Cars which aren't as bad as they're made out to be...

[v8will]

Morningside said:

I had two 827 SLIs (is there any other 827 model?). 1st one was brilliant and I was daft to sell it. 2nd one caused me nothing but grief! Gutless compared to the first and the in-built alarm kept going off causing the immobiliser to cut in and I could not start it.
In the end I scrapped it still with about six months MOT left as it pissed me off so much.

I thought I was going to hate them being a SD1 fan and avoided one for years but but I was quite pleased with the 1st one I had. Nice to drive and a good sized car to use.

Seemed to have all died. Just looked on eBay and there is ONE! And thats a HEARSE!

I still have an Austin Rover brochure from c.1990ish and I think the 2.7 was offered in SI, SLI and Stirling trim. I'd have to dig it out and double check. Pity they replaced the engine with the woeful (IMHO) 2.5 KV6

Ours had 2 sport modes on the gearbox, how cool and pointless?!

[J4CKO]

Liquid Knight said:

Have to mention my Rover. The car has proven reliable with only silly things going wrong, Saxoproof, 50+mpg, keeps up with traffic with ease, even though the car is a proper five seater saloon it handles as well as (if not better than) any similar sized hatch back, the boot is big enough for two six foot tall corpses and the car qualifies for classic insurance so I don't need a re-mortgague every twelve months.

Another criminally under rated car is the Alfa 155. Easilly one of the best saloon cars ever made and a Swan Song for Alfa before "Health and Safety" ruined car design.

You have a Rover 213, dont know why you have never mentioned it



My contribution is basically that with a lot of cars, people decide how good it is based on a lot of things, but mainly what other people think, good looking or premium brand cars get away sometimes with stuff their lesser brethren wouldnt, the Rover Above and its subsequent models were pretty good but got judged as being crap because they werent "premium" or cool, some of the premium stuff manages to ride badly and break down but nobody mentions it as it may spoil the premium thing, ok Rovers werent the last word in anything but neither were they as bad as people make out, pretty damn good in some cases. Its a bit like good looking women who know it get away with murder (not literally) because of dopey and desperate blokes and to a certain extent I think the premium brands enjoy this position.

[Mr Gear]

Iq owner said:

Toyota IQ
If you look at posts about the Cygnet in the Aston section they slate the donor car.
I like mine

I certainly don't - I like the IQ, but I don't understand why the Aston version exists.

[boobles]

Mr Gear said:

I certainly don't - I like the IQ, but I don't understand why the Aston version exists.

The reason is CO emissions.... They get judged over the entire range of cars & Aston Martin had to react, hence the IQ came out to balance the emissions.

[Bill Carr]

BMW 318ti - a far better car than the haters would have you believe. Some of the vitriol spouted about it is ludicrous.

[Mr Gear]

boobles said:

The reason is CO emissions.... They get judged over the entire range of cars & Aston Martin had to react, hence the IQ came out to balance the emissions.

I can't think how to search for the quote, but didn't the boss of Aston Martin deny this?

[boobles]

Mr Gear said:

I can't think how to search for the quote, but didn't the boss of Aston Martin deny this?

Perhaps he did. I was told whilst doing some tests on the Rapide that the IQ was for that reason.

[a11y_m]

TameRacingDriver said:

I also thought the original 1.2 16v Punto Sporting was an utter riot to drive, yet everyone went for Saxos instead.

I had that exact choice to make when I was 21. The Saxo VTR was the default choice at the time (around 1999) but I wanted something different. Rose-tinted glasses perhaps, but my Punto was a bloody riot: engine that loved to rev, 85bhp in relatively low weight, and entertaining handling. Had mine almost 5 years/50k miles.

[Morningside]

v8will said:

Morningside said:

I had two 827 SLIs (is there any other 827 model?). 1st one was brilliant and I was daft to sell it. 2nd one caused me nothing but grief! Gutless compared to the first and the in-built alarm kept going off causing the immobiliser to cut in and I could not start it.
In the end I scrapped it still with about six months MOT left as it pissed me off so much.

I thought I was going to hate them being a SD1 fan and avoided one for years but but I was quite pleased with the 1st one I had. Nice to drive and a good sized car to use.

Seemed to have all died. Just looked on eBay and there is ONE! And thats a HEARSE!

I still have an Austin Rover brochure from c.1990ish and I think the 2.7 was offered in SI, SLI and Stirling trim. I'd have to dig it out and double check. Pity they replaced the engine with the woeful (IMHO) 2.5 KV6

Ours had 2 sport modes on the gearbox, how cool and pointless?!

The Stirling sounds nice.


What about the 75 V6 model? Is the engine any good?

[NavSat]

I will go out on a limb and say most SEATs - not just the FR & Cupra models but the basic ones - everyone goes on about how good Skodas are but i personally think SEATs are better and they drive a lot better than VWs and Audis too...yes they do!

[keegs111]

My first car when i was 18 was a 2.5 V6 Vectra SRI (96 on an R plate if memory serves). Since then I've had some fairly decent cars (E46 M3, Z4, 650CI, Maserati 4200, 996s and currently a 2005 SL500) but I still often recall how much I loved the Vectra - a car that i feel got a lot of unjustified negative press. Wouldnt be seen dead anywhere near the MK2 onwards tho......