What was the car your mum/dad had when you were a kid?

[Dazed and Confused]

Plinth said:

Willhire89 said:

I see the DB5 has a towbar fitted - for towing what - a caravan?

There was a period when they were cheap - my father bought a 1960 DB4 for commuting to work in '75 from a dealer in Boston for £975 out of Exchange and Mart - whilst the same year my mother bought a Riley RMB for £550 to replace her Hillman Minx

Car trailer, mainly...
DB4 - nice!
Your father thought like mine did - the DB5 was used as a daily hack - this was the early 1970's when they were just secondhand cars.
Not the same, now...

The DB5 is great, but given it was just 4 years old at the start of the seventies I doubt it was that cheap and cheerful.

Nice though.

[captainsensible]

My Dads Ford Cortina Mk11 Savage. Jeff Uren's aftermarket 3.0 V6

[captainsensible]

Followed by a Superspeed Mk3 3.0 V6 Cortina - Jeff's Youngs take on the GXL Cortina

[Plinth]

Dazed and Confused said:

Plinth said:

Willhire89 said:

I see the DB5 has a towbar fitted - for towing what - a caravan?

There was a period when they were cheap - my father bought a 1960 DB4 for commuting to work in '75 from a dealer in Boston for £975 out of Exchange and Mart - whilst the same year my mother bought a Riley RMB for £550 to replace her Hillman Minx

Car trailer, mainly...
DB4 - nice!
Your father thought like mine did - the DB5 was used as a daily hack - this was the early 1970's when they were just secondhand cars.
Not the same, now...

The DB5 is great, but given it was just 4 years old at the start of the seventies I doubt it was that cheap and cheerful.

Nice though.

Fair point
“good value” might be a better description.
He paid under £1,500 for it in 1971 when it was 6 years old.
Which is about £21,000 in today’s money.

[Willhire89]

Plinth said:

Fair point
“good value” might be a better description.
He paid under £1,500 for it in 1971 when it was 6 years old.
Which is about £21,000 in today’s money.

The OTR price was £4175 for a 5 so it had come down quite a lot - particularly as the oil crisis was still to come

[PomBstard]

First I can remember was a red A40 Farina, followed by a white Hillman Minx - C-reg I think. Then we got two cars, so had a white or beige Mk2 Cortina with a black Morris Minor - with red interior!

Various combinations of Austin 1300, Morris 1100, Mini 850 and Triumph Toledo led to an L-reg, metallic green, Renault 16TL. Which was about as cool as my dad got with cars, and that got sold in 1982. He threatened to get a Saab 99 Turbo, but instead got a Mk4 Cortina.

At some point Mum had a Mk1 Escort 2-door estate with the mighty 1100cc engine. I remember clearly trying to get the thing moving from a standing start on Shirehampton Road. Anyone who thinks the current trend for Battleship Grey paint is cool should see this car...

Never understood my dad's mentality - he loved driving and was very handy with spanners, but never ventured far from safety/boredom. Even when he found himself on his own, he opted for crap - white Capri, followed by a light green Granada hatch.

[Deerfoot]

The ones I can remember..

Cortina 2.0S
Granada 2.8i
Senator 2.5i
Audi 80 (5 cylinder jobby, 2.3l I think)
Audi 100CS (the aerodynamic one)
Audi Coupe 2.2
Merc E Class(Can't remember the details apart from it being a flat blue colour)
Merc E Class Estate (silver, a 230TE I think)
Audi A6 2.5 TDI Avant

He said the Senator was his favourite....

Edited by Deerfoot on Monday 17th July 15:34

[Pie-n-Peys]

A few of the first cars I can remember:
E reg. Honda Accord
F reg. 3dr Escort Sport
Triumph Acclaim
D reg. Vauxhall Belmont (in green!)
F reg. Escort Van

[grumpyscot]

1. Austin 10 1948 vintage
2. Austin A30 1956 vintage
3. Austin 7 (mini) 1960 vintage - bought brand new

My own first was a 1964 Vauxhall Victor

[Plinth]

Willhire89 said:

The OTR price was £4175 for a 5 so it had come down quite a lot - particularly as the oil crisis was still to come

You are right - it had depreciated quite a lot - but that seems to be the "going rate" at the time.
He bought it from and trade advert in Motorsport, and I think I have found it among my back issues:
"1965 Aston Martin DB5, in silver grey with navy hide interior. Fitted radio, wire wheels £1,599"
Camden Sportscars in Bedfordshire.
I guess that with no p/x and paying cash he got £100 discount...

