I want a disgusting V8 for £1500, tops. Advice please.

[Partridge]

Says reserve not met http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dodge-Diplomat-/271612559367?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item3f3d5ec007

 

 

Oh I like that.

[Jim Bell]

DIPLOMATIC IMMUNITY.

[Felly Magic]

It's so full of epic shite points that Dodge..... Big lazy V8, red velour interior, chrome conk, fake wire wheel chrome hubcaps, and its brown. It has to be eleventy hundred billion shite points at least

[eddyramrod]

It's not actually possible, even for someone like Douglas Adams, to imagine how much I want that Dodge!

[Partridge]

Get a bid in Eddy! And the Dodge is most certainly disgusting.

[eddyramrod]

I can't, she'd kill me... besides, I've already had a Gran Fury, which is essentially the same car, although being a copcar it was dreadfully basic inside, nothing like as plush as that!

 

Anybody want to make an offer on a white Mercury Sable...?

[Partridge]

You could offer the guy selling it a swap?

[Taff]

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/OLDSMOBILE-CUTLASS-/231337110086?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item35dcc42a46

 

I think this ticks all the boxes being disgusting, V8 and £1500

 

that's astonishing. A car with no redeeming features at all

[Felly Magic]

I had a feeling Mr Ramrod would be drooling over that Diplomat

[Taff]

Says reserve not met http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Dodge-Diplomat-/271612559367?pt=Automobiles_UK&hash=item3f3d5ec007

 

 

 

I think we have a winner

[eddyramrod]

I had a feeling Mr Ramrod would be drooling over that Diplomat

Yes, sorry to be so predictable!  I literally can't see anything to not-like about it.  I could say the same about the Oldsmobile were it 20% of the price too.

[danthecapriman]

Yes, sorry to be so predictable!  I literally can't see anything to not-like about it.  I could say the same about the Oldsmobile were it 20% of the price too.

Just do the decent thing and buy them both! I can't think of any reason not to! Submit to the velourishness!

Do it do it do it...

 

Personally, when yank v8's are available I think it makes all other options wrong. The yanks are the only option if you want to do it right!

[406V6]

When I saw the title of the thread my immediate thoughts were a Jag, Rangie or an old yank. There aren't many other viable options.

 

I owned a V8 for a good many years (late 80s Firebird) and for me there are two key things to enjoying a V8.

• Firstly and by far the most important when you're pouring all that fuel in you need to be able to hear the thing burbling away although it mustn't have a stupid exhaust and frighten pedestrians. I've never been in a Lexus but surely it's ruled out by being too quiet.
• Secondly V8s were made to pipe all that torque through an autobox - smoothness all the way. Forget all that Clarkson bar-room bollocks about real men and manuals. If you've never driven one you'll have to take my word for it that an auto on a V8 is nothing like an auto on an asthmatic 4 banger - badermatic is where it's at when you have a V8.

Back to the choices.

• A Benz, Bimmer or Audi has an insufficient number of shite points as well as parts costing lots of ££££.
• Vauxhall (Holden/Chevrolet) V8s are definitely not sh*t – when I've heard one drive past the soundtrack is pure evil - but they will be well out of budget.
• The Caddy STS has to be a top contender as well as having max shite points. It's American and will surely sound good. I remember driving a top-of-the range Seville in the USA for a few days in the late 80s and it was a decent drive.
• A Chrysler 300 would be brill but is too new and more £££ than you'd want to spend.
• Any old Yank like the Dodge runs the risk of being unreliable through age and for my taste the lhd and soggy handling on our roads would be a nuisance.
• Any Rover / Range Rover / Discovery would provide a fantastic soundtrack but be unreliable. Most of them are autobox though and the sound will be great. Also good when the snow falls provided you have at least some all season tyres.
• A Jag is undoubtedly the most sensible choice but for some strange reason you've ruled them out. (which you're allowed to so as it's your dosh). Daimler ?

If it was my money I would be looking at a Range Rover and thumbing through the directory for a specialist repairer near where I live. I've never even driven one but just the thought of that burbling V8. smooth progress, wood trim and elevated view is getting me all excited. Nurse ! Time for my medicine.

