a year old Beemer 3 Series, this being the late 80s and me being a right annoying yuppie at that time.   The young dude at the dealer may well have had a huge bollocking from his boss for agreeing a mad PX value when looking at the shagged Rover while it was wet, but one of the mechs at the dealership then had it and ran it around for years  About that time I also bought a slightly ropy 1970 Triumph Vitesse Mark II, and from then on I was doomed. 

[nacho man]

Its my dads fault I buy shite, he had many ace motors, capris, sherpa vans (my brother fell out the sliding door and cracked his head open) was stationary at the time mind. scimitars, plenty of old bmws, mk2 cavaliers etc much to my mums displeasure. At one point my mum was made redundant and my dad bought her a knackered brown s3 xj12 which she went to the doll office in.

 

Now there divorced, she drives anything as long as its new.

 

My dad drives a astra van with 217000 odd miles on it, no radio and a blue bonnet, the vans white.

[Rocket88]

As people who had[ and still have] no interest in cars, my folks had a fantastic array of chod.

 

A30, [which I fell out of when I was in my cot, whilst doing about 20 mph up a hill, which may explain a lot......]......as with post above, perhaps a theme for a new thread!

Morris Traveller, which had a dicky SU fuel pump mounting in such a way in the engine compartmet that you could "agitate" it from the driver's seat, via the bulhead. 

2 CV, epically rusty

2 pot Citroen Visa [see above]

Fiat 126, which required millimetric choke/throttle juggling to keep running

Metro VDP auto, which did 22 mpg......

Mk 2 Escrote Estate, in turd metallic brown, which hid the rust nicely

Renault 5 auto, which went through 3 gearbox rebuilds within it's first 2 years of registration

Toyota Yaris, which was actually reliable, until the slushbox started playing up

Fiat Panda [current shape] auto, so far so good

Mazda Demio, which, so far, appears to be "father proof"

[HillmanImp]

My old man only ever had one 2nd hand car. Other than that it was a new car pretty much every year so that my Mum could impress the neighbours.

 

I on the other hand had GoBots instead of Transformers and a singular, lone Action Man with no Army buddies, so when I pulled the chord in his back and he ordered the other soldiers to 'Advance in single file' and warned them of 'Enemy tanks approaching' it painted a sad image of a soldier suffering from desperate loneliness, driven to the brink of madness from isolation and solitude.

 

Saying that, maybe by only letting me have shite things they never gave me anything to aspire to?

 

Fuck me, are there any shrinks on this forum?

[Cavcraft]

My dad defo launched my shite 'career'. The first car I can (properly) recall him owning was a very early (1969 I think) white Maxi when we moved to Chester.

He then got an Austin 3-litre (EFO 177H) as his next company car, this had previously been owned by someone 'further up the chain' by the time my dad got it. Loved that car, felt like a Rolls Royce after the Maxi and we were sorry to see it go.

Next up would have been another Maxi (OFO 9M) in an especially horrible sort of burn orange colour. Most vivid memory was a holiday to the isle of Skye, me in the boot with a load of luggage and a travel sick golden retriever.

After that came a white Mk3 Cortina 1.6L estate (ONB 903P I think) which was quite a change from the BL stuff. It looked nicer and seemed to be a better place to be in general, but boy could it rust.

Next up was a beige Mk4 1.6L estate (PEM 120T) which I though was fab. Brown cloth trim set it off nicely and around this time my interest in cars was booming and I went to the local Ford garage as often as possible with my dad.

Next came a green Talbot Alpine (DHG 511W) which wasn't very nice really. I had done everything I could to persuade my dad to get a Princess 2200HLS instead, but he had a drive of (1.7) one and didn't like it. I learned to drive in the Talbot with it's rattly, wheezy 1.5 engine and I suppose if nothing else it had some character.

