Most underpowered large car?

Although not strictly a car, we had a Cortina shaped P100 a fair few years ago. It had been converted to a flat bed, which was very useful for the second-hand furniture shop we had, it also towed the burger van to the nightclub where we traded on Thurs/Fri/Sat nights. When we had engine trouble, a Ford mechanic friend helped us out, and pointed out it was a rare

1300 pinto engine!!! No wonder it was so gutless! Once a 2-litre was in there, it was a different monster and would have been welcome at any drift club.

-- R

Renault Laguna 1.8 SOHC. Pig in a poke.

BMW E34 518i Touring, closely followed by Vauxhall Carlton Estate 1.8L (carb!).

JB

The 1.8 carb Carlton still made it to just short of 300k without any fuss though, didn't it?

Audi 100 1.6 ?

Tim..

I had one of the latter. Never did figure out why someone had fitted it with a limited slip diff. Twas a 1.8GL, though. Was there such a thing as a 1.8L?

Yup, one of the best cars I've owned. Averaged 30mpg too.

Well that was directed at JB, but anyway....you had one up to a high mileage too?

Those 8v Vauxhall engines were actually bloody good engines before they started strangling them with cats and all that. Nothing to set the world on fire, but good bulletproof engines.

I had a pre-cat 2L Cav with 130bhp. Went like shit of a shovle and was quiet as a mouse doing it. 70mph at 2600rpm - Lovely.

Yes. My parents had one when I was a kid. Totally indestructable. Horrible brown colour, though. The L didn't even have electric windows or central locking, at least back then (it was a B reg, if I recall).

Christian.

The GL didn't have electric windows either, but did have central locking and a sunroof. This was E reg though.

I think most of us did.

After making the decision to scrap mine and get something else, I stopped servicing it. 20,000 miles later I had to chop it up with an angle grinder to kill it. That was the first time I saw the inside of the dizzy cap (they're almost impossible to get to with the bulkhead in place) and it was like new, despite doing 90,000 miles in my ownership.

I was once tempted by a Ford Granada 1.8 (new model). It had only 4 forward gears, but what really put me off was the lack of power steering on such a large car.

Citroen CX 2200D? (let's say safari to make it even bigger). 75hp

cheers, clive

Zodiac mk4 with the little v4 in it, or mk3 cortina estate with 1300 crossflow, likewise mk4

mrcheerful

So do I get sympathy for my Fiat Ducato? 68bhp and 2800kg loaded?

Christian.

Granada 2.1 diesel, Pug engine

Ask Burgerman about diesel Ducatos (or should that be Ducati?) - he likes 'em.

I recently drove a mint one owner very low mileage SD1 2000 without power steering. And instantly knew why it was very low mileage. It was near impossible to park in the average street parking space.