Goodbye Dagenham's finest....(?)

A sad day. I remember borrowing one from a friend when he was off island for a couple of weeks and thrashing the poor thing around the hills.

To be fair, he only drove it on choke and for short distances, so it was coked to the gills and i did him a favour. And if he did not want people borrowing it, he would not have left the keys visible/available/unlocked.

My first car was a 1978 V reg 2 tone beige and brown Fiesta, and cost me the princley sum of £150. Was down as a 1.0L but had a 1.3 in it!! Naughty. That was in 1995. What a bag of shite. It was my bag of shite though, and it got me a round a bit.

Also had an E reg one, black 950 engine. Only car I've ever made money on. Paid £300 for and sold it for £650 about 6 months later.

I had one as my first car. must have been early 90s, a B reg bright red beauty! Loved it! Could fix it with a screwdriver and learned the old trick of whacking the sticky starter motor with a bar in a traffic jam on the M1. During a total panic that I'd stalled it and it wouldn't start again in lane 3 (as that's the only lane Fiestas with 18 yr old drivers should be in), a guy in lane 2 got out and told me to whack it, then showed me. It started first time! What a car...

the very humble Mk1 950 was nearlymy second first car

My mates had one, two brothers, they were selling it for £500, I told one of them I'd have it, he forgot to tell the other one, who sold it to someone else...

Oh, actually, also did my first MTB roadtrip in one. MartynS off of here had an XR2, and we put his Spesh Rockhopper and my Marin Hawk Hill on the back of it and went camping in Wales for a week in 1996.

First new car we had was a Y reg mk1, pine green, 1.1 Popular Plus. Can remember thinking it was really posh as a 4 year old! We loved that car.

Mate had a mk2 XR2 like above which looked great but wasn't very fast.

Real shame to see it disappear, especially as there's still obviously a market for them. Focus is going too so loads more SUV's no doubt. Yay.

I famously went to work in the Welsh Valleys in it once driving through Merthyr watching the youths on the streets watching me and hoping I didn’t have to stop…

A cycling friend used to work as some kind of lawyer in Merthyr and would drive his Golf GTi there. It was never stolen or damaged because he'd threatened to stop defending the local youth in court if anyone touched it. 😀

My first ever car! Terracotta Mk1 W reg. Absolutely loved it. 1.1 I think and it got ragged everywhere and never once let me down. Happy days.

I had a Mk2 XR2. Loved the car, however only one of the twin choke's worked when it was cold. So when you got to a junction and it was cold you had to blip the accelerator to keep the engine running.
My GF at the time decided to borrow the car, which then died on one of the busiest motorway junctions. She also didn't know about the immobiliser and how to re-set it. The car lasted longer than she did.

Also for anyone who has ever been to Ambleside...

We had a MK1 XR2 in the Eighties I think the reg was VJX 812X

Same as this. Had some great times in it

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A friend had one when we lived in Kirkcudbright. It was black with pepper-pot wheels. It was an absolute hoot of a car around the Galloway coastal and hill roads. It was it's agility and go-kart feel, not outright speed (our other workmates Sirocco 1.8 was good for that...) which was fun.
Some happy memories of that thing.

Many memories of Fiestas (car not the magazine ;))
Mate had a mk2 one we had 11 people in it one night returning from a young farmers disco.
When dating my now wife,her pride and joy was a n reg fiesta she took me out for the day only for the window to fall into the door when I wound it down.
Weve had 5 fiestas over the years last one was an ecoboost 15 plate was really sorry for it to go. Loved driving it on a twisty road not a load of power (125ps) just enough really.
Writing has been on the wall too expensive when I looked to replace it

Writing has been on the wall too expensive when I looked to replace it

That seems to be the case with all superminis now - long gone are the days when it was £99 down and £99 a month! 🙂

Very sad I know
G892 XPA 1.1 popular in red
N406SNL 1.3 white
R849PVK 1.3 Red metallic
R857PVk 1.25 Zetec Black
ND13EPC 1.0 EcoBoost Red
YC15UTU 1.0 EcoBoost Red

I had two mk4s. An R and an 02. The R rusted to death. The 02 was much nicer, power steering and a better engine. Unfortunately I crashed it after hitting a load of gravel on a bend and it was written off 🙁 but no one harmed thankfully as it was just me and quite low speed.

Pfffttt.

None of those rust buckets can hold a candle to Foxy* the Racing** Fiesta

*Image shown is not actually Foxy, Foxy has 3 badly kerbed alloys which the owner achieved in a single incident with a chicane and pedestrian refuge. The 4th was kerbed separately, along with sever other kerbings of the other 3. She also has several "go faster stripes".

**it's a sate of mind, any racing noises are actually just where the Holts GunGum has fallen out of the exhaust between MOT's

Y reg (1981?) was my first car in 1994. Can't actually remember if it was 975 cc or 1.1, all I remember is that is was a bigger engine that the 750cc Fiat Panda my parents were pushing me towards!

