A local timber guy around our way has run one for many years.
What's made you smile today?
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What's made you smile today?
I always think useful and reliable cars don't get to retire. They just get used harder and harder with less and less maintenance as the value goes down until something catastrophic breaks.
People put away things like a Fiesta RS turbo or old BMW when it was beyond logical repair in a barn having done their best to keep it nice and drag it out 20 years later.
If it's a useful car but not interesting there's no putting it away in barn it just gets cubed. Hence things like the festival of the unexceptional where the cars themselves are very ordinary but the very fact they survived is the miracle.
My current car will be an incredibly rare beast one day (technically it already is)...especially as mine will not be around and no one will mourn it's passing
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So true, the ordinary cars, despite large numbers, disappear. The larger the number sold, the fewer survive. Only the 'special' ones are kept. Our 169 Pandas, whilst special to those of us who have them, are ordinary disposables to most owners. Soon there will be few left, maybe a few 100HPs, but the rest will disappear. My Alessi is now 19 years old, and recently putting up a fight. Latest issue, an intermittent noise from the aircon. I see a new compressor and condenser on the horizon.I always think useful and reliable cars don't get to retire. They just get used harder and harder with less and less maintenance as the value goes down until something catastrophic breaks.
People put away things like a Fiesta RS turbo or old BMW when it was beyond logical repair in a barn having done their best to keep it nice and drag it out 20 years later.
If it's useful car but not interesting there's no putting it away in barn it just gets cubed. Hence things like the festival of the unexceptional where the cars themselves are very ordinary but the very fact they survived is the miracle.
My current car will be incredibly rare beast one day (technically it already is)...especially as mine will not be around and no one will mourn it's passing
There’s an 80’s landcruiser round here still going strong…the Australians know their worth, if you want to go to the outback, buy a Land Rover, if you want to go in the outback and come back again, buy a landcruiser
Even James Mays ex Panda 169 was bought next by someone who seemingly had no idea and treated it like any other used Panda, despite the supercar garage stamps way back in the handbook. Sad but true
From what I hear of this festival, it’s a pretty toxic group.
They will go out of their way to buy the most boring bland piece of crap they can find, polish it up and then show it.
In most cases the cars are usually bought from that one old lady who’s had it from new but now given up driving aged 98, and had only used it for the past 30 years to go two and from church once a week.
They buy the car dirt cheap, display it with a hope of winning something and it becoming more valuable as a result. One person who did win best in show tried to claim to me that the car he had was worth £20k despite it being a particularly crappy car.
Tell them to see how much they get offered in part exchange at local car showroom.
Well more fool them really.
I'd absolutely go and have a look for the nostalgia value but otherwise I've got no interest in owning a very ordinary car from another era with no parts availability.
It might be nice to see a Ford Escort pop like my dad used to have etc but it was never anyones dream car or the car they promised themselves..it was always the best they could afford at the time. Also it'll drive like absolute crap...
Unless they find someone with a similar delusion it's not worth much. You're committing to most of the headaches of owning a classic..but the car you get at the end doesn't really balance the effort put in.
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Yeah, I saw a picture of a 128 at one of the shows, that’s very definitely not unexceptional, it set the standard for fwd cars that’s relevant even today, and, there would have been no golf without it. I know one man’s boring is another one dream, and I’d have a 128 in a heartbeat, but I’m also not delusional about what I’d have to pay to either, get a good one, or sink into a project
There's the whole "find another" argument but at the same time I'd doubt anyone selling something of this nature will be beating away eager buyers with a stick so the counter argument is "find another person who wants it?"
It's a massive commitment on the basis if you use it it'll break and parts will be largely unobtainium. If you leave it outside it'll dissolve...etc. etc.
For me if I was committing to dry storing something, scouring the country looking for bits whenever it broke I'd want more than a Nissan Bluebird to show for it.
So they have a value definitely but there's got to be an element of realism in terms of..it's just like an ordinary car but with added inconvenience.
Well there are two ways to look at it, either it is worth £20k in which case sell it while you can because if the values are high someone will find one and there aren’t going to be too many people wanting to pay that sort of price, so in that respect the bar for market saturation may be very low.
There is also the risk that it gets damaged or just by virtue of its existence it rusts and then needs expensive restoration.
On the flip side it’s not worth that money and he’s just delusional which is what I’m inclined to think.
A lot of the current FOTU cars tend to be 90s cars as they all fit the bill of 30something year old cars own by some old lady who’s not driven In the last 20 years, drove very little in the 10 years before that, but owned the car from new
Tip-shop deal of the week.
A working petrol chainsaw for just £25. Had just enough fuel to start and run, but I need to get a can of petrol
Looked on eBay and there is only one of these on there for £125, and when I googled the model number it is apparently something that chainsaw collectors like to collect.
Turns out it’s a “partner” brand made in Sweden and is part of the husqvarna group so a decent quality.
I also picked up a Bosch electric drill (corded) for £10
A working petrol chainsaw for just £25. Had just enough fuel to start and run, but I need to get a can of petrol
Looked on eBay and there is only one of these on there for £125, and when I googled the model number it is apparently something that chainsaw collectors like to collect.
