4 seat classic car

Don't think anyone's mentioned the Volvo P1800 yet?

Beautiful looking in coupe form and supposed to be solid as a rock mechanically. Again, I've never owned one (I'd like to) just heard good things about them.

Should fit into the 2+2 category.

David

If it was *properly* re-built, 100 miles should be more than enough 'running in'.

Ah, yes. Nice car, especially the injected ones. Enough room in an ES version for two very small children or 1 x 10 yr old :-)

Might as well stick my head over the parapet.... yes, ZB Magnette. Had a lot of them many years ago. Now drop in an 1800 five-bearing MGB lump with o/d gearbox (although I am told something Japanese with five gears also fits), MGA front discs and you have a lovely looking old thing which goes and stops well. Dead easy to maintain. Er - thinking of nice looking and all the other good things - Jowett Javelin? Same designer as the MG, remarkably good sports saloon, but bits would be hard to come bt now so nowhere near as practical.

Geoff MacK

"o'Really"

Oy - pedant's hat on - the 308's predecessor, the 246, was a Dino and not a Ferrari. Although most of them now have Ferrari badges. But the 308 was called a Ferrari from the start. Good car, suffered from comparison from the model it replaced (XJS after E-Type comes to mind) but agree that one for under £10k would be a very bad place to start.

Geoff MacK (The pedants's revolution was led by Which Tyler)

Was there any other sort?

and supposed to be solid as a rock

Oh, no! Had one years ago. Liked it a lot, but the back seats - well, depends what you want to fit in them. Took a couple of friends to Devon (from Surrey) in mine, took a soda syphon to get them apart and one was pregnant.

Geoff MacK

o'Really (o'Really@mothanks) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

I never realised JUST how much - especially around the r3q - the Eventer looks like a Beta HPE before.

Hmmm. Beta HPE... Volumex...

I'm pretty sure that some of the glass /was/ Beta HPE. The rear window and maybe the rear quarter glass.

They're both Scimitar GTE knock-offs, mind ;)

Andrew Robert Breen ( snipped-for-privacy@aber.ac.uk) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Ah. That would certainly explain it...

Which was, of course, an A40 Farina knock-off...

A40 Countryman.

Willy Eckerslyke realised it was Fri, 09 Dec 2005 09:04:35 +0000 and decided it was time to write:

Funny you should say that. Triumph, in its day, was actually aiming at the Merc SL market with the Stag. An ambitious goal, not a bad idea, but not brilliantly executed either.

Willy Eckerslyke realised it was Fri, 09 Dec 2005 14:10:35 +0000 and decided it was time to write:

Damn. I knew I'd made a mistake somewhere. :-(

Ian Dalziel ( snipped-for-privacy@lineone.net) gurgled happily, sounding much like they were saying :

Same thing, innit?

There was the 'Estate' form...

Ok, so they don't look bad by any means, but not as pretty as the coupe... David

"David Balfour" realised it was Fri, 09 Dec 2005

16:26:58 GMT and decided it was time to write:

Yes, pretty bomb proof mechanically, but watch the rust, especially on the early ones with British-built bodies.

The P1800 would, but the P1800ES would be even more practical. Most of those have PI and decent performance, too.

Got to say I've always preferred the estate version. The big fins on the coupe do something less than nothing for me.

I'm not so keen on the colour of that example, though.

Best of the lot was the Lancia Gamma estate. Sadly they only made about three of them.

Or perhaps a Sunbeam Alpine or Rapier, maybe a Dolomite Sprint

Gwyn

>