My Shed Mk1 Focus Ghia
Discussion
mercedeslimos said:
Based on them having that car (Its replacement was a diesel Rover 75, another top comfortable shed) I have bought a MK4 facelift Mondeo which has the same type of control blade suspension. I put some 16" steelies on for the winter and with 215/60 (Galaxy size, too big slightly) it's unstoppable. Very similar gearchange and characteristics from the Peugeot 2.0 HDi unit (lag then whoosh) compared to the old TDDi Lynx unit.
Mine was a great all-rounder, quick across country too. MC Bodge said:
Mine was a great all-rounder, quick across country too.
I normally (not at the moment) do 100 miles a day over a poor country roadhttps://www.google.com/maps/place/51%C2%B054'27.6%...
That road.
Compared to the previous B6 Passat Sport it's super comfortable, both on 16" wheels...
mercedeslimos said:
I normally (not at the moment) do 100 miles a day over a poor country road
https://www.google.com/maps/place/51%C2%B054'27.6%...
That road.
Compared to the previous B6 Passat Sport it's super comfortable, both on 16" wheels...
"Sport" not always desirable. https://www.google.com/maps/place/51%C2%B054'27.6%...
That road.
Compared to the previous B6 Passat Sport it's super comfortable, both on 16" wheels...
vikingaero said:
I truely think that some people who drive nice new cars would do well to drive a shed. When I get back into any modern car after driving my Daihatsu Charade, I really appreciate the NVH, comfort, smoothness and power of a modern car! Sometimes, like you say it's the purity and simplicity of the drivetrain and engine. There's one junction near me where all my other cars seem to struggle, on the BMW it gets caught in the wrong gear, on my old Clubman the turbo lag was annoying, on the Passat the autobox is in too high a gear, yet in the Daihatsu it's just pure (limited) linear power.
I bought the Charade as a stopgap after the MINI lunched its turbo and I needed a car for 8 weeks for £495. I thought I would sell it after 8 weeks, but 5 years later it's still on my drive. I'm going to run it until it dies. It still makes me laugh - 155/65/13 tyres for £21 each, going for rescue practice where none of my colleagues would drive their 4x4's along the deep rutted track and yet I dragged the Daihatsu along by its belly, using the car to push-start other cars, or moving skips by pushing them!
The epiphany for me was when the Operation Stack was in force about 6 years ago. To drive home, I would have to queue at the A249/M20 junction for over an hour to get home. If I took a parallel country lane it would take 45 mins because of having to stop start nature of the narrow country lane. Then I took the Charade and it fitted perfectly. I had a RRS and 911 behind me and I soon lost them because I never had to stop for oncoming cars and the tall narrow tyres didn't mind the craters on the side of the lane. Total time was 25 minutes door to door. Sometimes a shed is "just right".
That's a great post about your Charade - have you done a Readers Car write up on it? If not, I recommend you do.I bought the Charade as a stopgap after the MINI lunched its turbo and I needed a car for 8 weeks for £495. I thought I would sell it after 8 weeks, but 5 years later it's still on my drive. I'm going to run it until it dies. It still makes me laugh - 155/65/13 tyres for £21 each, going for rescue practice where none of my colleagues would drive their 4x4's along the deep rutted track and yet I dragged the Daihatsu along by its belly, using the car to push-start other cars, or moving skips by pushing them!
The epiphany for me was when the Operation Stack was in force about 6 years ago. To drive home, I would have to queue at the A249/M20 junction for over an hour to get home. If I took a parallel country lane it would take 45 mins because of having to stop start nature of the narrow country lane. Then I took the Charade and it fitted perfectly. I had a RRS and 911 behind me and I soon lost them because I never had to stop for oncoming cars and the tall narrow tyres didn't mind the craters on the side of the lane. Total time was 25 minutes door to door. Sometimes a shed is "just right".
Is it one of those early-mid 2000s Charades, they were really very nippy for what they were. I totally believe you when you say you dropped the RRS and 911. I found my last car, an Insignia, very ponderous on the local lanes. I reckon yesterday I went 10-15MPH faster in my Focus than I did the last time I drove my Insignia on the same road. The Siggy was far too crashy and too large for the narrow bits! The Focus is just right. A Charade would be even better!
MC Bodge said:
mercedeslimos said:
Based on them having that car (Its replacement was a diesel Rover 75, another top comfortable shed) I have bought a MK4 facelift Mondeo which has the same type of control blade suspension. I put some 16" steelies on for the winter and with 215/60 (Galaxy size, too big slightly) it's unstoppable. Very similar gearchange and characteristics from the Peugeot 2.0 HDi unit (lag then whoosh) compared to the old TDDi Lynx unit.
Mine was a great all-rounder, quick across country too. greenarrow said:
Although I've not owned one, I really rate the Mondeos. I remember going in an early Mk4 Mondeo to Goodwood and thinking how comfortable the ride was and how good the NVH. Its a real shame that badge snobbery and the obsession with Crossovers and SUVs has pretty much killed the Mondeo. It was set up just right for our roads.
I took a colleague on a fairly long motorway trip to a meeting a couple of years ago in my (8 year old) Mk4 Mondeo. He drove a new Lexus RX450H (which I found to be hard-riding). He commented on how smooth and comfortable my car was, and was surprised by how many miles it had done.
