Showing results in  Forum [Show all channels]

Sort by: Relevance | Newest first | Oldest first

• Goodwood Festival of Speed 19 Jul 2009 (Forum)
  The road cars included almost all the cars on Top Gear's lap time list - Zonda, Koenigseggegg.., Caparo, Mercs, BMWs, Lotus Evora, Bugatti Veryon (with or without roof), Maseratis,etc The Ferrari California was almost ignored!! The bikes came in all shapes and sizes from a 50cc bike with a top speed of over 100mph ( but a frame and tyres smaller than my mountain bike ) to GP and Superbikes and a couple of sidecar outfits.
• Audi A5 Cabrio (2009 - ) - Test drive 29 May 2009 (Forum)
  She wants a new or nearly-new 'proper' 4-seat cabriolet that needs to have room for the shopping in the boot with the roof down. Which rules out a BMW 3-series, and leaves just another CLK or an Audi A5 as the only choices(?). We obviously know the CLK and so we booked a test drive in an A5 (2.0 TFSI) manual. Now I haven't driven an Audi for years, so it was all-new to me.
• Volkswagen Golf V estate (2007 - ) - - first impressions 29 Sep 2007 (Forum)
  Ride / handling compromise excellent - much better than any of its predecessors, especially the lovely direct steering response. For normal driving I don't think it's inferior to the benchmark Focus or even a BMW. Comfort and accommodation are fine - the seat has proper wheeled adjustment for backrest and lumbar support and the steering wheel moves both ways as it should. Not-so-good - Only niggle so far is that you have to take the rear headrests off to lower the seat.
• Picking a new family estate 27 Sep 2007 (Forum)
  It's not slow - it's just not quite the same as my 330D, which she enjoys driving a lot Sane total cost of ownership - happy to buy newish, but looking to avoid less reliable marques. Will do about 12k miles / year Short list so far: BMW E39 estate - both like the 3.0 engine (525 or 530), you pay a premium, but I guess you would probably get it back. Open to the idea of a petrol (post 2001 revisions) Audi A6 - when did they start going wrong?
• Sometimes things work well 3 Jul 2004 (Forum)
  So you rock up to the local clubhouse in a convivial atmosphere while a very polite chap with a pickup truck does your emission test (no one ever fails), stencils your VIN on the application form, ticks all the boxes to confirm your vehicle passes all the requirements to be driven on the highway (no bothersome MOT's here) and an extremely pleasant lady sells you your third party insurance, and another lady with her infant on her knee types out your policy in between texting her paramour and you go back in 3 days and collect your stickers for your licence plates. During this particular episode (took about 90 mins) I met a chap with an immaculate 1955 BMW bike, a journalist (Brit) with fascinating tales to tell of our recent (rigged) elections and a delectable movie starlet with a Land Cruiser and substantial appurtenances who wouldn't give me her cellphone number.
• Galaxy Nearly Had Her Chips Yesterday... 22 Mar 2004 (Forum)
  I must be cursed however, as I've seen four serious traffic accidents in just over 200 miles of driving this weeekend: 1) Saturday: 3.5T lorry overturned on M74 southbound 2) Saturday: BMW aquaplaned and hit central reserve on M74 before spinning into middle of carriageway 3) Saturday: (the worst one) Honda Accord on M80 near Falkirk had aquaplaned at high speed, missed an overbridge, gone up the embankment, rolled several times, hit trees and returned to the carriageway.
• Handling improvements 14 Oct 2002 (Forum)
  It might be relevant to note, as an example of my personal taste, that when I was given a lift in an old BMW 3-series coupe a few years ago that I found the ride uncomfortably firm over some of our local roads. I know that there are other combinations (e.g. option 2 AND the anti-roll bars) but this might be over the top for my needs.
• Advice/input re 75 buying decision 23 Sep 2002 (Forum)
  He says he can put me in touch with the previous owner to verify this and can do any RAC/HPI check. All sounds fairly good, so my only concern is with the mileage. I know this is a BMW-sourced diesel engine and general consensus seems to be that this is a good thing. But I'm trying to get a clearer idea of how reliable the engine will be. Does anybody know how long this engine has been in use, or which Beamer(s) it's been used in?
• Motor May 13th 1972 8 Jan 2002 (Forum)
  Having said that they rated the E-type (£3519) highly besides the overpriced Lamborghini (£9505). Torque from the Jaguar V12 was such it would pull from 10-145mph in top gear. BMW 2002Tii's were winning the production car classes which included Z28 Camaros and Citroen SM's. There was talk about the excise duty rate on LPG for car use, an LPG conversion cost was about £175.
• Passat or RAV4 - VW or Toyota 11 Nov 2024 (Forum)
  It's really new and I'm afraid I might end up as a guinea pig here.   Obviously it's a much bigger car, I'm told it's as big and roomy as the BMW 5 series. Brand new, so the warranty lasts for 2 years (not 1 like the Toyota). It has all the things that RAV4 has plus other extras - ventilated seats, electrically adjusted, 3-zone Climatronic and HUD display.
