The Poverty Spec Enthusiasts' Thread

[Bill]

My Disco2 is the base spec (cloth seats, windy sunrooves, leccy windows though) but the first owner added Active Corner Enhancement (ACE ) and climate control. Now it's 13 years old I have less useless tat to go wrong.

[W00DY]

Toaster Pilot said:

My base model Kia Picanto went one better than that - MASSIVE fuel gauge where the rev counter should be!

I wonder how much they can actually save, by designing and tooling up for a large fuel gauge over fitting everything with a rev counter. Must be worthwhile.

mickyveloce said:

I currently own (although it's for sale) a deliciously low spec W124 E280 with cloth and wheeltrims; it affords less distractions to allow the owner to concentrate on the quality of the engineering.

Indeed, despite my car's lowly spec, it never feels anything other than absolutely lovely and like it's missing out.

wildcat45 said:

I used to love the steel wheel base spec Discos.

I'd love a 3-door, manual, steel wheeled, V8 Disco in that flat blue colour. Yum.

That TVR price list is amazing. £8.67 for a door mirror sounds good to me.

[Fast Bug]

I bought a 1957 Standard Beetle. Standard as in 1 sunvisor, wingnuts to adjust the seats, crash gearbox and cable operated brakes. Now that poverty spec

[Bill]

W00DY said:

That TVR price list is amazing. £8.67 for a door mirror sounds good to me.

£200+ for a cassette player in a £4k car

[GroundEffect]

W00DY said:

Toaster Pilot said:

My base model Kia Picanto went one better than that - MASSIVE fuel gauge where the rev counter should be!

I wonder how much they can actually save, by designing and tooling up for a large fuel gauge over fitting everything with a rev counter. Must be worthwhile.

mickyveloce said:

I currently own (although it's for sale) a deliciously low spec W124 E280 with cloth and wheeltrims; it affords less distractions to allow the owner to concentrate on the quality of the engineering.

Indeed, despite my car's lowly spec, it never feels anything other than absolutely lovely and like it's missing out.

wildcat45 said:

I used to love the steel wheel base spec Discos.

If they can charge £100 for the tacho, then it's already covered.
I'd love a 3-door, manual, steel wheeled, V8 Disco in that flat blue colour. Yum.

That TVR price list is amazing. £8.67 for a door mirror sounds good to me.

[NNH]

I might be missing the point of this thread, but when I got my Cayman I went for the little 2.7 engine and full poverty spec except for the stuff that made it faster: 6-speed box, active dampers, and Xenon headlights. It's even got the super-base (definitely not super-bass) 2-speaker stereo system. I've still got it seven years later so I guess the resale value isn't so crucial now.

[Fartgalen]

I grew up with poverty spec. No bodykits, airfilters, alloys, bassbox, etc here. Heated rear window was the first aftermarket fitment on my first car. Followed by an FM/Casette radio with parcel shelf speakers !!

[mickyveloce]

Fast Bug said:

I bought a 1957 Standard Beetle. Standard as in 1 sunvisor, wingnuts to adjust the seats, crash gearbox and cable operated brakes. Now that poverty spec

Yep, you win! The definitive parsimonious motor car.

[W00DY]

kapiteinlangzaam said:

Did you see the one I linked to in the 1-5 thread a while ago? Twas a Japanese import, looked spiffy.

Our neighbour is serious old money and rattles around in a very early MK1 Disco in dark green (albeit with a diesel engine). Its a rumbly old Hector, but a great old thing. Most of the exterior paint burned off years ago and you can hear it start on a cold morning from about 10km away

Yeh, that one looked like a peach and a lot tidier than most of the UK ones you see. Must've been rare over there given that Honda sold that rebadged Crossroads job.

NNH said:

I might be missing the point of this thread, but when I got my Cayman I went for the little 2.7 engine and full poverty spec except for the stuff that made it faster: 6-speed box, active dampers, and Xenon headlights. It's even got the super-base (definitely not super-bass) 2-speaker stereo system. I've still got it seven years later so I guess the resale value isn't so crucial now.

