What's the slowest car you've owned?

[ChinaTom]

Chinatom, be interested in what you refer to as the '8 year rule'?

Domestically produced vehicles had an authorized life of 8 years after which they must be destroyed. Chinese MOT is more admin than safety, and furnishing a friendly local official with an envelope full of cash could see the issuing of a new reg plate and a few more years. But this was a company tool and by the time you have tickled the ministry of Finance, the Tax Bureau, the stats bureau, the foreign investment departments and miscellaneous other states departments that take an interest in everything on the books, you could have bought a new one. Which is what we did.

 

Imported cars had 12 year permitted lives.

 

I think this has all changed now as the standard of Chinese cars are comparable with Korean and many Europeans. My China era was 99 till 2012 and I think our later pickups were older than 8 years old - our Pajero was certainly older than 12. Today you can still see Toyota Crowns bimbling about with old retired ‘leaders’ on their way to free dinners.

 

Sending our first Deer 桂AB2068 to the crusher was equivalent to sending a 9 year old Jack Russell to be put down because the puppy farm needs business.

 

 

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[sierraman]

Those old Transit mk3’s with the 2.0 pinto in were horrendously thirsty, from memory they had the Granada carb on them with the stepper motor control. Economy wise they weren’t all that far behind a 3.0. The petrol transits were always a bit lame apart from the prodigiously thirsty 3.0, the 2.0 twin cam in the 95 facelift would no doubt be even more prone to head related grief.

[STUNO]

1965 Hillman Super Minx 1.6 - nicest 4 pot engine I have ever owned in terms of refinement and quietness. Did not like being hustled along, was much happier pootling. 0-60 was somewhere in the low 20's but rarely was full power called for. Huge flywheel meant it was more fun to drive the torque band than rev its knackers off.


Phil

 

 

Agree, my father had one, I used it a lot and it went well. I also thought the gearbox was nice to use, smooth and quick.

[purplebargeken]

Mk3 Escort, mainly due to the fact that it would frequently cut out at really unhelpful moments, usually when doing around 50mph on the North Circular. The dash then caught fire and I px'd it against a Nissan Bluebird. Simpler times. 

[andy18s]

1.8td Mondeo in which some kind soul had stripped the guts out of the wastegate controller for more mpg's...

[bramz7]

I did drive a Yugo 45A the other day which sounded super fast and loud going into 4th but in reality it was about 35mph

[Zelandeth]

Okay, actually In terms of driving rather than owning, 1929 Albion bus.

 

That would do roughly 40mph downhill with a following wind. Well we think it's about 40... there's no Speedo. Nor any other instruments aside from an oil pressure gauge!

 

Not that you'd want to go any quicker in five odd tonnes of vehicle with cable operated brakes which exist only in the mind of the madman who designed the thing. Emergency stop from walking pace is about 200 yards.

 

Traffic lights are an especially annoying problem as there's never enough time to get through before they change again, it's that slow off the mark. Not helped by the gaping chasm between the gears...the thing sounding like it's about to explode in second (probably about 1500rpm in reality) will result it darn near stalling the moment you get into third (crash box of course).

 

Between it trying to bake you alive, having to bend double to see under the wiper motor which protrudes a good couple of inches below the top of the windscreen, it trying to gas you, the almost total lack of brakes, steering with several inches of free play in it and so heavy that at low speed you basically had to brace your foot against the bulkhead and heave, and trying not to knock yourself out on the steering wheel while reaching for first or third gear... it's a "challenging" vehicle to drive!

 

Fun though...and rewarding when you manage to complete a trip safely, smoothly and looking professional the whole time.

[bangernomics]

1.2 punto

[twosmoke300]

Not really a car but my 1.9d engined Peugeot boxer . Just painful .

Drive from cornwall to Croft circuit in it once ! Settled to a steady 60 which I can live with . Until I plugged in the sat nav and realised it’s 51mph !

[NorfolkNWeigh]

Slowest I've owned was Montego Countryman diesel , notice I didn't mention turbo diesel. I bought it with a seized turbo, but noticed that it drove perfectly OK if very very slowly. This was a bonus because I had a guy that wanted to rent it as a cab and he was a notorious car breaker. His last cab was a 2.0i Ghia Sierra which he crashed, so he had the Montego for a couple of years, ended up buying it off me and it never had a working turbo.

