What car do you drive?

BennyBoo said:
I drive the new Mazda 6 for work, Same engine and package, but a saloon.. I find it's not a bad drive, quite nippy when it wants to be, but a small tank!? Only got 50l in last fill up, and i was down to 30 miles on the DIS..!
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Just done 500 miles of cross country thrash averaging 45mpg and had 1/4 a tank left.not bad at all.
 
Byker28i said:
Just done 500 miles of cross country thrash averaging 45mpg and had 1/4 a tank left.not bad at all.
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Yeah, seems town driving it's not massively great, for me anyway, that's mostly what I do..

Went to Scotland last week, 720ish mile round trip and made it on a tank..!
 
That's good to know. Off through France in a month. We used to get about 200 miles in the primera before we needed to refuel, so constant fuel stops.
There's definitely a different way of driving a diesel than petrol.
 
boogie man said:
Bought a nearly new Jaguar XF about 9 months back. It's the 3 litre V6 diesel version. Really really happy with it, it handles very well for a big car, goes quickly and we had 42mpg out of it on a recent trip. It's a Premium Luxury model, so loads of toys to keep me happy too.
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Missed this! Same as mine, although the toys are probably different. "Only" the 240HP version but that's plenty for me and the extra insurance on the 275 would hurt. On a mixed A and M journey up to the megameet a couple of weeks ago I got 42 (indicated, 41.5 calculated) with most of the toys on - my previous car (Citroen Xsara Picasso 1600 petrol) was worse on fuel and nowhere near as comfortable (or toy filled!) As you say, they handle very well for a big car - certainly better than I'll ever need! Not cheap but I paid less than 1/2 the list price of a new PL specced one for a 3 year old example. Thought quite long and hard about what to get after a serious illness and surgery a couple of years ago and decided on a (relatively) premium type 2nd hand over a new something or other. While I know the XF has depreciated, it's still worth significantly more than anything I had bought new for the same money would be!
 
I've got a vw passat for now - not too bad, seems pretty quick for a 2 liter big sedan. Next will probably be a Bmw 3 series once I get promotion by the end of the year! View attachment 13107
 
Had this for a while. You can put the power down in pretty much all weather conditions and it's very tuneable. It's a heavy beast though!

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gman said:
Had this for a while. You can put the power down in pretty much all weather conditions and it's very tuneable. It's a heavy beast though!

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Have you had any problems with rust? The older mazdas used to be really bad. We had some coming into work needing new quarter panels, sills, doors and wings at only a year old. All got done under warranty though. I don't paint for Jaguar anymore though and that's who was doing the warranty for Mazda's so I don't know what the new ones are like. Apart from the rust they were nice cars.
 
I see that a lot with the Mazda 6's, especially under the wheel arches but mine seems to be fine. The chassis has a bit of surface rust and the less said about the exhaust bolts the better, a little disappointing as I would have expected more from Mazda but perhaps it's the Ford influence that's caused that? lol In stark comparison my Accord is spotless underneath, even the exhaust bolts etc. I'm going to be treating the chassis to either a nice coat of rust treatment paint or just go messy and get some Waxoyl.

I know they used to have serious problems with the DPF and engines needing replacing, not sure if they've sorted it but I'm not a diesel fan anyway and all petrol at the moment. Never looked at the newer models as the GG was the only generation you could get this in and production stopped in 2007 I think. You can get it in the 3 though which has two generations right up to now, much lighter although only FWD.
 
gman said:
I see that a lot with the Mazda 6's, especially under the wheel arches but mine seems to be fine. The chassis has a bit of surface rust and the less said about the exhaust bolts the better, a little disappointing as I would have expected more from Mazda but perhaps it's the Ford influence that's caused that? lol In stark comparison my Accord is spotless underneath, even the exhaust bolts etc. I'm going to be treating the chassis to either a nice coat of rust treatment paint or just go messy and get some Waxoyl.

