chazpowerslide Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 Well, some of you guys may know that UJE departed from my home for the last time on the Thursday 8th September en route to it's new home in Austria driven all the way by it's new and very proud owner. I happy to report that Christian and Westy arrived home in the early afternoon of Saturday 10th after their 1200 mile odessey none the worse for their experience. Considering that Christian had not even test driven the Westy before he left Cambridge on Thursday night at about 9pm I'm pretty sure that they were more than well aquainted by the time they got home!!! The phrase "Balls of steel" comes to mind here. In the next copy of WW I will write up the story of the sale, as it's an uplifting tale and it was a real pleasure to be dealing with such a good natured, patiant and humourous buyer. A good friend of mine who was very well travelled used to say that people were much the same across the world, the good vastly outnumbered the bad and it was just language and custom (which is not difficult to adapt to given time, understanding and a little effort) which differed. Anyways, some of the regulars will remember certain threads that I started asking the collective for advice and opinion uopn what I should replace the Westy with. From this and a good few test drives it basically came down to the Elise and the er......the Elise with the 2.2 litre Vauxhall engine, Griffin badges and non Elise bodywork, yes the VX220 (which I'll freely admit I was determined to hate from the word "go" coz I really wanted an Elise) In the end it basically came down to bang for the buck and well, the VX220 won hands down really in all respects from looks, handling, power milage and condition. Around 8K in Elise land will get you a reasonably well worn (often tatty) early example with a few owners on the clock and a head gasget failure waiting to happen in the wings. The standard 1800cc K serise sounds a little rough and lacks punch (though I'll admit it has great tuning potential all be it at a cost) I'm not running them down you understand but I rather thought that for 8k with a bit of carefull searching I could lay my hands on a minter that wanted for nothing. I'm sure they are out there but I couldn't find one. The problem with the VX220 of course is the badge. People forget that the cars were made at Hethel along side the Elise and that Vauxhall being Vauxhall engineered into the VX220 a little more quality durability and comfort all be it at the expence of added weight (which the more powerfull 2.2ltr Ecotek takes care of) The advantage of having the wrong badge on the VX220 is that for 8K in VX220 land you can have the pick of low milage examples with all the options and few owners that are 6 to 10 years younger than the equivlent Elise that you just "know" you won't be replacing the head gasget on any time soon. I really loved the Elises I drove, a standard 1.8, a Sport 160 and a 111s (the latter two I thought were close to grenade spec engines and out of my price range) I approached the fist VX220 I drove (a 2.2 NA) with a sort of off hand contempt that I have always reserved for Vauxhall products (I'm a Ford man through and through) and on seeing one in the flesh for the first time in many years (when did you last see one on the road?) was suitably impressed. I began to like it and like it a lot actually despite still really wanting to hate hit. I then had a drive and had to admit that I was wrong about the car. It felt a bit more "grown up" that the Elise a bit more solid and composed but had lost none of the handling and sweet steering that people get hooked on in the Elise. The next one I drove was an early turbo (standard) and felt much stronger then the 111S with all the same handling excitemant of the 2.2 NA and the Elises. This made the decision for me, I reckon the VX220 is one of the best kept motoring secrets on the planet considering I have seen early higer milage ones go for as little as 5K and it's a lot of car for the money...... Once I knew that the Westy had sold I homed in on the VX220 I eventually brought (thanks to Sam Cooke for the advice and help) and on the Saturday after the Westy had gone d**k ran me over to the sellers home to have a good look over the car. Now at this point I had test driven 4 and had a good look over a further 3, done a shed load of research on the net and with the local Vauxhall dealer (who used to be an approved VX service agent) so I had a pretty good idea of what I'd be looking at. The car fitted the bill in every respect apart from the colour (I wanted either Yellow or Metalic Blue) which was silver and I felt that I could live with that. So after a quick test drive and some hard negotiation I paid my cash and took my chances and drove it away. Apart from some minor cosmetic things it pretty spot on with a spec as follows. 2.2 NA. 53 plate, 32K miles Courtnay stage 2 supercharger kit (over 4k worth of reciepts) running 239bhp Pro race 1.2 wheels (Exige sizes) Eibach spring conversion. Full service history. 2 owners Leather trim and touring pack Needless to say it goes like stink, stops and steers as well as it should. Mechanically it's in superb nick and I've began the process of getting it cosmetically back in order (it needs a good deep clean and polish) Anyway, here are some pre-valet pics. All that for comfortably under my budget. Happy bunny, you bet. Quote
Nic Chase (NICO) - Shropshire & Mid-Wales AO Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 Looks very nice Chaz. Will you be removing the body and doing a complete rebuild, with this one? Quote
chazpowerslide Posted September 20, 2011 Author Posted September 20, 2011 I'll probably have the clams off over the winter Nic to give it all a good clean but no, no rebuild planned. I still have the single seater to fiddle with which is plenty to be going on with. This ones for driving Chaz. Quote
SteveD Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 good choice wuv the sc conversions are very very good and are highly regarded in the vx comunity Quote
lippydave Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 nice nice nice....... Err Jay, you might want to reword your sig.... "getting an inch" Quote
Scottish Bloke Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 Nice buy Chaz, always liked these, enjoy! Quote
flyingbanana Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 nice...and push-button start as standard... Quote
LocoR1 Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 Good choice Chaz will be interested to see how you get on with it. Don't know if Cleggy told you I had a ride round snetterton last month in a courtnay supercharged vx220 was very impressed with how well it went! Quote
jerryhzx12 Posted September 20, 2011 Posted September 20, 2011 Ooh, neat! - I remember having a drive in a VX and an Elise soon after the VX came out - Both excellent, expected to prefer the Elise, but thought the VX was a better real world car... Quote
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