Cars I've driven; BX diesel auto was pretty glacial but the award goes to a Mk2 2.5 Senator auto, in real terms not that slow, but it always felt horrible because your expectations were so much higher.

[SRi05]

1.4 Astra H "Active", Absolutely glacial

[MikeR]

Rust and fiberglass Fiat 126 running on one pot .... Spare tyre on the back seat beacause the front boot was rotten ...any slope was a killer .. Cant get cars like this now ????

[SierraMikeHotel]

Jumping up and down with excitement, I will read all the other answers tomorrow, but I don't care I bet I've won!

 

I've owned a Citroën BX.

 

1.7.

 

Diesel.

 

Normally aspirated.

 

Automatic!

 

 

I feel a bit bad being mean about this car because it did me a really good turn at a time when I was utterly skint, but it was really very very slow.  I grew up in Orpington and I live near Brighton: when I had this car I used to joke that you put your foot on one pedal until Gatwick then the other pedal until home.

[motorpunk]

I think I might win this:

 

1972 Fiat 500. Two cylinder, half a litre engine. Maybe 20ish BHP. Well, it did have, anyway. Currently in the garage awaiting seats. Flippin' brilliant little thing.

[motorpunk]

Oh. Yeah. My Sinclair C5. Makes Dollywobblers Invacar look like a Wraith. Sold after I drunkenly crashed it.

[Zelandeth]

Oh. Yeah. My Sinclair C5. Makes Dollywobblers Invacar look like a Wraith. Sold after I drunkenly crashed it.

 

I've cracked 35mph in mine...that is however with an over-excited husky cross attached to it however.  I really need to upgrade the damned brakes...

 

Photo from last year, when the first dusting of snow brought our area to a standstill.

 

 

Got some very confused looks from people.

[sierraman]

Corsa D 1.0 5 door. I was convinced the clutch was slipping. I looked under the bonnet to make sure it didn’t say Briggs and Stratton under there.

[chodweaver]

Runner up was an ex company Scrote estate LX (not that that garnered any equipment of note) TD (not that the T garnered any performance of note). Utterly glacial but the first car to introduce me to casual stress free motoring. And 50mpg+

 

Unlike its predecessor: a brand new company Xant 1.9SD, which was supposed to have a very small turbo in it. Over a period of about 4 months it got slower and slower and went back repeatedly to the Citroen main dealer for this. They were even more hopeless than the car. Its last visit to them very quickly followed its penultimate visit to them, when I drove it out of their car park, having been assured that it was fixed. But when it failed to pull away at the 5% sloped T junction outside the dealers due to a complete lack of torque at any revs, I just let it roll backwards into their car park, returned the keys and walked home.

[Mrcento]

My Mondeo TDDI when the boost hose split , 0-60 in...well it wouldn't do it. I timed it 0-40 and it was 37 seconds.

 

If we're talking out the box non broken slowness, on paper probably the Discovery 300tdi, but it honestly isn't really that "slow", day to day....albeit mine is lightly tweaked for more powaah. If you catch it off boost it's pretty much as you'd expect. Not much happens until you get it back on boost, If you get it on boost and know where the power band is, it's respectable up to about 60 (actually relatively surprisingly so), just over 60 is really where the gearing starts to take it out of its peak torque range and the fact it's aerodynamically like a house starts to overcome the lack of grunt, the acceleration really tails off spectacularly and you really need to ring it harder than sounds healthy past that point to keep up a decent rate of speed picker-uppery.

[LightBulbFun]

I've cracked 35mph in mine...that is however with an over-excited husky cross attached to it however.  I really need to upgrade the damned brakes...

 

Photo from last year, when the first dusting of snow brought our area to a standstill.

 

IMG_20180228_134738.jpg

 

Got some very confused looks from people.

 

the C5 is the one vehicle i keep forgetting you have, ever since i saw one on Britains greatest machines I always wanted to have a go in one

 

as for slowest thing iv ever piloted...

 

does my own broken-ass count? im always embarrassingly slow on foot...

[mercrocker]

I think I might win this:

 

1972 Fiat 500. Two cylinder, half a litre engine. Maybe 20ish BHP. Well, it did have, anyway. Currently in the garage awaiting seats. Flippin' brilliant little thing.