I know they used to have serious problems with the DPF and engines needing replacing, not sure if they've sorted it but I'm not a diesel fan anyway and all petrol at the moment. Never looked at the newer models as the GG was the only generation you could get this in and production stopped in 2007 I think. You can get it in the 3 though which has two generations right up to now, much lighter although only FWD.
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Let's hope it stays fine and just give it a good go over with Waxoyl, horrible stuff. Every car has some sort of problem though, can't keep away from them. My passat was fine and dandy till the common injector problem hit me and stopped me dead on the fast lane of the M5 in the middle of a 10hour drive, wasn't happy lol.
 
Not a car but it's motorised transport! In keeping with our current cars, my bike has 500cc/cylinder but has only the single pot! Royal Enfield Bullet Classic EFi. Slower than most modern learner bikes but much nicer to ride. Pulls me up the steep hill home in top at 30 - just above tickover. Way more comfortable around town than any sporty bike and not fast enough for the upright position to pull on the arms on dual carriageways. Now it's had the grotty fuel drained and the injector unblocked, it runs as intended. The time off driving I had didn't do it any favours - thanks again DVLFA. While it's not raining, I'm using it as much as possible, including a run into town this morning after a challenge from one of my wife's students - she said that IF I could still get into the suit I got married in, I was allowed to join them for coffee and cakes after their class. Since I was near my biggest when I got wed and have shed around 4 stone since then, I had no problems with getting into the suit but it was a little chilly at 08:15 in it on the bike! (It's only a mile run down relatively quiet roads so I wasn't too worried about leathering up, although I did put a helmet on!)
 
MPS aye. Excellent engine and performance considering the weight but also a good daily driver. Not quite as refined at my Accord though. The suspension with the MPS really should have been better, there are various bushes that are far too weak and need replacing too soon for my liking but can't fault the handling.

The smaller and current MPS3 is already a serious player but there's talk of a new MPS3 using the 2.5 skyactiv engine with a turbo and also making it AWD. If they can get the weight down then the other hyper hatches are going to have to watch out! Lol
 
Seat Leon S 1.4 51 plate. My first car and is nice and cheap to insure. I wouldn't mind an Audi A4 1.9tdi/2.0tdi next or a VW Passat. Something diesel :D

Really like the look of the Seat Leon Cupra R's but they suck on fuel big time
 
Beav said:
Seat Leon S 1.4 51 plate. My first car and is nice and cheap to insure. I wouldn't mind an Audi A4 1.9tdi/2.0tdi next or a VW Passat. Something diesel :D

Really like the look of the Seat Leon Cupra R's but they suck on fuel big time
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If you want a VAG diesel better off with one of the 1.9 lumps, avoid the high 150/170ps versions. Also the old 2.0TDi is nowhere near as good as the 1.9, we had no end of trouble with the 2.0 - dropped 2 injectors and the dmf was going.

My uncle did the best part of 300'000 in his 1.9 A4, with proper maintenance they're good for megga mileage.
 
FTO GPvR Aero by R. Alan Jones ~ www.quarryscapes.co.uk, on Flickr

My latest plaything to replace the Eunos Roadster I'd grown to hate. It's capable of being very quick, but being based on a galant chassis it's shall we say entertaining in the corners! Tends to be quite vicious, high revving V6 with decent power through an LSD to the front wheels with repmobile suspension! By God does it sound good though, especially when the cams changeover, the low range cam sings and the high range one growls and snarls!

Fun fun fun!
 
Hazza said:
If you want a VAG diesel better off with one of the 1.9 lumps, avoid the high 150/170ps versions. Also the old 2.0TDi is nowhere near as good as the 1.9, we had no end of trouble with the 2.0 - dropped 2 injectors and the dmf was going.

My uncle did the best part of 300'000 in his 1.9 A4, with proper maintenance they're good for megga mileage.
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Ahh ok, thanks :)

Ide like maybe an A4 Estate after a year or two.
 