Things I do remember about it;
- Was a Mk 1, but had acquired a Mk 2 tailgate at some point
- Was red (faster natch)
- Was supplied with a Manic Street Preachers sticker holding the tax disc on, which I thought was a good sign of the previous owners good character.

I had one of these, in the charming "signal yellow". I rebuilt the engine, fitted some free (not very good but big) parcel shelf mounted speakers that then got stolen, patched many various bits of rust, rebuilt the twin weber carbs, had the heater matrix out which included removing the dash... I learnt a lot from that car, especially controlling understeer!

Edit - and I fitted some extra locks after I unlocked it and tried to start it with my front door key.

Didn’t realise that the Focus has already been slated to be axed too! Guess everyone really does want bigger, less efficient cars! Madness.

Red 950 popular 1981, w reg, Billy basic no boot cover, plastic upholstery, permanent engine fan no thermostat, 4 speed, but it was mine and first taste of freedom.

Replaced with a polo which was miles better.

Rip fiesta

I had one of these, in the charming “signal yellow”. I rebuilt the engine, fitted some free (not very good but big) parcel shelf mounted speakers that then got stolen, patched many various bits of rust, rebuilt the twin weber carbs, had the heater matrix out which included removing the dash… I learnt a lot from that car, especially controlling understeer!

A 1300 SuperSport! My friend had a white one which he understeered into a hedge with us in it, luckily no harm done.

any racing noises are actually just where the Holts GunGum has fallen out of the exhaust between MOT’s

Ah, you met mrs_oab's and I's first car - a dodgy (cut n shut) early Mk2 Fiesta in a fetching shade of blue. With a blown head gasket and patched exhaust.
Just like this one:
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Ford Fiesta 1.1 Popular Plus[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/47381765@N04/ ]Alan Gold[/url], on Flickr

First car was a mk1 bravo 2. I would have it back in a heartbeat if I had money and storage. So basic and light, easy to work on and a joy to drive being so small and simple. If anybody ever went on retro rides 10-15 years ago they may recognise it, I was a regular back then.

Ah, you met mrs_oab’s and I’s first car – a dodgy (cut n shut) early Mk2 Fiesta in a fetching shade of blue. With a blown head gasket.
Just like this one:

I had a 4 speed (1.0 I think) like that.

It would lose speed on the motorway on long gradual inclines, despite foot hard to the floor, I seem to remember having to change down to 3rd once or twice, haha.

It also used about the same amount of oil as it did petrol. It was a hatefull shitter of a car.

2-tone brown beige Mk1 was my first car bought for £200 and then cost me another £150 for second hand shocks and part worn tyres all round. It got ragged from Settle to Blackpool and back every week, every corner on the A682 was an adventure in understeering.

After 2 years the rear arches were 90% rust and failed the MOT so knocked them out and rebuilt them with fibreglass matting and filler, gave it a rattle can and it passed it's MOT no problem. The following week I exited the Spar shop just in time to witness an old duffer reverse into one of my newly rebuilt arches depositing it on the carpark. Insurance came and assessed and gave me £200 for it - I bought it back for a tenner.

With nearly a years MOT left I wasn't going to bother rebuilding it again so just gaffer taped it up and drove it around until the following winter. The girlfriend at the time had a Nissan Cherry Europe - the one with the 1.2 alfasud engine in it - always a lottery if it would start on cold days. One cold frosty morning it let her down and she borrowed the Fiesta to go to work in, 20 mins later she was back home sans Fiesta - a Mondeo man had slid on some black ice and put the Fiesta into a wall - front end completely twisted and unrepairable. Insurance ponied up another £200 and that was the end of it. RIP

Just checked my old Mk2 XR2 on the gov MOT checker - untaxed since 1995 and no MOT history! Someone's either got it in storage, or more likely, it's been stuffed into a wall 🙂

I've got (a fairly modern) one parked outside. Well, would have if mrs. mogrim hadn't taken it to work. Nice car to drive, although a little underpowered. Very dated and ugly inside, but practical.

Shame. Of all the Ford's I've driven through the years, I've never driven a Fiesta I hated.
It did amaze me how they had an OHV probably 50yr old engine in the early 2000s variant. 1.3l of tapping feebleness.

The 1.25 si (Zetec?) I had as a courtesy car in the late ninetes was awesome for the eighty(ish) miles until it got squashed by an Audi into a Volvo. Amazingly it still drove despite the rear suspension being broken and the headlamps buried somewhere in the engine bay. Not sure if it got written off but they wouldn't give us a courtesy car again.

A friend had a really early Fiesta, the windscreen washer pump was a foot operated thing, it kept snapping exhausts, but apparently if the engine mounts were tightened up you then couldn't get 4th.
Proper old shed with a block of wood to hold the window up.
It was a great old thing.

