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My trusted Berlingo blew the clutch last week and I've scrapped it as we don't really need it and the cost of repair plus the insurance up for renewal and the fact that the thing was actually falling apart made the decision easy. I have a motorbike and now a small campervan and both myself and the Mrs live within 1 mile of work, my riding is 100% from the front door as well unless travelling over the sea which in COVID times has been very little this year (not even 10 trips I don't think) and the van is perfect for that anyway
So the above is the logical explanation for why I don't need a car
HOWEVER I find myself looking at marketplace and the local Gumtree equivalent etc at cheap cars. I'd love something like a MK2 Golf but I'm talking sub-£1500. The advantage I have is I can drop that money and lose it the next day without worrying too much (not because I'm rich but because of the saving and scrap money on the Berlingo plus a patent I submitted recently returning a few 100) so I don't need anything with any kind of resale, just something cheap, stupid and fun.
Candidates I've found:
'04 Jaguar XK8 V8 for £1,095 - bit tatty bodywork but it's a V8 for a grand!
Skoda Felicia pickup thingy for £1,250 - Looks like a fun little vehicle but not sure what I'd do with a pickup
Infinite amounts of Golf cabrios, mk3&4, for anywhere from 400 quid upwards. Cabrio would be fun but it's a 1.6 petrol with no guts and a leaky roof in most cases
What stupid car did you buy for cheap and enjoy?
mx5 or an mr2 roadster (if in your price range)
I bought a Clio 172 a few years back for £1300 - absolute grinfest when it worked. However, the time it worked was outweighed by the time it didn't work by about 2:1. You'd not get anything even half decent for that money now though as they are starting to creep up in value.
Try and find a Mercedes 190E or even better a W124 shape E-Class.
Or just spend it on something else. £1500 doesn't really get you much anymore.
was gonna say mr2, like a mini lotus
Ignis Sport a modern 106 rallye. Buy it and keep it well, these are special.
Yeah the other option is not to spend it. Which I will end up doing unless something really takes my fancy
MX-5 was on the list but that money doesn't get anything decent. Clio 172 is the kind of thing I'm looking at but as you say the older stuff is now gaining value. If I had somewhere safe to put it I'd be investing alot more and getting a 205 GTI or MKI Golf GTI as they are going up but I can't buy an investment car and keep it on the street, I'd be forever worried (I worry enough about my KTM on the pavement)
Go to pistonheads and look at their shed of the week.
XK8 - if it's the 4.0 they had nikasil'd cylinders which wore prematurely with big drop of power. The later 4.2s have cast iron liners.
S-type V8 would be a laugh too.
Cheers for the Headsup Murray!
A few years ago I bought a Saab 9-3 for £400. It was a 240bhp version so it was less than £2 per bhp. It wouldn't go round corners though
BMW compact. Choice of engine sizes but look for a 325. Massive boot and good for skids. Do loads of drifts and donuts then post the pictures on here so everyone can clutch their pearls in horror.
Base model Mk2 MX-5 and drive it like you stole it.
You should get something decent for around £1,500.
Never had one but I think there's a certain je ne sais quoi to the original Audi TT 225.
Plenty within your £1500 budget although I have no idea what condition that price would actually get you. Very tempted myself but I can't quite get the Skyline 350GT out of my head...
BMW is on the list for sure. It seems all the cheap ones are 5 series or bigger round here though but a beaten up 325 would be spot on
TT is a good idea, or a big engined A3 for that matter
Do MX-5s have much grunt though?
If you look around you might be able to pick up a scruffy kit car for that sort of money. Heaps of fun to be had.............
I was on a similar search a few months ago and decided for that sort of budget it’s difficult to look past an mx5 or Clio 172/182 (or an MR2 but I’ve never really been keen on them, not sure why!)(and maybe a really really cheap R56 mini)
Ended up going for a clio 182 which was a bit over budget but I absolutely love it!
If you end up choosing what car you want, have a look on car specific/owners club Facebook pages, there’s way more listed there than on gumtree and autotrader etc
If you end up choosing what car you want, have a look on car specific/owners club Facebook pages, there’s way more listed there than on gumtree and autotrader etc
They also tend to be a fair bit cheaper especially compared to Autotrader.
MX5 grunt is passable but no more.
However it’s handling, balance and only just enough grip make for a huge grin factor.
Fabia VRS?
How much fun is a Hyundai coupe? I've never driven one but plenty in budget.
But if you can afford to write it off (or sell for parts) when you get a big bill get the Jag!
I just went on eBay to try and find a nice old Volvo 240 within your budget (built very solid, good engine, RWD, classy AF and you can waft around pretending that you are the cool detective in a Scandi Crime Drama), and got distracted by this beast.....
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/114658378548
Please buy it. If you were already looking at the Skoda pick up thing then the colour shouldn't be an issue.
Been beaten to the Ignis Sport already, so much fun for what it is.
Other things that spring to mind are a Mitsubishi Colt in 1.5, bit of a sleeper. Maybe a Panda 100hp if you can find one, prices may have started to creep up on those though. Ford Street Ka might be a laugh if you can find one that isn't rotten. Oddball choice would be a Hyundai Coupe.
Edit: someone else thought of the Hyundai while I was typing! Also good luck getting a 240 for under £2k, values on them have shot up the last year or two.
Buy a couple of Palmersport days instead. You'll have more fun and better memories of actually driving fast rather than spending weeks under the bonnet of whatever you buy trying to get it to start.
Theres a Mazda RX-8 on Autotrader for £1250.
Could be fun plus it comes with the 'will the engine blow up today' factor! 🙂
And a nice bill for £3-4k when you find out the Apex seals are all knackered. Great cars when working fully but a pain when they haven't been looked after well.
