[Closed] What was your first car?

a 1974 Mini 1000 in dark green

A Jetta GTI 16V, twas a flying machine.

First one I bought was a mk 2 GTE ('89)

I chuffing loved that car until it exploded in a fireball at the bottom of Telegraph hill (by a bike shop IIRC!)

First car owned was a Renault 20TL auto, a 1978 bought in 1985.

Paid £100 as the seller (my landlord at the time) was picking up a new car and needed £99 for the deposit.

First car driven on passing my test at 17 y/o was a brand new Renault 5 GTL - my Dad worked for them and he got two new company cars every six months. Drove a Fuego at 18 y/o. 🙂

MX5 (1990) was the first car I owned (First car I had use of was my wife-to-be's car which was a Pug 205)

P reg Austin Maxi !

Old version P reg 😀

68 mk1 escort

Mark 4 Ford Cortina Ghia. Light metallic blue with black vynal roof. 2.3 V6 converted to manual shift.

A beautiful 1970 series 11a swb landrover in light blue called Wendolene *sigh*

1981 Austin mini Metro. Resprayed by my cousin in pearlescent black, with gold painted wheels and a gold pin stripe. Mini Cooper steering wheel and rallye spot lights.
Looked awesome ish. Was still shit.

A Citroen GSA .

Bloody loved that car and it's flat four , air cooled engine.

Mk2 Morris mini MNW963F it's still on the road although now black not the original tartan red.

Ford Capri Mk3 1.6. so many great memories in that car and all my old mates seem to remember it well too. Keep thinking of getting another to restore but silly prices now, probably best kept in memory lane.

Toyota Carina MK1

One of these. Just realised how much I miss that car. Wrote it off within a month by driving into a ditch.

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Vauxhall Chevette 1.3, originally silver, silvery-grey with a black smoothrite lower by the time I'd finished with it. Cost me £50, got £30 back for scrap.

1978 Ford fiesta, in mucky cream with a brown roof!! Bleeding aweful car, absolute bag of shite, but I loved it!!

Bought in 1995 for £150.

Triumph spitfire and ive still got it.

My first "car".

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Not mine but it was this colour. Bought it when I set myself up in business aged 22. Unfortunately it was stolen a few months later and burnt out. I was gutted as it was followed by a succession of Ford Sierra's and Escorts for the next 10 years.

This gorgeous piece of work. Only mine was a four-door.

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A 1981 Pontiac Le Mans, for those who didn't grow up in North America.

1963 Mini reg AAW 681A. Tuned 1140 block, de-seamed, fibreglass front, buckets. Best bit was hi-low beam switch was in the middle of the floor and my passenger could operate it for me. Loved that car.

1981 Mk3 Ford Escort 1.3L bought in '91 after I passed my test.
I wrote it off 6 months later.

Mk2 Escort 1.3L in beige. After 6 months it got an Italian designed nose, after I drove into the back of a Fiat 127. I never got it repaired and eventually sold it on in a non running condition as the piston rings were jiggered.

A mini pick up, got it whilst a post grad student having just passed my test. It opened up a world of mountain biking possibilities not just for me but a group of riders who worked at Robin Williamson Cycles in Edinburgh. I'd would take the bikes and one passenger, Leffeboy took the others in his Austin Allegro with the BMW M badge on the boot.

Austin 1300 Super deluxe in a sort of yukky tan colour. The spedo was like a horizontal thermometer thing with a red ribbon that grew longer the faster I drove. Turning on all the electrics caused the wiring loom under the dash to melt, to the consternation of the passengers in the back as I drove up the Llanberis pass in the rain and fog on honeymoon.

Eventually died from too much filler and not enough metal.

Fiat strada 65cl for £120, like this

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very random electrics and not much to recommend it

I should add the original stereo in my car, above, was a Delco 8-Track player. 8-tracks in the car = 8)

Mk2 Escort 1.3L in beige.

High-five to a fellow beige MK2 Escort owner 😀

RWD, which was fun in the wet and in gravel carparks!

A reg Fiesta in BRG with pepper pot alloys. Just the smell of a Forest Fresh Magic Tree and I'm back parked up in a country lane. 😉 😉 😉 😉

In 1989 I bought a 1979 MK3 Ford Capri 1.6L.

