Favorite Car

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For me, its probably my 2015 Toyota. I had a lot of fun with it and was able to see many nice places, some which were quite far away from where I live now. If you can share what yours is, and what your experiences and adventures were with it, thanks.

It's a toss-up between the Honda Integras, Civics and CRXes and the Ford RS200, in particular the Group S evolution of the RS200.





You can see they've relocated the intercooler and the huge vent associated with it on the OG model. By cleaning up the roof he's been able to convert the rear to use a wing instead of the standard spoiler.

Most reliable and pleasing car to drive for me was a 1982 BMW 525i, should never have sold it. Quite honestly though, I have a soft spot for all the other cars I've owned, namely a 1973 Vanden Plas Princess 1300, a 1976 Rover 2200TC, a 1973 Triumph 2.5 PI, a mid-1980s Vauxhall Astra, a mid-1980s Audi 100, and a 1986 Vauxhall Cavalier.

The latter was the last car I owned. It was stolen from outside my flat in 2003, and written off after being used in a robbery. I could never own another car after that. The criminal who was involved in the theft received a laughable £100 fine, and the other participants were let off. I'd have jailed the lot of them for 10 years, with not a day's remission. I'm not a social liberal, would you believe....

My first car was a mini which had everything go wrong with it like the battery exploding, it cutting out whenever it rained, the cylinder head gasket blowing. It cost me a fortune and lucky I was in the RAC for whenever I broke down. I enjoyed driving it though. Then I had 2 Vauxhall Chevettes which were great. Then I got a Fiesta mkI which was also good to drive. Haven't driven since 1997 though for money and health reasons.

My favourite car is the classic Volkswagen Beetle. I like the green ones.

My Dad's '96 Chevy S-10, V6 Vortec, she kept me on time for class and work and alive in an accident, my 2019 Honda Fit and my 2015 VW TDI (Mk VII in Europe I think). RIP Betsy and Evelyn, long live Tanya!

Thanks for the replies.

About comfort, are some cars more comfortable than others? Which car has the best seats and so on?

For me, my toyota is comfortable sitting at, but I understand there are cars with better seats.

i wish to heck i'd noticed this thread earlier, my fave car hands-down is the AMC pacer. 2nd to that, a '88 caddilac sedan de ville, base model with the strip speedo and cloth interior, preferably pink. 3rd, a vw karmann ghia convertible, also pink. 4thly, buick encore, all models before '21. 5thly, Citroën DS or ID. what they all have in common is a soft and absorbent ride quality over broken pavement. ride quality is very important to me. also, all of them are roomy inside. as a big person that is also important to me.

For comfort it has to be the Volvo 7 and 9 series cars. (9 series were 7 series with small improvements and came out as a temporary model until the 8 series came in). The Mercades 200E estate we had was comfy and also economical despite being an automatic and had a small petrol leak. Still gave 40mpg which I thought was great for a heavy car. Was not sluggish like the write ups suggest. Could be that once the engines do a good milage they open up?
I have had a lot of quick cars (Not very quick but 0-60 a within 7 seconds sort of quick I think was the quickest), and two stand out as accelerating quicker than anything else to the point where it was physically not possible to change gear quick enough and these were the Volvo 740GLT and the Citroen C2GT. The Citroen was close to not being able to change gear fast enough to keep up with it's acceleration, and the Volvo 740GLT definitely was not able to change quick enough. It was hitting the rev limiter far quicker than I could physically select it's next gear even when quick changing (Hardly using the clutch). I had a T5 estate (8 series and also had a non T5 version and both were what I call "Average" cars as I have owned many Volvos and driven many. Think I counted that I had owned 14 so far. What surprized me was the 740GLT was deceivingly light weight. Just 1200kgs and that is with side impact bars and airbags. A Ford Fiesta weighed more than that when they fitted airbags and side impact bars!
The most fun car I ever had, and was actually amazing to drive once one got used to it was the Volvo 360GLT hatch (3door). Handling for its rear wheel drive is said to be better than the old Ford Escorts and they were good. (I know this by a Ford guy who once had a 360GL (GLT had Porsche designed improvements over the basic GL) and he had had many escorts and cortinas and capris and was amazed with the Volvo. He said "It goes where you put it". The 340's looked the same but we're different cars to the 360's. They were said to be OK but nothing like a 360 to drive. The write ups in the press assumed they were just a more powerful 340 and did not rate them, so one often amazed other drivers who did not realized they were so quick and such great handling cars.