Everyday I drive a £500 Citroen Berlingo van
It's dreadful but costs nothing to run

Also have a nissan Navara 2.5td pick up truck which is in stoppable and used for holidays Ect

My gf has a vw lupo 1.4 auto in bright green which she adores

And iv just bought a nissan 350z as a massive boys toy but I seriously doubt I'll keep it long ... It is fun though ...
 
There are some beautiful cars in this thread, I am jealous of the black Celica - I drive a red volvo C30, I love it
 
Very heavily modified Vectra C 2.0T (Petrol) estate, bought it brand new in September 2004, still own it, love it and drive it hard every day. It's tuned to 240bhp, not the most powerful car by any means, but enough to surprise people that's for sure, roughly 6.4 seconds 0-60 time in a car the size of a bus will do that :)

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Mine's a 2011 BMW 320d Efficient Dynamics. I find it a good all-rounder. Great to drive with enough power to have a bit of fun and excellent fuel economy (60mpg+ is quite easily achievable on a trip, with around 50mph general driving), road tax only £20/year. The boot's a bit small though but I'd certainly consider getting another in a years time.
 
Ian-Highlander said:
Very heavily modified Vectra C 2.0T (Petrol) estate, bought it brand new in September 2004, still own it, love it and drive it hard every day. It's tuned to 240bhp, not the most powerful car by any means, but enough to surprise people that's for sure, roughly 6.4 seconds 0-60 time in a car the size of a bus will do that :)

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OOOO very nice. Love modified estates and have a modified Passat estate myself. It's a heavily modified diesel though, around 235bhp.
 
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Well for the last few days I have been driving my M135 around the Brecon Beacons, other than an old M3, I can't think of what else I would prefer to have at my disposal. Me, this car and full sport mode has been an absolute joy :D
 
Just back from a few miles through France. Averaged 46mph over 850 miles of mixed driving - not bad.
Had the opportunity to take a photo of the filthy car

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Ian-Highlander said:
Very heavily modified Vectra C 2.0T (Petrol) estate, bought it brand new in September 2004, still own it, love it and drive it hard every day. It's tuned to 240bhp, not the most powerful car by any means, but enough to surprise people that's for sure, roughly 6.4 seconds 0-60 time in a car the size of a bus will do that :)

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What mods have you done?
 
A sedately Volvo V50S. Goes like the devil with a rocket up its a*se.
 
Ian-Highlander said:
http://www.gcrpeople.com/images/modslist/index.php

Not sure if you can read it without being a member, but my full "diary" is on Vectra-c.com, where I'm one of the admins, here http://www.vectra-c.com/forum/showthread.php?154223-This-will-be-a-bit-of-a-novel
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That's some list! Did you ever fancy the 3.2 V6 or the Signum 2.8T? Perhaps more expensive to add some extra zoom though. Shame they didn't do the VXR in Estate although there's always the Insignia 2.8T V6 Tourer. With 256bhp and 350Nm standard it's a pretty good starting point and has AWD. How did all those mods effect your insurance? I've done a few mods but they had no impact on the policy.
 
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gman said:
That's some list! Did you ever fancy the 3.2 V6 or the Signum 2.8T? Perhaps more expensive to add some extra zoom though. Shame they didn't do the VXR in Estate although there's always the Insignia 2.8T V6 Tourer. With 256bhp and 350Nm standard it's a pretty good starting point and has AWD. How did all those mods effect your insurance? I've done a few mods but they had no impact on the policy.
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The 3.2 is a nice engine, with plenty of torque and lovely and smooth but being normally asperated it's a lot more expensive to do anything with power wise. The 2.8T is a lovely car especially in VXR form (and they did do an estate VXR), although does have it's weaknesses (has a habit of stretching chains etc) and you can get serious power from them quite easily. I'm very happy with the 2.0T though, owned it from new and enjoy it as my "other" hobby (photography and the car are my hobbies basically), It's a car that we've very much made our own and there's definitely not another one like it around, but it's still just a Vectra at the end of the day and some people won't like it regardless. Me, I love it still even at nearly 10 years old.