It could also be driven fairly briskly along a twisty, undulating road for such a large car.
The later Mk5 is also better than some early reviews made it out to be. Ford Europe just gave up and used the US car as a basis for it. The last of the line.
s m said:
Small article from a fair while back...
Cheers, I must have missed this one. I think their comment about corrosion is a bit out of date however. Its quite hard to find a rust free Focus Mk1 these days. Most have some either on the back doors, the rear arches or the sills, usually near the arches behind those plastic coverings which are a bit of a water trap! Other than that, a good article. In another article from way back when, I recall EVO magazine lauding the basic 1.6 petrol Focus in a huge track test in around 2004. They said that in many ways it was the stand out car from the entire range and a better all round car, than say the ST170.greenarrow said:
s m said:
Small article from a fair while back...
Cheers, I must have missed this one. I think their comment about corrosion is a bit out of date however. Its quite hard to find a rust free Focus Mk1 these days. Most have some either on the back doors, the rear arches or the sills, usually near the arches behind those plastic coverings which are a bit of a water trap! Other than that, a good article. In another article from way back when, I recall EVO magazine lauding the basic 1.6 petrol Focus in a huge track test in around 2004. They said that in many ways it was the stand out car from the entire range and a better all round car, than say the ST170.s m said:
Yes, to be fair about the rust it was about 6 years back
Out of interest SM as you seem to have a huge Autocar collection (I've offloaded most of mine over the years) do you have a copy of that 12,000 mile test in a week they did in a 1.6 Focus when it first came out back in 1998? What stood out to me was that by the end of the test, the car was quicker than their road test 1.8 Zetec. It was something like 4 seconds quicker from 0-100 at the end of the 12K than at the start, if I remember correctly. Just shows how cars can get quicker with miles!!greenarrow said:
s m said:
Yes, to be fair about the rust it was about 6 years back
Out of interest SM as you seem to have a huge Autocar collection (I've offloaded most of mine over the years) do you have a copy of that 12,000 mile test in a week they did in a 1.6 Focus when it first came out back in 1998? What stood out to me was that by the end of the test, the car was quicker than their road test 1.8 Zetec. It was something like 4 seconds quicker from 0-100 at the end of the 12K than at the start, if I remember correctly. Just shows how cars can get quicker with miles!!
Ford struck gold when they designed the mk1 focus, i have had mine 6 years now as a rat car, run around, van .The car does it all. The handling is superior to other mid size hatches of the time, such as a mk 4 golf. To be honest mines been bullet proof, passed last mot but i was gutted to recently discover a couple off rust bubbles on the drivers side wing. Not bad for a car with 120k made in 2005 though. last of the mk1s i believe
Let off some steam Bennett said:
Ford struck gold when they designed the mk1 focus, i have had mine 6 years now as a rat car, run around, van .The car does it all. The handling is superior to other mid size hatches of the time, such as a mk 4 golf. To be honest mines been bullet proof, passed last mot but i was gutted to recently discover a couple off rust bubbles on the drivers side wing. Not bad for a car with 120k made in 2005 though. last of the mk1s i believe
Never mind then, even now, a Mk1 Focus will handle better than a lot of cars in 2020, imo.s m said:
You probably mean this one....
Yep that's the one, brilliant!The performance figures really aren't bad. People often complain that the 1.6 petrol is gutless but the 0-60 time before the run is comparable to a modern MK4 1 litre ecoboost Focus and 9.5 secs after 12K miles wasn't bad at all! They were light cars back then. I think the quoted kerbweight for my car is only about 1100KG, which is less than a MK8 Fiesta.
Let off some steam Bennett said:
TheJimi said:
Never mind then, even now, a Mk1 Focus will handle better than a lot of cars in 2020, imo.
Very trueSo with time on my hands during lockdown to scan the classifieds I've noticed how many tidy looking Mk1 Focus' are out there. So I've been pondering, given that mine has a few issues which I would need a garage to fix in time, If I decided to hold onto my car, is it worth selling it. I am quite tempted by a later model Mk1.5, this time with Zetec trim, that has service history so I know the belts have been done. Mine has no history so in a sense Its a ticking time bomb as I've no idea if the belts have ever been changed. Its a conundrum. All Mk1 Focus' are old now, so do I just stick with what I've got, as its been reliable for the last 5-6 months? Every time you change your car there's a risk of buying a lemon. On the other hand, for a bit more than I paid for mine, I could get a late model Mk1.5 Zetec with history, that theoretically would need only consumables for the forseeable.... I must admit this little Focus has got under my skin, so I'd be quite happy to get another one... even an early Mk2 is worth considering as they're going for buttons these days and tend not to rust, unlike the Mk1s.....alternatively that EP3 still calls out to me, even though they too rust and probably don't steer or ride as well........hmmm.........
I had hundreds of these as hire cars back in the day, all credit to them as i never managed to break one ! Superb handling for a mainstream car and comfortable too, many miles spent bombing from Southampton to Bristol / Sheffield.
Honda Civics of the time however, weren't so keen on being thrashed mercilessly.
Honda Civics of the time however, weren't so keen on being thrashed mercilessly.
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