Year: 2021

Hello everyone,

I’ve been half watching Wheeler Dealer episodes after the F1 qualifying finished and that with another thing gave me the idea for a non Internet Spaceship post ! To be honest, I haven’t been in the internet spaceship since Sunday and game’s got so many issues that the Steam owners have affixed the “Early access” tag to it.

I’m going to go from worst cars owned to best and there is going to be a big Lexus vs The Rest split in here. They’re just well sorted cars that tick all the boxes and set out to do what they were supposed to do. Disclosure note – no inducements of any kind involved, save the things like free servicing and repeat customer discounts. I do feel that I need to pop in a different picture though so that the absolute worst doesn’t get the thumbnail !

The absolute worst – a 1992 Rover 420 “Exec Limited Edition”.

This was a 2 litre engine variant that gave about 140bhp. It wasn’t slow and was actually fairly decent around the corners. It supported me through my early working days and did a decent amount of miles for me. It handled my early hifi and computer gear which were far more bulky than what I have now. But … 30ish mpg was poor for the performance and it broke CONSTANTLY. Reliability is by far, the most important criteria for me in a car with repairability coming second. For a car that was marked Exec Limited Edition, the interior trim was cheap. Dredging up from memory, this car broke the alternator with no warning save for not starting up the next morning. The engine developed a coolant leak which later most likely turned into burnt valves (4 cylinders down to something like 2.5). The alternator broke again. Expensive servicing. And I’ve banished the rest from memory. The car wasn’t great to start with and was constantly breaking.

Other cars I’ve owned have had major mechanical issues but those were usually one hit things like the broken inlet throttle body on the next car. I’ll forgive one thing breaking … but not the repeated breakages of the Rover.

Car 2 – not quite the worst … but nearly. 2002 Ford Focus ST170.

One of the considerations with this list is : Does the car do what it is supposed to do ? So a later one will get a free pass on performance that this one definitely doesn’t. This car is a Focus ST170, a 2 litre performance oriented variant of the early Focus designs. It was medium weight, without any real effort in lightening the car to get more speed. Or maybe they did and it wasn’t noticeable.

A minor sin was that it wasn’t nearly as good handling as the Puma I had before. But the biggest one is that to fit an extra gear in to give this car 6 gears, far too many compromises had been made. The 3rd gear had a design weakness that led to awkwardness in engaging the gear, plus there was a big gap between the 2nd and 3rd gear ratios. If you changed up at the wrong time, you had absolutely zero power available. The engine also had a very over protective heating sequence, where engine power was limited to what felt like 50% until the car reached operating temperature.

All that together and it didn’t just lose its Performance Car feeling, the driveability was shocking. It also had very cheap trim that was increasingly becoming detached.

So that’s the really bad cars … The rest have been pretty good ! Well. Maybe this one’s on the verge :

It’s a Ford Fiesta Mk2 and the one I had was a 1982 950cc Popular Plus. I’m not sure what the Plus meant because the car didn’t have very much included outside the little 4 cylinder engine. It did exactly what it was supposed to do. It’s an entry level car that goes from A to B without the rain getting in and you could bring back a bit of shopping in it. Cheap and cheerful. Don’t ask about the 0 to 60 or the top speed ! Things did break on it, including the brake master cylinder on the way home. But parts are cheap and somewhat easy to replace. Oh and it wasn’t a car for going round corners fast.

Not in the same league as any of the other cars in this list for performance, practicality, comfort or toys … but it did exactly what it was supposed to do and was great value. I denigrate this car a lot but it really doesn’t deserve that. Good little car and it owed us nothing when we traded it in for …

The car that replaced my Fiesta was a 1.6 litre Astra Mk1 from 1982 that was the original Buggy. This one had its mechanical issues, like broken springs at the front, headlight glass and a few ignition things but all those got replaced very quickly for minimal monies. Oh and it developed an oil leak at the back that damaged the starter motor. (I think I caused that by overfilling the oil). This is a case where things breaking get forgiven because the car keeps on ticking (oh – alternator failure as well) and fixes were easy and cheap.

It’s a car of its time, which means the 90bhp was in a very lightweight car giving about the same power to weight as the Rover and the Focus. However, because it didn’t have the complex computer control of those later cars, the power is inconsistent. Some days it’s good, other days the carburettor isn’t quite as well sorted and it takes time to get happy. The radio was a thing I put in and I really should have bolted down the speakers behind the back seats.

But ! This car got adopted as our university hall shop van for my second year and was happy lugging deliveries of £500 ish of Stuff from the cash and carry place. It handled pretty much everything I threw at it but it was getting really tired by the end. I joked that it had a beard, this was a vast array of corrosion under the front bumper. Plus it was down on power, perhaps it hadn’t been as adapted to lead free petrol as I thought.

Great little car, this one got me through university.

On to the Lexuses … The big thing to note with these is higher cost and available technology brings with it far higher expectations. Whereas the Fiesta and the Astra had minimal technology because it wasn’t available, the 2010 onwards cars have to be judged on how they put their technology into practice on the road.

And there are shortcomings with the IS300h’s which is another reason why I was content to switch to a different car and held off when I was being offered to switch to one of the last of the IS’s in the middle of last year. Before I dive into the shortcomings, the IS300h is a very special car. But it could be better ! The handling is excellent and the power train is the hybrid system that combines great power, massive amounts of torque with driveability and economy. I had no issues with the boot and it was lovely having all that technology on the inside like seat heaters and coolers, and bluetooth connections to the rather good hifi. Reversing cameras and parking sensors are also something I would demand in all future cars and the adaptive cruise control is fantastic when on the motorway.

