I love cars. Very much. Imports in particular. My boyfriend has a Type R and we just love it. It is quite a wonderful machine. When a 1.8 liter 4 banger beats a Mustang GT and Camaro Z28, that has got to say something. This car is the reason I live and breathe cars. So, that being said, is anyone else interested? Or, just name the kind of car you have. If you don't have a car, what is your dream car? Anything about cars!!!

The first car I ever drove was a 1988 Mercury Sable. Now we (well... my parents) have a 1996 Chrysler Intrepid and a 1995 Toyota Tercel.

I'm not really much one for cars, so I don't know specifically what kind I want. I just know that I want it to be aquamarine, and I prefer straight lines (especially on the trunk) to the contoured look that's popular today. My favourite LOOKING car is the Pontiac Sunbird, although I've heard that it's pretty unreliable.

The car that I would never EVER want to even have to sit in is the PT Cruiser. It looks too much like a kiddie hearse!!

I once had a Renault5 GT Turbo. It went from 0 - 60 mph in under 7 seconds. The turbo-charger cut in at 3000 rpm, at which time the G-force could really be felt. If you weren't ready for the acceleration, your head got flung back into the headrest.

It had wide wheels on it, which were great for traction on a dry road but they tended to skid when braking on a wet one. Thereby hung it's downfall (and almost mine on one occasion).

After a few prangs on wet roads, both the insurance company and me decided it was time I got a more sensible car. It was most unreasonable of them to refuse to insure me anymore.

Anyway, I haven't had any accidents since it went ...and that was a good number of years ago. That car and me just didn't suit each other I suppose. It was a memorable one for its sheer performance though.

Now I didn't have you down as a boy-racer Martin! I used to have a Renault 5 too but mine was a standard one with the funny gear stick on the dash - handy for hanging the handbag on.

My current car is an ancient Volvo, it is almost time for it to be retired but I can't afford it at present. I actually fancy a Smart car, cute and easy to park.

Very posh you lot! I had a Honda Civic once that would go 0-30 centimeters in just half an hour. Sadly in my poor student state I could only afford minimal petrol. Oil was a deemed as a luxury item.

Oh, I'm so glad people are responding!! Speaking of the Volvos, I hear those are very reliable cars. The PT Cruisers, I also hate. I think I've seen a Reanult GT Turbo somewhere before. I thought it's time would be lower. The Type R does 0-60 in 5.6 seconds. (Naturally aspirated with a Thermal exhaust and cold air intake). My Honda Civic does it in 7 seconds. (Bone Stock). That's another thing, what year Civic did you own, and was there anything wrong with it? Because last week I beat an old Mustang. (Dude was mad). I swear by imports. Oh yeah! My boyfriend's old boss bought himself a new Mini Cooper S. (Supercharged). It handles VERY WELL! It is also very quiet. Not extremely fast. The Type R humiliates it, but against "normal" cars, yes, it is considered pretty fast. (I haven't raced it. In fact, I'm about to go look up it's time).

There is something eminently ugly about the PT Cruiser; I think that LadyC expressed my feelings quite eloquently. It looks like a mini hearse or one of those cars where a dozen circus clowns climb out. I think that the designers intended an updated version of the '47 Ford.
My all-time favorite driving car was the 68 Volvo I had. Excellent road car. I would own another except for the initial price, insurance cost and outrageous cost for a tune-up and repairs, if you can find a competent mechanic.

First car, Ford Anglia (the one with the wings over the front wheels that flapped if you got to 40 mph) 3 forward gears and a reverse you used if the hill was to steep. Windscreen wipers were vacuum driven and stopped if you accelerated too hard. Windscreen washer was a squeezy bottle(you stuck your hand out of the window and squirted the screen). No heater so you froze in winter. BUT IT WAS MY CAR! In the mid-1960's to have a car as a teenager was a luxury. My favourite car was my dad's Vauxhall Vanguard, built like a tank, and drove like one, but bench front seat (column gear change) meant you just parked up and didn't have to move to the back seat. For parking and general running about my Triumph Herald would take some beating (turned on a sixpence (dime)). Dream car - they haven't made one yet! You can keep your 0-60 high performance jobs that people of my age have difficulty just getting into the driving seat(or getting out of it!) - give me a car that I'm still happy to be driving after a couple of hundred miles on the road! (and yes I have driven professionally and never found a modern car that could do it)

I have never heard of that Ford. I might have if I could hear you say it, but....
That's the cool thing about the Type R. After 2 years we both still get very excited to drive that car. I mean, come one, when you can sit comfortably in a car that is taking a city curb at 50 miles an hour (because of the front strut bar it came with), that's gotta say something!

I'm addicted to convertibles. My third car was a little Triumph Spitfire, and I bought it without even knowing how to drive a stick! Turned out to be a good car to learn on, even though it didn't have a tachometer or a working speedometer. I had to learn to listen to the motor, and that's served me well over the years.

The Spitfire was about the most fun of any car I've ever had, but my VW Karmann Ghia convertible comes in a close second. It wasn't as fast nor did it handle was well as the Spitfire, but it was MUCH easier and cheaper to work on, and more comfortable to drive or ride in.

