Show me your most memorable car.

[pistonpopper]

So here's the game people, as the title says, show me your most memorable car. It doesn't have to be the fastest, the most comfy, the most powerful, the prettiest, or even the best, but it must be a car that you've actually owned. It doesn't even really have to be the one you liked the most, just the one that lingers in your memory for some reason. If you have more than one memorable car, like most of us do, pick the one that is the most memorable, and post the picture of that one. Also, write a little bit of blurb saying why you've chosen that particular car as your most memorable car. So c'mon people, show me your most memorable car and tell me about it. As it's my game i'll get the ball rolling and lead off with this...

[pistonpopper]

1979 Chrysler Alpine.



As you can see, this is not the most beautiful specimen of the Chrysler Alpine, but it was my first one. It wasn't my first car though, that was a very rusty Ford Mk2 Escort van which dissolved faster than anything i've ever had! So why did i chose this as my most memorable car? Well, i learned a lot from that car, this picture was taken about 1989, so the car is only ten years old at this point, and by now it had had a very hard life. It was bought for me by my Dad for managing to finally pass my driving test, it cost him just £200, and it was immaculate inside and out, and ran like a dream! Being a stroppy teenager i was very un-impressed by this car, and hated it! What i really wanted was a Mk3 Escort van, but at the time they were still quite pricey. Anyway i begrudgingly took the keys and proceeded to drive it like i stole it everywhere. As it was my first car, it taught me a lot about all sorts of things. It taught me about friends, and how when you're 20 years old with a car suddenly you have lots of friends, and these friends are not all your friends. My car was always full of friends, people who i knew and trusted. Then, one day i was cleaning out all the rubbish that my friends had left in my car and i noticed that in the back the back of the front seats had been cut in several places with a stanley knife, and so had the back seats, and the door cards. I was completely shocked by this, and asked several of my friends who had been recently riding in the back of my car, nobody knew anything about it. This brought about a swift change in my social status as i decided that from that moment on, no one went in the back of my car, infact, from then on it just as well have only had two seats. It turned out that by not letting loads of people into my car, i was billy no mates! Still, no matter, by ditching the idiots who i thought were my friends i gained something else, a girlfriend, WooHoooo! The learning curve continued! But not only did i learn about social skills from having that car, i picked up basic mechanical knowledge through driving it like an idiot, and fixing with with my Dad, who would tell me all the time that if i didn't drive it like an idiot all week, i wouldn't spend all weekend fixing it again! I also learned about power to weight ratios in it, and by stripping absolutely everything out it would accelerate faster. But in doing this it made it noisy, uncomfortable, and in the winter, cold. It would also make my girlfriend complain, and then leave me. I also learned that there is a way to talk to Police officers, and a way to not talk to them, and i learned that some of them are pretty cool, were young once too, and were into cars and bikes as much as i was. This car also taught me that car accidents, even ones that are minor are bad, and hitting a Volvo 240 head on is not going to end well, especially if it happens to be a police car, even if the police car happens to be on the wrong side of the road on a blind bend! It was not good, but we both walked away from it unscathed, although the front of my Alpine was peeled back like a banana exposing the engine and front suspension! My Dad and i also learned basic bodywork from this episode in the cars life getting it back on the road about a year after the accident by visiting scrapyards every week, cutting off parts from scrapped Alpines, and welding them back onto mine which was why it's so many colours in the photo. I also learned that no matter how cool i thought painting a confederate flag onto the roof of my Alpine was, this did not make it a Dodge Charger, i was not Luke Duke, and there was no way on earth i was ever going to get a girl like Daisy Duke! I drove it for another year in this guise until about 1992 when i took it off the road to complete the restoration, it's still in my garage now, waiting patiently!

Of course i have had better cars since then, cars that were bigger, more comfy, faster, and cooler. But it's this little Chrysler that i still hear clattering through my mind, it's engine rattling like a sack full of rusty spanners! I've even had other Alpines, five other Alpines to be precise, my 1985 Beige one currently still in my custodianship and starring in the Readers Rides section somewhere even now, but its the original one that taught me the most, not just about car stuff, about other 'life type' stuff too. Yep, i learned a lot from that little car, and for that, i salute it!!

