Musing on the thread I started re: a car for our 17 year old, I was reminded of my own - somewhat different - first car buying experiences. Mainly as it was with my own cash! I didn’t pass my test until I was at Uni.
Ford Escort Estate MkII 1300L. Repained in two tone ‘Turd Brown, Mud Brown’ motif with what I’m suspecting was a brush in one hand and a bottle of vodka in the other. The engine was very tired, the wipers didn’t work, the heater would occasionally blow warmish air into the car some 10 minutes after starting, the doors dropped on opening and everything was manual. Most electrical stuff kind of operated occasionally if it wasn’t raining.
On a good day it’d do 70 although your teeth would be rattling and the wheel bearings would be howling.
It cost £400 in 1987. I had it a year before it was stolen/recovered with a few dents. Insurance paid me £400 and I sold the remains to a mate for £50.
Sadly no picture.
So what about the rest of you then? I can’t say I miss that car but it was brilliant to be independent at last.
17, Mini 1000
17. 1L Mini van. Would be worth a fair penny now.
Ford Fiesta Popular MkI cost about £900 it was numb 950c engine but it was Ok as my first car to learn in, it blow the cylinder head soon after I passed my test going to work one day.
21
Bright yellow ex-council transit
18
1.8N/A diesel Fiesta. 98000 miles on the clock and had 240000miles by the time we finished with it
Renault 5 in a metallic green colour - 1300, with a 4 speed gear box with a very long gear stick, finding gears was always a challenge. I didn't take lessons till after Uni, so it would have been 1986 before I started to drive - car Reg RPC50X. Rolled it's way round corners and it had no acceleration!
11 or 12. mini van.
thrashed round the farm. last time I saw it, it was rotting in the corner of a field where it had run out of petrol several years prior...
18. 1.3L mini sprite. Bought for £1350, sold for £1400 4 years later. Got 3 responses with the ad on the first day, should have asked for more. MOT checker indicates it is still going.
Ford Escort MK1 in yellow. 1.3l with coated metal steering wheel, vinyl seats, and a dent in the boot.
I was 18 and it cost me £300.00
If you drove through a puddle the solanoid would get wet and the car would die. 😀
Easily repaired and most bits available from a scrap yard.
bought: fiat 126, I was 20. Only vehicle I've ever spun on a public road. Truly diabolical heap in every way. Still loved it though.
17, mkIII ford escort 1.0 with a knackered gear linkage so there was no gate on reverse.
I really wanted a Renault 5! Stupidly bought the first car I saw. I should have taken one look at that paint and started running!
24, and it was an 1100cc, 13 year old Mini. It was written off 12 days later when I was hit head-on while stationary at traffic lights. Didn't really get time to work out how good the car was. Replaced with a (even older) 1275 Midget when I eventually got the insurance.
I cycled mostly, or took trains/buses. Living in London, that made sense.
I had passed my test at 22 - driving really wasn't a big deal.
My old work oppo lived in London all his life and never bothered to get a license. Now in his 40s, he reckons he’s too old to learn.
Good to see the trusty early Ford Escorts so well represented.
I lent my first street legal motorbike to a mate who somehow contrived to bury it under the wheels of a lorry. Only had it 3 weeks!
18, Brand new Peugeot 306. My parents must have been mad. Having said that, although I had a lot of near misses, I never crashed or damaged it. Did get a few points for speeding.
34
Diesel Mondeo estate with the rear bumper held on with gaffa tape
Think we paid my SiL £250, and got about 35,000 miles out of it before it finally coughed its last.
I was 17, she was a silver Ford Capri mkIII 1.6 Laser only a couple of years younger.
Good times were had, although I was too naive to give her the care she deserved. I went to uni and she rotted away in the garage until given away for nothing.
34, my mum's old '89 Polo (in 2003). Had if for 4 years then got an Amazon.
Now on a Smart Roadster, love that car.
Thanks for the handy list of website security question answers, everyone!
My first car was a 1977 Ford Fiesta 1.1L in Arizona Gold. 13 years old (the car, not me) and 35K on the clock. I ran it into the ground then sold it for more than I'd paid for it.
1981 Pontiac LeMans like this one, but with 4 doors:
I was 16, and the car was 7 years old. It had no serious issues until I blew the motor when the accelerator stuck to the floor. It had an 8-track tape system that meant I had to carry my small portable cassette player with me so that I could listen to The Police at full blast.
