?
Classic Jewetts don't count here (sorry Ted!) unless it is actually the main car.
The oldest car I ever had was a 1996 N reg Fiesta MK4 I ran from October 2008 to February 2009 (so 12.5 years old). Got rid of it as I decided it was too rusty and didn't feel safe in it, an early MOT - 4 months before it was due (you may remember the threads on it) confirmed my worse fears and then some. It was actually more dangerous than I had imagined.
My newest is of course the Panda which from the day it was made in Poland and the day I received it was less than three weeks old.
|
|
I had an old Honda Accord for a while, until the middle of last year.. I think it was '90.
|
My '94 KIA.
I'll be picking SWMBO up in it from the station and stopping for a ruby on the way home.
I'm intending to bounce it round a field on Sunday.
|
>> I'm intending to bounce it round a field on Sunday.
Lucky Ruby...
|
|
I drove a 1972 Volvo 144 in the 80's.It was 16 years old when i sold it.My parents paid £2000 for it in 1972 and i was given it 14 years later.I ran it for 2 years and then sold it for £800.Not bad depreciation!.
|
I ran a 1976 Mk2 Escort with a bad 2.0 pinto conversion. The whole drivetrain used to shunt when you accelerated because the gearbox mount was bodged. But great fun, like a go cart around the bends until you overdid it and the back axle flexed sideways on it's leaf springs, so you had to steer into it like a back end slide. It was around 15 years old, bought in '91. I was the lucky 13th owner and also the one that scrapped it before it killed someone :)
Where's bellboy these days?
|
|
I was the 12th owner of the Fiesta. Was pretty dumb to buy it but I was just excited about my first car. I did have an N reg MK3.5 a couple of years before but could only drive that with L plates so wasn't the same.
|
Back in 1990 I used my 1964 Daimler 2.5 litre V8 as my daily driver for a few months, including work (I must admit the insurance co didn't know I was a reporter - I just told them I worked for a newspaper). It was a brilliant asset - everyone wanted to talk to me.
For 4 months in 1995 I used my 1969 Rover P6 V8 on a three-times-a-week commute from Weymouth to Weston-super-Mare plus running about for work. Again it was a brilliant asset. People used to come into the office if it was parked outside and say (in Brummie accents) 'I used to make them at Solihull'. In my mind I used to reply 'pity you didn't take more care over it'.
Anyway, I got about 25 mpg both times...
Last edited by: Mike Hannon on Fri 15 Apr 11 at 18:03
|
My ex wife used to run a 1980 Talbot Avenger auto back in 2004. Felt pretty antique to me but she would pound down the M1 at 85 in it - I dared not do more than 60.
It would never start in my ex's hands, she had no mechanical sympathy nor understanding of how a choke worked, so if it didnt start after a few goes, it was flooded and I got a call.
I never once failed to get it to go, but it was forever falling out of tune and weekends were a conatant battle with electrics and mixture adjustments. Quite quick for an old bucket though and sure turned heads in its electric blue paint and chrome.
Last edited by: KosaiIggypop on Fri 15 Apr 11 at 18:20
|
My first car must have been 25 years old when I had it, a mid-thirties six cylinder 1.5 litre Fiat. Second, a Citroen Light 15, was 14 when I had it. My R Type Bentley was 15 when I got it. Only ever had one new car, a Dyane. My present car is 11.
Glad to see a couple of other recent posters have had cars in their twenties.
And I think Ted's Jowetts ought to count. Some people have more than one car and they are likely to drive one more than the other for all sorts of reasons.
|
>> I drove a 1972 Volvo 144 in the 80's.It was 16 years old when i
>> sold it.My parents paid £2000 for it in 1972 and i was given it 14
>> years later.I ran it for 2 years and then sold it for £800.Not bad depreciation!.
Inflation over that period was 475%, so that initial £2000 had become £9,500. So 92% depreciation in real terms over your 16 years.
|
I drove a 1988 BMW 325i Touring as my main car for a few months in 2007 while waiting for my new car to be delivered, so 19.5 years old. Nothing went wrong with it, it always started and it had a/c, heated leather seats, a sunroof and ABS. Along with a 2.5 litre straight 6 that sounded great, and did 22 mpg...