• All the car you need? 7 Feb 2022 (Forum)
  It came about during the usual spat involving a fellow driver talking about buying a daft twin turbo diesel BMW 335d for £5000. An all too frequent convo involving someone on an ordinary wage with little spare money thinking that buying a highly complex prestige turbocharged car would be an astute move and me arguing that it would not.
• EV versus PHEV 5 Oct 2020 (Forum)
  For an average 12,000 miles a year involving regular 8-15-mile return trips within rural Dorset, and 200-250-mile return trips on average twice a month, a PHEV seemed the obvious answer - electric power for the short runs, petrol for the long trips with no range anxiety. The BMW X1, Ford Kuga, and forthcoming Skoda Octavia PHEV (impressions based on the Superb that I tried) are the most impressive so far. But having recently tried a Hyundai Kona Electric, last week, and a Kia E-Niro this morning, pure EVs have a lot more going for them than I'd thought.
• Vauxhall Astra - Astra 1.4 Turbo: First time with new car! 2 Nov 2015 (Forum)
  We weren't going to go for the top spec (Opel won't let them order the 1.4 turbos any more apparently) but I think it may be easier to live with. We intend to keep it quite some time. Just so comfortable..... I have owned A BMW, Golf and Focus in the UK and so far the Astra competes well I think. Test drove Skoda Yeti and Octavia 1.4 TSIs, Suzuki Vitara 1.6 and over the last couple of years have had two Astra hire cars.
• VW Dear Honest John. I bought a 200 passat estate - Faulty Remote Locking 15 Jun 2013 (Forum)
  I bought a 2001 VW Passat 3 weeks ago from a reputable second hand car dealer Beck Evans ( not a main dealer), dealing with high end Porches and BMW's. They had taken the Passat as a part exchange. I paid £4200 for the car with 58,000 miles and a full VW service history. The car was offered  with a 3 month warranty from Autoguard . I took the car for a test drive, but did not check the Infra Red remote locking.
• Total Loss !! Help please. 8 Sep 2009 (Forum)
  Is the NCD accumulated on cheap cars (say £2000 value) valid on a £40K car as well? I think so but you never know. If yes, then my BMW is only a few years away. If no, I'll always buy cheap cars and claim only after I have a protected NCD !! Thanks, Sam.
• SAAB - SAAB 93, good opportunity or bad idea? 4 Jun 2009 (Forum)
  We tend to drive the cars until they die (my MD has a 51 plate V70 which is still going strong at 180k miles or so), but running costs are a consideration (one of the reasons why I changed my Volvo to a BMW when the Volvo was getting tired). £12,500 seems a reasonable amount of money to buy a 1 year old / 10-15k mileage car and is roughly what we tend to spend. Better for the member of staff to have a bigger more comfy car for the mileage than a new Focus or similar.
• Mercedes Benz CLK W209 (2002 - ) - Found a lovely one.. but 11 May 2008 (Forum)
  A friend of mine who chauffeurs in E Classes reckons they are good for 150K miles without too many issues. 2. the suspension knocks badly when you drive over a speedbump. To be fair, the dealer (not a merc, but an independant specialising in mercs, BMWs and Porches, had only received the car the day I saw it (in part ex), told me before the test drive, and told me the front bushes and roll bar would be seen to. Without asking, he also told me that he would give a 6 month warranty on the vehicle and have it MOTs desipte the fact it has 6 months MOT still on it.
• Dealers fighting back against BER 22 Aug 2007 (Forum)
  I wonder if these manufacturers and dealers realise that their cars only have relatively good residuals because of the fact that there is an efficient 'parallel' network of independent parts suppliers and repairers. Kill this off, and a secondhand Merc, Audi, or BMW becomes a much less attractive proposition.
• 2500 miles per month. £2500. Diesel? Petrol? LPG? 1 Jan 2017 (Forum)
  From heart to reason this is the list of cars I have been considering: 1) Audi A4 TDI 1.9 130 Estate/Saloon (B6) (Dont care for the B7s or newer) 2) Subaru Legacy Estate/Saloon (4th gen)  Freshly converted to LPG with the addition of Valve protection 3) Mercedes C220 CDI Estate/Saloon (W203) 4) BMW 320D Touring (E46)  5) 7th Gen Honda Accord 2.2 cdti Executive Saloon (Not the Touring! That thing looks like a vessel!) 6) Any Volvo Sedan or Estate with the 2.4 D5  7) BMW 1 Series (E87 either the 118D or the 120d) 8) VW Golf IV/V GT TDI Up to 130.
• ABI category C and D writeoffs explained 20 Oct 2016 (Forum)
  This can be clearly illustrated by a quick browse of salvage websites, generally the older the car - the more likely it is to be a cat C. Take for instance a £50,000, 6 month old BMW. The vehicle has been involved in an accident and has a repair bill of £25,000. Insurance companies never normally repair vehicles with such extensive damage and, as a rule, will write the vehicle off and sell it on as cat D salvage.