Dad's last company car then was a Mk2 Cavalier 1.6SR, can't remember the reg. but something like VFV 252Y. I hated the car at the time because I was a massive Ford fan but I'd love to find it one day and buy it back for keeps. Obviously it will have been cremated a long time ago now and will have been made into lawnmowers and dangerous toys.

 

Mum had a few shiters as well: two Renault 4s, a Riley Elf, a Fiat 126 (and I still hate those fucking things with a passion after that) and dad then had a new Lada Samara, two second hand (old type) Pandas and his last car was a new shape Panda which he reluctantly had to sell after he had to give up driving. 

[meshking]

Earliest car I remember was a gs estate that my parents had. Then, that was traded for a N reg 2cv which caught fire on our way to Brighton one Sunday. After that, we had a visa 1.1, which spent more time in the dealer than on our drive. That said, I remember pissing about in the various loan cars - mainly Peugeots of early eighties variety.

 

When my parent split up, mum got a maestro and dad bought a 2cv van. So, although they probably weren't shite at the time, they are considered that now!

[Justin Case]

Yes. Only an hour ago, Mrs A took one look inside the garage, which to be fair looks as if only a small tornado has hit it and said in a despairing tone 'You're just like your father' I took it as a compliment

[Micrashed]

Not a Bedford Beagle HA Van. ERN 393E by Micrashed, on Flickr

I was brought home from the hospital in this and spent the early years of my life being ferried about in the back of it.

 

Its all my fathers fault then I guess....

[DSdriver]

My father was a great shiter, possibly due to his French peasant upbringing. His first car was a 1932 Ford Y type. This was in about 1959 and it was very embarassing when he had to hand crank start it when picking me up from school. He then had a Renault Dauphine and then a Fiat 1500 which was kept until it was completely lace. Then he always had an old car as well as a newish one. A 1956 Landrover sat on the drive for years rusting away. My mother complained about having to stuff her fur coat into the gaps around the doors on the Citroen Dyane when they went out to posh dinners. So, yes I think I did inherit my shite gene from him.

[hairnet]

scooters......

 

then he met mammy and mk 1 tina then victor (mum binned into a ditch in ireland with us in it )

 

then mk3 tina estate then mk2 granada the 89 montego then xantia for 11 years now e39

 

with him and uncle shay (marina lots of 504s s type jag cortinas and lots of japanese stuff till he was given an 01 passat that was taken off cousin gillian cos it was an ni car used in the south (norty)

 

yeah all their fault

[dollywobbler]

There's definitely something in the genes. When I was a child of the early 1980s, my dad had a 1975 Hillman Hunter (in that delicious bronze). It was chronic shite at the time, with rusty front wing tops and infuriatingly squeaky wipers. It did have overdrive though, and side indicators. Plush. Mind you, it was all my dad could afford...

 

At the same time, my Aunt had a primer grey Morris Minor 1000 Convertible. The door cards weren't fitted, so you had to be careful not to get oily gunk on you as you clambered in. She parked this up (I spent many years pretending to drive it as it languished in a garage) and replaced it with a Morris Oxford Series VI, with the most ill-fitting glassfibre front wings imaginable. I remember being distraught when she fitted two of Halfords' finest black plastic door mirrors to it, having decided the wing mirrors were just too rubbish. Her choice in cars definitely had a profound effect on me. It was twenty years old at the time, and I absolutely loved it. 

[SambaS]

Definitely.. the start of it all was my Grandads 1930s MG TA.. the car he pulled me Grandma in

 

My Dad still has a Ford Probe V6....

 

and then I happened.

 

One of my earliest memories of family motoring was the hammer that me parents had to use to get the MK3 Escort going.