But … the 2013 car had driveability issues with the software. Pulling up to traffic lights in Normal mode would lead to kangaroo hopping as the mechanical and electrical brakes started fighting with each other. The 2016 car was the best of them and fixed that issue. I moved on to the 2019 car because the previous one had a suspected broken power steering pump (also offer that couldn’t be refused). The last one had a definite step backwards with its satnav and it was a victim of plague lockdown with its battery.

The level of technology in the 2010 and onwards cars would have been undreamed of even in concept cars to the 17 year old Sleepy who had just got his driving licence. That technology HAS to work though and it HAS to be sorted out before the customer sees it. Breakages like the battery and the power steering are ok, that’s not a design issue. But issues like the drive by wire software and the satnav giving up before the crucial last mile have to be 100% done.

I have fond memories of this car, despite not having it for that long ! It’s a Vauxhall Belmont SRi and I got this one as a result of a bit of a shuffle of cars in the family. Before it was mine, it was Mum’s Rocket. And it definitely shifted along. What happened ? My sister’s Astra GTE blew up as a result of faulty maintenance from a garage (a new cambelt broke – engine go byebye), so she got my Astra Mk1 Buggy until a replacement could arrive. The Belmont had really heavy steering (no power assistance) that was hurting my mum, so I got the Belmont and my mum got the short straw of a nasty little Peugeot 205.

I can’t remember why I moved on to another car but it could have been a combination of that lack of power assistance on the steering coupled with me recovering from the dislocated shoulder. It was also still my mum’s car in my mind. I’d have been much better to keep it to be honest as this was one of the last pre-catalytic convertor cars. It was lighter and a little more powerful than the Rover 420 that replaced it. I think it gave around 45 mpg too on the motorway heavy driving I was doing.

It did need to have the fuel pipes replaced and the oil cooler took about 5 Vauxhall garages in Lincolnshire to fix (bad garages saying they had done work that they hadn’t) but with its issues sorted out, this was a splendid car, albeit getting a bit tired on 130k miles. With hindsight, I should have kept it because the Rover that followed it was a shocker.

This is the 1998 Ford Puma that I had for maybe 7 years before it started disintegrating on me. This was a spectacularly good little car. It starts as a Fiesta, which then has an uprated engine and improved suspension systems. The result was a little rocket ship that was a dream to drive. It’s a toss up as to whether this should be actually number 1 in this list because it does what it’s there to do in a wonderful style of its own.

The engine is a 1.7 litre engine with a “VVT” or “VCT” label on it, which stands for Variable Valve Timing or Variable Cam Timing. What that means is that with the 1.7 litre engine in a little body, it’s a fast car. When you floor it, the engine changes the timings of when petrol and air go into the cylinder and it becomes a ludicrous car. This was such a fun car to drive, with a well sorted gearbox and handling that had power oversteer, which was brilliant when doing daft things when going round corners.

I think the next two are just Better though.

This one is a bit of a floating selection. I haven’t really had the car long enough yet to properly place it in this list but I’ve been greatly appreciating what I’ve seen on it so far. It’s the 2020/2021 Lexus ES300h and although it shares most of the powertrain goodies from the IS300h, the big difference is that it’s been turned through 90 degrees and drives the front wheels.

This gives it a bit of a skittish tendency when going over broken up pieces of the road, like railway lines or joins in the tarmac. Still goes round corners pretty well though.

So – easy to drive, cavern of a boot and the toys are all working very nicely indeed so far. The selection of trips so far have been very easy and it’s nice having a sun roof again. One other thing that puts this above the IS and definitely the Belmont is that the steering is incredibly light at parking speeds. The Belmont’s lack of power steering really hurt it in car parking.

So … what’s the best car I’ve owned ?

Yep ! It’s my first Lexus, a Tardis Blue CT. This one gets the nod because the hybrid bits made this ridiculously easy to drive, which I desperately needed because the heavy clutch and nasty gearbox of the Focus that preceded it were causing my definite pain in my left leg. That was gone with this car because … no clutch work !

The drawbacks on this one were the limitations of the Prius powertrain that it inherited. It didn’t really have enough power to keep me happy, which led to switching to the IS300h’s. However … the system meant that whenever you asked it the question, this car would give it absolutely everything that it had. Off the line from traffic lights, this car would beat pretty much anything else due to the electric motors, up to around 40mph. It was definitely far more flexible than the Focus with its dodgy gearbox.

Splendid car. Could have done with more power but it more than made up for that with lovely comfort, great start on the technology toys (first car with reversing camera and smart entry) and the more mundane but utterly critical thing of a flat boot floor when the back seats were down. You could probably fit more in there than can go in SUVs.

Gosh, long post ! As a little recap of the order :

Nasty – Rover 420 and Focus ST170.

Cheap and cheerful – Fiesta Mk2 and Astra Mk1

Not quite there – IS from 2013, IS from 2019, IS from 2016.

Best of the older ones – Belmont SRi, Puma

Favourite cars – Lexus ES and 2011 CT.

The family had a bunch of other cars that I drove from time to time … and a couple I refused to (Golf TDi was dangerous and I would refuse to drive it). I can’t remember those too much though. I didn’t like the Volvo because I didn’t get on with its gearbox brain, the MX-5 was lovely, sister’s Saab was another rocket ship and the Mondeo Mundanos did their job well. I missed out on the Mk3 Spitfire that we had.

That’s all for me for today – stay safe, drive safe, have safe fun on the roads, be well.