Event For Chod & Ulster: Local Auctions for Local People (Nordie Shiter Events)

[hairnet]

Arf - I was on my way down to Connswater, and stopped off at Tesco! Shoulda just carried on and had myself a McSausageMcMuffinMcThing...

 

Never worry - hope y'had a good time at the Transport Museum.

 

Easons usually stocks Irish Vintage mag, never seen it on Tesco's shelves. Good wee read.

No easons in newry they closed it so found the one in dundalk

 

Must sub again but Robbin cnuts want 80 euro

[The_Equalizer]

As The_Equalizer mentioned, Ballyclare doesn't offer quite the same auction experience as BCA etc... it really is an 'old skool' experience of handwritten notes and children in hi-viz ragging nasty old Beemers around a muddy, puddle-strewn yard.

 

Miles on the clock weren't forthcoming (it might have been mentioned by the auctioneer, but my cloth ears didn't catch it), nor trim level... I can confirm black velour seats, if that's any help? Interior looked quite tidy, but it was all locked up so I couldn't investgate further.

 

DVLA details do confirm it as the 3.2; not sure about the wheels but guessing it might be something to do with its ex-police status OR if someone had put daft alloys on it, then removed them before putting it up for auction and replacing with whatever steels they could find lying around.

 

If it's still there next time, I'll be sure to take a closer look!

 

This might have hints of being on a spectrum of some sorts, but I checked the mileage too. It was a whisker over 112K in 2017 according to the DVLA. Most of its recent MoT history is available. Makes you wonder how it ended up here in Northern Ireland recently? N.b. NI doesn't do MoT history it is either pass or fail* at our government run test centres - they don't do advisories.

 

* In Datsuncog's case it either fail or fail. 

[Spottedlaurel]

Cartell describes the Omega as "V6 SPECIAL AUTO Euro 3"

 

My 2003 Parkers's Guide (not infallible, admittedly) lists the only saloons with 3.2 as being MV6 and Elite. Maybe it's some sort of special order build that wasn't available to Joe Public?

[Datsuncog]

On 12/8/2018 at 12:16 PM, SierraMikeHotel said:

Re Volvo C30s... I always really liked the looks and used to fancy one, until I owned a V50 that I just didn't get along with.

While I had the V50, I got a lift somewhere in a C30 that had the same diesel engine as mine (the clattery Ford unit from the contemporary Focus, I think) so from inside the car the experience was exactly the same as the V50. I remember thinking that you may as well have the estate, if it's exactly the same to drive but more useful day-to-day.

Excellent write-up as always, many chortles and guffaws here!

That's actually really good to know... and may save me from future domestic disharmony if it's not really all that special a driving experience!

I think I just really liked the P1800ES-type glass hatch (hey, it's the closest I'll ever get to a P1800ES), but if it's all fur-coat-and-no-knickers, then I may direct my lust elsewhere... a Focus unit? Bollocks to that.

[SierraMikeHotel]

That's actually really good to know... and may save me from future domestic disharmony if it's not really all that special a driving experience!

 

I think I just really liked the P1800ES-type glass hatch (hey, it's the closest I'll ever get to a P1800ES), but if it's all fur-coat-and-no-knickers, then I may direct my lust elsewhere... a Focus unit? Bollocks to that.

 

They do look good, and the interior is beautiful (but actually ergonomically quite poor) but there are more engaging coupés around!

 

Going further back in time, I was once given a lift in a Focus diesel (a brand new one in probably 2008-2009ish) and when I got back into my BX (XUD turbo) I remember immediately thinking how quiet and refined it was by comparison.  They're not my favourite engines - although both C30s and V50s did have more than one option!

[R9UKE]

Cartell describes the Omega as "V6 SPECIAL AUTO Euro 3"

 

My 2003 Parkers's Guide (not infallible, admittedly) lists the only saloons with 3.2 as being MV6 and Elite. Maybe it's some sort of special order build that wasn't available to Joe Public?

 

 

I had a 2003 Mondeo 2.5 V6 a few years back in LX spec.  Not available to Joe Public, was also a Police special with the certified calibrated speedo etc just like that Omega.  

[The_Equalizer]

I think I just really liked the P1800ES-type glass hatch (hey, it's the closest I'll ever get to a P1800ES), but if it's all fur-coat-and-no-knickers, then I may direct my lust elsewhere... a Focus unit? Bollocks to that.

 

I thought exactly the same thing on Wednesday (glass hatch, not the knickers bit), but didn't mention it. I spent many, many years wanting a P1800 (ideally a Jensen-built one). I did eventually get one that I drove once and then it needed so much work for the MoT it spent the next few years as a garden ornament at my parents' house. I then sold it to a chap in Sweden who, with a friend, wrote a definitive guide to the P1800. Recently, as in the last year or two, the 1800ES had caught my eye. I will bore you to tears next time I see you Datsuncog!

