Spun off from the VW thread -
>>>>Yes, the classiest colour for most cars in my opinion of course contrasted with the dusty often shabby blacks and whites, reminiscent of white van fame. <<<
I will not pay an extra £500+ for a colour when the base colour is white (Citroen) or yellow (Fiat).You mayget something back on trade in if you keep the vehicle for only a short time, but since I tend to run things into the ground what is the point?
OK there are certain colours that I would try to avoid having - but if the discount was big enough....
I recall in 1979? when the VAT rate was going up I bought a (new) Chevette Estate on the basis that I would take any colour from stock other than 'the puke lime green'. The salesman just accepted that I was a little crazy.
|
Base colours used to be a no-cost option on many cars including VWs. Then white became a popular colour and they started to charge for white. Many cars now have two different colour options for white.
When I got a Passat in 2011 there used to be a no cost option on the white and non-pearlescent black. So many cars were ordered as white or black (white looks good with the panoramic sunroof). Then they changed one of the FOC base coat colours to grey and for black you had to have a pearlescent paint and pay for it.
|
|
I hate black cars but with any other colour it depends on the car itself. Yellow looks naff on most cars but fantastic on an Esprit, a Lamborghini or an MX5 to name just three. Orange is awful, but pretty on a Bond Bug. Silver is ok but boring, white suits a small car but looks too stark on anything Mondeo sized or larger.
|
I would take any colour from stock other than
>> 'the puke lime green'. The salesman just accepted that I was a little crazy.
>>
I saw - one for the rare sightings thread - a Peugeot 404 this morning, in a similar hideous shade.
I'd call it 'bronchitis snot'.
|
|
There's a Lime Green Multipla around the corner from us, they are ugly enough in themselves but in Lime Green they are absolutely hideous!
|
>> There's a Lime Green Multipla.
One near us as well.
It has a 'kermit' sticker on the back
|
|
Many moons ago we had a Saab 99 in a delightful shade of non metallic brown, if I was being polite one could refer to it as the colour of fudge, but it was pretty awful!
|
60s and 70s car colours were pretty bad, all round.
As with the 404 - my father had a company one in dark brown. one of his colleagues had one in a colour best described as sharky - a mix of khaki and sh**
|
Saw a movie on the box last night that had a 1953 R-Type Bentley in it. I used to have one of those and loved it dearly although it cost me a fortune and I treated it horribly. Mine was dark silver over light silver, very pretty until I had bashed it about a bit.
How appallingly stupid one can be when young and sprauncy. I still blush at the memory.
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Fri 26 Aug 16 at 14:21
|
>>I treated it horribly.
>>
>> How appallingly stupid one can be when young and sprauncy. I still blush at the
>> memory.
>>
BMW 318i, 2-dr 1986 model.
Thrashed it into the ground. Sold it for chips.
These days, they are worth a fortune, especially amongst the racing fraternity.
|
>> Sold it for chips.
Paid £525 for the R-Type, got 50 quid for it. Silly little hooligan.
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Fri 26 Aug 16 at 14:32
|
|
A Ford Mondeo in Ruby Red is quite stunning.
|
Of course you are all forgetting that beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
What some of us love, others hate and long may it continue.
Pat
|
My first car in this colour.
This version shown was a poverty spec (only 1 wiper) , but mine was even more poverty stricken as it did not have the chrome grille!
PS mine also only had single dip headlight (for which I can find no written records), and the no water pump, convection cooling system. Which makes me think mine was VERY early.
|
>> This version shown was a poverty spec (only 1 wiper) , but mine was even
>> more poverty stricken as it did not have the chrome grille!
I had the 1600 auto. so there!
|
Picture was missing 1948 Minor MM
My first car in this colour.
This version shown was a poverty spec (only 1 wiper) , but mine was even more poverty stricken as it did not have the chrome grille!
PS mine also only had single dip headlight (for which I can find no written records), and the no water pump, convection cooling system. Which makes me think mine was VERY early.
www.simoncars.co.uk/morris/slides/ac_Morris%20Minor%20Series%20MM%202-door%20head.jpg
Last edited by: sherlock47 on Fri 26 Aug 16 at 16:58
|
I have not-so-fond memories of fixing the drum brakes on one of these beasts.
One wheel at a time. jack up, wheel off, do the fix, bleed the line, wheel back on.
All was going well until the last wheel, when the lady who owned it forgot my homily to keep checking the fluid reservoir as she pumped the brakes... here we go again.
|
|
I'm happy with most colours, with the caveat that the colour needs to suit the car. I'm particularly taken by the metallic red that Renault use on the clip and, I think, their small 4X4 thing. I think our A3 looks good in its pearlescent red, but only when its clean. Metallic grey, silver and the various browny beige shades of the same look good on the right car whether clean or dirty. Though I can't think of a small car that looks good in those shades. I've just bought a BMW in a rightish metallic blue, which I think looks great, but the same colour on a 5 series, or even a 3 series, would probably look too load!
|
Best-looking car my father had was a Humber Snipe desert staff car. It was painted matt grey and had girder bumpers and big fat tyres.
Someone, an admiralty driver perhaps, had scraped the paint off the radiator grille and polished the brass under it. Very handsome motor that was, far better than the 1943 American Ford V8 that preceded it.
To my utter disgust it was followed by a shiny navy-blue Hillman Minx. What a comedown!
(My father claimed that when he stopped once to avoid running over a leopard the animal noticed the RN number plate, saluted with its left front paw and sang God Save the Queen).