The mister's been promising me another evern since we sold the Ghia, but since then I've gotten older and fatter---now I still want a convertible, but a bigger one!

I have memories of borrowing a Spitfire (my husband's) when I was eight months pregnant and had a toddler in the passenger seat, did I get some funny looks when I struggled out of it!

Oh, and re Fosse4's "troubled" Anglia---the worse car I've ever had was a 74 VW Superbeetle with a (permanently) broken accelerator cable. When my BF pulled the old, frayed cable out to replace it, the little tube it runs through down the tunnel broke, and no matter which end you started from you could only push the new cable half-way down. We wound up taking the back seat out, drilling a hole in the firewall, and running a wire through it and fastening it to the accelerator. The end inside the car we wrapped around the handle of s screwdriver, and the harder you pulled the wire, the faster the car went. It wasn't too bad on the straightaway, but changing gears in town got a mite tricky, since you had to lay down the wire, shift, and grab the wire back up in order to go. It was a true "family" car, since it took the whole family to drive it.

We drove it for nearly two years!

I've never heard of any of these cars. I am glad I started this thread. I love learning! I have had a car that you had to "play with" to get it running right. A mechanic could never fix everything wrong (Ford I will add). That is why I stick to Hondas. Mine is a 99 with 110,000 miles on it and it has never been in the shop. Still runs like it is brand new. MsBatt, I have to comment on your signature. I don't think I have laughed that hard in a while. Jello to a brick!!LOL!!

Thank you for the link! What a very neat little car. I am definatly showing my boyfriend tonight. I don't even think I have heard him mention it before.

I got some info on the Mini Cooper S.
Acceleration
0-30 mph : 2.9 sec.
0-60 mph : 7.4 sec.
30-50 mph : 2.6 sec.
50-70 mph : 3.9 sec.
Quarter Mile Time @ Speed : 15.4 sec. @ 90.4 mph

YAY!!!! I can run with it! I clocked my Civic 0-60 at 7 seconds and it gets faster after that. I love my third gear. Still, the Mini is awesome. I KNOW it could out handle my car.

Here is a link to my first car, that was a Mini, and that is me giving it a wash! To save any Brits doing calculations, G was for January 1969.

Same thing, take out the space when pasting the link.

http:// user.super.net.uk/~monks/mini.jpg

That is a sharp car! I love those. Did you take a lot of pride in it? Do you think it is better than the new ones? A lot of car companies mess up when they try to "fix something that wasn't broken".

The old Minis were great little cars. That one was a company car, the company I worked for decided to give us girls one each for three years to make sure we didn't leave them at a very busy time in the company history (two years before and one year after Britain went decimal, I worked for a business machine manufacturer), then sold them off to us so I had it from new until it was nearly six years old. I wouldn't mind having another one, especially if it was free.

Our son still has a rather nice older Mini Cooper. I had a Mini Estate car that I used for work for a while. The clutch release bearing breaking up was the worst and most noisy thing that ever went wrong with it. I needed a tow home that day. Other than that though it was a great little car.

Everyone I know has owned a Mini at sometime in their lives and they all speak of them fondly.

Hello Sue. I saw your comment above about Tripod and bandwidth, but I'm not sure I undestood it. Downloading the (very small) image would take a tiny amount of bandwidth even if every viewer of this post went and looked. The site is for a model car retailer who I thought might like people visiting and possibly buying their products.

I just used Google to find the image again and it is still visible.

Hey, any free car is good, right? My friend just bought a Taurus for $200. AND, it runs. Not bad. I showed my boyfriend that Ford. He was very impressed. He said that the reaction time of the start was slow, but if he had reacted faster at the green it would've had a ten second quarter mile. (Or close to it).
The other day I was driving with my friend and TWICE in the same day I got my automatic Civic to shift out of third gear at 90 miles an hour (while in D4). It is very hard to drive an automatic like a stick, but I am learning. I was impressed with that. Now bf wants to have a battle of the third gears. (Yeah, right. My Civic Vs. his Integra Type R). I'll let you guys know when we do it. I really don't have to tell you who will win!

Biggles, when I clicked onto the link all that was visible was the Tripod logo - they block all links to their site in this way, you can visit their site and view it, just not link to it. The amount of bandwidth might be small, multiplied perhaps by many thousands of people doing the same thing, it all mounts up and they have to pay for bandwidth used.

Quote:

---

Modify, publish, transmit, transfer or sell, reproduce, create derivative works from, distribute, perform, link, display or in any way exploit any Content from any Lycos database, including, without limitation, by incorporating data from any Lycos database into any e-mail or "white pages" products or serviced, whether browser-based, based on proprietary client-site applications, web-based, or otherwise.

---

The above is in their terms and conditions published on their website, part of what is forbidden.

I'll try this picture Biggles Click here to view my first car
That's what my first car looked like - I wish I had it now!

Hope that's OK Sue!

Edited by Sue943 in an attempt to fix the page width.

Since you mention it, no - you have blown the page width to smitherines! I will see what I can do to fix it for you.