Used daily on a 40 mile (round-trip) commute rom November to January; the furthest it went in my time was a 350 mile round trip to Devon to pick up an eBay purchase; again no trouble at all, and perfectly capable of keeping up with modern traffic.
I kept that car for a further 2 years to use as a general run-around, and it came in really useful when we moved house. Got rid of it last summer, as we really didn't need 3 cars, but I still miss it when I see another one around! Had it serviced every year, and it always passed its MOT. The underneath was sound, but the front wings were beginning to go where it had had mudflaps fitted, and the sunroof and tailgate were begining to bubble with rust as well.
|
|
My first two cars were my oldest daily drives. The very first was a 1936 Wolseley 14 and the second was a 1936 Citroën 12. Both were 20 years old when I bought them in 1956. I sold the Wolseley (for scrap) after only a short time when I discovered that there was a hole in the top of one of the pistons. The bomb-site dealer had stuffed rag around the top of the oil filler cap, and up the engine breather tube, to try to prevent smoke emissions. (I was young, inexperienced, and naive!) There was so much free play in the steering and front suspension that a front wheel wobble used to develop at about 40 mph. The only thing which would make the wobble stop was to brake to a standstill. I kept the Citroën for a few weeks. All four (remould) tyres were completely bald (and I mean completely!) when I bought the Citroën and it had the same tyres on it when I sold it. I remember the registration was BFE 14.
|
I got conned like that with my first Fiesta. The dealer must have used very thick oil or stop smoke because when I tested it the emissions were fine. However a few days later it was burning oil and sure enough blue smoke appeared.
To fool the MOT inspector I just did the same at MOT time, put loads of stop smoke in and it passed fine, a few days later it was belching out blue smoke again. Sold it £60 for scrap once it got so bad there was no longer enough compression to start it.
Even before that it had broken down a couple of times but always managed to get it started again by messing about with it.
Last edited by: RattleandSmoke on Fri 15 Apr 11 at 19:06
|
|
1968 Triumph 2000 auto, bought as a cheap MOT run around in 1990 (ex-girlfriend's younger brother took it in as a part-ex at a Ford dealers). Drove it for 3 years doing 12K a year mileage, garaged it when it got a bit unreliable, then fully restored it as a divorce present to oneself...and have still got it.
|
|
I always like the old Triumph 2000, even now its a good looker and a bit classy.
|
>> I always like the old Triumph 2000, even now its a good looker and a
>> bit classy. >>
My dad had one new in '73, facelft model, 84bhp and dog slow, it was replaced in short order by a Cortina 2000E which was far superior dynamically as was my Dolomite Sprint (so as to not appear anti Triumph).
|
>>My dad had one new in '73, facelft model, 84bhp
Are you sure?
I had a '67 2-litre Vitesse, which like the GT6 turned out around 100BHP. IIRC the 2000 was slightly lower on power, but I didn't think it was that much.
|
>> like the old Triumph 2000, even now its a good looker and a bit classy.
Yes it was. Available with overdrive too as many Triumph cars were. Perhaps Standard-Triumph owned Laycock de Normanville.
But I have a slight prejudice against the 2000 having been run into by one in Marylebone Road (I was very prompt through a green light, he was incredibly late through a red one, and admitted it). I was driving a hired Herald by a sort of coincidence.
I wonder what colour Westpig's is? There were a lot of sober dark blue police ones.
The Singer Vogue estate that I minicabbed in was a very smart sort of dark Prussian blue until the cheapo respray down the nearside, made necessary largely through my own fault early in that unhealthy but entertaining short careerlet, dulled and bloomed. One was often pulled in those days, usually without follow-up. During one of these pulls the young copper asked what colour the car was. Dark blue, I said as we both contemplated the jalopy, with its rakish long aerial attached dodgily to the edge of the tailgate.