Fir fuel economy, surprizing, the 360GLT and the 740GLT were both regularly achieving 50+mpg even when towing.
The C2GT was good as was small, powerful and light. The BMW 318IS (E36) coupe was good. Good engine. Shame about the rest of the car. Very overrated compared to competition as an Audi 80 I had just before would do roundabouts a full 10mph quicker before she slid out. (Audi 80 2.6E saloon with impeccable handling. Handled so amazingly well it was boring to drive! One just turned and it would do it at almost any speed! Just no fun to driving it as there was no challenge).
Going back to mpg. The Citroen AX's gave excellent MPG (Both I had were 997cc petrol and were excellent climbing the steep windy hills home on snow or ice... Another good snow car was the Volvo 480ES and the one I have now which is the Mitsubishi Colt DiD (2005 though body shape was said to be up to about 2003 though have seen a 2007 and think I saw a 2012 model with the same body shape so the odd few were delayed in sake? Body has the flatter back to it which gives more internal space. This car not only is good in snow, but going back to mpg is excellent. Usually gives 50 to 70mpg depends on conditions. Has an excellent Mercades 3 cylinder diesel engine though more modern cars had a Mitsubishi 3 cylinder diesel engine. Also had a 3 cylinder petrol version with a very revvy 3 cylinder engine though my brother had it on the road so I only drove it on our drive where we lived. It was also economical and gave 50 to 60mpg.
Other good mpg that I had was an early (2001) Fiat Doblo non turbo diesel which hardly drank any fuel but was s-l-o-w. Handled well but one used the handling around corners to keep the speed up as if one slowed it would take a while to get back up to speed!

For space, I have had a few such as Citroen C8 (2000cc HDi diesel) which accelerated as quick as mercs and BMW's but only did 35mpg at best. Mine was an 8 seat version. Sadly timing belt broke some 20,000 miles before they were supposed to last, so it killed the car as due to engines location no one wanted to work on it to rebuild the engine.
Fiat Doblos and Fiorinos were spacious inside, and so were the estate versions of the larger Volvos, and the Mercades estate.. (Merc estates are stupidly awkward to put the seats down through being massively over engineered. Can't put seats down until one first removes headrests and other such stupidly impractical features. Volvos one just pulls a leather strap and job done, and one can even fold the front seats flat so one has a full 10ft to play with, but the prize for me with space is the Citroen AX and the Mitsubishi Colt. (My Mitsubishi has a bent seat mechanism on one of its seats so can't remove seat, but brothers all rear seats came out and he used his for his business carting things back and fore! The AX? I moved house in it and got my whole king size double bed in there as well as the mattress! Yes, my nose was almost pressed against the front window and I squeezed in with the seat forwards for the 10 miles to drive it, but it did fit along with other things such as sofas and fridge and freezer, cupboards etc. Was amazed how such a small car could carry so much!
But cheapest to run and own has to be the Citroen AX and the Mitsubishi Colt. The Citroen AX also did a diesel version (Non turbo) which as it was so lightweight, it was said to be as quick accelerating as their 1400cc hot hatch petrol version. The only snag to the AX is no power steering. No servo assisted brakes etc. Taught one how to drive! Felt flexible due to thin bodywork but handled ok, though leaned a bit round corners...
But overall my Mitsubishi Colt wins it for a cheap car to run.
Parts are said to be a little expensive but they do such good mpg it makes up for it.

I used to drive Minis which I liked because you could repair them easily yourself but being over 6 foot they were never too comfortable for me.

The car I really liked and wanted was a Vauxhall Viva. My neighbour had a silver one which I envied. I think I liked them because there's a bit of American influence in the design (it had a rectangular speedometer like some US cars do, I don't know if any other UK car has had that), just on a smaller scale.

I'd still like one, but they are very few and far between these days:

That car in the pic is odd. Looks like a Vauxhall Magnum as Vivas had larger rectangular lights. The Magnums had larger more powerful engines and four round lights instead.
My Grandad bought a Viva when they first came out new and very quickly sold it when he saw the build quality. He was a designer by trade and he did not approve of a brand new car wired up by hand twisting wires together which he saw in his early Viva. (Done like this from the factory as he had one of the first).
Having said that some of the Vivas did hang on for a while as a few made it on the road into the early 1990's.
My favourite car my Grandad had was when he had a job designing trailers for Renault. (Renault had a contract to build massive trailers to bring heavy pipes to help build the oil pipelines in the Middle East. These trailers were shipped over in three parts as the parts were built to just about fit in the cargo holds of these large ships. Massive trailers when assembled). While at Renault he had a car made for him. It was a Renault 15 with the larger Renault 17 1600c engine (Gordini?). He would test it once a year on a short stretch of road and if he did not do 120mph he would tinker with the engine. Think his Renault 15 was the only one fitted with a 1600cc engine as it wasn't an option with Renault unless one had the Renault 17. Was a nice looking car as well. Later facelifted Renault 15's and 17's did not look so nice.
My dream was to have that car when I was old enough to drive, but when my Grandad wanted a new car (He bought a new a Peugeot 309 diesel with every optional extra imaginable), he gave the Renault to his oldest grandson (My cousin) who rear ended another car at over 110mph. but apart from a dented front it was usable. Then my cousins wife rear ended a car that pulled out in front of her while she was travelling at 120+ mpg in it and the car was a right off. (Max speed limit on the dual carriageway was 70mph. They didn't care to obay the law or look after the car). Was a sad end to a lovely car.