What car do you drive and would you recommend it?

FX_Munkee

joneve said:

paulk said:

Currently an Audi Q5 which I like well enough. Very comfortable drive. However I'll be changing to a Volvo XC90 in a few months because it is the absolute dogs' bollox.

Ha! The new ones are fucking lovely aren't they? 

At 50k - 60k they bloody well should be!

ICBM

Sporky said:

Most cars seem to have very poor ergonomics to be fair.

Renault Scenics don't .

Assuming you meant ergonomics and not electronics of course .

Snap

BMW X6, one year old now. I love it. Second one I've owned. Monstrous thing, got big black wheels, but the new model is reasonably economical (around 36-40 mpg on the motorway, 30-34 around town), and hits 60 in 6.5 sec. Ace to drive, and about half OK off road too, which i do now and then. Loaded with kit as well.

Would I recommend it? Its a love hate car for most people. If you like big SUVs, its a bit different. BEst car I've had too.

Small car wise, the Mini is the best IMO. Great drive, totally reliable, look cool, cheap to run.

maltingsaudio

Current money pit is Subaru Forester, last one I had cost next to nothing to run until gearbox started whining at 160,000 miles this one has had a few bits replaced (all Subaru parts are gold plated it seems, £300 for a wing mirror?)  but absalutely love it, except for the fuel consumption its done 165000 so far after 14 years. Hired a Peugeot 208 diesel last week, I just about fit in it but went well and did 140 miles on a tenner, in the Scoob would have cost £35 odd

Jalapeno

Hyundai SantaFe. 

Bit of a monster truck, but it'll take the full band kit & my gear no problem, and so big  & sluggish theres no speeding fines.

Love it.  So much so that 6yrs/53k later and I've just ordered a new one

Snap

On holiday, needed a 7 seater, and I ended up with a Dacia Lodgy. Mixed opinions. They are cheap. Pretty OK to drive actually. But weak engined. DUnno what they are like long term, but for a cheap roomy solution, this wasn't bad. Fully loaded, AC blaring, it did struggle though. Always felt about to tip up too. Their Duster 4x4 looks like a good value car too.

Nitefly

Peugeot 208, 14 plate, 1.2 petrol.  Currently getting 51-52 mpg (improved from 48 since starting to use "proper" unleaded instead of Tesco basic, in response to the other thread!). 

It's fine, not very exciting but it gets Our Maud and me around OK.

Thinking I might chop it in against a Merc A180, was hoping someone on here might have had one to report on?

Nomad

2002 Land Rover Freelander.

Useless, unreliable piece of crap with a blown head gasket and various other faults. It's heading to the scrappy as soon as they phone back with a date to collect.

Not recommended, and easily trumped by...

30 year old Land Rover 90 (Defender shape, before they were called Defenders).

Slow, noisy, dirty, smelly, crap heater, a bit heavy on the juice (28-30mpg) some bits don't work, some bits work intermittently, most bits work no matter what. Only a couple of faults that have actually stopped it in 7 years, and cheap to fix if it does happen.

A minging old pile of shite, but bombproof and great fun to drive.

It's not an alternative to other 4x4s - if you don't want one, no amount of recommendation will make any difference, and if you do want one, you don't need any recommendations. The 'Defender wave', like the biker nod, is a real thing.

TTony

welshboyo said:

joneve said:

I can attest that the Merc CDI engines are frugal as fuck. I drove my bosses old one for a few weeks before he had to hand it back when he changed his car a few years ago...Ridiculous. 

This one has been remapped too, so pushing out close to 250bhp and 650Nm of torque!! and still returning high 50's on a run..

I'm another fan of the Merc CDI engines - mines the 350 variant, and is the main reason that I bought the car.

At steady speeds up to 80/85, it does 50mpg.  With 265bhp and more torque than I can count (I wouldn't dare even think about what a remap could achieve), it will also accelerate "in a spirited fashion" in just about any gear and at any speed and does so whilst making it appear totally effortless.  The downside is that even the rather-fat rear tyres can struggle to translate power into traction.

Would I recommend it?  

Less sure.  The interior isn't as well designed or put together as any of the Audis that I had over the preceding 20 years.  But then those Audis were designed and built for function (rather than the current ranges which seem to have been designed more to attract a certain kind of driver) and will probably prove to be the "best" cars that I'll ever have had.

randella

sinbaadi said:

Had a few fun cars in my time, but my 106rallye S2 was the best by miles.  Awesome little thing.

@sinbaadi ;
 
If we can drop in a shout for old cars, then the only car I've ever missed was the Citroen AX GT I passed my test in and went on to have regular use of as a first car. 

God I miss that ol' biscuit tin. Nothing, but nothing, should be able to attack a B-road that quickly with 85 horsepower. It defied physics. 