[3VOM]

You go on holiday and you get this

Ffs

Why does the Vauxhall badge look like a cross between a griffin and Scooby-Doo?

[The_Equalizer]

And so the star of the September 12th Ballyclare jolly, the Isopon-tasic MGB:

 

Has surfaced on DoneDeal. Magically this MGB has started to regenerate as the seller states:

 

"Mgb car starts and drives solid in all the right places lots of chrome in good condition comes with v5 has the original registration which is rare and valuable .good project with no major work or buying for this car"

 

Which is slight different to Datsuncog's description three months' ago:

 

"Christ it was rough. And not just 'honest rough'; this jobber evidently had more pudding in it than Sainsburys Seasonal Aisle currently does. More space invader than a 1980s video gaming event. Maybe even more wob than Jah Wobble on a spacehopper holding a plate of Hartley's raspberry jelly.

 

The pictures don't even come close. The flanks looked more like a contour model of the Mournes. It. Was. Hanging.

 

The deeply patchy rattlecan finish was almost flat enough to disguise the heavy orange-peel and long drippy paint runs, over bodywork that looked like it had been repaired to its current high* standard by a classroom of over-excited seven-year-olds with a giant bowl of papier maché, who'd been told that they couldn't have any Haribo or watch Paw Patrol until it was all finished.

 

According to the card stuck to the windscreen, this was a 1970 example fitted with the rare Borg-Warner 3-speed slushbox - and although I thought the nose was rather different for the 1970 model year, this was probably the least of its myriad problems."

 

You can find more details here:

 

1970 MGB - DoneDeal

 

 

It's a small World (or Northern Ireland is the World's smallest village according to Datsuncog).

 

 

[Datsuncog]

On 12/10/2018 at 1:15 PM, The_Equalizer said:

And so the star of the September 12th Ballyclare jolly, the Isopon-tasic MGB:

MGB.jpg

Has surfaced on DoneDeal. Magically this MGB has started to regenerate as the seller states:

"Mgb car starts and drives solid in all the right places lots of chrome in good condition comes with v5 has the original registration which is rare and valuable .good project with no major work or buying for this car"

Hah, fantastic - great spot!

Well now... having looked at the DoneDeal ad, what can be seen of the boot floor from within does seem better than I might have expected. The snap of the underside, while a smidge on the dark side, does at least indicate that it mostly has a floor, which I wouldn't have been all that confident about otherwise. Although... is that the interior of the cabin I can see? Might want to keep your wellies on, if driving in the rain.

Maybe it does start and drive well, maybe it is in fact sound as a pound, structurally. I suppose it is a chrome-bumper BGT with wire rims and a single-digit plate, the very essence of Clazzics 'n' Sportscah stringback-glove fantasies, and if nothing else might part out profitably.

It's also advertised at the same price as the royally rotten left-hooker Dolly Sprint profiled on the 'Just Scrap It' thread earlier. But as this one apparently sold for £3500 in Ballyclare back in September, I'm wondering what kind of spirited negotiation took place in the intervening weeks, for it to end up online at £1895 ono...

In all honesty, if I trekked all the way to Enniskillen (and probably significantly beyond) with two grand in my pocket, I dunno if I'd want to see a car with supposedly steel bodywork that's actually cracking...

"Solid in all the right places?" Hmmm.

[SierraMikeHotel]

It's occurred to me that the last time I saw my old V50 - which was this summer - my vile ex was chasing me in it (when I was on foot).

 

I hated the fucking thing even when I was driving it every day and this experience didn't help matters so please feel free to take my opinions on the things with a pinch of salt.

[Datsuncog]

^^^ Heh, I reckon my chances of ever owning a C30 are vanishingly small anyway, so never fear that your (perfectly understandable) grievances are unduly influencing me!

 

No, if I were to have another Volvo on the drive, I'd want it to be a 760 estate for preference... although a 242 GT would also be quite nice...

[Faker]

There are loads and loads of police spec base model Sri and such models available to the plod. It's actually referred to as police spec. My Octavia is ex-plod. Basic as hell with 2.0 bkd diesel. Was a branch car.. so no extra antenna etc. No lights or sirens etc... and it was fitted with a genuine tow hitch.... Just so it wouldn't look like a plod car! The thing pulls like a train too!!

[Faker]

The yoke!

 

Genuinely one of the bestest cars I've ever owned. And it doesn't have an easy life!

[somewhatfoolish]

This has made me all nostalgic for the auction in Glasgow's old meat market, which was a similarly unhealthy set-up well stocked with chod when I frequented it in the late 90s.

 

 

 

[Datsuncog]

On 12/11/2018 at 3:29 AM, somewhatfoolish said:

This has made me all nostalgic for the auction in Glasgow's old meat market, which was a similarly unhealthy set-up well stocked with chod when I frequented it in the late 90s.

