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The Cars We Bought And Wish We Hadn't


Welly Jen

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OK, we have had topics called "The Cars We Sold And Wished We Hadn't" and " Cars You Really should' Buy..." recently. How about "The cars we bought and wish we hadn't"?

Tales of woe. Disaster purchases....

Jen

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Jen, good thread, I need more posts :)

OK, I've already told the story about the Lancia Dedra.

I don't think I'm in the position of "buying" a car that I regretted as, being in the motor trade I just took whatever was in and if it wasn't to my liking I just swapped it for something else.

When I stared the computer company I had no choice for the first year but to use whatever was available. The worst was a Volvo Estate thingie that was awful but would carry all my antique furniture, had I had any.

After the first year and the company groing like wildfire and my mileage getting to 80,000 mile pa I could afford to indulge myself.

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C3 Picasso - looked well designed and practical but an absolutely pig to drive - totally uninvolving. How did I manage that??

Rory's Dad

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1992 Mini 1275 injection

Red with white roof. Previous owner mother to a 17 yr old, assuming his car after I had it a few days! Had neons under it at some point, ripped out, dodgy wiring. Spent ages sorting it out, then sommin else would go wrong and every month I ran out of cash fixing it and ended up on the bus!!! Sold it for profit to some moron claiming to know about cars. Well not notice that morning I put a spare on, directional tread going wrong way and wasn't balanced!!! Said fe loved the rawness of the drive, could feel every bump. Well those bumps are vibrations from a dodgy spare!

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2006 VW Transporter T5 4motion.

It went back so many times it nearly put me out of business. :no:

Brilliant when it worked properly. :suspect:

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Lancia Beta HPE in 1980. Fine when I bought it and took it to Germany but it was riddled with the metal moth one year later. Sad really because it was an excellent drive.

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Morris Marina Estate, for Mrs H to drive the kids about in, and to tow a caravan. Not too bad at the former, but useless at the later!

Oh, and a bit of an embarrassment to be seen in.

On one occasion, with about 10 small children in the car and a large dog she went to the garage to have something looked at. Mechanic wanted to put the car on the hydralic lift, so Mrs H said should she get them out? He took one look inside, and said, no, better leave them all inside!! Much exitement on the part of all the "contents" when the car went up into the air!!

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Several,

The Fiat Coupe 16v Turbo that I bought in preference to a Ford Puma because I thought it would hold it's value better. Oh how I laughed about that one when i sold it, (plus I sold my first Westfield to buy it and despite it being claimed to be a drivers car I found it lacking). Looked great though, plus it also had all the usual Fiat features like an alarm that went off at random during the night and an odd problem that meant it ran in limp home on occasional mornings.

Others include the Mazda 323 1.5 GLXi. What a raw powerhouse that wasn't. Insurance was more, like for like, for the Mazda over the Marlin Roadster with the SD1 3.5 V8, because, and I quote, "it has the 16v engine".

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I owned an Elan, 1973 sprint hardtop. I was going to say it was trouble free but then remembered it need a complete engine rebuild, new brake discs and pads and a respray because Paul Matty's paint fell off.

After I had changed the Micky electronic ignition it was fine. Had some great drives in it.

Over the 2 years I owned it it only cost me about £20,000 apart from the £13,000 I paid for it.

(In those days I was working and didn't have time to do much work on cars)

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Oh, Honda S2000! Sold Robin Hood, wanted adult car. Replaced lights £800, tyres £600, brake pads/discs £300, changed full stereo, amp and speakers £800... List continues. Paid £5k, spent £3k in three weeks, cut my losses and got £3,500 for it... At a struggle! It had power at high revs and in a straight line. But not the pick up and handling of the ROBIN HOOD! Got a Westfield, never not having a Westfield!

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Mk3 Golf. Twice, because I don't learn. Though I guess the 1.8 driver was more of a disappointment than the GTi 16v.

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