That car made way for a Sierra 2.0 4x4.... and that was traded in against a nearly new 309 GLD

[Hendry]

My old man has never owned a brand new car in any way shape or form so that probably explains why I'd never consider a brand new one unless I won the lottery, he used to always say that in addition to the only brand new cars he could afford being base model small hatches that cars lost at least £2k the minute you drove them away from the dealers, I used to plead with him to buy year old cars but he always Insisted on buying 3 year old ones and keeping them 6 or 7 years (probably why I get bored and want to change my car every 6 of 7 months)

 

My Fatha didn't pass his test until he was 26 as he had no interest in cars and only passed because I came along,

First up was a yellow W reg Allegro with black vinyl roof which I don't remember but be says was his favourite car he's owned, next up was a Fiat Uno 45 base model 3 door in white (B535 SLS) which never started any time it rained (IIRC it had something to do with the rain getting to the engine via the vents on the bonnet and I remember my dad frequently removing wet newspaper from the engine bay and him and my mum constantly jump, bump and push starting the thing, he eventually got pissed off with this (reason ill never buy a Fiat) and traded it in in 1991 to Arnold Clark Fiat for an '86 D reg jobby brown Maestro 1.3 City (D907 ODS) this thing was a heap of junk as well, the OSR door would regularly not close properly because the plastic cover in the latch mechanism used to work loose, the thing was completely rotten by its 7th birthday, it had a Ford radio fitted, dad fitted a Moss security alarm from Halfords which was a pile of crap too, the electrics went haywire and it had to be parked at the top of a hill to start it every day, sometimes the wipers and indicators randomly stopped working, yet someone tried to steal it, it ended up with 4 keys for it due to new locks with holes in the doors where they'd tried to break in and someone stole the hubcaps and the triangular trim piece at the OSR quarter window,

 

This got chopped in in September 1994 for a March 1991 H reg Ford Orion mk3 1.6 LX in Matisse blue (H371 BNS) this was largely trouble free other than the heater motor burning out burning out all the wiring too, central locking motors breaking, the key breaking in the fuel cap at a petrol station 1 day, the keys always breaking in the door locks, (wtf were Ford upto in the '90s with those shitty round bladed keys, everyone I knew who had 90s Fords were always needing new keys) the speedo cable broke so for abouta year the mileage stayed the same and my dad guessed how fast he was going. Getting in and out was a ham fisted arrangement, had to unlock it by the passenger door lock as the key wouldn't turn that way in the drivers door lock, had to lock it from the drivers door cos if locked with the passenger door lock the key jammed and wouldn't come out. Someone tried to break in busting the passenger door lock completely then eventually in 2000 it got stolen from a hospital car parked and burnt out,

 

Next up in Feb 2000 was an August 1996 P reg Chrysler Neon 2.0 LE (P688 TGG) which was a rare manual box with electric sunroof in emerald green, I loved that car, it was an ex company car with 66K on it and was faultless for the 8 months he had it before someone in a Volvo 440 drove into the side of it and wrote it off.

 

Next up was in November 2000 a November 1997 R reg mk3 facelift Astra which ended up my 1st car, this was an ex notability car with 7K miles on it, nothing of note here except it got used as a taxi for a while when my dad got made redundant and became a cabbie,

 

After that in September 05 he bought a Feb 2005 54 plate Vectra C 2.0 DTi Energy (DS54 KRX) (his newest car ever) this was a 12K miles ex daily hire car which he had until August 12 when it got traded in with 232K on it, none of the 1.9 CDTi faults occurred like DMF, gearbox, EGR, swirl flaps, inlet manifold etc but it did need a new clutch at 145K, it ate springs, bushes, wheel bearings, ball joints, arb links, control arms etc and it had 3 steering racks, first one failed at 2 years old, if got replaced under warranty, its replacement lasted a month then it got replaced and its replacement lasted 8 months before it got done with Vauxhall paying a 90% contribution.

 

That got traded in in August 12 for a July 09 plate VW Jetta 2.0 CR TDi Sport 140bhp which will no doubt suffer OMGDMF turbo failure, manifold, gearbox, EGR etc

 

So yep grown up with shite and now like older cars that I wish my old man had bought instead of the shite he did buy.