 

I had one.  Same year.   Definitely slower than yours as I never actually had it running and pushed it home the mile or so from where I bought it! 

 

I think the "book" 0-50 (not 60!) was in the order of 34 seconds.     

 

I still harbour a suspicion that it might actually have been faster (if it ran....) than my 4WD Bedford CF with an overbodied Hanlon ambulance conversion.   

[BavarianRetro]

1979 W123 240TD.

 

Top speed wasn't too bad. By the time you were past Abington, you'd run out of acceleration and the speedo needle sat on "p" of "mph" and it'd stay there till you caught the traffic at Preston, but if you had to slow down, it was another 30 miles to make it back to "cruising" speed.

 

Sierra estate with tbe 2.3 diesel was pretty awful too.

 

But neither could match a 109" Series 3 Land Rover 2.25 diesel safari.

[drum]

Had a 6 cylinder Land Rover for a short while in the 1980s,max speed about 50 screaming it's nuts off,so slow it was genuinely funny.Engine was sweet as a nut but was just gutless,a 2.25 four pot would have left it for dead and 12 mpg didn't help,it would be dangerous these days.

This 109 has a Perkins diesel from a fork lift in it. It's no flying machine.

[Zelandeth]

the C5 is the one vehicle i keep forgetting you have, ever since i saw one on Britains greatest machines I always wanted to have a go in one

 

as for slowest thing iv ever piloted...

 

does my own broken-ass count? im always embarrassingly slow on foot...

 

Please kick me about it next time you're here.

 

Haven't had it out much at all this year, really should fix that before there's no year left.  It's a real shame they didn't come with years from the factory as that would make them far more user friendly.  Few folks have fitted hub gear systems, but it requires no small amount of fabrication work...

[Uncle Jimmy]

if I ever get the Saab 92b on the road it will rival it, bigger and heavier but 27bhp...

That's the caravan doodah innit? Need piccies please

[Six-cylinder]

I had a 948cc triumph Herald

 

34 ½ bhp, 0-60 30 secs, 73 mph

 

I had a 1973 Fiat 500 but it was fitted with a 650cc Fiat 126 engine and did 70 mph!

 

Orginal 499cc engine 17 bhp, 0-60 83 secs, 63 mph

Engine in 126 652cc 23 bhp, 0-60 48 secs,  74 mph

 

Now I have a 602cc 2CV

 

29 bhp, 0-60 32 secs, 68 mph

[Zelandeth]

948cc n-s front 1995 broad.jpg

I had a 948cc triumph Herald

 

34 ½ bhp, 0-60 30 secs, 73 mph

 

Fiat 500 EEL 950L side broad.v2 jpg.jpg

I had a 1973 Fiat 500 but it was fitted with a 650cc Fiat 126 engine and did 70 mph!

 

Orginal 499cc engine 17 bhp, 0-60 83 secs, 63 mph

Engine in 126 652cc 23 bhp, 0-60 48 secs,  74 mph

 

P1420465 broad.jpg

Now I have a 602cc 2CV

 

29 bhp, 0-60 32 secs, 68 mph

 

I've driven a couple of 2CVs, albeit not in many years, and don't ever remember them feeling at all underpowered.  Guess that's a combination of light weight, decent aerodynamics for the era and it being surprisingly easy to maintain momentum in them.

 

Plus they sound fantastic flat out...

[anonymous user]

Nearly all my cars have been slow, it's the way I drive that's the problem, not the car. I think the slowest off the mark would probably have been a Mercedes 200T, the Series 1 Morgan with its 1172 side valve was ok getting off the line, but was not very quick on long journeys and despite the 4 speed gearbox had a big gap between 2nd and 3rd which made steep hills quite wearing. More worrying have been the cars which felt a lot slower than they were actually going, I often got caught out switching from my Caddy non turbo diesel pick up to the 928, the Caddy's natural trundle along speed was about 50mph, the Porsche seemed to be ticking over at illegal speeds.

[Noel Tidybeard]

peugeot 106 1.4 xnd graduate

[paulplom]

My slowest by far was a 1999 ex royal mail escort van. Shockingly under powered. It needed brake pipes at 4 years old and I watched the mot tester poke a hole in the passenger sill with his stick thing.