'Would you say it was a sort of police blue, sir?' the copper asked with a grin.
|
>> I wonder what colour Westpig's is?
Maroon, with beige leather. It's a mk1 so it's got the rounded snout at the front. Auto. It's in very good nick now as I had it restored a while back. Used it for a couple of weddings last year (brother's and mate's daughter - pleased that other people wanted to use it).
|
|
Running a 21 year old car as a daily since my reliable 20 year old car went bang. Will be running a 42 year old car as a daily when the youngster is in for rust repair later in the year...
|
As a student in the late 1960s, ran a 1929 Riley 9 daily. 40 years old..
Crash box and magneto ignition.
|
Our current Clio, had it since nearly new, 13 years old this year. Before that a '68 Beetle, my first car in '79, it felt ancient at the time.
|
>> Running a 21 year old car as a daily since my reliable 20 year old
>> car went bang. Will be running a 42 year old car as a daily when
>> the youngster is in for rust repair later in the year...
May we have more details please tb (can I call you septic?).
|
Driven plenty of olduns, but never actually owned and relied upon a car that was over 7 years old.
|
I drove one of these in the early 70's as a daily driver ~ www.co-oc.org/A55.gif
It needed a new wing so I got one from the scrappy for a fiver and bolted it on in no time.
|
>> I drove one of these in the early 70's as a daily driver ~ www.co-oc.org/A55.gif
I really learned to drive in one of those perro, hired by friends in Oxford. They were such hopeless drivers I was able to take over in the middle of the night on the way to Cornwall (as it appens), stayed on Bodmin Moor at Bernard Leach's pottery. On taking over I had no licence and had hardly driven on the road. Two days later I was a seasoned pedal to the metal man and it was clear that my companions had Someone watching over them because they were hardly even frightened.
Great understeering tyre-squealer the thing was, anyway once the rear tyres had been pumped above their initial 11psi bringing the silly low-speed wet-road oversteer to an end, and four up it could run right out of brakes from high speed too. All that I learned in 36 hours...
:o}
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Fri 15 Apr 11 at 20:07
|
>>I really learned to drive in one of those perro<<
Same here A/C, the very first car I drove, mine was black with red leather, like the one in the picture,
My friend Laurie Smith lived in an isolated cottage in Cardynham on the Bodmin Moor, he was a leather craftsman and his work can be found in Bodmin museum, Shakespeare's birthplace, Guildhall in London, museum of mankind in Kingston Ontario, and my house :)
Interesting chap, Bernard Leach, they all settle in Cornwall (after travelling the world!)
Last edited by: Dog on Fri 15 Apr 11 at 21:25
|
|
Our elder Golf is 12 years old this week and is used daily. Reliable, comfy, still pretty quick, and unlike its younger sister, barely a single rattle inside.
Last edited by: DP on Fri 15 Apr 11 at 19:57
|
1951 Series One Land Rover; bought in 1982 from a local garage who'd used it as a breakdown truck, no crane but it was painted bright yellow. Original 2-litre IOE engine, did about 20 mpg on a good day.
Ran it for about 18 months, it never let me down. Even did a trip from Newark to London and back in it one Saturday, Muswell Hill IIRC. I was working at the time as fleet mechanic for a slightly idiosyncratic chap who owned a mining engineering company, and when one of the company cars broke down he sent me off to fix it, despite my protests that it would cost him a fortune and it would be far better to call a local garage. He handed me £200 and told me get started, didn't refuse 'cos I had an agency card for petrol!
Turned out to be a duff alternator connection, which I fixed in five minutes. Fool and his money.......
One fine summer days that Landy was an absolute hoot; doors off, windscreen down, it would literally go anywhere.
I sold it, regretfully, not long after I left that bloke's employment , simply couldn't afford to keep the beast in petrol. FTL401, happy days.
Two-wheel wise, for about a year in the mid-90's, my only means of transport was a 1942 side-valve Harley. Tended to be somewhat more reliable than some of the later Jap bikes I've owned.
