To the original poster, no that is a terrible idea as a first car. Unless you make a pretty nice living and can afford the high prices of maintenance. Also, you'll probably be a target for ticket happy cops.
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Porsche
- Thread starter Noseferatu
- Start date
that's gotta be incredible. man, I wanna see that.
We are all heading to Sebring in a few weeks, I'll take some pics.
mint!
Shoot some vid too! hahaha......no....serious....
edit: my DREAM stable would have a 928, a Karmann Ghia convertible (1969-ish), a 916 (4 or 6), and a VW thing, done up buggy style...
Shoot some vid too! hahaha......no....serious....
edit: my DREAM stable would have a 928, a Karmann Ghia convertible (1969-ish), a 916 (4 or 6), and a VW thing, done up buggy style...
You do realize the Ford Focus is a Mazda right? The early nineties Focus's were Mazda 323's which later became the Mazda 3. The Ford Ranger is similar. It's a Mazda B3000, and B4000 depending on the engine you opt for. My Ford Ranger 4.0 xlt was a Mazda b4000. I looked at the Mazda's and opted for the Ford because it was cheaper.
I've driven many Jags and my Dad actually bought a 1996 xj6 for my mom. It wasn't that bad of a car, but it was gutless, heavy, and handled poorly. Then the interior started falling apart. They sold it for a Toyota. My Dad has restored a 1958 Mini Cooper S, and is currently looking to restore either an E-type or an MG (classic chrome bumper era). He recently retired as VP of a very prominent British (well until they were bought out by a German company
) car company after working as automotive engineer for over 30 years. I only bring this up because this is the basis of my opinion on the Jag.
Yeah you're right. That was a typo. I meant to say 'those early Focus's in the nineties.'
But my point was you were heralding Ford for a model that wasn't even theirs other than what was essentially a badge swap and some cosmetic body treatments.
Ford is looked at more as a slightly upmarket brand in Europe. The main differences between Euro-Ford and US Ford are the same differences most automakes have between their European offerings and their US lineup. The suspensions are usually tighter and there's usually a wider range of smaller engines, especially diesels. Even so, I'd never consider them the all conquering juggernaut of automitive excellence others here have. To that end, Maki's experience with a Jaguar with the interior literally falling apart is the kind of thing I was reading in prominent car magazines about Jaguar all through the 1990's. I wouldn't own one.
Lastly...the Fiesta is a Mazda2. Not sure who did the bulk of the development on that pair, though.
Mike
Yeah you're right. That was a typo. I meant to say 'those early Focus's in the nineties.'
But my point was you were heralding Ford for a model that wasn't even theirs other than what was essentially a badge swap and some cosmetic body treatments.
Maybe for the Us Focus, but the Euro Focuses (Foci?) were designed from the ground up as the Ford Focus, being based on a concept by Ghia in the very early '90s.
We're in the American market. European and Japanese for that matter, are entirely different animals. Different emission standards is just the tip of the iceberg. You can't compare the two for this application. Remember a piece of **** called the Ford Merkur? In Europe that thing was an animal, but over here the thing was a turd.
Especially the pickups with the Triton 5.4, which comes factory with self ejecting spark plugs. Of course some brilliant engineer redesigned them in the mid 2000's and the self ejecting plugs became non removable plugs, as in you'll break them trying to get them out.
Way to go Ford.
There were two of those toilets, the Merkur XR4Ti and the Scorpio. Thank god we don't see those anymore.
It's old... that's all it takes nowadays. A friend of mine just bought a low mileage, very clean 2003 Jaguar X Type for $3k. He put it through inspection and all it needed was a tag light.
A few months back I saw a 2000 Z3 Coupe similar to mine for $6900 in nice condition.
The only way I'd consider the Boxster (and I did thoroughly research them before buying my Coupe) is by doing the same thing I do with most of the cars I've purchased relatively recently: Do the research. That means not here but on someplace more brand specific, like a Porsche forum. But your first call should be getting an insurance quote. I bought a used VW Scirocco S back in the 80's and my insurance ended up being double what I paid on my vintage Porsche. Lesson learned... do it before you buy the car.
Find out about normal maintainence and failures and the costs to fix them and even better, how many you can do yourself should you need to. Find out who in your area repairs them. I never use dealers for repairs because I don't have to and I save a ton of money that way, finding and providing my own parts saves too. I have a great independent shop that works on whatever I don't.
Figure out how you'll initially pay for it. Even a reduced price might be more than the loan value.
Find out about the local Porsche club if there is one. Pretty valuable resource. Figure out what you'll do for transportation should your call be out of commission for a period of time. Figure out what you'll do if you actually need to carry more than will fit in the car.
Those are the basics IME IMO. If you have restraint you shouldn't have issues driving it. That being said, I know of at least four younger drivers who totalled their BMWs like mine in the first year I owned mine. Learn how to drive the car you're driving.
That said, if I were looking for a first sportscar I'd get a Miata in a heartbeat... like the one I own. You can pick them up cheap, they're very reliable, parts are plentiful, they can be as much to handle as you want, lots of upgrades available and they're simply fun to drive. I even drive mine to gigs... two gigbags and a small amp and cart easily fit in my trunk, speaker on the seat or floor.
I had a brand new XR4Ti as a company car back in the mid 80's. It was basically Ford's take on a SAAB Turbo, which I'd already owned. Had a ton of room in it. While mine was problem free and held up very well, the turbo'd engine was about as crude feeling and sounding as anything I'd driven up to that point.
Would've been nice to have the Cosworth version.
Yep.
I'm still a fan of older 911's. 928 parts costs concerned me so I never pulled the trigger.