[retrorob86]

1991 Peugeot 205 1.9 GTI



This is my favourite car. I bought after taking a detour on my way home from work one day and spotting it on someone's drive for sale. My first car was a 205 1.1 and I remember then always wanting the GTI. I owned the car for nearly 2 years. I only sold it as my wife was pregnant with our eldest child and we needed a sensible family car. I still remember the day the guy who bought it picked it up, I had taken it out for one last drive and given it one last wash for him. He even said to me as I handed over the keys you really don't want to get rid of this do you. I still drop into conversation with my wife now about her making me sell it lol

*edit to mention it was because of this car me and the wife became an item

[WheelsonCanvas]

Easy, that one.

As bought in 1998:



2009, just before I had to sell it:



The heart of the beast, fully rebuilt 440 six pack motor:



I'd wanted one of these since the first time I saw Christine when I was about 10. Went to Steel City Cruisers show in '97, got absolutely spannered on the Saturday, then saw this on a for sale board on Sunday.

Slight problem - didn't have a penny. So went home and put everything I owned up for sale (including my vinyl collection, which I still regret.)

Car landed in the February and work started in the Summer. Fannied on and changed my mind countless times, and learned a very valuable lesson - if I'd stuck to plan A, I'd probably still have the car.

Anyway, got painted in 2009, blew my brains out and completely skinted myself, p!ssed my wife off, p!ssed my boss off, then one night just thought 'this is too much. it has to go.' So it did, to Belgium. Last I heard it was still sitting in the guy's garage unfinished.

The whole disastrous mess put me off for a few years; didn't go to shows, cancelled all my mag subscriptions, stopped trawling the net. Only got back into things a couple of years ago and I'll know better than to overstretch myself this time. One of these days, and it might take a Lottery win, I'll own another Plymouth, but I'll use my brain this time.

[chairchild]

Rover 220SD - no other description needed




small vid of the exhaust

[steptoeshaw]

My Rover that my dad bought brand new in 1980.


Given to me in the late 90's



Needed more work than you can imagine.

Kept at it




Still got it. My dad is proud but keeps nagging me as is not finished yet.

[WheelsonCanvas]

Well done for keeping it!

[retrolegends]

This, still miss it now 15 years after I sold it.
Rebuilt it from a rusty old dog, fitted a top spec head and a straight through exhaust, found some rostyles in a scrap yard and lovingly repainted them after having them powder coated and then took it sprinting on the stock suspension at Curborough, an absolute bloody scream! Long before Avengers were regarded as the classics they are now, people thought I was nuts but I loved it!

[Ryannn]

924, EAC 928Y



My first ever RWD car, and although I didn't drive it as much as other cars I've had, it was far more fun! I have an awful feeling it doesn't exist anymore after I found it on eBay in a container as a non runner recently and I had no money

[craig1010cc]

I'd have to go with my first mx5

[pOG]

This.
1984 Skoda Estelle in 'Autumn Gold' (aka poorly poo).
I was 17 years old, and my dad had just bought a nearly-new Favorit, and as I was moments away from passing my test, I inherited this £200 chunk of Czechoslovakian Chod.
It was slow, curse word and vaguely embarassing, but screw it, it was a car, my car, 4-wheeled freedom.
And needless to say the combination of Actually Having a Car, being devilishly handsome*, witty & charming meant that the interior bore witness to several 'happy times' in the company of assorted FEMALES.

[nofrills]