Turns out it’s a “partner” brand made in Sweden and is part of the husqvarna group so a decent quality.
I also picked up a Bosch electric drill (corded) for £10
Attachments
A clean solid 128 is sold before it’s advertised, well almost. The ones that never sell, like that orange 3p that keeps appearing, is not exactly enticing as the pictures clearly show ‘the usual suspects’ of a badly maintained/eagerly disintegrating example.
I went to see a mid late model 128 which I thought was a reasonable £3k, let’s just say that that was the starting figure, it went for over £5k as that’s as much as I was prepared (sweating) to pay
I went to see a mid late model 128 which I thought was a reasonable £3k, let’s just say that that was the starting figure, it went for over £5k as that’s as much as I was prepared (sweating) to pay
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I love those wheels. They look surprisingly fine on that Mazda2. Great little car that as well!Can't quite let go of Fiat, so...
The story goes that Ford used the 128 front suspension as the basis for the first Fiesta. Certainly, years ago, having two side-by-side the front legs and brakes looked identical.
VW also, under the direction of Giorgeto Giugario, purchased a 128 and stripped it as the design inspiration for the golf, and the Audi that became the polo
The Panda Nut
Nutty about Pandas Infected by Panda virus and OPD
One clutch slave fitted on PB4 IN 20 minutes, 1 set of dampers inspected. (HALFORDS MOT FAIL) They are indeed as far as can told, perfect. No visible delamination at all and road tested it still drives as a new Panda. Halfords disgust me!
Panda bird3 however also inspected and though it recently passed its Mot, failed the Nut inspection. Both top bushes delaminated and fell apart ON REMOVAL. Much as anticipated. I said a few weeks back they needed doing and I was right. One damper was mechanically OK, the other not. it remains compressed. This would explain the odd feel.
PB3 Dampers changed in 20 minutes. It took longer to refit the wheels than to do this. So now I Have 1 pair of monroe gas shocks on my spares shelf. I will change them on PB4 inthe autumn as a precaution. Now Ishalltake Halfords apart systematically starting with MOT APPEALand then on to VOSA. as I know our localguys I willstart bychatting to them about how my report should be worded. Skunks that try to fleece single women NEED to be held to account. PANDA NUTS ADVICE : KEEP AWAY FROM HALFORDS AS IT SEEMS THEY CANNOT BE TRUSTED. How they can possibly try and charge £700 to change suspension arms defies logic.
Pandabird 3s dampers. Clearly past it, but also passed its MOT. PB4 Will get its new ones in October as I have them unless PB2 gets them first. The Improvement in ride and road holding is substantial. The one with no natural rebound is pretty sad.
Panda bird3 however also inspected and though it recently passed its Mot, failed the Nut inspection. Both top bushes delaminated and fell apart ON REMOVAL. Much as anticipated. I said a few weeks back they needed doing and I was right. One damper was mechanically OK, the other not. it remains compressed. This would explain the odd feel.
PB3 Dampers changed in 20 minutes. It took longer to refit the wheels than to do this. So now I Have 1 pair of monroe gas shocks on my spares shelf. I will change them on PB4 inthe autumn as a precaution. Now Ishalltake Halfords apart systematically starting with MOT APPEALand then on to VOSA. as I know our localguys I willstart bychatting to them about how my report should be worded. Skunks that try to fleece single women NEED to be held to account. PANDA NUTS ADVICE : KEEP AWAY FROM HALFORDS AS IT SEEMS THEY CANNOT BE TRUSTED. How they can possibly try and charge £700 to change suspension arms defies logic.
Pandabird 3s dampers. Clearly past it, but also passed its MOT. PB4 Will get its new ones in October as I have them unless PB2 gets them first. The Improvement in ride and road holding is substantial. The one with no natural rebound is pretty sad.
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Now now let's not say it's because she's a woman...
While our local one hasn't found any imaginary faults with cars they did attempt to to charge 650 quid for an exhaust that was 400 elsewhere.
They are unfortunately the cheapest for Goodyears online...
Sadly fast fit type places are well known in the trade for ripping off the public, if they didn't have the power of national advertising, but relied on word of mouth like many small honest garages, then they would go bust and rightly so.
The trick used is to attract customers with a good price for one item and then miraculously their staff "discover " some terrible fault that would be dangerous if you were to drive it away to your regular garage for a second opinion, thereby forcing the hapless customer to have a needless and expensive repair.
One I recall was a regular old lady customer of mine, I had just serviced her "classic" mini, then taken it to an independent Mot Station where it was tested and passed. She needed a puncture repair on a her spare wheel and went to the local National Tyre company and sat in their office whilst puncture was sorted, they called her over to her car and pointed to leaking shock absorbers with oil dripping from them that they "happened" to notice when fitting the wheel to the car, luckily she stood her ground and left, on inspection we found the "oil" was WD40 that they had sprayed onto two perfectly good shock absorbers.
This is one of many problems from making staff work to a bonus system in my view.