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Fri 26 Aug 16 at 17:27
|
More a case of what I don't like really. Not keen on "wishy washy" colours, especially pale greens, pale blues, beige etc. Yellow not a favourite but pretty much anything darkish is ok for me or boring old silver. Don't mind red but not very fond of white. Had a lot of black cars but they're devils to keep looking clean.
Current car is silver which I think looks nice with the contrasting tinted glass, black/silver wheels and panoramic sunroof. ( have I mentioned my panoramic sunroof before? ) 😉
|
I don't bother generally with superstition, but the widely held belief that green cars are unlucky correlates with my experience, going right back to a dark green Viva my father had in the 60s. Perhaps green is just less visible.
He was rammed amidships by a (well known for tippling) local doctor in it. Following repairs at the bodyshop, while awaiting the final polish, it was heavily crashed into by a clot in a van, so had to be repaired again. As a result, it was probably slightly more rustproof than when it left the factory, but that was small comfort.
Funnily enough, the same doctor did the same thing in the same place to an ancient Morris Minor driven by my brother, about 10 years later. The Minor was grey however.
In 2002 I bought a new Civic for the boss in dark metallic green. Not the colour I would have chosen but it was available, and I didn't think it mattered - it looked nice enough. It soon had a dent on every other panel. It was nutted in the front wing by a cyclist in Cambridge - he darted across a queue of traffic at a red light, just before the lights changed and everybody set off. It was hit up the chuff twice. I sold it in 2014 to my mechanic friend, who finds it to be an easy, trouble-free car to use, but he says he had never had one that collected so many parking dents.
Last edited by: Manatee on Tue 30 Aug 16 at 18:35
|
A fellow Clapham minicabber had a very nice Vauxhall VX 4/90 in metallic green.
Other drivers commented that green was an unlucky colour. The owner and driver came to grief sure enough, doing 70 it was said down Lavender Hill. A slow mimser waddled out of a side turning and wallop! Bits of car all over the road.
He was a country boy the Vauxhall owner, barely literate. The car had the registration letters HOT, and he referred to the jalopy fondly as 'my 'ot car'. He thought he was immortal and hadn't grown out of being rude and reckless. No doubt Lavender Hill was a lesson to him, but he never reappeared in the firm.
I don't think he had a punter aboard. Just as well because few punters wore the safety belt. Driver of the other car survived I think, but must have been a bit shaken at least.
|
I obtained a dark Green Triumph 2000 at a silly price from a friend.
I had by far my worst accident in it and it was a write off.( not worth a lot)
Fortunately it was at low speed and it was sandwiched front and back.
The only dark coloured car I have ever owned.
I buy S/H and to date have had a grand total ( the above green) plus four white, one silver and one silver blue. I hate black cars and always treat the owners with suspicion.:-(
|
|
I don't trust anyone who drives in a hat.
|
|
A jacket hanging over the rear door makes me wary.
|
|
Indeed, and as for cushions on the parcel shelf...
|
Overflowing ashtray of suspicious-looking dog-ends, a few cans and bottles rolling about on the floor getting under the pedals and so on? That would be all right wouldn't it?
Used to do 90 along the South Bank in the dead of night, and so did others. It was dangerous and I wouldn't do it now.
|
>> It was dangerous and I wouldn't do it now.
You wouldn't manage to do it now... Not quite sure where you mean by 'The South Bank' - unless you mean the Albert Embankment.
|
>> Indeed, and as for cushions on the parcel shelf...
>>
I'll trump that with a box of tissues.
|
>> trump that with a box of tissues
I liked my Singer Vogue estate. It couldn't do much more than 90 but I liked its handling, better than that of the saloon version it was said. Anyway it could hold a tail-out slide on a slippery bend and make very good progress in the Clapham back-doubles.
Only once went to the effort of scaring the bejasus out of a punter... a damn rude lesbian who had gone out of her way to be offensive, showing off to her girl friend, and urged me offensively to get a move on. Clicked instantly into getaway-driver mode and had those two chicks rolling about and hanging on for dear life.
'You're mad!' the bull dyke cried as we broadsided round some bend on Clapham Common. We soon arrived, and I murmured something urbane about them being in a hurry.
Not much of a tip, but well worth it. I made a personal apology to the girl friend, assuring her a bit untruthfully that she had never been in actual danger as such, but TBH she looked a bit traumatized so probably didn't take it in.
|
I used to have three Westies which sat on the rear parcel shelf of a 520 I owned ( many many years ago)
Mother, brother & sister
That trumps a box of tissues!
|
|
And their names were Holly, Vicky & BusterJakeHogarth
|
I'll trump THAT with a metal box with gold filigree, which contains a box of tissues...
Very popular among certain members of the local populace. Guaranteed to smash your head in in the event of an accident.
And the greatest irony - chaps who have industrial hard hats on the rear parcel shelf.
|
>> I don't trust anyone who drives in a hat.
>>
I find that a Panama on the rear parcel shelf tends to increase the braking distance that the driver behind my adopts.
|
|
Back to car colours... Before suspending my search for a 3 Touring, my fav combo was metallic Mineral Grey with Coral Red Dakota leather. Another acceptable combo was Estoril Blue with black Dakota leather, and a third, which I have recently taken a shine to, is solid Alpine White with Coral Red Dakota leather ( again).
|
|
Estoril blue with coral red, despite sounding rather 'loud', also looks exceptionally good in real life I think. Though it is sometimes called 'superman' spec I believe ;)
|
Very droll....
Thank you for bringing it to my attention
|
>>Before suspending my search for a 3 Touring, my fav combo was metallic Mineral Grey >>
Interesting. My 2007 VW Jetta Sports is in metallic Mineral Grey...:-)
|
Car Colours -whatever rocks your boat? or doesn't? - rtj70
