So what does the panel think then?

Sitting in traffic isn't too bad when it's on company time, rather than your own ;-)

However, sometimes I wish I could do customer visits on a bike rather than in the car - eg. I go to East Anglia and surrounding area every few weeks, which takes bloody ages in the car, even if I leave at 6am.

For internal company business, I do tend to use the bike, though.

Agreed - Yamaha Diversion 900 springs to mind, or a full-on BMW tourer for weather protection, followed by a Pan European or a Deuville.

Just for once, how about buying something a bit more mainstream. Otherwise you'll end up in the same situation as the Celsior - some oddball Jap import with matching spares availability and costs.

I'm not strapped for cash, I just don't like the idea of getting into=20 finance. Granted I might use =A3200 fuel a month, but I could pay much more than=20 that for something posh and ecomical (middle of the road merc diesel).=20 And, should the money take a turn for the worse for what ever reason, I=20 can sell it and buy a banger/ride my bike/walk and I'm not tied to a=20 finance plan that I would struggle with.

I love the idea of the Lexus IS diesel but the finance plan would be=20 stupid.

--=20 Carl Robson Audio stream:

Estima things are quite common though. My dad had one and he never had any problems getting parts. I borrowed it for an Ikea run a while back - not bad to drive TBH. Doesn't feel as big as it is, and although it's not quick (I think it was the 2.2TD) it had enough get-up-and-go to make sufficient progress

Of course, the other downside is that everyone thinks you're taking the community elders on a day trip to Bradford Mosque when you drive one of those ;-)

W124 Turbodiesel are nigh on impossible to find. They didn't exactly sell like hot cakes when they were new, either.

See, I thought you wanted comfy, reliable and cheap.

That probably means an Avensis....

I'm old enough now that I get the attractiveness of such a thing.

P.S. Ebay is groaning under the weight of Citroen ZX Turbodiesels. One of them with an autobox would be a good thing. Slurring automatics are the new flat shifting at 6500rpm as James May might say.

And another one. Let's face it, you bought it for the surge when you boot it in a straight line and for the toys. And the *driver* wallowing in the sumptuosity inside it.

If it corners like a cow, so be it. Pretend it's a Cadillac...

i get it in vauxhall's and citroens. vauxhall's tend to be to hard and citroens to soft for me. MR2 turbo was my fave and the MK1 MR2 and BMW a joint second. cavalier killed me and so did my dad's AX and my sis old corsa! the skoda fabia is just ok. the fabia my sis has doesn't hurt my back but doesn't make me comfy comfy, i guess being a lanky tosser i like to stretch my legs out which is the prob as most cars make you sit like your driving a fecking transit!

The Estima mechanically the same as the Previa, very popular, roomy comfy but smaller to suit Jap tax levels.

And they run well on veggie, and they are jap reliable and they are Toyota build quality and they will be expensive if anything breaks but so is a 3 year old yaris. just not as expensive as a Lexus.

I found out why the monster parts are so expensive here. In the US, Toyota dealers can work on a Lexus, get access to the service manuals and repair schematics. They compete against each other and against lexus dealers.

Here they can't even order parts as they can't access the Lexus part of the EPC to enter the chassis number, and they can't officially do jobs according to the book prices because they can't access them. So Lex get a nice little main dealer monopoly.

Oooh, forgot the pug 6** series.

Only car to ever give me serious back grief was a Ford Cougar with cloth trim. That put me off work for a week, the only time I've ever had back problems. The ones with leather seats are comfy as anything, but I think the leather ones are made by Lear, so they should be good.

If I stretch my legs OK on most cars, including the celsior, the steering wheel doesn't extend enough.

So it is either have the knees bent a little too much, or end up with the back too upright.

Yebbut you're still thinking about cars for the commute, when being in a car is costing you 2-3 hours/day. Lose the 4 wheel requirement, and you gain a hell of a lot of free time. I'd spend some cash to do that. (A motorbike could struggle to be as cheap as a banger - maybe less fuel, but more on purchase/maintenance - but it would make up for it by freeing your life up.)

cheers, clive

You're right, you know. I've just had a look.

C-class oil burners are getting quite cheap these days, though.

I know they're nowhere near as well built as the W124, but they don't rot like a W210.

To be fair, a Deuville or BMW shouldn't be any more expensive to maintain than a decent-ish car.

Rear tyres are the killer in terms of costs, but oil and filter every 8k miles on the Honda or 4k on the BMW aren't killers, and shaft drive means there's no expensive chain and sprockets to replace.

You just sometimes forget that it is so wallowy and get into a country lane corner bit fast and then try to hold it together as the tyres grip fine, but the body is going one way and the pocket sprung mattress is trying to go somewhere else usually against direction the wheels are going. Gets quite scary and not in an oversteery or understeery nice way.

And it is about 1/3 shorter than the Celsior.

As long as they share the curry, I can live with that ;)