More cars...

Pretty boring French Supermini.

Lots of plastic and cheap fabric inside, as you'd expect.

Haven't driven one for about 8 years, but they handle OK, in a slightly soft French style.

Buy my 156..... I'll take about a grand for it, with MOT and 6 months ticket.

It's in wales isnit?

Oi, Dan, how do I know if a Clio has the good or s**te 1.4 engine? I see some of the 1.4s are as nippy as the 1.6...

Yes, it is.

My mate has an R reg 1.2 one with 140k on it, it did a headgasket about 20k miles ago, other than that it's been totally reliable.

Mike P

It's the low milers you've got to watch for. They'll have spent thier entire lives pottering around town barely getting warm and the bottom end will drop out at the first sign of real work.

So you're getting rid of the 406 and the ZX and are going to replace at least one with another piece of french junk?

It's like the eejits who look at houses and say 'but I don't like the wallpaper' - it wouldn't actually be in Wales when *you* owned it... ;-)

Aye, but Barry is fecking miles to go and collect a car.

Anyway, I said "Alfa?" and she said "No."

I dunno to be fair - my friends have a 1.4 that is pretty nippy. It's a very late one, the last before the new one came out where they like, made it a bit more rounded with the lights and stuff. The fast ones, the 1.8 8v is the RSi, the 16v is the Clio 16v heh and the 2.0 is of course the Williams. Any of those that aren't trashed are worth decent money as they're fabulous to drive apparently. Also, the bad nick ones if salvageable are also worth something as they make brilliant track cars, very light anyway, moreso when stripped.

The none sporty ones are ok, not too rolly, check for rust and get the latest one you can would be my advice. The later models have better rust proofing, better insides and are generally better, 1995-1997. The Clio owners Wiki and the proper Wiki both only have one 1.4 engine - so I don't really know, what's the difference? Actually, I've just noticed the E6J and the E7J were used in the Clio, not sure of the differences but the E stands for 'Energy' claiming they are extra economical, a bit like Vauxhalls 'Hi-Torq' engine that was less torquey than every competitor. Also, there is no 1.6 in the Mk1, I think you've been lookin at Mk2 stats heh.

They're no worse than any other cars in the same bracket, but handle better than most of them - the 205 was getting on a bit and the Fiestas are still shit and Corsa that old are rusty (all of them, no exceptions :-)). I can't really think of a better option, as you know the Polo of around there is just utterley abysmel, is she wanting to go down a size from the ZX then? As then there's a whole different load of cars...

I'm looking at the ones before the current Clio - the ones that your V6 was based on. MK3? They're just about findable at a grand.

Well, she wants something that's different to what everyone else has, and fairly new, and she's just not particularly inspired by anything in the Focus / ZX / Xsara / 306 size class. I'd go and pick up a Xsara for £500 if I were her (broke and in need of reliable transport)...

I may have forgotten to mention that she also wants the moon on a stick. I think from her POV she is spending a fairly large sum of cash on a car compared to what she's spent before, and doesn't really see value in what you get around a grand. Of course, she's actually spending banger money for any kind of interesting car.

Neither would I.

We went looking for test drives today of shonky old shit. And my girlfriend finally arrived at the correct position: We'll buy whatever's a) is in Saturdays ad-mag, b) has PAS and c) is in good nick.

As long as it's the TDCI not the TDDI. They're a bit rough, and I think it's a common-ish thing that the oil cooler cracks across the ports (as on the 75bhp version in my old Fiesta van) making it look like the head gasket's gone.

If low tax and good fuel economy (at least 40-45mpg) are important to you, as well as wanting something semi-modern, the obvious choice is an IS200.

Come one, as much as wanted to, I was never going to buy a nice sensible diesel was I, although, I might still yet. Depends how good they are at the old aftersales.