Dont come to Grantham if you want to buy a fast car.

atpbx

atpbx

atpbx

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21 Oct 2002
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I went car hunting yesterday, mainly because I need two cars because my new job is shift work, and I cant manage with just the one and the motorbike (I am not riding to work in the cold and the rain, **** that)

Now normally I would just go and buy anything for a work car, but this new job is paying me so much more money than the last one (12k more and I already had enough left over with the last job) I've decided I want to get something proper sporty, I dont care if its petrol or diesel (so long as its a big diesel, with a whopping turbo on it) I'm not going to be doing anywhere near enough miles for it to even be considered proper driving to work (less that 6 miles, I could push bike it if I had to).
So, armed with a budget of anything up to 10k and the only critera being that if had to be faster and younger than the R/T, which is 52 plate, we set off to scour Granthams many dealers and second hand garages.

We went to Ford, Toyota (stupid I know), Honda, Vauxhall, Subaru, Renualt. and a multitude of second hand garages.
In the whole town, there were 5 cars that were faster than the R/t for sale that we could find, (two CTR's, 2 new WRX's all over 10k obviously)
And a dodgy old R reg Impreza with 80k up, a wrecked interior, ruined paintwork and no service history...............up for 4k.

Its not that shocking I know, but what was shocking was that there was nothing even vaguely sporty, just acre after acre of boring flat painted, plastic wheeled sub 1.8 litre crap boxes up for proper car money.

I'm going into Lincoln this afternoon, hopefully there will be someone who will take my money there.
 
I think a lot of main dealers are like this - until you get into the premium brands you're going to need to look at specialist indies to find anything remotely interesting.

I remember doing the same thing in Exeter a little while back - went to have a poke about to see if there was anything interesting for a similar budget. Went to Ford to see if there were any Mondeo STs, nope. Honda didnt have any CTRs except the new one, Seat didnt have any Cupras apart from new ones, no Celicas in Toyota, Volvo didnt even have any T5s....
 
Don't shop inside Lincs. I live in Lincs and went to somewhere just outside Sheffield and saved about £2k on the exact same spec car, main dealer too.
 
what's an r/t? i'm guessing it's not a dodge viper :p

edit- after looking at another thread, a neon..
why not just buy something on t'internet?
 
mjt said:
what's an r/t? i'm guessing it's not a dodge viper :p

edit- after looking at another thread, a neon..
why not just buy something on t'internet?
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I might well end up doing, thought I'd look around first, Its a comment about the lack of cars on forecourts, not my unwillingness to but outside of them.
:)
 
Seems like a daft way to buy a car, you could end up with anything. Surely better to decide what you want, find out how to spot a bad one then find some to view. Doing it your way you end up getting something random from a profit crazed trader.
 
[TW]Fox;14642614 said:
Seems like a daft way to buy a car, you could end up with anything. Surely better to decide what you want, find out how to spot a bad one then find some to view. Doing it your way you end up getting something random from a profit crazed trader.
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A good point - although going out as an investigatory mission is quite a good way to find something that appeals
 
[TW]Fox;14642614 said:
Seems like a daft way to buy a car, you could end up with anything. Surely better to decide what you want, find out how to spot a bad one then find some to view. Doing it your way you end up getting something random from a profit crazed trader.
Click to expand...

I will be perfectly happy with any one of about say 10 different cars, the point I am making, is about the complete lack of quick motors for sale.


I would be happy with-

CTR.
LCR
WRX
ST220
Mazda 3 MPS
Mazda 6 MPS.
Focus RS
Focus ST 1,2 or 3.
Forester S
VRS

Anything, even a Vauxhall.
If I dont find anything interesting , I will buy a banger and go and buy a new Fireblade instead.
 
Theres this website, called auto trader...

It advertises cars for sale....

You can put your post code in and find ones for sale local to you.....

I heard it saves time driving around in the hope that you find a car you want to buy.
 
atpbx said:
I refer you to post 6.
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But they do have a point though.

You might be happy with a fairly large shortlist of cars, but not a single one of them is what I'd call an easy to sell car, certainly not when compared to the dull as dishwash base models that they make their bread and butter on.

I can't see the reasoning behind a large non specialist large to stock a Focus ST that has a very select following, when that space on the forecourt could go to a reasonably priced 1.6 Titanium with a much more board appeal.
 
Joshy said:
But they do have a point though.

You might be happy with a fairly large shortlist of cars, but not a single one of them is what I'd call an easy to sell car, certainly not when compared to the dull as dishwash base models that they make their bread and butter on.

I can't see the reasoning behind a large non specialist large to stock a Focus ST that has a very select following, when that space on the forecourt could go to a reasonably priced 1.6 Titanium with a much more board appeal.
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I think you are having the same problem of understanding the relatively simple point I'm making.
I'm not asking for advice, or where to buy cars, or what cars to buy, or how much to pay or asking for anything that anybody here can possibly offer any help with.
I am merely decrying the complete blandness of the cars on dealers forecourts these days.

Time was, not that long ago, you could wander past a garage, and half the cars would have a SRi, Gti, Turbo, or similar badge on them.
Every dealership would have at least one example of the range topping fast car they sold, every single one, without fail.
Now there are hardly any, despite there being no real shortage of manufacturers who offer these models.
 
[TW]Fox;14644324 said:
Some very similar cars there, you obviously have a clear idea of what you want from a car. Have you also considered a Mercedes Sprinter or a Porsche 924 Lux?
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I seem to have tapped into an alternative dimension today, where half the people who respond are spoiling for a pointless, baseless argument.

Again, no advice required or asked for, your opinion on my tastes in cars wasnt invited, or welcome, I'm just making a point about how boring dealer forecourts have got.

But to answer your question, they are all more intersting than the average econo box, or average rep mobile.
 
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