Last edited by: Harleyman on Fri 15 Apr 11 at 22:17
|
I had 10-12 year old cars most of the time - several V, W, X, Y, A, B, C regs from 1990 to 1997. I caught up between 1997-2001 with cars that were 8, 5, and 4 years old before a brand new Y plate followed by an 8-month 53 plate. Normal service was resumed in 2005 with an N-reg Carina E...
Mum bought a 1964 Ford Zephyr 4 six years before I was born and kept it until I was 16 - that made it 24 years old when it gave up. Its replacement was a 1975 Volvo 244 which was sold in 2001 when she could no longer drive, it was then 26 years old with a mere 53,000 miles on the clock. DVLA shows its last RFL expired end of January 2010 :(
|
After a Bond...transition from bikes on same licence, I got a '58 Wolseley 15/60 as a proper car.
I was on duty in the Information Room at headquarters some time after I changed it when I heard one of my colleagues interrupt the radio girl and put an urgent call out, something like ' All patrols, observations requested in the Cheetham area for a white Morris Oxford , reg no. JCW 18, Involved in a robbery '
I was able to add that it was a Wolseley with a black roof, as it had been mine.
I don't know whether it was caught. Some nice number plates then...next car was a powder nlue Herald droptop with white hood and tonneau, YBA 60. I later got 35 CFR...which I still have.
Numbers boring now..unless you can make a good word....BO11 OCK, or something !
Ted
|
>> BO11...
I had a customer once with BOL 10K on his Mercedes. We used to pronounce it "bow-lee-ock".
|
Good to see fond memories of the A55 Cambridge from Dog and AC. My first car was also the oldest I've driven - a 1955 A50 bought for £65 when I left university in Cambridge - suitably an Austin Cambridge with a local registration, OCE 340.
It never failed to start and never let me down on the road in the year or so I had it. With 'Austin of England' on its flanks and that fine old flying-A mascot atop the bonnet (which Elf & Safety would never allow now), driving it one felt good to be British.
In the 1950s Austins were the best mass-produced cars that you could buy and what happened to the marque subsequently always makes me sad - particularly when you see what well-managed British car workers can produce currently for foreign owners.
|
|
4 Years old, more a case of boredom than strictly the age of the car but I don't like driving outmoded models if I'm honest. Of course, if my fiancial circumstances change (as well they might) then I'll drive whatever I can reasonably afford for however long I have to.
|
>>In the 1950s Austins were the best mass-produced cars that you could buy and what happened to the marque subsequently always makes me sad - particularly when you see what well-managed British car workers can produce currently for foreign owners<<
Like my British built Nissan Almera - 6 years old, we've owned it 4.5 years, used 6 days a week,
not had to replace so much as a light bulb, I keep looking to replace it, but most cars (of that ilk) look the same to me - and do the same, so, I may even hang on to it.
until next week :)
|
My friend ran an A55 for several years as his daily driver and often to haul the ladders for his aerial-rigging business. It would have been about 14 years old then.
Interesting thing was, it had a 'Manumatic' gearchange. I never figured out how it worked but I recall there was a vacuum tank under one front wing. All you had to do was grasp the gearknob and the clutch went out. Must have been unreliable I guess, or they'd be everywhere now.
|
A similar concept to the semi-auto system of the Citroen DS where the manual gearbox and normal clutch were actuated via the central hydraulic system from a small gearstick... more like a lighting stalk really.
When set up correctly it was absolute perfection but sadly few people could be bothered to understand the system so many were poorly adjusted giving it a bad name.
|
Did the GS semi-auto have the same system Fenderlander,
I've driven a few of those over the years and allways found they worked quite well.
|
I think the Gs was a 3-speed with auto operated wet clutch plus a torque convertor. The DS system was a 100% conventional clutch/gearbox with hydraulic control added.
So similar but the GS system was more user friendly.
|
My bro had 2 GS's, the last one was a GSX2 in gleaming red with alloy wheels, didn't arf look the part!
