44 replies to this topic

[Mini-Mad-Craig]

Of course we'd all love to keep all of the cars we'd own but for a lot of us that just isn't realistic. I've always managed to hold onto my first car through everything that life has thrown at me so far and I plan to keep it forever. 

 

Like many on here, I'm totally convinced cars have a soul. Especially something old, with a story, something that's been places and has been things to somebody. Has been in a family and was a first car, a holiday car, or just a project to people before you had it, that's special, and priceless.

 

I owned a Metro over Christmas and really wish I could have kept it. I'd known it locally for a few years, and when I saw the guy had a newer car on the drive I had to knock and ask if it was for sale. I'd always walked past it and loved it. It turned out the guy was just too old to get into it and with a Frogeye Sprite and two MGB's that were both projects it was retired for a modern car. I got the car for a great price, brought it home and it flew through it's MOT. Unfortunately I had to sell it to pay for my driving lessons and test, but I wish I'd have kept it. Shortly after I sold it (To the people that I bought my first car from! things with cars like these really do go round in circles) the car was written off I found it on Copart shortly after. It was fixable but after auction fees and transport home I just couldn't justify it. Now it's no longer on the DVLA database so I can only presume its gone now. It is a shame that to some people it's just metal and rubber, but I definitely think I gave it a good last few months and tidied it up so much which is deserved, it wasn't perfect by any stretch, but it was a great little car.

 

 

 

Next up was my first Mini which of course is totally irreplaceable. If we had the knowledge that we do now I'm sure we'd have kept it and did the work it needed, but I just didn't have the space and it had to go. To so many it was just a rusty old Mini but to me it was so much more than that.

 

 

And of course the one I'll never let go of (That oil is Simon's and not mine! ) 

 

 

So share your stories. Maybe you owned a car, sold it, later regretted it and bought it back? I want to hear them all, with lots of pictures! Is it your first car? A Mini, or a 106? Maybe you're from the wonderful US of A and your parents had an old Dodge A100 that you went on holiday in but was eventually sold. Tell us why it's great and show us some pictures!

 

Get posting

Edited by Mini-Mad-Craig, 08 July 2014 - 12:27 AM.

[Ben_O]

I had an old Cavalier years ago which started off as just a cheap runabout  but i sadly grew attached and used it for a few years. It never let me down and was a big part of my teenage years as i had the biggest car so all my mates would pile in it and we went everywhere. All the way to Alton Towers on a spare of the minute road trip. I remember the water pump going in the mcdonalds drive through in Nuneaton and having to beg borrow and steal the tools to fix her up to get us back to kent!  It was tatty but i loved it, well we all loved it! lol

My now mother in law bought it off of me as i bought a brand new car and she moaned about it constantly saying what a heap it was. It was a heap but it was my heap. She sadly 'upgraded' to a vectra and sold it off cheap to a friend who scrapped it soon after.

 

I got into old Mercs a couple of years later after seeing that my neighbour was selling a 190E. I had just split up with my ex, and for the first time in years despite great friends i really felt alone and this car really cheered me up. There was something about it that just caught on. It looked like it needed love as it was tatty and uncared for (bit like me lol)

Here she is.

 

 

That picture was taken after i had done some work to it and it was virtually mint by the time i sold it. I regretted it immediately and spent the next 6 months driving round looking for it. Sadly it disappeared off of the DVLA's website soon after that     

 

That was that, i had to have another one so after about 2 hours searching, i found a clean 190E with  the perfect combo of a 2.6 straight 6 engine with manual box. What a fantastic car to drive and bloody powerful too!

Here he is

 

 

That was taken the day of my mum's wedding so it meant alot using it as her wedding car. I had ALOT of fun in this car. It was a real sleeper, it would show up most things on the road despite its weight!

Everyone used to tease me as it had grey MB tex interior (bit like vinyl) and high suspension and so was fondly called grandads car.

 

In the end, i wanted low and mean so the decision came to lower it and fit a cosworth bodykit etc so the hunt started and in my search for parts, this came up

 

 

So £800 later it was mine and the 2.6 went up for sale. A local chap bought it promising me it would go to a good home. Little did i know his plans....

 

A few weeks later, he e-mailed me a youtube link and when i watched it, my beloved car was hammering sideways round a race track, stripped right out. Thats right, he turned it into a drift car. I was mortified..

 

Still, i started making the green one my own by slowly improving it. We went on a road trip to somerset to pick up a cream leather interior for it and then in the time that followed, it had 3 different sets of wheels, several different grilles, different lights, and ended up staying like this for a while.

 

 

Then like this....

 

 

Then a bad front end smash which i rebuilt and then another change of wheels before it finished up looking like this.

 

  

 

It moved to the isle of wight with me and i continued to look after it but circumstances changed so i had to sell. I was insanely jealous of the bloke that bought it. I actually felt angry watching him drive away in it.

I know it is still on the road now but no idea where. I would love to own it again. It was unique to me as i never saw or heard of another anywhere in that colour (nichtgrund)

 

The main success was my Mini 25 which i bought and sold more times than i care to remember over the 15 years i have known it. I own it again now and it's not going anywhere!

 

One last sad one for me was this. Ill end it with a picture but it was a project that ended up being scrapped by my uncle because it was at his place and one day he decided he didn't have the room for it so rather than ask me to move it, he scrapped it from under my nose. But that was a long time ago so bygones and all that. lol

 

 

Ben

[zinzan]

Wish I had my dad's '78 Civic hatch that he drove for years.  Metallic gold paint and classic 70s vinyl inside.  That thing just ran and ran and ran for so long and drove us all over the place as kids.  Like most 70s Japanese cars, it succumbed to Canadian winter road salt eventually.  He eventually traded it in on something...a late 80s Mazda pickup I think.

