SHED AMNESTY: What was your first car?

[bosscerbera]

A bit in the chav-baiting thread (see link) got me thinking about whether you can spot a future TVR owner from their youthful modes of conveyance....

www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?t=192705&f=13&h=0&p=2

- Boy racers pinch our paint styles ...
- They covet our electric door releases ...
- They want our exhaust cans ...
- They cover their big smiley Euro headlights with little round "TVR headlight stencils" ...
- TVRs are the supercars to which boy-racers aspire - just take a TVR (esp Sagaris) to a "cruise" and watch the reaction.

Laugh at their "bling Saxos" as we do, we run the risk of having turned into our own Dads who took the p*ss out of - in my day - rigid Firestik CB antennae, coloured-in white lettering on remoulds ("to make them look like General Grabbers" ), Starsky stripes, Cherry Bombs and fog lights illuminating the diffs on our jacked up 'Tinas and Vivas.

I started with...
...a Hillman Imp. Its improvements included bumpers cut down to quarters, springs cut down to get negative camber on all four corners, a steering wheel the size of a sixpence, 4-2-1 tubular manifold and lots of red Hammerite detailing.

This was succeeded by a dark blue HB Viva to which I applied a white Starsky stripe, fitted wide 8-spoke steels (painted black with chrome trim rings), tiger-fur Corbeau bucket seats, the obligatory sixpence steering wheel, and a complicated array of "James Bond" switches in the centre console for switching off various rear lights when being pursued down lanes by other herberts. It had a blueprinted 1256cc (!!!!!) engine with the diff from an 1159cc Viva "so it accelerated better". F my old boots.

What did you have? Think of this as a "Shed Amnesty".

In a [probably vain] bid to mitigate the above monstrosities, sort of overlapping with them I had a 1980 Rover SD1 V8S (got prosecuted for Furious Driving in it) followed by a 1972 Granada 3.0GXL (which I still have).



>> Edited by bosscerbera on Tuesday 12th July 16:47

[tvrbob]

Vauxhall Viva HB estate.

[ccharlie6]

a mini which actually is really good

but im not a TVR owner yet (only 19!) but seeing as most of the classic mini owners on PH also own various TVR's i think i must be destined to own one at some point (i won't complain if it happens!)

>> Edited by ccharlie6 on Tuesday 12th July 17:09

[zippee]

My first car was a 1.6 Citroen BX.
Second was a Mk2 Astra GTE 16v, nowadays a bit Chav but at the time a damned quick car for a 19 year old, with an insurance premium to match.

[fidgits]

my first car was simply the worst car, ever...

and infact, it is so embaressing, I cannot bring myself to actually tell you...

[rev-erend]

Austin A30 - we nick named it the Surrey snail.. cause it was so slow..

A Savage Cortina MK 2 followed - as I had a need for speed..

[softtop]

A Peugeot 106. Abosolutely standard, someone else had one in the town who drove it like a mad man and everyone thought it was me! Did paint the tyres once. Good year 135s

[gemini]

Mk2 escort estate in orange!

[tonyvid]

FIAT 1100D estate(the default Indian taxi one) whilst restoring my Bond Bug!!

[Griffter]

Orange 1.0 Metro with:

Rev counter
MG interior
Metro cup alloys
Moutney steering wheel (from Ripspeed before they became part of Halfords)
Hella spotlight grill
4 speaker stereo (involving butchered parcel shelf)
K&N air filter
'Sports suspension' (Deflated hyrdagas suspension)
Timing advanced and mixture screw turned up for 'extra' bhp

If I saw it tomorrow I'd buy it back

Better get the Griff retrimmed in Burberry...

[.Mark]

1000cc Mini like most probably, but my second was a bit better.
Triumph Dolomite Sprint that thing shifted and although in a very matt honeysuckle colour showed a clean pair of heels to any Beemer repmobile around in those days - guess I was destined for TVR

[Mats]

Y Reg (The first time around ) Black Metro City 1.0
Butchered parcel shelf and an alpine pullout stereo. Everything else was standard. except the gearbox which I obtained from the scrappy after shearing off the 2nd gear. It only had 4 Great car, it got me everywhere...

[GOM]

1967 Grey Mini Van with
1320 (bored) Cooper S lump
Twin inch and a half SUs
Janspeed 4-2-1 manifold and straight thru pipe into Peco back box
Chopped suspension cones (lowered van by 2"
1" wheel spacers with 10"x6J reverse rims (great for buggering wheel bearings)
10" Mountney wheel on lowered column
and last but not least, Sleepeeze double matress in the back. Those were the days my friend.


Edited to add: Bus pass pending

>> Edited by GOM on Tuesday 12th July 17:53

[Nuggs]

Suzuki Swift 1.3 GLX (the GLX was the luxury version which came with seats and a steering wheel).

It's papier mache construction was incredible - I used to dent the bonnet so badly when cleaning it that I had to lift the bonnet and punch the dents out from the inside!

Once I even managed to get it up to about 60mph (downhill, tailwind etc). Unfortunatley as it hit terminal velocity, I went over a hump-backed bridge, took off and when I landed I had no front suspension and no rear exhaust section.

Ah those were the days...

...that I'd rather forget