Double the turbos or double the drive wheels?
Double the turbos or double the drive wheels?
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DH_350z

Original Poster:

1 posts

103 months

Monday 17th July 2017
quotequote all
Yesterday was one of those days, when I agreed to sell my pride and joy.
The car is a 2003 Honda Integra Type R which I had owned since May of last year. I'd taken it through a lot of Europe with my best pal in August, from that fabled track in Germany to the glorious Autostrade of Italy. It meant a lot to me, but with a number of articles starting to show worrying signs of age, it was time for the old Teg to go.

I've got two weeks before the buyer collects the car, and that means I have two weeks to buy a replacement.

Please don't ask how I've gone from a naturally aspirated Japanese road racer with a huge spoiler to wanting one of these, I'm just looking for guidance between the two. Also, I have no idea how it's happened.

I want to use the cash I received for my Honda to buy the new one, less some cash I'm putting into savings. So I'm looking at <£4,500 for the purchase price of the car and (because of my age/driving history) around £500 insurance.
A car I've always been intrigued by is the Saab 9-3 TTiD estate. Yeah, a big, heavy, diesel, twin-turbo charged affair with heated leather seats and a multitude of creature comforts that simply didn't exist within Honda's Type R division.
The other side of my interest is piqued by the Subaru Legacy with its two litre boxer diesel and four wheel drive. It has double the drive wheels of the Saab, but the Saab has double the turbos of the Scoob. Both are around the same on insurance, both can be had with heated leather seats, both claim to average around 45mpg (combined) and both-within my price bracket- have between 80,000 and 100,000 miles on the clock.

Does anyone have any experience of living with either (or both) of these cars and has any advice or things to look out for?
I'm split straight down the middle at the moment so as soon as my car is gone I'll jump online and whichever has the best deal I can find will be the one I buy.