Sadly, this kind of absolute bottom-rung style of car auction seems to be getting rarer these days: I can remember Carryduff Auctions as something similar back in the day, punting through a never-ending cavalcade of wheezy Escort estates and crispy Mitsubishi Sigmas for around the two hundred pound mark, but now it's part of a national auction chain and seems to specialise mainly in 3yr old ex-Motability/ ex-PCP cars... 

Time was, my plumber uncle would buy some old nail for work duties - usually a MkIV or V Cortina - for peanuts at the auction, run it for a few months until it broke down/ran out of MOT, then badger someone into towing it up to Bobby Shaw's yard before heading over to Carryduff to scoop up another one just as bad. Rinse and repeat.

At a guess, higher scrap prices - and electronic faults that render an iffy older car simply too banjaxed to even stagger through the ring - have probably played a part in making cheap-cheap auctions like this unviable, plus a shrinking band of Bangernomicists willing to take these old nails on.

I suppose it's also worth remembering that twenty-odd years ago, selling a car involved phoning in an ad to the local newspaper's classifieds desk, or else the tender mercies of Autotrader, or bucking it up to the auction. Gumtree/eBay/Facebook have made it easy and free to have an endless parade of gormless idiots waste your time over an old shitter; you no longer have to pay handsomely for the privilege.

Cars do last better now, though. I'm generally disappointed at first arrival at Ballyclare - "they're all too new this time!" - but they're nearly all over ten years old, with many in the 15-20 year old bracket (like the green Omega).

For perspective, my dad's old Marina estate (just like Trig's, only Sandglow Beige) required serious corrosion-related welding before it was five, and was hopelessly, terminally rusted-out and perched atop a three-car stack up at Shaw's before its tenth birthday (despite my very best efforts here with the Tetrosyl).

Compare that to the 2007 Fiat Bravo upthread, that went for a mere £450 - maybe I just hang around here too much, but it really does look like a nearly-new car to me. For £450! It's quite hard to imagine a 2009 car doing a Marina and being a total wob-packed colander at that age.

It seems that Ballyclare does have a rep as *the* place for dealers to dispose of undesireable trade-ins that are almost but not quite scrap fodder; and I hope it does continue. That £70 Corsa B did tempt me...

So yeah... support your local shite auction, folks (if indeed there's still one near you). All those who say they prefer to just crush a cheap car, however decent, simply to avoid having to deal with incomprehensible texts from the Great Unwashed might want to consider the no-reserve auction route in future? You might be surprised...

[Datsuncog]

On 12/10/2018 at 11:10 PM, Faker said:

My Octavia is ex-plod... and it was fitted with a genuine tow hitch.... Just so it wouldn't look like a plod car!

Arf! Sneaky stuff... a tow hitch would be something I'd look out for, truth be told - along with window stickers and dealer lettering on the plates. Absence of all those things on a dark-coloured Mondeo/Insignia/Octavia/A6 Avant would make me suspect a Smokey Bear in a plain wrapper. Guess I'll have to re-think that!

I also heard a rumour many years back that PSNI ran a special-build VW Bora VR6, in electric blue, as a plain-clothes motorway response cruiser. I'd love to think that's still out there somewhere...

[Tadhg Tiogar]

.....children in hi-viz ragging nasty old Beemers around a muddy, puddle-strewn yard.....

 

I have visions of Funland in "Good Luck, Father Ted!"

[The_Equalizer]

It would be jolly sad if super cheap car auctions disappeared entirely. Despite feeling slightly bewildered at Ballyclare - I have no idea how a profit is made nor what would be a good bad punt - I rather enjoy its low rent charms, the random cars that appear along with the random bids and the stupidly cheap prices. I was very tempted to go again tomorrow, but I have my son's play to see.

 

When I have bought and sold a few classics there was time to do a bit of homework, look round the things, read the history file and calculate a margin of profit. With Ballyclare it is like popping down to your local Ladbrokes (how very analog) and sticking £500 on the first horse that catches your eye. I am busting to give it a go when I can justify gambling a 'monkey'.

[Datsuncog]

I'm kinda dreading/ gleefully anticipating the day we go up and there's a tired-looking E110 Corolla 'bugeye' liftback, in either pogweasel pink or matt purple, sitting there... because MrsDC willI want to have it.

It's bound to happen eventually.

[The_Equalizer]

Bound to coincide with Faker having brought his trailer.

 

Perhaps we should have a punt on something?

 

Blimey buying chod at Ballyclare is like trying to convince yourself to go and talk to the pretty girl at a party. Bear with me on this analogy - Ballyclare has free passive drug taking, there is a good chance any endeavour will end in tears and even if it does not, the outcome will not be anything like you hoped. Oh, and it will be expensive any which way.