Easy enough to dodge that bullet though: get a compression test done and walk away if it's not at least mid-7s on all 6 chambers. Then add some 2-stroke oil every time you fill up and take it to the rev counter beep every drive.
The ones that are still about and working are generally the ones that have been looked after. I'd probably think twice about going for a 231 hp one that was only £1500 though. Not necessarily the most fun cars either, my sis had an R3 version and while it was obviously quick it somehow never really felt like it.
I recently sold my slightly rough around the edges but mechanically sound ep3 Civic Type R for £1K. A proper fun car on b roads and country lanes and very reliable.
Mx5 mr2 deffo
Or a yaris 1500 sport
Mk2 VW scirocco
Same boat here bought myself an mx5. Great fun has me grinning like a kid again and haven't even had the roof off yet!
Proton Jumbuck
Ford Focus ST170? Huge fun if you know how to drive them and the handling is superb. I had one a year or so ago and loved it. For your budget you should still get a sub 100k with history, 3 door and not a rot box. They are starting to creep up in price though.
Smart Roadster is more fun than an MX5 and a lot cheaper to run, rust not an issue but odd electrics and sealing often are, especially at that price.
Suzuki Swift Sport
https://www.pistonheads.com/news/ph-features-sheds/suzuki-swift-sport-shed-of-the-week/43684
Proton Jumbuck
My first car was the car version of that, a 1.6 Persona. It was actually pretty good, not hugely powerful but it was 900kg IIRC, decent brakes, it had discs all round which a contemporary BMW 3 series didn't have for example, and independent rear suspension, which Ford were making a fuss about on the newly launched Focus. Decent tyres and there was loads of grip.
It may just have felt fun because it was my first car and it was quicker than dad's Defender which i had been driving until then but I really miss a nice light chuckable car. Probably the best £200 I ever spent.
If I remember right there was a 2.0 version about. Pretty rare now mind.
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More sensible head on, ebay has many Celicas within budget. Also I looked for the Hyundai Coupe I mentioned earlier and it turns out they did a V6, never knew that
Still on the hunt here.
Any experience with Mini Cooper S from around 2002-2005? A nice little lightweight supercharged engine in a go-cart type car seems like it should be a lot of fun and I can see 2 for not much more than a grand within a couple miles of me
I had a look at the Supercharged Cooper S (R53) when I was on the hunt for something small / cheap / entertaining last year - general consensus seemed to be if it didn't have a full service history - steer well clear, the looked after examples seemed to be much dearer than the £1000 gumtree fodder - plenty of them ended up with shite remaps & being horsed around by scruffy yoofs.
I ended up with a R56 Cooper - 61k miles for £1900, it's mint - bought it as a runaround & i'm actually quite fond of it now. Not as exciting as the turbo/supercharged S model but having parked my old 1l Yaris in a hedge sideways I probably didn't need the extra 50bhp anyway
I went through this a couple of years ago after my trusty petrol VRS estate was written off by a van, I didn't want to spend any more than the payout I received from the insurance.
Ended up buying a Focus ST 225, if you can get passed the image it was a lot of fun and amazing value for the money. It went well (300bhp with a few basic mods & a map), handled ok for FWD (needed a dif but didn't want to spend anything on it) and the noise the 5 pot Volvo lump made never got boring.
I paid around £2750 for a low mileage ST3 spec car with heated Recaro leather, heated screen, climate, bi-xenon auto lights etc. It was super reliable and ended up keeping it for way longer than I expected - even sold it for a profit!
Buy a baseball cap and embrace your inner chav...
I have owned quite a few on the list, mr2 and ph2 172 clio being the best. Clio with a remap and some breathing work easily hit 200 bhp and frightened a lot of "fast" cars at knockhill.
For that cash and the fact it might not break down every day i would go MR2 but check its had the manifold changed (they had a honeycomb filter which crumbled and destroyed perfect engines) and spend cash on getting the chassis set up square.
If you squint hard it looks like a porsche boxster you know....
Mate of mine had the sporty version of the fiat panda... Apparently it's an absolute riot to drive.
Low power but it's small and very light weight, so the power to weight ratio is pretty good.
Have a look for a late model Xsara VTS, same underpinnings as the 306 GTI but no 6 speed 'box.
It kind of depends on how you define "fun" in a car, it's different things to different people.
But I very much agree to the comments stating the MR2 Roadster, MX-5, Smart Roadster and Clio. All of them have great handling and lots of feedback and are engaging to drive. For £1500 you should be able find something that is fairly good order and not break down all the time.
Not sure I agree with the Audi TT comment, possibly the earlier ones are better but I tried a slightly more modern one, don't know what spec or engine (certainly not the v6) but it was heavy and very un-involving with a very stiff harsh ride. Not my idea of fun from a driving point of view.
anything with a tvr badge with a v8 will fulfill the last two criteria and will be fairly cheap to buy by now. cheap to run however...
Currently it’s either a Cooper S with 130k, some warning lights and no history for £1200 or an e46 318ti compact on 70k with full history but all 4 discs worn and corroded brake pipes as advisories on the last MOT for £1500
BMW is in real good nick but what’s the brake situation likely to cost? Are Compacts going to go up in value?
Are Compacts going to go up in value?
Why would they? Not rare, not very special (in 318 form) and just another old BMW
I suppose in 20 years time if you had an absolutely mint low mileage one it may be worth more than it is now just as an 80's 3 series is worth more than it was 15 years ago but not something to retire on 🙂
anything with a tvr badge with a v8 will fulfill the last two criteria and will be fairly cheap to buy by now. cheap to run however…
TVRs on PH start at £10k.