Emp_Fab

'63 Maserati Quattroporte.  It's fucking shit.  I still get blown away at the lights by the harbour in Portofino by the rich kids in their 448's.

mike_l

Cirrus said:

Nunogilberto said:

14 plate Mondeo Zetec Business 1.6tdci, as a company car.

Quiet, comfortable, drives smoothly and pulls well for a 1.6 (115hp). I average around 53mpg. Huge boot.

My only annoyances are as follows:

1. Service Interval Limp Home Mode. The last couple of times I've got to within 5k of a service and just happen to creep over 2500rpm, a warning will appear on the dash screen, and the car will go into limp home mode until you eventually restart the engine. It seems like a cheap ploy by Ford to get you to commit to a service early. Unless of course I just have a shonky car...

2. The clutch isn't the strongest I've ever had. Reversing up hill can sometimes be a bit of a struggle.

Otherwise, it's nice enough.

The limp home thing isn't some scam to get you to pay more services, something is up with your engine! My '06 tdci 1.6 did the same thing after 120k or so, it's a relatively common fault with those engines though they never fixed it on mine. Iirc from reading up at the time, egr valve sticking or something along those lines.

Quite possible it's a blocked EGR valve (they're common), or a blocked particulate filter (again common), or a borked sensor.
I'd try a regen on the filter, dead easy, rev the nuts off the engine for 5-10 minutes, or take it for a long run up the motorway (at 70) without going over 4th gear.

sweepy

Nissan Qashqai 1.5 Diesel Emtech, it's been faultless, drives very nicely and is economical even if driven hard

TwoSpellWizard

Seat Leon (2013) 1.6 TDI. It's very comfortable and MPG is always in the mid 60's. I love it

ThePrettyDamned

Currently a Toyota aygo. It's a bit toy-ish but cheap to run and copes surprisingly well with motorways. It's actually quite fun, small and very agile. 

My previous car was a Ford Puma. Beautiful car - great fun, revvy, agile, loves sliding (when you take it onto a track or air strip, yeah? Don't kill anyone) and is built beautifully. 

Sadly, the wheel arches have begun rusting. Currently looking to sell - probably to we buy any car for 75 quid.

Roland

Jez6345789 said:

My best car ever was my 2004 mondo lx ... I now run an E Class which I thought was a real old mans car I am that these days but it eats the miles and is super easy to drive and has been solid and easy on juice amazing engine fuel consumption for a big car

My best ever car was a 4.0 Jaguar Sovereign which I picked up as a distressed purchase from a colleague. It was a like a family sized sports car. It could take a five piece band, plus my own equipment in the boot, and still burn off normal sports cars at the lights. Even better, the air con would take it from 30+ to 20.5C in the time it takes to leave the pub car park. The ride was so smooth that it ignored sleeping policeman as if it was a hovercraft. Join the autoroute at Nice, engage cruise, and get out at Calais ready for dinner. It never lost traction, even on ice. Point the bonnet and the rest of the car always followed, any corner, any speed. Many people asked me what the top speed was, but I never found enough road to find out. Unfortunately the engine started to come loose after 11 years and 196,000 miles.  Would I recommend it? If you want speed and comfort and don't mind 26mpg max then yes, but they don't make them any more.

mike_l

ThePrettyDamned said:

Currently a Toyota aygo. It's a bit toy-ish but cheap to run and copes surprisingly well with motorways. It's actually quite fun, small and very agile. 

My previous car was a Ford Puma. Beautiful car - great fun, revvy, agile, loves sliding (when you take it onto a track or air strip, yeah? Don't kill anyone) and is built beautifully. 

Sadly, the wheel arches have begun rusting. Currently looking to sell - probably to we buy any car for 75 quid.

Avoid WBAC if at all possible. They have an fixed admin charge (I think it £50) and offer twice the square root of sweet FA for your car, before mentioning the admin. Cuntnuggets.

Haych

Just spent a day with my old MKIII Supra Turbo, by jingo what a car!

The car has been in the family between dad and me for about 20 years, I sold it back to him when I got married - stupid, should have kept the car, it lasted longer than the wife did!

Its now 25 years old and has done 164k miles but it drives like new, never misses a trick and still moves like a stabbed rat! Not at all practical for an every day drive but definitely the most rewarding car I've ever driven. 

Damn how I miss that car!

dean2371

Mercedes E220 Estate here. Superb car. Bought at a year old with 7k miles on the clock, done 35k in the 14 months since. i moved to this from a BMW520d in which I did 175k miles, still going strong when I p/x'd it

ICBM

randella said:

If we can drop in a shout for old cars, then the only car I've ever missed was the Citroen AX GT I passed my test in and went on to have regular use of as a first car. 

God I miss that ol' biscuit tin. Nothing, but nothing, should be able to attack a B-road that quickly with 85 horsepower. It defied physics. 

My wife had one of those - not even the GT, just the normal one. I loved driving it, it was mental on roads like that! So light it would just float through corners.