Insurance wise, every mod is declared and it did up my policy quite a bit, but it's just part of the expense of the hobby. :)
 
I'm not driving my A6 at the moment as the engine grenaded* itself on the M4 last week. Not due to lack of servicing either, it's always been serviced by Audi to their schedule.

Currently hunting for a reasonable 2.5tdi 24v engine (180bhp variant, as that's the correct one for the car) from an accident damaged one.

*valve to piston interface while travelling at 70mph does considerable internal damage.
 
Ian-Highlander said:
The 3.2 is a nice engine, with plenty of torque and lovely and smooth but being normally asperated it's a lot more expensive to do anything with power wise. The 2.8T is a lovely car especially in VXR form (and they did do an estate VXR), although does have it's weaknesses (has a habit of stretching chains etc) and you can get serious power from them quite easily. I'm very happy with the 2.0T though, owned it from new and enjoy it as my "other" hobby (photography and the car are my hobbies basically), It's a car that we've very much made our own and there's definitely not another one like it around, but it's still just a Vectra at the end of the day and some people won't like it regardless. Me, I love it still even at nearly 10 years old.

Insurance wise, every mod is declared and it did up my policy quite a bit, but it's just part of the expense of the hobby. :)
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I never knew they did the VXR in Estate! How does that work with VED, does starting with the 2.0T and modding up keep the VED the same or does it have to be tested to see if the emissions have gone up? I'm guessing that starting with say the 2.8T would start you off at a higher VED? (I've not looked up the official bands).

I've installed a Stage 2 Corksport SRI which also upgrades the turbo inlet pipe, lowered her by 30mm with Eibach springs and the tyres are slightly wider with Vredestein Sessantas but that's because the OEM ones are an awkward size and therefore cost far more with less choice also. None of it effected the policy which was a little surprising.

How come you didn't go down the route of an SRI or CAI?
 
onomatopoeia said:
I'm not driving my A6 at the moment as the engine grenaded* itself on the M4 last week. Not due to lack of servicing either, it's always been serviced by Audi to their schedule.

Currently hunting for a reasonable 2.5tdi 24v engine (180bhp variant, as that's the correct one for the car) from an accident damaged one.

*valve to piston interface while travelling at 70mph does considerable internal damage.
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I hear a lot first hand and on forums about Audis being unreliable yet in the official press they rave about their reliability. Same with BMW engines going on fire and that dreaded "for life" timing chain being at the rear of the engine bay and requiring replacing at silly low miles. Makes me wonder if they are giving huge brown envelopes to the motoring press! lol

Are Audi going to help you out seeing as you've stuck to their servicing schedule with them!?
 
onomatopoeia said:
I'm not driving my A6 at the moment as the engine grenaded* itself on the M4 last week. Not due to lack of servicing either, it's always been serviced by Audi to their schedule.

Currently hunting for a reasonable 2.5tdi 24v engine (180bhp variant, as that's the correct one for the car) from an accident damaged one.

*valve to piston interface while travelling at 70mph does considerable internal damage.
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With hindsight you should probably have left it in fifth rather than changing down and dogging second! ;) :p
 
Yves Geza said:
With hindsight you should probably have left it in fifth rather than changing down and dogging second! ;) :p
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It was in 6th :p

A tensioner for the alternator (and misc other things that need to turn) belt failed, the belt came off, got caught up in the cam belt, sheared, wrapped itself around the crank pulley which caused the cam belt to jump teeth on the pulley, which caused the valves to hit the pistons. The cam belt itself is intact! (only had 18k miles on it). So I just had all the consequences of cam belt failure without it actually failing.