for me it was a Modern. I was 21, my orion 1.6 ghia (non injection had cost me a fortune, and I needed a reliable car for work) was starting to show its age and I just could not find the time to fix it, I decided to buy a brand new car on finance and take my orion off the road for a light resto. I parked my orion on my parents drive so I could work on it. After 6 months of owning my modern I absolutely loved it, I started to spend money on mods, lowering it, different wheels, different exhuast's, and different front seats. I loved my Fiat Punto Sporting 1.2 16v, it was quick (not top end) and very nimble and felt so well balanced. 6 months on my orion was still in the same place having not turned a wheel and my parents were getting angry about it so I relunctantly put it up for sale and sold it for £470 in Feb 2002. My then girlfriend (now my wife of 11 years) also owned the same car as me and we had decided to try and buy our own place. In March 2002 we managed to buy a flat I was 22 and my girlfriend was 19. The punto's both got more mods and were both at different shows all over the country. We then moved into a house in 2003 with a garage (I could now play with my car properly) it was brilliant, after a year we got married and then before our 1st wedding anniversary we had our eldest daughter. Just before she was born I was forced to sell my car to finish the house refurb, My lovely mint Fiat Punto Sporting with 11,000 miles on the clock was put up for sale and sold after just 1 week for £5k, it is to this day the only car I have cried over selling, some people will say "it was only a modern euro box, plenty more out there" but to me, it was a part of me, part of my identity, I learned alot more with that car than any other, and made some life long friends and strangely 4 of my closest friends that I met with that car and because of that car now live within a 5 minute bike ride, the car opened me up to the whole world of car shows, and meeting people and experiencing new things, my punto was even used in a Kiss FM advert in 2003, that was a late night in Camden for a photoshoot. Still miss that car to this day, infact tomorrow is the 10 year anniversary since I sold it (sad that I remember that date isn't it).

[SmokeEm]

I can't decide between these..

My 1st Capri - Bone stock apart from Janspeed system



My 2.1 Highly modded Laser (Still in the family garage with 302 V8 fitted)



Or.. One of the 1st half dozen or so cars after I passed my test late 87

Willys fronted, chopped, couped Moggy fitted with full race 1098 on single 40DCOE.



Learnt a lot on the moggy such as...

Spray window tint is just not an option
Having perspex as a windscreen is not only illegal, it just isn't clever
When the door latches decide to fail, a gate shoot bolt works in its place..
And finally....

The wipers on road traffic cameras are a perfect fit.....

[LAndy]

My mk2 Scirocco.



I loved that car and had some great times in it.
It also was the first car I did alot of work on both body wise and mechanical.

[dbizzle]

This piece of curse word.

13-03-2011 17;09;22 by dbizzle_, on Flickr

My first car, bought in 1999 for £225. Where it all started. Everyone fondly remembers their first car, right? No matter how terrible or explodey they may have been...

[dazcapri]

May 26, 2015 20:21:08 GMT WheelsonCanvas said:

Easy, that one.

As bought in 1998:



2009, just before I had to sell it:



The heart of the beast, fully rebuilt 440 six pack motor:



I remember seeing that somewhere was it Pottsy's place before he emigrated?

[WheelsonCanvas]

Yeah it was.

[Battenberg]

May 26, 2015 19:46:00 GMT pistonpopper said:

So here's the game people, as the title says, show me your most memorable car. It doesn't have to be the fastest, the most comfy, the most powerful, the prettiest, or even the best, but it must be a car that you've actually owned. It doesn't even really have to be the one you liked the most, just the one that lingers in your memory for some reason. If you have more than one memorable car, like most of us do, pick the one that is the most memorable, and post the picture of that one. Also, write a little bit of blurb saying why you've chosen that particular car as your most memorable car. So c'mon people, show me your most memorable car and tell me about it. As it's my game i'll get the ball rolling and lead off with this...

This a really cool thread, lots of people bearing souls and emotions, I wish I could find a picture of my beloved first Polo 'PLJ 69R'

[hoopsontoast]

1980 Triumph Dolomite Sprint

Triumph Dolomite Sprint by Robert Seymour, on Flickr

It was my first car I bought, I had learned to drive in a Citroen AX (1L 'Debut') while it was 'entertaining' I wanted something that was a Classic due to the lower insurance, and my love of '70s cars featured in The Professionals.
It was good, I had a few issues but I loved it so.

[philsford]

Mine is the 1275GT I sold back in 2008. I had first seen the car about 8 years before I brought it at my local mini show. The paint was superb and was 14 years old according to the paperwork that came with it. It had a sorted 1380 in it with straight cut drops and a copper exhaust, the sound as it went down the road was like no other mini and to me it was the perfect mini.









I had 3 cars in this condition at the time and 2 of them had to go.