• the Daily hi thread just say hi :)
  • All contentious threads including politics, religion, crime, immigration, laws, elections etc are banned & will be removed. There is still a Gun Related Politics section for relevant topics.

Sh!tboxes/bangers for first cars…

Attempting accuracy

Attempting accuracy

Member Extraordinaire
Joined
Nov 13, 2022
Messages
1,299
Reaction score
3,140
Location
Sunny Berkshire
The Allegro post in”They don’t exist anymore really” prompted this:
First car a ford escort mk 2 pop plus= no two panels the same colour and obligatory filler in wheelarch.
Second a mini clubman who’s subframe was twisted
Third was an SA 1275 mini whose 1st gear had died.
Various cars after BUT kids today don’t really have a banger first car. You know the type: where you approach roundabouts lifting the handbrake whilst keeping the revs up as you know it’ll stall if you leave it at idle with foot on the brakes. Or fan on max heat and cabin blast (with windows down) in the summer to stop the engine overheating 🥵
GF’s kids first cars a 17 and a 19 plate.
I reckon kids today lose a lot in driving skills as a result!
It can’t just be me that had bangers surely?
 
My first car was also a 1.1L Ford Escort Mk2 Pop in signal green :sick:, rear wheel arches were reconstructed with chicken wire and plastic padding, drove it for about 12 months before someone reversed into it in a Tesco car park, they only just touched it but the valance came away from both front wings due to rot, and it was scrapped shortly after.

I also had an orange Austin Allegro 🤮, my excuse is that I brought a brand new Kawasaki GPZ 500S which was my only form of transport for a year and I had to commute from Northampton to Leicester everyday, after riding through one winter on a bike in all weather, I swore I'd wouldn't do it again, but all I could afford on 4 wheels was the Allegro 🤫
 
My first car “on the road “was a Ford capri that was previously owned by my father and his father “my grandfather “ prior
I did have a mk2 escort harrier at 16 parked on my parents drive but never managed to get it on the road
Them were the days when if you drove 70mph you could feel it and new about it 😂
 
Lol, nope not just you mate. (y)
First few cars I had were all bangers, as its all we could afford.
1st car was a Ford Anglia 1100E, sat so long outside my Mums house the brakes seized!
Sold it for scrap in the end....
2nd car was a Mk2 Ford Escort 1100, lasted six months till the engine sh*t itself.... Me and my brothers stuck a1300 Cortina engine in it.
3rd Car was a Mini Clubman, loved that thing, it was a bit of a nail but it looked the biz. Drove to the coast in it once and had to stop every 15 mins to clean the spark plugs, Lol!
Also had a minger of a Fiesta XR2, bought it all wrong, at night, so it was dark, raining, so could not see what paint was like and miles away from home after seeing many other cars, so under pressure to "just buy something".... turned out to be absolutely shagged, needed loads of welding, engine smoked like a Navvy, went through oil like nobody's business, etc, etc and lasted about 9 months before we got rid.
Yet the young'ns today think they are hard done by if they can't have a brand new car on finance? Homer face palm
 
I don't think we had a "decent" car until about our 10th I reckon? a Nice four year old mk5 Escort, our first car that had "velour" seats and electric windows (front only) and a sunroof, bloody luxury. Four years old but we thought it was like new!!! Lol
 
pjgtech said:
I don't think we had a "decent" car until about our 10th I reckon? a Nice four year old mk5 Escort, our first car that had "velour" seats and electric windows (front only) and a sunroof, bloody luxury. Four years old but we thought it was like new!!! Lol
Click to expand...
I made same mistake buying an XR2 in the dark and rain ,Next day I realised it was crash damaged and terrible paintwork
But i did have some nice cars xr3/xr3i /golf gti’s and golf gti 16v big bumper’s etc
In them days car theft and high insurance costs killed the hot hatch secondhand market.
you could pick up nice hot hatches for peanuts but insurance was a fortune,…
 
Reliant supervan because I could drive it on my bike licence, bought it at Friday tee time and went out to the pub in it that night, with my mates in the back shouting instructions! I taught myself to drive in it then when I passed my test my first real car was a Triumph 2000. The Triumph had been owned from new by an elderly neighbour who polished it every Sunday, he sold it because he'd just bought a new Acclaim.
 