[flat4alfa]

My Dad bought a Lancia Beta Saloon at the height of the rust panic.  It changed my life.

[oman5]

My dad had no great interest in cars but his selection of chod was pretty much born from a lack of funds/extreme tightness.

In the early '70s it was cheap late '50s stuff, like a PA cresta that shed major underbody components through rust if you slammed the door too hard, several 100Es that were mechanically knackered when he bought them, a CA van, a 1953 Rover 75, Farina cambridge, then he went up in the world and got a '68 mk1 Escort. this got traded in in 1978 against a nearly new Vauxhall Vx490 FE, the most he ever spent on a car.  It had rotted out completely by 1982 and that was the last time he ever spent serious money on a car. once I'd started driving I used to pass on my chod to him when I got bored with it.

I'm the only one of 4 offspring that messes with old cars, the others have to have new.

[michael t]

Yeah it might well be genetical My father had a Mk2 Disastra GTE before I was born and my mother a Mk3 Escort, when I was born (1995) my parents drove me home from hospital in a blue Metro, they then bought a white Mk3 Disastra and then another blue metro (the 100 Knightsbridge version), they then went and bought a second hand red Mongdeo which had its locks picked and its back window smashed before my dad crashed it on the M6. It was then repaired only for the cambelt to snap on the way to school    . They then replaced that with an X-reg Zafira which was by -far the best car we've ever had, it did 8 years worth of sterling service including a 200 mile round trip to Silverstone and back, it died last year when the timing belt went. That was replaced with a 2004 Yaris in July last year which has so far been pretty good. My mother bought a brand new Shitroen C3 in 2003 and it is currently sitting on the drive in Liverpool awaiting what I hope will be it's death, electrics are buggered and the radiator rusted through after just 3 years 

[catsinthewelder]

My dad had company cars for most of my childhood and my mum ran newish small Fords.  I think the oldest car my dad has had for years is the 55 plate Corrolla that is on the drive now and that has been demoted to second car duties now. My friend lived round the corner so I got lifts with him and his 3 brothers fairly regually and I think I caught chod fever from his dad.  They've still got the 2 Morris 1000's and brown mk1 Fiesta they had then but have added an A reg W123 estate since.  We got the odd lift back from school with his grandad in a white E reg Yugo 45.

[cms206]

I suspect it is; my old man tended to bring cars home from the pub. He never really spoke of his car history, but it featured a bronze Toyota Starlet with a brown vinyl roof, a Cortina 1600E and a Triumph Vitesse before I was born; I came home fron the RAH in Paisley in a two tone Vauxhall Chevette (EGG 48X) though my earliest car memory was a beige Metro 1.3 HLS which the old man decreed "underpowered". Natural progression was a C-reg Montego 1.3 then a Proton 1.3GLS (H346 XDS) both from Peat Road Motors, a Sierra (G588 PNS) before his first and only new car, Panther Black Ford Escort 1.6 Finesse T160 JGD from Clanford in Paisley. My folks split up, dad got a Nova 1.2 Luxe saloon (J281 XUE or something similar) but it went before he took ill in 2003; he lived to see me drive in 2004, but he's sadly been gone 8 years on June 3rd just passed. Mum never drove.

 

I've got a late Escort Finesse on my shopping list but they're still a bit new for classic insurance

[HillmanImp]

scooters......

 

then he met mammy and mk 1 tina then victor 

 

Will ask Scooters about this when I next see him. Sounds a little complicated.

[DVee8]

I can just remember a beige 1972 Opel Kaddet this was replaced with a 1977® blue Opel kaddet which in turn was replaced with a 1980(TGR185V) Opel Kaddet one memory of this car was a farm house the parents had hired over in the lakes,the cam shaft went so the farmer gave my dad a mk3 tina to use while the Opel was in the nearest dealer all new.

