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Motors What do you drive? - The Photo Gallery

Discussion in 'General' started by :: Phat ::, 28 Jul 2003.

  1. TheMadDutchDude

    TheMadDutchDude The Flying Dutchman

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    Lucky! My brother got a Lexus Hybrid weird thing as a courtesy car when he took his Exige into service.

    Whereabouts are you based? He might have to go to your dealer... :D
     
  2. Mister_Tad

    Mister_Tad Will work for nuts Super Moderator

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    Central Lotus Nottingham, but I've had an Aygo before...
     
  3. IanW

    IanW Grumpy Old Git

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    My guess is that their normal loaners are all out, so they had to give you a demonstrator instead. It happened to me once, but sadly I drove a Vauxhall at the time...
     
  4. Mister_Tad

    Mister_Tad Will work for nuts Super Moderator

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    Yep, it was booked fairly last minute so the beast (Aygo) wasn't free, but this did nicely.
     
  5. Sentinel-R1

    Sentinel-R1 Chaircrew

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    Mercedes main dealers are pretty savvy when it comes to courtesy cars. I used to have a C220 AMG Sport Plus wagon and I never had a lesser car for a loaner! Over the various service and maintenance visits, I've had an A45 AMG, a C350 and a fully kitted out E350 demonstrator.

    They're not stupid!!
     
  6. IanW

    IanW Grumpy Old Git

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    Vauxhall were the same. When my diesel Vectra blew its timing chain 2,000 miles before the recommended change, they refused to give me a Corsa or Astra but had nothing bigger. They ended up paying Enterprise to rent me a Zafira for the month it took to get and install a replacement engine!
     
  7. Mister_Tad

    Mister_Tad Will work for nuts Super Moderator

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    I don't think BMW and Volvo have gotten the memo... I've swapped in the 7er for Minis, 1ers and 2ers and the Polestar for V40s and V40XCs
     
  8. Mister_Tad

    Mister_Tad Will work for nuts Super Moderator

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    This made me its bitch at the weekend...

    [​IMG]

    The rate at which it can devour a track is just ridiculous. I'm at the point where I can extract all that can be reasonably expected (i.e. just 1/10ths that will only come with experience) of an S3 Elise, and the step up to this took a huge re-adjustment to reality. It took a fair few laps just to string together something that wasn't a train wreck (I was lapping more quickly in the aforementioned Elise), and sadly by the time I was able to reset to a baseline groove it was time to go in :/

    Huge respect to anyone that can drive one of these at 10/10ths... had a few demo laps full out (really at 11/10ths tbh) courtesy of Martin Donnelly and the way this changes direction is mind-melting.
     
  9. xaser04

    xaser04 Ba Ba Ba BANANA!

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    Replaced my wife's Abarth 595 Trofeo with a Fiat 124 Spider S-Design. Managed to grab a quick pic with it alongside our M140i before losing the light.

    [​IMG]

    Got a cracking deal with around £8k off list price and the car being essentially new (Jan 19 registered with ~ 15 miles on the clock - was in the showroom).

    Has all of the toys possible for a 124 Spider to have (S-design is/was top of the range and mainly consisted of taking a Lusso + and adding different wheels & a red stripe down the side) and is more than quick enough for its purpose (140BHP* and just over a ton). I am not sold on the rack but it came with the car and is removable so... eh.

    *officially but the stats compared to a Abarth 124 (170BHP with near identical torque figures) make me think its somewhere in the 140-160 range. Feels like it has as much shove as the Trofeo which had 160BHP in Sport mode.

    My wife is super chuffed and I am looking forward to driving it properly (if I can somehow get the keys off her!)... :D
     
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  10. TheStockBroker

    TheStockBroker Modder

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    @xaser04 How do you find the M140i? I'm looking to swap rides at the end of this month and that's my top contender at the moment. You actually helped advise me in this same thread when I was getting rid of my Mk7 ST a few years ago (I ended up getting an e89 Z4 and doing quite a few mods).

    What would any other speed demons out there get for £25k? It'll be a daily but very keen to avoid the usual suspects (R, S3/TTS, RS). Ultimately want to achieve at least 400bhp, but am more than happy to need to modify to get there.

    I also considered the c43 and S5 which are fast, but seem comparatively unexciting?
     
  11. MLyons

    MLyons 70% Dev, 30% Doge. DevDoge. Software Dev @ Corsair Lover of bit-tech Administrator Super Moderator Moderator

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    A45 is my current "If 20k fell into my boot" car.
     