Hillmam imp with 2 fitted mole grips to wind down the front windows, and for some reason the quicker you drove in the rain the faster the windscreen wipers worked, think it also had a foot operated pump to work the screenwashers, written off in a rear end shunt from a ford capri.
Didn't have to slow down for corners though!
 
I was a biker and was into the full biker scene, rallies, run's, partying, first car was a Bright orange 1975 Morris Marina 1300 Super, anything with 4 wheels was just to carry bike bits in. The driver's seat went through the floor, so I drove at a slant for a while until we could weld a panel in it. Whilst driving down the motorway, I saw some bits behind me, never thought about it until I got home and opened the boot and could the road through the boot floor, it was my tools falling out behind us that I had seen.

Coming back from Wales on the motorway in a very bad summer storm with the wipers on full, I could hardly see anything then the entire drivers' windscreen wiper came off, I had to stick my head out the window to see to pull over, I removed the passenger wiper and fitted it on the drivers side to get us home, my girlfriend was laughing so hard, by the time I finished I looked like I had been swimming.
Reverse gear went, I drove it for 6 months without reverse, once in a car park I was pushing it out of the parking space and about 4 blokes ran over "we will give you a hand to get it started mate" came the offer, I then explained it was already running but didn't have reverse gear they thought that was highly amusing.
 
First car was a Nissan 100a coupe. Black plastic seats that removed your flesh in summer and freezing cold in winter.

Wings were held together with masking tape and rust cure then white spray paint.

£500 seemed like a fortune in 1983
PVK 729S iirc

IMG_3048.png

Second was a beautiful beige / yellow Vauxhall chevette - strangely can’t recall price or reg nbr - that’s how memorable it was 😂

IMG_3049.png
 
TonySTS said:
Second was a beautiful beige / yellow Vauxhall chevette - strangely can’t recall price or reg nbr - that’s how memorable it was 😂

View attachment 815740
Click to expand...

I worked on them brand new in my first job at a Vauxhall dealer garage! When you were fitting the rear number plate, you were supposed to take the spare wheel out of the boot so you didn't accidently drill a screw hole into the tyre. Lets just say a non-zero number of them went out with a puncture because we couldn't always be arsed to take the wheel out....
 
First car was a second hand Mk3 Capri 1.3L in Radiant Red. Severely underpowered, struggled to go uphill without putting your foot down early. Steering so heavy, there was no need for a Bullworker (remember the adverts for these)! Bought it at the Ford outlet in Dagenham, where an old school mate worked back in 1984, who sold it to me for £1100

A year later, that same schoolmate let me trade it in (for £1100)! for a 1.6 Ford Capri Calypso, which cost me £3600 secondhand.
<<<<< See left
I kept this until around 1990 when I got a company car (a Ford Escort).
 
First I drove as a daily was a Mini 24 (girlfriend’ s cast off) for a few years.

Door skins gone at the bottom held in place with insulating tape. Bubbling at every seam. Headlamps fell forward and dangled on the wires under heavy braking (rotten wings). Spluttered to a halt in the rain - WD40 in the distributor got her going. Loads of botched (by me) filler repairs - couldn’t afford to cut the rust out. K&N was inside the car on a modded manifold (came through the old centre clock bulkhead). Sucked the air out of the cabin at higher speeds.

Loved it.

First I owned was a 1973 GT6 - similar issues until it died, but doesn’t count as a sh!tbox/banger.

Wait - neither does the Mini. Loved them both and great memories.
 
I started my love affairs with engines-and-wheels from an early age.
Being too young to drive (10) on the roads, I had several motorbikes - mostly costing less than five quid - which were hacked around fields (with permission) . . . It was a different era over 60 years ago.

My first car wasn't exactly a crappy old banger, but by the time I was 18, I realised I could attract more girls with a car than I could ever hope to achieve with a motorbike. .
It was a 1965 Mk.1 Mini Cooper "S" 1275. . I loved that car. It was such good fun to drive, but it was yet another British car which could rust for England. . . After it failed its MOT miserably due to rot, I took the engine/gearbox out and fitted it into a 1967 Mk.1 "S" which I bought from a chap who had blown up his engine and wanted to get rid of it cheaply (a hundred quid) . . . . More happy miles of motoring. :love:

These cars are now classics and are fetching ridiculously strong (telephone numbers) money. . I am glad I enjoyed them when they were cheap.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top