September 1975 CAR magazine giant test bonanza!

[brammy777]

I ordered three the other day and they areOctober 1980-Metro Roadtest, Capri X pack, Golf Convertable against Beta Spyder, Escort MKIII vs Alfasud. And an interesting mg concept car...October 1982- Maestro revealed (They called it good looking!) A feature on the SD1 Vitesse and MG Metro, New 3 series, Maserati Biturbo and for the test- Colt 1.4 Turbo vs R5 Turbo vs 323 1500GTDecember 1982-Ford Sierra, Audi 100, Citroen BX, Corvette, and MG Metro vs XR2 vs 127GT.Alot of fun to read!I need more....

[Volksy]

IIRC the 14 lived out the rest of it's tax with one of the junior scribes for CAR, seem to remember it being mentioned in the editorial section. Thanks for posting that article up!!

[Pete-M]

Clearly the producer of Top Gear read this.....

James May was one of the entrants in the CAR's "Crap Car Cup" back in the early '90s. He also wrote quite often about crap old cars he owned, and gave his old Triumph Vitesse Convertible away to a reader - He'd had it for a good few years, since he was a student, and it wasn't going to get any better unless he got rid of it.I suspect May would love this site.

[Pete-M]

Nowadays it's normally electronics that write a car off,

After 20+ years poncing about with cars, I still don't know one that has been written off by electronics. Can someone please point me to the otherwise perfect cars with dead electrickery, I could make a bloody fortune if I could find all these cars.

 

(NB: Please note, Citroens don't count. Or should that be can't count?)

[garethj]

Nowadays it's normally electronics that write a car off,

After 20+ years poncing about with cars, I still don't know one that has been written off by electronics. Can someone please point me to the otherwise perfect cars with dead electrickery, I could make a bloody fortune if I could find all these cars.

 

(NB: Please note, Citroens don't count. Or should that be can't count?)

A friend of mine who was a mechanic at times told me about a few. Usually the problem is caused by a dealer charging £90 per hour, not knowing what's wrong until they've changed everything and second hand cars not being worth much.

 

If more mechanics knew what to do and didn't charge so much for their time, it would be worthwhile looking for the dodgy connection or knackered sensor. But the mentality seems to be "we can unplug this module and fit another one for £500, that'll fix it"

 

Yeah mate, but so would scraping the corrosion off the connector and refitting the original one.....

[r.welfare]

BMW 1st , Saab 2nd & Audi 3rdR5 1st, Golf 2nd, Kadett 3rdMaxi 1st, VW 2nd, R20 3rdCX 1st, 504 2nd, 240D 3rdAll a complete guess though!.

Good guesses, although only one is right (R5-Golf-Kadett - OMG DRIFT YO! enthusiasm didn't exist in '76).The Audi got the nod, with the BM 2nd (underpowered, overpriced and old-fashioned, they said) and the Saab 3rd.The Passat got the nod over the R20 (poor engine refinement and high price). The Maxi was predictably third - but CAR said it could be a winner in concept, just rubbish execution.The diesel test was a surprise. The near-decade-old 504 won, with the CX (quite a bit more expensive and less economical) 2nd, and the W123 last due to the excessive price.