Paging Rob...

Nah, it's much easier to take a base model limited edition and plumb in a 'red top'.

I mean, £450, they're having a laugh, 'cos it's going to be _so_ much cheaper to do a DIY job ;-)

You'll be there a long time, if it's as solid underneath - those engines put up with a lot of easily gained extra power, without breaking, so long as you keep up the oil and belt changes, and do the water pump with the belts.

If tidy, well worth the money.

Sod that. I was offered a 1994 2.5 Sport Jeep Cherokee, 121,000 miles, for a grand today, with a year's MOT.

You can't tell me that any Cavalier is half the value of a still quite desireable 4x4 of the same age with less miles.

Richard

That's one of those rare bargains, though, innit.

Anything reasonable, with 12 months ticket is worth £400-odd.

still not quite the bargain of my taxed and mot'd cavvy motorsportf for a

Erm, for one thing its the smaller of the two donks, and secondly, they leak residuals faster than a Mk2 Astra fuel tank leaks fuel, once a certain age.

Anyway... you see... you tend to get offered 'trade' stuff, by trader mates, at trader mate prices... for the man in the street, that Cavalier is worth the money, IMHO, presuming its all it seems to be.

In fact, if I didn't have the Golf (which I may be selling on), and didn't have my eye on my dads absolutely mint Rover 623iS, I'd consider it for myself, just as something to run the family about in, when the Micra is just a tad too small for us all.

Oh, and as an aside, that BMW turned out to be a 520i... £2200 it fetched, oh doubting Thomas. :-)

The 2.5 Petrol is the more desirable one for the average crack-smoking punter though. They think the 4.0 is thirsty. Which is is to an extent, but not as much as you'd think, and I prefer the 4.0 LTD as it has the proper full time and part time 4WD - rather more helpful in British weather.

They all want the diesels. X plater for £6,495.

Er, actually, a punter was offered if for £1,000 - and tried to get it for £800. Insane. ;) Given that E-plated Fourtraks fetch £1,500 randomly, a horrid F-plater Shogun practically flew out of the yard for £1200... a truly rotten Isuzu pickup with only about 3/4 of the body remaining went for £1000... hell, I think the Jeep is an insane bargain. There's not much wrong with it; certainly nothing an afternoon's fiddling about with the dashboard/electrics and random trim wouldn't sort.

Wow, £200 over. How much did it need for the MOT?

Richard

Yeah. But this is a Cavalier :D

Seriously. If Ian could get £400 odd for the perfectly good, fully MOTd, older cars he has, he'd be laughing. £50 for a Renault 19. Modeos? Anything older than an L is scrap now.

Richard

I'm not a Ford or Vauxhall fan, but Ford didn't have an alternative as such to the Cavalier SRi. I have to admit, a Cavalier is a nicer place to sit than a Mondeo, too, IMHO.

That Cavalier could be got for £400 no problem, and, for that money, you're getting a pretty good, and fairly fast family car.

YMMV, but that's how I see it.

But the Mondeo handles and drives 1000 times better.

I'd still go for almost anything else.

They had plenty of Sierras, replaced by plenty of Mondeos !

Are you having a laugh ?

Along with the 405 and 406, the first Mondeo was amongst the best in it's class.

The Cavalier is *dire*. The inside of someone's arse is a nicer place to sit.

How ?

I thought you'd be getting a Cavalier ?

Agreed.

No, it's much better VFM.

The Sierra was not a viable alternative to a Mk3 Cavalier.

Cavalier finished in '94 and Mondeo came in in '94 so Mondeo was not really a viable alternative either.

As they were not pitched against each other it wasn't in the same class tho.

The 405 was not even remotely a patch on a Mk3 cavalier either. It may be comparable to a Mk2 Cav, but not a Mk3.

Sounds like you've never actually been in one :/

I spent the best part of my teens and early twenties driving around in Mk3 Cavs CDi's, SRi's and V6's when all my mates were driving around in XR2s, XR3s, etc. The Cavs collectively pissed on all of them for speed and comfort from a very, very, great height.

Did I ever tell you about the Ford Granda Scorpio Estate (2.9 V6, auto, K-plater) I bought for a ton?

Someone ran into the back of it. I got £1,210. And I'd done 4,000 trouble-free miles in it before then.

Now, what was that about bargains?

Richard

Er... the Cavalier finished in '95, and the Mondeo came out in 1992. Either that or the 1992 registered K-plater POS Ian has right now is clearly some sort of rare engineering prototype.

There speaks a man who has never driven either a 405. And the 405 ran almost parallel to the Mk 3 Cavalier; 1988 to 1995/6 (there are P-registration 405s, by which time the car was somewhat lackluster).

Sounds like he has.

Perhaps you should have attended to those leaks.

I spent my teens and early twenties driving cars like Audi 90 Quattro, Citroen XMs, Fiat X1/9s and so forth. They would assuredly cane most Cavaliers in every aspect.

FWIW, though, my first car was a Chevette. I remember that car with affection. I'm not about to argue that it was the height of aesthetic perfection or ergonomic idealism.

Though the RWD gearbox was so lovely...

Richard

Oops, yup - there were a few on M plates.

Gah, thought K was '94 for some reason. That's still four years afterwards tho.

Driven plenty thanks. Had a 4x4 for a while many moons ago, then an Mi16 for a month or two, couldn't get on with it - awful car plaged with electrical problems. Switched to a Mk3 CDi that was duly converted with the help of an XE redtop. Was /lots/ more fun.

Not disputing otherwise. I meant quality wise it wasn't comparable. Early Mk3s were quite realiable, I'll freely admit later Mk3s are when Vauxhall took a turn for the worse, and never recovered (see recent ditching of Vectra V6, prime example).

Yes, but you're an old fart who acts like an even older fart than you actually are :)

Same here. W plate Estate, spent many happy days with that car full to the brim with as many people as we could fit in it :)