The Car thread - The Bear and Badger

poprock

Nope and nope. The breadvan is fucking cool.

Bob

the previous gen z4 with the electric folding hard top was cool but the roof was slow and apparently there was too much weight so they’ve gone back to a proper soft top for the latest model

poprock

I genuinely love the Z3M breadvan. I know it’s still a crap-handling Z3 at its core, but it’s one of the coolest things BMW have ever made. And quick enough for B-road shenanigans.

ZMM

poprock wrote:

I’m gonna moan a bit. This is my car. There are many others like it but this one is mine. Etc etc. It is as near to perfect as a 15 year old convertible kept outdoors in the Glasgow weather can possibly be, and every mechanic who looks at it tells me so. It’s usually called ‘very tidy’, or ‘the cleanest one I’ve seen’, or something similar. Which is nice. But every single year, it fails the MOT on handbrake strength. Then I pay for whatever work the garage think it needs to get that handbrake up to MOT pass strength. Then, a year later, it fails on the handbrake all over again. This is down to a shitty handbrake design from Toyota. Just like an MX-5, there is no separate handbrake. What the handbrake actually does is lock on the normal rear brakes. So, to make it work properly, you need to push the footbrake down and then pull the handbrake. Do that, and it’s perfect. But for an MOT the garage have to pull the handbrake unassisted, and that does next to fuck all. No question here from me, I’m just sharing my woes. And cursing Toyota’s handbrake design.

I'd love one of these but, being 6ft4, I'm thinking I'd look like a plonker in it.

GooberTheHat

I thought you'd be used to that by now?

Dinostar77

I thought skoda was supposed to be Volkswagens bargain basement brand. Have you seen the prices for them?

poprock

It’s VW’s taxi brand now. Keep up.

Bob

Dinostar77 wrote:

I thought skoda was supposed to be Volkswagens bargain basement brand. Have you seen the prices for them?

It still is although it's probably more about value. You'll get more for you money compared to the same VW.

Cars are just ridic expensive now. When I started selling new Vauxhalls you could rock in with £9,995 and rock out with a brand new Astra.

Unlikely

But then you'd have spent £9,995 on an Astra.

Lord_Griff

Astra-nomical

Bob

Unlikely wrote:

But then you'd have spent £9,995 on an Astra.

Yeah I'm not suggesting you should actually have done it.. but it was a lot of car for the money. Always had a soft spot for Astra.

Basically it's just as good as a Focus and better value but Motoring Journalists prefer the way the Focus handles.. I'd suggest handling is fairly low down on most shopping lists.

afgavinstan

Yeah you get a lot more toys with them now than the Focus. Makes me interested but then I become a badge snob lol

Dinostar77

BMW doing £350 deposit and £350 a month on outgoing 1 series m140i over 4 years. That's not a bad deal at all. That's a stupidly fast motor 340bhp, rear wheel drive.

poprock

Missing a marketing trick by not making the 340bhp car offer £340 dep + £340/m.

Dinostar77

I quite like what Hyundai and Kia do, which is chuck everything in as standard. They have no options list as such on their cars. Also the 5 year (hyundai) and 7 year (kia) warranties are pretty good and thrown in as standard.

Makes a change from the Europe manufacturers who list everything pretty much as optional. Also they begrudgingly sell you 3 year warranty.

LivDiv

I know things are different for different people, but fuck paying 350 a month on a car.

What an absolute waste of money, that's a mortgage on a 2 bed house up North.

Dinostar77

Depends on how you view cars and your disposable income I suppose. PCP accounts for 90% of how cars are now financed both new and old. Leasing is been gaining more popularity, you effectively pay the depreciation of a new car over 3 years then hand it back. 3 years of hassle free motoring. Ok you gotta be in a position to afford it in the first place though.

Cars arent assets though people still view them as they are. If you think of them like you do mobile phones then it's easier to justify the expense of a pcp or leasing. Not that I have money for either mind.

Recently a work colleague was trying to justify to me why pcp staircasing works and we worked out that hes spent in hard cash over 70k in 17 years. That's alot of money on cars. But he loves cars and new ones at that.

afgavinstan

Another 3hrs of lessons over the last few days, test getting closer. Beginning to nail my parking every time so confidence is building!

Watch a good bit of car stuff on YouTube now. Mostly reviews/business stuff. Watched one from CNBC last night about GM in Europe. I had no idea Vauxhall was basically French now. But, I dunno, do they/Opel still use their own platforms opposed to Peugeot and Citroen? I'm just trying to dispel the "French is shite" myth in my head.

I find all this stuff interesting so have at it.

Bob

Sold 3 diesel cars this morning including a C3 piscasso an infinity and an Evoque..

Dinostar77

Diesels will keep selling for years to come. Economical for the vast majority he who cant afford leases or new cars on pcps.

Edit: well done Bob, big bonus this month for you then?

Bob

I average about 30 sales a month if everyone would come in in an orderly fashion I could basically do one week a month

GooberTheHat

Whats the best date to buy a car on? Do you have monthly quotas to fill? Whats the best day to get a deal?

Bob

Hmmm near the start or near the end I guess

Dinostar77

Bob, if your selling 30 cars a month and your place has 30 odd cars in stock are you replacing 90% of your stock every month?

How big is the Isle of man? Seems alot of cars for a small island.

Bob

I am the islands premier salesmen

Dinostar77

So i had a quick google, 85,000 people population. I guess the low tax helps with people having more disposable income for cars.

Bob

Plus there’s no subway train Uber if you want go somewhere not on a bus route

jdanielp

You've got a tramway?

afgavinstan

Drove Scott's beemer yesterday and thoroughly, thoroughly enjoyed it. Got the bug now.
*looks at used 1 series'*
*looks at insurance quotes*
*cries*

Dinostar77

Buy a old MX-5 and have some fun. Small as a 1 series but more enjoyable and much less to insure i believe

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