Then came along the used,first was a Nissan Bluebird (ohn553X) i think.I think this is the reason i like nissans This was wrote off one Sunday lunchtime when my old man was returning from the club,he was edging out of a side street when someone who was more pissed than my old man took the front end off.Then followed a Austin Maestro 1.6VDP (FBR626Y)with the blond behind the dash dishing out the orders.This he gave to me when he gave up driving

[Lord Sterling]

Yes, one of the major reasons I got majorly into Rover 800s, up until myself and Fatha_Sterling moved to Belguim, our family mostly had run of the mill, private estate family type cars.....

 

Apparently, when I was born into this world, I was brought home in a Green Austin Marina, I have never seen this car but frequently get told of it breaking down on the M6 one day when Dad went to collect his parents from Heathrow Airport.

 

Next was a Gold Renault 14TL, (CAW 995T) a tidy little motor which ole_Dad fitted some wheel trims and other 1980s Halfords stuff to, I loved that car, despite dropping a small rock on the bonnet. Now if I remember correctly, what followed was a navy Blue mk1 Ford Sierra, I only remember it being an A-reg and being somewhat more sleeker than the 14, but Istill loved the 14.

 

Following that was, apparently, a White Ford Escort 'Sport' it was of a very late 80s variety but this only lasted a few weeks until it got took back to the vendor due to some faults or something which were never described by the vendor. After that came a Red mk2 Vauxhall Cavalier which he kept for years, I too loved this car very much but it got traded in for a brand new mk3 Ford Fiesta (G886 KAW) which was intended for my Mum.

 

The Fiesta git a bit crashed and bashed by ole_Fatha_Sterling until Ma_Sterling got fed up and offered to buy Fatha a car for himself on his birthday.

 

He came home with Shantung Gold/Gun Metal Grey mk1 Rover 825 Sterling (D233 KYG) this car left a HUGE impression on me of which you many of you know today.

 

This was the last UK car Fatha was to have before he left, with me in tow, for Belguim.

 

After that, his car choices were never the same, he had all sorts of rattly rammle and bilge, these include a Citroen C15 Van, a G40 Polo, 88' Honda Integra, a 89' Corrolla hatch (first car I learnt to drive in) an 82' Ford Escort which was immaculate when he bought it, crashed and bashed when it left us....

 

He also had a very old Mercedes car transporter thing. Nowadays dear_Fathas choice in cars has got better but less autoshite. He has recently had a Nissan Primera recently, a 2004 Nissan Altima in Kuwait and now he has a 2004 Volvo V40.

 

Ma_Sterling on the other hand has never had any interest in cars, if it works and drives Ok, shes happy. Ma is a small woman so often chooses equally small cars, when she makes the decision to buy one herself, she often ends up with a one-spec above the base model (Fiesta and Micra being very good examples) The only cars she's had were the mk3 Fiesta (bought with my Dad) a mk1 Rover 820i (Ok, not a small car and not bought by herself) and the current 1998 Nissan Micra. I think the Micra was the only car she bought by herself.

[Skizzer]

I don't think shiterdom can be congenital, mainly because in my experience it doesn't to much for the first pre-requisite for breeding, i.e. getting laid.  Either the ladeez run a mile from your limeflower chariot of lurve early on, or they spend one too many Friday nights on a windswept hard shoulder and dump you for the AA man; if you do manage to get beyond this and cajole them into marriage then periodic announcements that you've accidentally won a rusty XJ6 on eBay or liberated a dead Dedra you found in a shed normally lead to withdrawal of your conjugal rights for most of your fertile years.  Hypothetically speaking, like.

[AndyW201]

I think FathaW201 (God rest) was a bit of a shiter ahead of his time. We have a photo of the family mk1 Escort estate RUB 483G (one of the first estates I think and despite only being about 4 years old when photographed, had no bumpers and an impressive underseal tide mark!) when mutha and fatha only had the two kids. However once I came along, this was changed for a Mini, Definitely true shiters logic there? Cant remember much, but I do remember it having a one piece flip front and said flip front being open rather a lot...