Only owned one. Around a j reg I think. Sold it on to my sister in law who then had it scrapped as it failed mot badly and needed too much money spending. Was very Smokey. Later saw it driving round Huddersfield looking like it had been resurrected- probably by the mechanic she sold it to for scrap.
When I was learning to drive (in a succession of 1.0L fiestas in 1987) there was an instructor locally that had an xr2 then xr2i for lessons. Sacrelige!

FFS, a victim of the desire for SUVs. Eurgh.

The inner young-a11y in me still fancies a recent Fiesta ST, despite being old enough to father your average age driver of one.

Learnt to drive in a mk2 XR2 like above. 1st test failed in Loughton as nearly stacked into a London bus. Passed 2nd test in Dad's Volvo.

My first car was a battered 950cc Fiesta. Did me proud for years including a few very dodgy police chases going where cars shouldn't go as part of the rave convoys of the late 80s/early 90s.

RIP

I fitted some extra locks after I unlocked it and tried to start it with my front door key.

Ah, this reminds me of a story about a mate who had an XR2, which another mate had left his jacket in the night before. We're all in the pub, jacket-missing mate says "have you got my jacket?", XR2 mate says "it's in the car, here's the keys", and jacket-missing mate toddles off to the pub car park.

He returns a few minutes later saying "I looked in the front and the back, and in the boot, it's not there"

XR2 mate says "it's on the front seat"

"No it's not"

"It bloody is, I'll show you". And off they both toddle to the car park.

Turns out that jacket-missig mate had been looking in the wrong car, as there were two different XR2s in the carpark that night, and the keys worked perfectly in both...

@mattyfez - that was exactly like ours. I remember being down to 40mph on the motorway going over M62 at Scammonden and carrying a bottle of oil in the boot at all times.

My mates XR2 felt like a totally different car.
As was the Polo 1.4 Estate we replaced the dodgy Fiesta with.

The most upsetting part...?

<b class="ssrcss-hmf8ql-BoldText e5tfeyi3">drivers opt for SUVs</b>

This is not a happy trend.

Sad times, I’ve come from a ford family and had escorts, mondeos a couple of focuses (foci?) a puma (old one) a C max, a Ka and I’m currently on a new shaped Kuga but almost unbelievably I don’t think I’ve ever even driven a Fiesta. The puma is as close as I’ve got.

We’re looking at getting a second car because the Mrs is going back to work soon was looking at Fiestas, but the new ones are too expend compared to the competition, so the record will probably continue.

This is not a happy trend.

Dacia has said 'Hold my beer'.

It seems many manufacturers are going 'upmarket' and SUV styleee.

Meanwhile, MG, Dacia et all are all growing sales. Heck, even oddball things like Citroen Ami are getting a lot of interest.

Will the pendulum swing back, once Ford's marketing department realise they have spent 10 years telling everyone to buy an posher looking SUV and in doing so killing the small hatchback / supermini sales for themselves?

I've had two.
Excellent cars, and very good as a packhorse.

Got given my first one by my grandma.
I don't think she used it to carry downhill bikes.

Also great for carrying Canadian canoes.

I learnt a lot from that car, especially controlling understeer!

A 1300 SuperSport! My friend had a white one which he understeered into a hedge with us in it, luckily no harm done.

I had a 1300S Loved it. Very nippy in the lanes though I discovered it was also possible to encourage it into oversteer if "making progress". That's how I spun then rolled it. I was distraught.

My first car was a mk1 Fiesta, 1.1L in Arizona Gold. #SecurityQuestions

I saw a mk2 on Sunday, a red one in good nick, driving in the opposite direction as I was coming home from Yorkshire.

My first car was pretty much this beauty...

1.3l engine and twin-choke Weber carb meant I ended up in several ditches as an enthusiastic but not-very-good 17-year-old driver.

Good for fitting bikes in the hatchback too.

R904CNT was a Fiesta, and a reg I'll never forget.

It seems many manufacturers are going ‘upmarket’ and SUV styleee.

Meanwhile, MG, Dacia et all are all growing sales

Between them they only make one non-SUV.

A 1300 SuperSport!

Oh yes, I had one of these too. I think it was my second car.

I remember taking a mate - who was a year younger than me - down an old dirt road one night, so I could give him his first driving lesson. Needless to say, he drove very much in a straight line and without braking, ignored the left hand bend, and smashed into the gates of a sewage treatment plant. I reversed out of there sharpish, returned home and called it a day on teaching him to drive.

The front grill, bumper and bonnet were all scrunched up and I was contemplating i) how to hide this from my mum, and ii) how to fix it on the cheap, ie parts from breakers yards etc. Anyway, the following morning I went off to Uni for the week, only to receive a call from my mum the next day saying the bin lorry had reversed into my car that morning and damaged the front. What a stroke of luck, I thought. Grabbed a statement from her and my ex-gf who also heard about it from her mum up the road, sent them off to the council only to be informed that they were denying it happened. Couldn't be arsed to take it further and ended up getting bits from the scrappy. That was one of the cool things about cars back in the day - you break something, you find a part and fit it yourself or with your mates.

Fun times.