  12. Wakka

    Wakka Yo, eat this, ya?

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    Seen a few 400+ Cupra R's? And the Golf R is always prime for mods.

    Problem is, a lot of hot hatches are due completely new models or face-lifts in the next year or 2 (MK8 Golf, Leon, 1-series all getting completely re-done, I would imagine a new 308 GTI is on the cards after the new 208 and 508, as well as the new A45 - Civic Type R getting updated, possible AWD i30n coming, new Trophy R Megane on the way)... What will all these models do to the used price of the current cars??

    I have a year and a half left on my little Swift, then i'm prime to get something properly feisty too, but I will be waiting to see what comes out in the meantime!
     
  13. IanW

    IanW Grumpy Old Git

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    Reminder:- Order books open for VW's ID3 electric car at noon on Wednesday.

    I'm looking at one of these for my next car, but probably not this first batch (Lease on my Up expires end of Sept 2020).
     
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  14. IanW

    IanW Grumpy Old Git

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    Re: Above - Press conference is at noon today (Wednesday). Order books open 10mins later.
     
  15. stonedsurd

    stonedsurd Is a cackling Yuletide Belgian

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    On what planet are y'all getting A45s for £25k?

    We don't even get any >200hp hatches here but if we did for £25k equivalent, I'd be all over that s**t!
     
  16. MLyons

    MLyons 70% Dev, 30% Doge. DevDoge. Software Dev @ Corsair Lover of bit-tech Administrator Super Moderator Moderator

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  17. stonedsurd

    stonedsurd Is a cackling Yuletide Belgian

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  18. Wakka

    Wakka Yo, eat this, ya?

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    Yeah, repaired stolen and recovered... only 30K miles, but how many of those were done on the ragged edge while evading the fuzz? :p
     
  19. stonedsurd

    stonedsurd Is a cackling Yuletide Belgian

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    And how do you think I'd be driving it if I had one? :naughty:
     
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  20. xaser04

    xaser04 Ba Ba Ba BANANA!

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    I absolutely love it and so does my wife. It replaced a Ausi 8v S3 (which itself replaced a Mk7 Golf R.. stupid "upgrade" tbh but hey ho..) and in every way bar some of the interior plastics being worse it is better (imo of course but this is coming from owning both for more than a year).

    The S3 always felt nice to drive but was somewhat dull. The soulless 4 pot up front (with DSG farts of course) really didn't help.

    The 140 turns in sharper (ours has adaptive dampers), has more feel through the wheel, feels more alive under you (rear can be somewhat playful even without a M-diff) and has the gorgeous 6 cylinder rumble. I also find the 8 speed auto to be better at lower speeds and just as fast (shifting wise) when pressing on. Downsides are that the rear diff eats up boot space and the engine / gearbox layout can make it feels more cramped in the front.

    It should be noted that mine is not stock. It seems that BMW themselves - or at least the dealership - had some fun with the options which are normally not available when configuring the car. It has the full M performance exhaust (part of a "M performance pack" option which we didn't pay for but cost £3,000 according to the invoice and seemingly isn't available to spec on the 1 series (?!)) and lots of carbon and Alcantara in place of the normal plastic / metal interior pieces (again not on the options list). The steering wheel is also Alcantara. Having driven it back to back against my dads old M140i Shadow Edition it feels sharper and quicker and ALOT louder at full chat. There is only two things I would change about it; 1) Sunroof as the interior can be quite dark at times (made more obvious when you other car can drop the entire roof..) and, 2) Coral red leather instead of black like we have now, for the same reason really.

    Down the line I am looking at a Birds B1 "Fast road" tune will will give it the LSD, Bilstein Dampers (IIRC) and, if wanted, around 450BHP. Essentially making it very close to an M2 in a 1 series body. The extra power I am not sure about as the car is hardly lacking in that department.

    TBH though you can't go wrong with any of the "mega" hatches nowadays. I would recommend test driving all of them (including some outliers like the C43 as mentioned) and going for which you prefer as the all rounder. I would probably say the Golf R feels like a good middle ground. The A45 I always felt was a bit of a joke mainly because of the initial list price. Granted it competes with the RS3 and seemingly does quite well at it, but damn at the normal list price I would be looking at a 6 month old M3/M4 RS4 or C63 instead.
     

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