 

This was followed by a red HA Viva SL which like most of them had paint as flat as a plate of stale piss. Then he upped his game and bought something really quite reasonable, YWW 159L, a white Avenger DL. Will have been about 3 years old when he got it, although I do remember the periodic rubbing down and spraying of the wing tops and an ever increasing width of tide mark on the sills and front valance... I seem to remember it was pretty reliable and took us on a lot of family holidays. So, the next Avenger probably wasn't a good idea. BYG 745T was a brown (with severely brown interior) 1300 LS which was only 2 years old but had knocked up an impressive 75,000 miles in the hands of Leeds C.I.D. It was in fairly good order but fatha was persuaded by a 'guy down the pub' that at that mileage, the engine would be about to go and that he had a mint* low mileage* engine that he would put in for a good price*. And after that it ran like a complete shithouse and it got sold about 6 months later. Somewhat demoralised and out of pocket, he ended up with a Sahara Beige Mk1 Escort (estate again) PTO 715M. It was pretty mint for one of these at the time and was most reliable. Mutha putting a great big gouge down one side of it was about the only event with that one, which earned it a funky new two-tone paint job with Roman Bronze on the lower half.

 

After that, in 1984, mutha and fatha started on brand new cars, though nearly always with futureshite. Starting with Nissan Sunny B829 MPY, through Fiat Uno D260 BPY, Escort mk4 in glorious popular spec D944 FPY, back to Nissan with another Sunny, 1.3 LS (first car in the family with leccy windows FTW!) F610 VPY, a Micra k10 (with funky 1990S 'graphics' and KN Meteor alloys courtesy of the dealer) H976 NPY. Then one I really liked, a Rover R8 214i (when the basic 214i still had the 16v engine and decent size wheels before the chrome grille facelift) K901 XEF. Then the parents started buying stuff I really wanted for myself, like the Carribbean blue Corsa SRi M830 OVN, and Escort mk7 Mexico N51 VAJ. Back to bona fide shite with one of the first Meganes N926 TCN, A 1.4 8v, one of the most underpowered cars I have driven (and I've owned an 1100cc mk3 Escort...). Mutha didnt like it, so back to Escorts with a lovely 1.6 Si P371 JVN in metallic Aubergine, a must have colour for an Escort. Things went a bit shite again with a Rover 214 bubble shape S220 LVN, but I really liked the Opel badged Corsa C 1.4 GSi (bought from a car supermarket. Povo spec but went like the clappers because it had all the engine and chassis spec of the SRi. One of the first quickish Corsa Cs on the road round here so the local boy racers loved it) Y584 DTV, Citroen Xsara NV52 XYA (another 1.4 8v so another non-ball of fire.) Then the last car purchased by fatha, and one he absolutely loved, bless him, was the fat arse Megane Dynamique PL03 PDK. Complete with the funky electric twin sunroofs, automatic wipers, headlights, push button start, etc. Sadly fatha passed away shortly after and mutha couldnt bear to keep the car. However she has been keeping the market for future shiters buoyant with recent purchases being an '04 Clio, '07 Mitsubishi Colt, '09 Ford Ka, and currently one of the latest shape Micras.

 

I'm pretty sure I wouldnt be logging on here every day (thankfully for you lot not posting much), and with a 20 year old poo brown Mercedes  on the drive if it hadnt been for those early years watching fatha underneath a 70s saloon swearing and breathing in Schultz fumes!

[HMC]

Not based on my family at least. Dad had and still has little taste in such vehicles and neither do any of my 3 brothers.

 

Having said that Dad did have form with new car purchases- capri in 1.3 flavour, 1983 toyota tercel and a rock bottom povo spec 88 3 door escort 'bonus' with a dash full of planking plates so maybe the gene was expressed in that generation after all