I like cam chains, always have done.
 
gman said:
How come you didn't go down the route of an SRI or CAI?
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The vectra's don't respond well to open/cone air filters, they tend to suffer quite badly with heat soak and can actually lose power/responsiveness because of it, although that's less of an issue with a turbo'd car anyway of course as you have the intercooler cooling it nicely for you. A decent panel filter (mine has a K&N fitted) will usually give better results overall. When mine was being used to help develop the Maptun maps for the Vectras (Maptun are a Saab tuner, but the Vectra 2.0T is a Saab engine), one of the techs at one of the many rolling road sessions it had to have said it was being starved a little of air just at the very top end of the rev range and advised fitting a second inlet or cutting some holes in the air box just to allow that extra bit in.

So I did...

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It made a big difference (and it's not a placebo, I have the rolling road printouts to prove it) but only at the very top end of the rev range as until you get to 5.5k or above the standard feed can easily provide enough even with the upgraded turbo. As I say, mine's no massively powered car, lord knows half the cars in this thread could eat it for breakfast I imagine, but it's fun and does go like stink if I want it to. :)
 
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Interesting stuff. Surprising as there was a big discussion elsewhere on heat soak and about how with turbocharged engines it's not really an issue unless you are stationary or at crawling/low boost speeds because once the turbo starts sucking the air in the speed on which it passes through is so fast it would be near impossible for it to warm up and cause any heat soak. Is yours a top or front mounted intercooler? I'm a big fan of SAABs, especially their large torque band (in particular the Holden developed 2.8T V6). Very excited to see what new models they come out with.

There may be some cars that could beat you but then how much do these cars cost? Take the new S3 which unlike the previous one can easily keep up with me. It's still about £29K to buy whereas the MPS can be had for under £7K. Both AWD but with the MPS you'd have £22K to spend modifying it! lol
 
Currently a Peugeot 508SW - opted for this due to being best that I could get for my budget. Liked the drive etc more than other cars tested at the time. Looked at Insignias, Mazda 6 (favourite but too dear) Mondeos and Toledos. Wanted a car with manuf warranty low running costs etc.
Previously had a Mitsubishi Lancer 2.0D which progressively got worse the longer I had it. Suspension creaks and interior trim seemd to deteriate.

I miss the 6th gear folding mirrors and the extra pull of the Mitsi but the 508 has more useful accessories - auto lights wipers etc
 
onomatopoeia said:
It was in 6th :p

A tensioner for the alternator (and misc other things that need to turn) belt failed, the belt came off, got caught up in the cam belt, sheared, wrapped itself around the crank pulley which caused the cam belt to jump teeth on the pulley, which caused the valves to hit the pistons. The cam belt itself is intact! (only had 18k miles on it). So I just had all the consequences of cam belt failure without it actually failing.

I like cam chains, always have done.
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When I first knew Yv, she had a Vauxhall Astra [sic!] I was driving it once with three kids on board, rolling up to a red traffic light, in gear at about 10mph when the engine died. And then wouldn't restart. And never started again! It turned out that mild reverse of load had sheered the [ageing] Woodruff key in the [ageing] bottom pulley! It's the only time in my life I've ever blown an engine!

On the other hand, one morning in the 1990s I unlocked my garage to find a car parked across the drive with a "broken down" sign and the keys through the door. So of course I went to see if it would start and it went "clunk". I lifted the bonnet, burst out giggling and phoned my Dad "When you lift the bonnet on a Renault Laguna should you be able to see the crankshaft!?" :LOL:

The owner had "just been driving on the motorway when it broke!" Obviously the only explanation was that he'd changed down from 5th to 2nd and the weight of the heavy 7-seater estate meant that the low powered 1.8-litre engine had punched its main bearing caps out through that big hole in the side of the cast iron block! I was actually quite impressed at the metallurgy that the crank hadn't snapped.

And while there's the usual internet moaning about car warranties running in another OOF thread, Renault paid to replace the engine under warranty even though it was pure operator error!
 
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