 

I should also add that cars, girls and houses - basically you only know what you've really got yourself into about six months down the line and by that time it is too late.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

..... With Ballyclare it is like popping down to your local Ladbrokes (how very analog) and sticking £500 on the first horse that catches your eye. I am busting to give it a go when I can justify gambling a 'monkey'.

 

....without bothering to pretend to read the form?

[The_Equalizer]

....without bothering to pretend to read the form?

 

In the same way, I pretend to myself that I know what I am doing when buying a car. Trouble is at Ballyclare they all look like they are fit for the 'glue factory' and what with it raining and being dark, any chance of spotting anything but huge cavernous dents goes out the window. Perhaps that is half the fun, for when I was bidding on classics at auction one of my clear memories was having sweaty palms and my heart racing. I did state to a seasoned dealer that perhaps I wasn't cut out for this sort of thing - he explained that the adrenaline rush was half the fun and if you didn't get it, then what was the point?

[Tadhg Tiogar]

....when I was bidding on classics at auction one of my clear memories was having sweaty palms and my heart racing. I did state to a seasoned dealer that perhaps I wasn't cut out for this sort of thing - he explained that the adrenaline rush was half the fun and if you didn't get it, then what was the point?

 

Sounds like "dying seconds" eBay bids to me....

[somewhatfoolish]

Sadly, this kind of absolute bottom-rung style of car auction seems to be getting rarer these days: I can remember Carryduff Auctions as something similar back in the day, punting through a never-ending cavalcade of wheezy Escort estates and crispy Mitsubishi Sigmas for around the two hundred pound mark, but now it's part of a national auction chain and seems to specialise mainly in 3yr old ex-Motability/ ex-PCP cars...

 

<snip>

 

At a guess, higher scrap prices - and electronic faults that render an iffy older car simply too banjaxed to even stagger through the ring - have probably played a part in making cheap-cheap auctions like this unviable, plus a shrinking band of Bangernomicists willing to take these old nails on.

 

I suppose it's also worth remembering that twenty-odd years ago, selling a car involved phoning in an ad to the local newspaper's classifieds desk, or else the tender mercies of Autotrader, or bucking it up to the auction. Gumtree/eBay/Facebook have made it easy and free to have an endless parade of gormless idiots waste your time over an old shitter; you no longer have to pay handsomely for the privilege.

 

Cars do last better now, though. I'm generally disappointed at first arrival at Ballyclare - "they're all too new this time!" - but they're nearly all over ten years old, with many in the 15-20 year old bracket (like the green Omega).

Since my disposable income reached the point where I could potentially indulge a punt on proto-bridge fodder without fear of bankruptcy I've pondered visiting the auctions in Glasgow again just for the craic, or perhaps Wilsons in Dalry, but it's a long way to go to breathe fumes in the freezing cold for 3 hours. Perhaps an SVM day out needs to be organised.

[The_Equalizer]

Sounds like "dying seconds" eBay bids to me....

 

Absolutely. However, there is also a period of limbo between the gavel having fallen and you getting to drive the thing you have just bought. I was always a bit gung-ho and made a habit of driving my winnings back from auction. This added a bit of spice to the event. One that sticks in my memory was a MK2 Jaguar 3.4 MoD - BPO 505B. My Dad plugged the sat. nav. into the ciggie lighter which promptly filled the cabin with smoke and then (thankfully) blew its fuse. Another was a very nice Daimler Sovereign (Jaguar 420 version) which decided to flick on the low brake fluid light when I had cranked it up to 70 on an A-road. Turned out to be a dickie sender, but for a brief moment, I thought I was dumping brake fluid out at a rapid rate.

 

Oh and that MK2 Jag decided to lose its entire tread on the off-side front while I was coming onto the M25, but that's a different story.

[The_Equalizer]

Since my disposable income reached the point where I could potentially indulge a punt on proto-bridge fodder without fear of bankruptcy I've pondered visiting the auctions in Glasgow again just for the craic, or perhaps Wilsons in Dalry, but it's a long way to go to breathe fumes in the freezing cold for 3 hours. Perhaps an SVM day out needs to be organised.

 

You could always have a jolly over to NI - more than welcome and we might even treat you to chips from the dangerous donkey burger van!

[Datsuncog]

So! Who's back? And when are yis free?

I'm now off until 7 January. Although there's a few things on the calendar, I'd love to get together with some of our lesser-spotted Ulster shiters at some point, just for general chat and the strengthening of fraternal bonds... pints/coffee, day/night - whatever works. State preferences below, if you please!

[warninglight]

I'll be home later this weekend and not back over the water til the 6th.

 

I have a few days away from 31st to the 4ththough. Back quite early on the 4th.

 

No plans made yet!

[hairnet]

 

 

I'm now off until 7 January.

Skiving fek