 

Like this:

[will_]

My EP3 Type R that I owned 4 years ago.
It was a low owner car, with low miles and it was perfect. I did 20k miles in it, tracked it and it never missed a beat. Much more lively than the FN2 Type R I've got now.

Here it is at Retro Rides Prescot Hill Climb

[Tamworthbay]

Three for me, first Capri KMG282W, first mini YAU930S and my 944 ANZ8640. Plus loads of motorbikes.

[Daviewonder]

1976 Clubman in Tahiti blue with a 1380 engine and Cherry Bomb exhaust. I swapped it for an Mi16 engine but the guy never dropped the engine round  

[Black.Ghost]

When I was younger and before I was into cars, my great grandad passed away. He had a Mk2 Ford Escort that he had for years and years. Right up until he died, he did pretty much everything on that car he was physically able to do. It was original and immaculate. It got left to my mum when he passed, and it remained parked up next to our house. She used it for a bit and it was great. But then it got left and left, and in the end she sold it for not very much money at all. 

 

At the time, I was only 16 or so and not really into cars, and I didn't even take my test until I was 23 in the end. But I so wish that she had never sold it, and that I could have had it. Not only was it extremely cool in a brilliant red colour, it had been in my family for years. Devastated.

 

My mum also had a 405 in pale blue. Not a nice car at all, but I quite liked it for some reason. The clutch went or something, so it sat doing nothing for a while and she got something else. Then a couple of windows got smashed by some pikey kids in the area and it went off to a scrap yard I believe. 

 

She also claims she had a Minivan when she was much younger. We had a Montego and my aunt had a Maestro. At the time, not really interested but I wish we still had a lot of the old cars now. 

 

Personally, I wish I still had my first Mini, a silver 998 Mayfair, rusted to bits, smelt amazing and cost me £270 on ebay in 2007 I think it was. My mate suggested I get a Mini and I am glad he did because that is what got me into them. I left it on an army camp and it stayed there for years. They even built new accomodation blocks, and just fenced it in to do the work. It was eventually taken away though I went back to the camp to enquire about it, and it was too late. 

 

I love old cars. They are so cool, and I would love to own more but the gf wont let me. And I don't have the space. Or the money. Or if I am honest with myself, the skills to maintain and rebuild them all. I can dream though and tinker. 

[M J W J]

My mk3 astra merit diesel. It was a £400 banger but with the suspension mods I had done to it, it was great to throw around. I only got rid of it when the engine went bang on me in Stoke.

 

(looking unusually clean in this picture)

 

I was toying around with the idea of dropping a z19dth engine from a vectra C on a Saab FM57 gearbox into it to make a sleeper but just didn't have the time or the money at the time and I didn't have the space to keep it so it had to go. 150 bhp diesel mk3 astra though would have been nice. Hmmmm...

 

It already had GSI suspension under it so it would have been able to handle the power (mk3 GSI petrol was 148 bhp). It would have just looked like an astra merit. I may build one one day when I have the chance.

[Daviewonder]

My Dad had one of these but got rid of it as the sills were starting to show signs of rust-

 

 

 

 

Wish I knew then what I know now!!

[The Matt]

Too many, far too many.  Unfortunately I don't have pictures of most of them.

 

The 205 GTI I sold this January.  BIG mistake. I miss it so much now. 

 

 

 

My MK2 XR2 was a blast for an 18 year old.  Bored out to 1760 (I think) Burton head and a different Weber on it, with a Piper camshaft.  Went like stink until I got rear-ended turning in the drive.  RIP D702 MWW

 

 

Then there was the 'Rocco.  I'm SO gutted that I sold it.  MK2 Scirocco GT2. My first ever European road trip, my first lap of the 'ring, the first time I spent away on holiday with the amazing Bec. So many amazing times in that car!  It was immaculate too.

 

 

 

 

Random picture:

 

 

 

I also really had to confess to my chav period, I LOVED my Megane Coupe:

 

 

 

Random picture I found on photobucket:

 

 

 

My first Mini, RUF 779V.  Loved it, little black HL 998 with suede seat covers  You never forget your first one!

[Daviewonder]

Too many, far too many.  Unfortunately I don't have pictures of most of them.
 
The 205 GTI I sold this January.  BIG mistake. I miss it so much now. 
 

At least it went to a good home. It's looking pretty mint these days.

[The Matt]

I know, he's worked absolute wonders with it.  It looks amazing now, like it's just come out of the factory!

[Black.Ghost]

Matt, I remember that Scirocco - that was my first Euro road trip as well - and 4 months later I was posted to Germany and lived there for 4 years and 10 months. Got used to driving in Germany after that. There were some great cars on that trip. I remember Minimanpie's Metro chucking smoke everywhere, The Stig in the Hearse, a couple of pretty cool drift cars. A great trip. Loved lapping the Ring in the little Cooper. 

[henri1972]

really wished i still had this spent 15k restoring this sold it to commit suicide ie got married was not bad it knocked down three garages before i bought it

 

Edited by henri1972, 08 July 2014 - 07:57 PM.

[Mini Manannán]

My first mini, a '63  I bought when I passed my test two months after my 16th birthday.  Just wish I'd had more mechanical sympathy in those days!