[Uncle John]

My Mum and Dad had a fairly eclectic collection of cars while I was growing up, I'll try to remember the more interesting ones:

Jaguar XJ6
Daimler Sovereign
Hillman Imp
Mini Moke
Chrysler Alpine
Talbot Horizon
Triumph Stag
Matra Bhageera
Peugeot 504 Station Wagon
Renault Espace Mk1
VW Camper
BMW 318is
Alfa Romeo 33 1.5TI
Nissan Sunny 1.8ZX

Probably forgotten a few but these are the ones I remember the most.

Edit to add one of my favourites - Mini Metro Van.... it was white with a sort of gold foil privacy glass for the rear window which the Police loved pulling my Dad over for

Edited by Uncle John on Monday 17th July 16:22

[Salamura]

The first one I remember was a yellow Skoda Estelle 1.2. I loved that car. Nobody else in the neighbourhood had one. It was loud, it smelled funny in the cabin (as there was a vent which lead directly into the engine bay...), and it was incredibly good in the snow.

Then they upgraded to a Renault 11 with the indestructible 1.4 Cléon-Fonte engine. The Renault was in a different league to the Skoda when it came to refinement. I remember the softness of the suspension and the quietness. The interior seemed very space-age as well, and it had a talking onboard computer. Needless to say, it only spoke French... Nevertheless, to me it looked like something from science fiction.

What followed was a Citroen ZX Estate with the 1.8 XU engine. This one they kept until quite recently as it just refused to die. It had a number of small faults, such as non-functioning hazards button, broken rear window winding mechanism, non-functioning rear windscreen wiper and so on, but the mechanicals were more than solid. They sold it when it turned 22.

[Europa1]

miniminter said:

The car my dad had when I was a Nissan Micra.

And you have grown up to be a GT-R? Or slightly disappointed your parents and only got as far being a Qashqai?

Edited to add an answer to OP's question: my parents' choices veered from the sublime to the ridiculous: there was an Allegro, there was a Maestro, but at other points there was a Stag and a 3 litre Capri.

Edited by Europa1 on Monday 17th July 17:45

[cullen]

DBS6 Aston.....I was always slightly embarrassed being dropped of at school in it.

[coppice]

Mound Dawg said:

Ford Anglebox seen here in a 1967 holiday photo. I'm the little twerp with the mug in his hand. Dad got a new one every January.

Big family then?

[Revisitph]

Plinth said:

For me, from earliest memories in the 1960s until the 70s petrol price hike put it in the garage, a DB2/4 - my sister, when she was similar aged to you in that photo and I sat on sofa cushions on the very very hard rear seats (which were a board of wood covered in leather with side bolsters I think) for the 2 day journey to Elba for the summer holidays, (day 1, SE England -> Switzerland [where you could see your trout supper swimming in the tank outside the restaurant, fed by the stream going past and there were cows with bells coming up the street as you had your fab breakfast - with, exciting or what!?, tiny jars of jam and butter placed on the plates in curly swirls] and next day down to Elba, leaving streaks of grape pips down the side of the car as you pinged them out of the wound-down front windows.. He offered me the car in the late '90s but I said no as I didn't have a garage to keep it in.. what a fool I was. I think it is in the AM museum now. Our other car was a ?Morris Traveller ?Mini with wooden battens / frame at the rear.

[andysgriff]

Ford Zepyhr 6, Moggy Minor and a VW fastback that we used to push most of the time.

[BGarside]

First car I remember was a Hillman Hunter GLS '74 with the Holbay engine, replaced in '80 with a Talbot Solara 1.6 with a mighty 72hp, a bland blancmange on wheels. Followed in '85 by a beige Fiat Uno 1.1. All I could do is read about interesting cars in magazines as a kid......

[ClaphamGT3]

Earliest I remember was an Aston DB4 and a Volvo 145DL. Moved on to a 911 Carreras RS and a Volvo 245DL then a series of Jaguar XJ-Ss and a Volvo 265GLE/Range Rover In-Vogue/Volvo 760 Turbo

[ClaphamGT3]

Revisitph said:

For me, from earliest memories in the 1960s until the 70s petrol price hike put it in the garage, a DB2/4 - my sister, when she was similar aged to you in that photo and I sat on sofa cushions on the very very hard rear seats (which were a board of wood covered in leather with side bolsters I think) for the 2 day journey to Elba for the summer holidays, (day 1, SE England -> Switzerland [where you could see your trout supper swimming in the tank outside the restaurant, fed by the stream going past and there were cows with bells coming up the street as you had your fab breakfast - with, exciting or what!?, tiny jars of jam and butter placed on the plates in curly swirls] and next day down to Elba, leaving streaks of grape pips down the side of the car as you pinged them out of the wound-down front windows.. He offered me the car in the late '90s but I said no as I didn't have a garage to keep it in.. what a fool I was. I think it is in the AM museum now. Our other car was a ?Morris Traveller ?Mini with wooden battens / frame at the rear.

God, I remember the rear seas in the DB4 - and the joys of five children under ten trying to cram into them....