Beige with low back beige tartan seats.

I can remember the reg number of every car I've ever owned for some reason. This one was TWM148V

My eldest brother had a Capri 2.8i at the time and I thought "well, it must be a bit the same". Er, no.

Mk2 Golf GTi 16v - it went downhill from there really.

Peugeot 405 with no power steering.

Metro Gti 16v. It was a go kart and I loved it.
Then got several minis including a 1275gt with mg metro turbo engine.
Now I have a Dacia Duster. I miss fun cars.

One of these bad boys in burgundy
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Very dull but reliable, roomy and would take camping kit and bikes for 2

Mogrim, I loved mine but it was pretty gutless. Sustaining momentum was the order of the day. I thought it handled well, but corners that felt dangerous in those days, are easily lapped up by today's cars.

White Fiesta XR2 (F reg)

I would really really like another (mid life crisis) however I've seen what mint ones go for...

Aerodeck?

Not mine but one of these Capri Cabaret II 1.6. It was written off in the Great Flood of Saltcoats and I bought it back off the insurance (it was maw and paw's). Never got round to drying out the back seat( passengers sat on black bags) and the electrics gradually failed one after the other.

My first drive in the dark after passing my test was a nightmare as I couldn't see a thing, unbeknown to me for a week the main beam didn't work and all I had was sidelights and full beam. I assumed it was normal, terrifying but normal!
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Mogrim, I loved mine but it was pretty gutless. Sustaining momentum was the order of the day. I thought it handled well, but corners that felt dangerous in those days, are easily lapped up by today's cars.

I think mine was a 1.6, which didn't go too badly, but you're 100% right about the corners!

A silver E-reg 1L Mini Metro left in my grandma's will to me and my younger brother. Actually went ok, you could fit a couple of bikes in the back, or lug four idiots and their stuff to a festival and back and only have to stop to cool the engine down occasionally. It only broke down once, but very memorably, when the wiring loom caught fire in the fast lane of the M1 filling the car with black smoke and nearly killing me, that was fun.

Still, I looked after that car carefully for two years before I left for university. Then my brother smashed it through a drystone wall and wrote it off, the little git.

MK1 Mini, then a MK2 Mini that was completely spaceframed with a 1480 full steel motor and twin 40DCOES and a one off hand ground cam.
Spitfire MK4, Avenger Tiger then a Marina 1800TC, then an ex-factory Hillman Imp with god knows what engine in it - had to get it serviced by an very old guy in a shed in Meriden who used to work in the R&D dept at BL as no-one else knew what the hell it was! That went to the same guy that bought the MK2 Mini (both are still going now and that was 1988!)
124, Montego Turbo, then a MK1 Mini that had been raced/rallied with full provenance which I was offered an obscene amount for so got a 5 Turbo that had been "played with".
Nothing "hot" since coming back from spain though. Although there will be either a 135i or a MK6 R sitting in the driveway soon...

Full beast/pimp mode.

Ain't she gorgeous!

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Best thing was at the time my old man had an any car/any driver policy so it cost my nothing to insure, 2.3 5 cylinder awesomeness!!

Mini Clubman in bright orange with full length canvas sunroof.
Was probably rubbish but everyone loves their first bit of freedom on the road don't they?

One of these beasts.

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Silver with an orange velour interior.

Mk1 Polo Coupe

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Always thought it looked like biut like a Golf GTi but without the insurance problems in the mid 90s. Obviously also without the performance.

My first car was a golf gti mk3 8 valve.

One of these bad boys.
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Amazing to see just how much glass those 70s/80s cars had, compared to the massive a-pillars modern cars have!

Mk 1.5 Focus diesel estate. Well, I was almost 30 when I got it. Sold it on when the clutch slave went but it was ace.

1990 Citroen AX GT Sportif in black. Well several shades of black from the many repairs it had over there years.

Lasted 6 months then was replaced with a mint 92 AX GTi in white, I miss that car (with rose tinted glasses no doubt).

One of these, it was also my first company car.. G reg, if you can remember that far back.

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A s*** one, that needed nearly all the brakes replacing, plus one safety recall, plus at least one warranty repair, plus lambda sensor replacement, plus... all before the first MOT.