One of these, though it wasn’t in this condition. My father rebuilt most of it but died before completing it, which meant the rust on the sills and boot were still pretty crumbly and the hood had holes in it.. the drivers carpet would also soak any water in (which I never figured out where it came from, but could have been from anyone of a 100 places. I sold it pretty quickly, because it was bloody horrible to drive, I drove it through Uni years, so 19 at the time. I got a company car as soon as I left Uni and I got shot of the MG and got one of these, which was chuffing fabulous ..
During that time I bought an AlfaSud 1.5ti off a friend..
Then... another Alfa.. and so on...
Age 17
1.3 Mk3 Escort Popular - like this but mine was blue and and the little rubber spoiler (which made it go faster of course!)...
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..had the obligatory ===ESCORT=== sticker in the rear window and a stick on Garfield too! 🙂
23. Caterham 7.
Post university, and by the time I bought the Caterham, I'd had a 1.3 Mk2 Astra Estate and 1.8 Sierra Chasseur as company cars. Sold when we needed the deposit for our first house.
God, I miss that Sierra.
Not mine but almost identical. Bought it as a student when I was 22.
23.
Rover 214SLi.
It had the best BHp per tonne/insurance cost of any motor I could afford. 😆
21
Hillman Imp in 50 shades of blue.
16 and a biege 1971 Mini Clubman with a hard saved £200. Did it up a bit before passing test, lots of spotlights, nudge bars, a pod on the dash with 4 extra dials in it, chrome trim, etc, you could open it and drive it with a flat head screwdriver. Saw one the other day, can't believe how small they were!
23, after a couple of years driving my dad's Landy 110.
A Proton Persona 1.6XLi, cost £200 and lasted 12,000 miles. 1996 model, had independent rear suspension and four disc brakes, a 318i of the same vintage didn't!
88 90 2.0 10v, cost £200 when I was 17.
I've never actually owned a car; numerous bicyles and motorbikes though. I taught myself to drive in about 1974 on the dirt foundation of the M40 motorway between Thame and Stokenchurch in a Mk1 Escort van owned by Gleesons, for whom I was working as an engineer's assistant. It took me a week to pluck up the courage to change up to second gear, which opened up a whole new world of speed to me.
Vauxhall Cavalier MkII - about a 1988 job with a 1.6l engine and 4 speed 'box. It was utterly rubbish... and old... and unreliable. But it was mine and it was ace!
Age 22 I think - sometime around 1997
It looked a bit like this... but much shonkier... even back then!
A horrific 1L Austin Metro Mayfair when I was 17. Was stolen whilst at work in Oxford, replaced with a 1.3 Escort Poplar in white (just like the pic above).
Both cars were utterly terrible, but I had them again in a flash.
21 and just about to graduate I bought an 11 year old Triumph Spitfire 1500. Owned it from 1989 until 2008 having rebuilt it during that time.
I think I was about 10 - original Fiat 500. Went 50:50 with my old man.
Ended up restoring it when I was about 20 and sold it. Bought another about a month later to restore, it's still sat in the back of the garage 🙁
17 - Renault 5 Campus Prima 1.4 1995 in red.
17 years 3 days.
Mini Piccadilly in Jewish Racing Gold, I think my dad bought it as a joke.
A little later than most at 23, but despite being really into cars I didn't need one. First car was a MK2 Golf GTi 16v. The insurance was horrific, but I loved it.
17
The awesome Humber Sceptre ..I loved that car,but spent more time fixing it than driving it .
17 or 18. A Vauxhall Chevette 1.3L, in what was once silver. Enhanced with wire mesh, filler and smoothrite. My Dad sourced it for me - £50 in 1988 (beat the seller down from £70). Someone had tried to hotwire it and pulled the electrics out which my Dad (being an aircraft electrician) fixed.
Sold for scrap in 1989 when it failed the MOT (wire mesh and filler instead of metal door sills) and the clutch went.
17 1959 Land Rover, perfect learners car (if you can drive that everything else is easy)
One of these, only in a nice 70s maroon colour. I was 18.
I didn’t own a car until I was 32. When I was 16 I had a Yamaha FS1e moped, and a series of bikes after that until a SMIDSY nearly cost me a leg and my job. After that I got a Suzuki SJ410 which I kept for a few months then went onto Landies.
Mk3 diesel eccy. Just kept on going. Reckon I was 21.
20yo
Mini 1275GT - 1981 - big bore exhaust, outsized carbs, stiffened suspension, complete hooligans car. MOT check says is was last on the road in 2007. For me it expired when I bent the crankshaft, mechanic said he had never seen that before.