He went onto BX's after those, he had the 1.4 and I went for the 1.6 5 speed auto jobbie.
|
|
I always used to admire the curvaceous lines of the Citroen GS ~ mattysk.tripod.com/picture/2gs35.jpg
|
GS was a very nice motor, but not long-lived in most hands.
I could never get on with those manumatic-type clutch switches. Obviously one could have learned the correct rather leisurely rhythm to drive them properly, but to me at the time, an impatient and heavy-footed driver, the system was counter-intuitive, and I never drove a car with it for long enough to be anything but clumsy with it. Even with an original DS it was a bit difficult at first, although serious mistakes generated such embarrassing and violent body movement that one quickly learned restraint.
The worst thing I did was in an NSU RO80. Stomped down on the brake pedal with my left foot having forgotten it wasn't the clutch. Fortunately no one ran into the back of the car but they could have.
I admit this with some shame. No one is perfect but that's no excuse.
|
A 1933 Ford Tudor saloon. Manufactured in Canada , I believe, sent over to UK, CKD and reassembled. Reg. No:- VO9499
14.9 HP side valve - body like a gangster's car excellent pour l'amour in the back!
I paid £49 for it, spent 7s/6d on it in a year and sold it for "£25!
|
I ran a 1947 Triumph Roadster as my only car from 1966 until 1975. It cost £45, and I sold it for £750.
The Triumph 2000 (Mark 1, 1964) was in daily use from 1998 until 2008. Still in perfect running order after 213,000 miles, but finally rusted wafer-thin all over.
My current daily drive (25,000 miles pa) is a 1992 Volvo 240.
|
>> a 1947 Triumph Roadster ... cost £45, and I sold it for £750
Dad rang up to view a white one last year near Buntingford, it had already sold for £12995...
|
|
The oldest daily drive would have been my first Morris 1000 - a 1960 Series II with a one piece screen and the separate rear indicators...I drove it between 1977 and 1979 so it would have been nearly 20 years old. My cars progressively younger as I started earning, by 1982 I was running a four year old car. I have had cars that I've subsequently kept longer - but through choice as I loved them.
|
Well I suppose it was my first car, FUU 220J, a white Mark 1 Escort 1.1 Deluxe. Quite what it had which warranted the label "Deluxe" eludes me.
It was 17 years old when I had it as a daily driver.
The Volvo 360 I currently have is 25 years old, but I don't use it daily, even thought it would be perfectly serviceable as a daily driver.
|
In my impecunious days, about six months after I passed my test (this was in 1969) I bought a venerable 1951 Rover 75 cyclops, for the princely sum of 30 pounds; it was three months younger than I was. I used it regularly for about two years until it died on the M1 near Newport Pagnell on its fifth return journey Basildon to Manchester University. About two years later, I received a phone call from a policeman asking me if he could take some parts from the car. which he had seen dumped in the area. I wonder how he found my phone number?
Now, not as impecunious, but not inclined to spend 5 months' salary on a new car, I run a 1984 Peugeot 505, with just under 200,000 km on the clock. I bought it from the original owner (or to be more exact, his estate, as he had been dead for two years) six years ago and use it for my daily commute and weekly trips to Jerusalem (75km plus 800 meters ascent), which is no mean feat in the 40 degree summer heat with the air conditioner on full blast. When this one goes, though, I'll buy something newer as a retirement present for me and the missus.
|
>>In my impecunious days,<<
What does impecunious mean?
|
>> >>In my impecunious days,<<
>>
>> What does impecunious mean?
>>
When I had no or little money!
|
When you were poor, then?
:-)
|
|
Ah! cor blimy guv'nor - you mean boracic lint :)
|
|
Skint (a temporary state) I may well have been, but poor - never.
|
1972 Triumph 2000 Mk2 saloon back in the late 80s, early 90s.
Lots of miles done, lots of money in repairs!
Overdrive didnt work, 20mph/1000rpm in 4th and 20-25mpg.
Lovely smooth straight six motor.
|
What is the oldest car you've ran as a daily drive - FotheringtonTomas
