Making a beautiful car even more beautiful

[sgnicol]

I bought a 1997 nautilus blue elise recently. By the number of scratches on the inside of the driver's door, it looks like the previous owner must have pushed it open with his foot everytime he got out.
Anyone know how to hide/repair these scratches inexpensively?
Also, any opinions on the best washes/waxes/polishes for hiding exterior stone chips/scratches?

[Gargamel]

color restorer - zymol product range - best waxes for this car
although auto glym is pretty good too

chipsaway - do the best job if you have deep scratches and stone chips

fact of life with these cars I am afraid. anyway don't be a garage jewellery owner - get it on a track and worry less about cosmetics and more about driving it !

[sgnicol]

Thanks for the advice. You're right - shame on me for being such a girl.

[ledger]

sgnicol,

I'm still saving for mine but am amazed at the range of prices I see them advertised for, what in your experience seems to be a realistic price for a P reg s1 at present ?. Did you buy privately ?, if not I see you are in the london area what dealer did you use.

I'm just starting my research so any advice would be welome.

[adeewuff]

quote:
sgnicol,
I'm still saving for mine but am amazed at the range of prices I see them advertised for, what in your experience seems to be a realistic price for a P reg s1 at present?

Don't pay more than 13k for an immaculate low mileage P reg Elise. Trade prices for those cars are as low as 11k so don't be fobbed off with private owners overvaluing them. Expect to pay upto 15k if it's from a dealership.

[sgnicol]

I got my P reg S1 for a bit over 11k from a trader in London who sells cars from home ( so really, no more security than a private sale). I kept an eye on the autotrader website everyday for months before buying and never saw any that cheap, but not suprisingly I then spent almost a grand at HR Owen bringing the servicing up to date and fixing a few minor things. With that in mind, I would say you should be able to get one for 12-13k, any more than that is too much, but the 10-11k quoted by Parker's in just not realistic.
Happy elise hunting.
PS I dont know if you know much about cars but if not, be careful about getting an RAC inspection before buying - I wasted a couple of hundred quid on one: they didn't even take the undertrays off, and used their presence as an excuse not to inspect the underside of the car at all!. From the report, it was obvious that the engineer new nothing about elises (like its normal for the MMC disc breaks to squeal horribly). HR Owen later told me that for the same price they would have given the car a complete inspection and provided a quote for all the work needed (probably not really needed).
Anyway, the sun is shining, so I'm off to struggle with the roof (actually, it's not so difficult when you get used to it, just a shame nobody told lotus that the purpose of a roof is to stop water getting into the car)

quote:
sgnicol,

I'm still saving for mine but am amazed at the range of prices I see them advertised for, what in your experience seems to be a realistic price for a P reg s1 at present ?. Did you buy privately ?, if not I see you are in the london area what dealer did you use.

I'm just starting my research so any advice would be welome.