£8-9k sporty car with better fuel consumption than RX8?
- Thread starter Skeptic
- Start date
Soldato
Or a Yaris T SportOr a McLaren F1.
Or a McLaren F1
Which is a Supercar?
Huzzah! I love pedantry. What about the Nissan GT-R?
I would define a 'sports' car as a car with the design and intention of being 'sporty'. Ie great handling powerful engine and so on (In comparison to a non 'sports' car, not to other 'sports' cars.). Its a pretty broad class I'd say, one the RX-8 definitely fits in.
In that case an MX-5 doesn't fit in, as it has no powerful engine.
However I'd say the MX-5 is definitely a sports car...
Not really, there's a blurry line between sports cars and supercars to an extent but a 1 million dollar 'hyper' car sits squarely in the realms of supercar-dom.
We have also established that something like an MGB which is 100% a sports car, has neither a powerful engine or handles particularly well and Mazda advertises the RX-8 as a 'sports coupé'.
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But it was built with the intention of being sporty no? It doesn't HAVE to have a powerful engine, but its quite often a characteristic of a sports car.
I'm sure at the time the MGB was also intended to be sporty, a B-road blaster in the sun.
So it is a sports car then, or at least intended to be one.
I'm think I'm trying to show that you can spin the wording to prove most cars into the category. You could argue they are I guess, they are both designed with the intention of being 'sporty', ie fast and fun to drive compared to a run of the mill car. Ofcourse, the McLaren is miles away at the other end of the scale, and I would agree with you classing it as a super car. But is super car only really a sub-class of sports cars?
Would you classify for instance, a RR Phantom as a 'super car' just because its wildly more expensive than a luxo barge from another manufacturer. Personally I wouldn't. So what defines a super car? A Sports car at the top of the scale, just short of 'hyper cars'.
I'm not really sure what I'm arguing about, just that I would certainly classify the RX-8 as a sports car, and that having 2 seats and no roof are not the only attributes to determining a sports car. Does a Suzuki Cappuccino become a sports car because its a 2 seater convertible?
The Suzuki Cappuccino is a Kei Car
I guess there's a blurry line, but the F1 is a Supercar, you can't deny that. If you say sports car to someone, they instantly think of an old bloke in an MGB driving through British Country lanes
Ok, what exactly is it you want from a car? How many miles do you do, what sort of mileage is it? Do you need more than 2 seats? Do you need 4 doors? Is insurance an issue? Are you prepared to pay for the higher maintenance costs of a performance car? 
I'm in a very similar position myself.
My current shortlist is as follow (in alphabetical order):
- Alfa GT – Stunning to look at but FWD
- BMW 120i Sport – Not really 'Sporty' but fun and practical
- BMW 330 Ci – Seems to be the OCUK fav at the moment
- BMW Z4 Roadster – Only 2 seats
From my research:
They all have similar fuel economy, around 31mpg combined. +/- 1mpg
They are all similar to insure, around £700 +/- £100 for a 24 y/o with 6 years NCB.
They are all in the K tax bracket (£225 for 12 months). The GT is J but same price
A decent example with <60k miles can be had for <£9k.
Other cars I have considered but discounted are:
- Alfa Brera – Too expensive to buy
- Audi S3 – Not a huge fan of VAG
- Golf GTI – See above
- S2000 – Too expensive to run
Your requirements may be different to mine but I guess any suggestions might help. Someone else might even suggest something to change my mind!
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Soldato
Just looked at the insurance for myself at 24 with 6 years NCB on an S2000... £1200!
I wonder how much that will change next march when I'm 25.
Not half as much as you might like. I've found when doing quotes than generally, when it comes to properly nice cars, 25 is a barrier insurance companies will use before giving the "Sorry, but on this occasion we don't want your business" message.
I got my M5 when I was 24 and most insurance companies stated this. Luckilly I was mid-way through a year with Privilege who after some discussion with an underwriter decided to let me amend my car to the M5. When I turned 25 it went down from about 1400 to about 1200. At 26 it's now 900 through A-Plan.
![[TW]Fox](/data/man-of-honor/2009.png){kind=avatar}
What is a 120i doing on that list? Its a 4 pot womans shopping trolley in comparison.
[TW]Fox;16162185 said:
It's the sensible voice in the back of my head saying "Go for something small and practical". However, the more I look at it, the more it seems that to get a decent model I'm going to have to spend more than I would on a good 330Ci / Z4.