More commonly known as a Peugeot 306 1.4

Did have use of a Massey Ferguson before that, but I call that a company car.

That's a MK2 Graham.

S Reg Allegro Estate in '88.

Brakes failed going down the Mound in Edinburgh - that woke me up!

850cc mini RYS222W (says something that I can remember that 23 Years on when I can't remember many later ones).

Went round corners like it was on rails but showed its limitations on climbing trips. I remember going up onto Rannoch Moor in 1st gear with 4 of us in it bound for Ben Nevis.

Good memories.

My first car was a knackered mini. Got it when I was 14 as a "project". It never rand and was ignominiously scrapped a few years later

First working car was red mk2 VW Golf 1.3 (4 speed!) loved that car.

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Replaced it with a golf driver when I could afford the insurance.

One of these in shitty brown. Affectionally know as the Scud.

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A slightly different colour one of these, minus the thingy on the roof.
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NPL 15D (33 years ago 🙂 )

1965 mini van which in 1971 got my brother and I, two slalom canoes and camping gear to Italy and back via the Simplon Pass and Grand St Bernard's Pass. To keep the engine cool on the passes we raised the bonnet six inches and this was just enough to stop the engine boiling.

Not mine, but just like this...

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Made me think that - what 18 year old would drive a car as old as they are these days??!

An Austin 1100. Can't recall the year, mid 60s I think.

First 'legal car' after passing my test on my 17th birthday was a talbot solara (similar to below), given to me by my gran but i only had it 3 weeks as i bought a tatty 1275gt mini from my workplace back in 1989 (apprentice mechanic at a rover dealer).

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The very first car i owned (not legal at age 14) was a mk2 escort mexico that i got free from a neighbour as he stove the entire rear end in after crashing it driving back from the pub drunk, there was not a straight panel left on it, we lived in Dalavich on the shores of loch awe (deepest/darkest argyll) and i used it to hoon about the miles n' miles of forest roads but it was quite a handful as the entire car was rather twisted and the propshaft used to bounce off the transmission tunnel. Cracking fun though, especially on the forest roads.

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Made me think that - what 18 year old would drive a car as old as they are these days??!

Noticed that myself too and not in a 'different in my day' thing. Sure, there are a few driving older cars, but sooo many are all pootling about in either '£5k loan' cars or (leased?) new cars.

Dunno why.

1968 Mini traveler , 850cc I think . Complete with moss in the sliding window channels . I paid £50.00 with nearly a years mot and sold it for scrap when the mot ran out - for £50.00 🙂

Ford Anglia.
Reg number 1377 AT
Flat as Olive oils chest.

Mk1 Ford Escort 1.3l. It had a metal steering wheel that got really really hot in the sun 😯

When that died I bought a Hillman Imp California. 🙂

Nova merit 1.3 🙂 lasted a surprisingly long time

Something very similar to this. 3.5 litres of Buick petrol drinking goodness.

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A handpainted escort Mk1 Van 🙂

Mini. Pre reg number suffix. 1100 engine, 165\70\10 tyres on white 8 spokes. No arch extensions so it was always filthy. Dark green with white roof apart from the biggest folding sun roof ever. Dash had a plastic rally type fascia with extended switches and some duplicated for passenger.

I had something pretty much identical to this, complete with rust and welded sills. Fiesta 1.1 Popular. Almost 20 years ago now and I still have a deeply ingrained hatred for Fords because of that car, yet still secretly yearn for an XR2.

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I also had a mk2. 87 1.1 L. Unlike the pop it had the higher spec dash. Banged some pepperpot on, xr2 spoiler. Thought it was the tits.

Didn't get my first car until I was 34ish, still got it 8 years later. Volvo V40.

Had company cars / drove parents, wifes car before that. Learnt to drive in mums Mini 1000 registration AXI 8010.

SJM910S

That was my first car, A Triumph Spitfire 1500 with Overdrive.

It was great fun , but also the most efficient producer of rust known to man.

Still miss it though 🙁

Looked like this, but with rust, lots of rust!
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But unlike you butcher I love Ford's. Currently driving a Mondeo and a fiesta St.

A Triumph Spitfire 1500 with Overdrive

I has one in Blue, 1275cc IIRC. Good fun but built out of paper mache