[Guest Lord Sward]

I ran a manual Disco V8 and it could spin its front wheels when the throttle was nailed on a tight bend.  Priceless.

[Pete-M]

I've had at least 10 Range Rovers.

 

Love those things but P38s has made me wait for 322s with the Jag engine to be in my budget.

[Timewaster]

Nobody mentioned TVR or TR8 yet?

 

Cba to scour the bay for examples but I'm sure someone will.

[Bren]

Agreed about the auto box coupled to a V8.

 

My SD1 is badermatic and suits the car well - especially if you change gear yourself.

 

The manual variety is hard work - heavy clutch, not particularly smooth change and a bit noisy.

[skattrd]

Nobody mentioned TVR or TR8 yet?

 

Cba to scour the bay for examples but I'm sure someone will.

 

Can't get a V8 one for anywhere near £1500.

The cheapest TVR would be the Capri engined Tamsin (aka wedge) and a scruffy with no T&T will go for £1000 - 1500, anything on the road £2k+. With a V8 £3k upwards.

[cort16]

Its not one of these dodge diplomats thats in the Radiohead Karma police video is it? I remember the car in that has a crushed red velour interior.

[Jim Bergerac]

The back seat of that Dodge looks like the most comfortable place in the world.

 

[Guest Lord Sward]

It does mind.

[Negative Creep]

Disgusting you say?

 

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/331325562116

 

Don't worry that it's outside your price range, his "mate" is a dealer and can offer finance

[Guest Lord Sward]

Yes.  Finance that involves a picture of your KNEECAPS and your missus' KNEECAPS, and your children's KNEECAPs.

[danthecapriman]

Disgusting you say?

 

 

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/331325562116

 

Don't worry that it's outside your price range, his "mate" is a dealer and can offer finance

'Batman'? Twatman more like! What a pile o shite!

[eddyramrod]

That thing absolutely IS disgusting.  Jon, buy that Diplomat!  It's the most sensible decision you will ever make, plus it'll save me from being brutally nagged to death.

[Felly Magic]

Button backed red velour........V8 powah, badermaticness, squdgeomatic suspension......You know it makes sense

[Partridge]

why the hell would anyone spend 18k on THAT?

[Felly Magic]

That black Porker needs one thing, a fucking great skip full of rubble dropping on it from about 100 ft, will improve it no end

[dugong]

Yeah, so I haven't got as much money as I thought and every insurance quote I've received so far has been horrifying.

 

Someone asked me why I didn't fancy a Jag - well, I find the XJ40\X300 (and to a lesser extent the X308) a bit tragic. Coming from someone who's owned two Volvo 480s, that's worrying.

 

That era of Jaguar is a car I reckon I'll never own. I like how they drive, I just can't see myself behind the wheel of one, ever. I can't work out what the XJ-S was supposed to be, either.

 

While I'm at it, the E-type looks like a wheeled dildo and I don't understand why people hail it as a design masterpiece. The windscreen's at a stupid angle and the 5.3-litre V12 was a dog in the Series 3. If I lived in the States I'd drop a big block Chevy into one to annoy the purists who regard J-LR selling every car it can make as 'worrying'. These people fail to understand that if Jaguar had continued down the three box 'trad saloon' route, it would have tanked like Rover did with the 75 ages ago.

 

That said, I'm glad that bloke in the 'States got his roadster back - I bet he's over the moon.

 

I'd have a 3.0-litre V6 X-Type estate - it's like a European Impreza with a nicer interior.

 

Other than that, Jags do sod-all for me I'm afraid - sorry. Ask me again in ten years.

[Partridge]

I love Jags as you know, but I'm the first to agree that they're crap in the cold light of day.

 

AWD X-Types are cool. Anyone keeps coming out with the same old "ITS JUST A FORD LOL" needs to have an entire Mondeo shoved up their arse, which has been cut into very small, sharp pieces.

 

The XJ-S/XJS was/is a grand tourer, it just looked weird. It was also a codpiece for balding, fat men who needed something to show off at their swinger's parties which came out too late and lived too long. Even if the latter cars are better.

 

The V12s were a bit useless because US anti smog rules meant it was strangled to comply with them.  but would be a cool toy to have. If fuel was free.

 

AJ-6 for the win.