Sounds perfect to me. All about the driving, without added weight or distraction.

[R_U_LOCAL]

Am I wrong to prefer cloth seats over leather?

The most poverty spec car I experienced was one my Mum bought about 30 years ago. It was a 1 litre Metro that she bought from it's first owner who was a Leyland Motors employee. They used to have a raffle for a car every month and this bloke won a Metro. As it was given away free, it was the most basic spec imaginable - no mats, one sun visor, one door mirror and not even a heated rear window, let alone a rear wiper.

Mind you, police forces tend to order some really boggo cars. I spent many a summer sweating my way through some long shifts with no air conditioning and a trucker's tan.

When I worked at the police driving school, we had a new Vauxhall Omega MV6 auto delivered - it had steel wheels and wheel trims, but because it was being used quite hard, the brakes weren't getting enough air to them through the cheapo wheels, leading to several worrying moments for students and instructors until the wheels were swapped for alloys.

[V8forweekends]

This is why German "premium" brands developed such a reputation for high residuals - almost no-one ever buys one at list price (they add thousands of extras), but no single car is the same. Residuals look good compared to basic list price, but not if you factor in what was actually paid.

Probably the meanest spec I had was a 1979 VW Polo - single sunvisor. The speedo and fuel gauge were the sum total of instrumentation (not even a clock). It did have HRW and a rear wash-wipe though.

[Erudite geezer]

[Fartgalen]

As a slight aside. Recently looked at a 2000 1.4 Polo for my daughter. Lovely low miles car in fantastic condition. Steel wheels. No AC. No central locking. No Elec windows. Had an aftermarket radio. Only radio !! But it had an electric tilt/slide sunroof and electric mirrors ??!!

[Erudite geezer]

[Erudite geezer]

[Chapppers]

Erudite geezer said:

That's from here http://www.carthrottle.com/post/10-of-the-worlds-h...

I wish there were larger sizes of steel wheels available for sports cars with large brakes, I really like how my Puma looks on them but I think 18" wheels are a minimum on the Noble unfortunately.

I love what Tim Schrick did in this video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7H4LcJLgKQ) to an Elise, the "povspec look" could totally be a thing:

[Max M4X WW]

W00DY said:

Max M4X WW said:

Hmm, not sure on this one.

At least it makes the car simple, for maintenance etc in the future but when I ordered my Leased M135i I just couldn't spec a 30k car without sat-nav. If only for the next owner..

M135is have quite a bit as standard, don't they?

And I'm sure your lease cost will have gone up showing you that the next owner won't value those options quite as much as BMW ask for them.

They don't have cruise or parking sensors which I think is a bit stupid really! I didn't want to drive round with a TomTom on the windscreen either. The options on lease cars vary depending on the expected resale value, the Nav wasn't too bad.

[Pit Pony]

RobinBanks said:

No. I tend to think that poverty spec cars are a bit crap.

I tend to frequent a website called www.autoste.com so I tend to think the opposite.

We have a 1997 Mx5 Mk1.

Poverty Spec Monza, 1.6 90 bhp, with NONE of the following : ABS, Central Locking, Electric Windows, Power Steering, radio that works, (it has a radio but karput), electric aerial, remote boot lock, leather, hard top, speakers in the head rests, wind blocker, air bags. I have no idea what it would be like to have those things, but it would definately slow it down.

[Rincewind209]

I can remember back in 1994 (approx) the company I was with used to give all the reps and engineers Cavaliers. And at that time Vauxhall changed the specs so that all Cavaliers got airbags and ABS. But to save money the L spec which ours all were lost aircon. Very unhappy people I seem to remember.

[DoctorX]

Erudite geezer said:

Designed solely so you buy the next model up. I like the citroen advert on here ('no wonder it's so reliable....):

http://www.citroenet.org.uk/publicity-brochures/gb...