olliesgrandad

Did your Z3 have a wooden centre console fitted as I test drove one in Bidford on Avon at a small garage. I eventually bought my car in Harold Wood Essex privately.

The W124 was probably the best built Mercedes for many years. I know that my car cost the first owner £42000 in 1992,so at today's money is probably nearing the 10000 mark. But the build quality was amazing which I think can be sent in the interior shot. With the sunroof and pillar less construction it was the ideal long distance cruiser. My car was factory fitted with a long range 90 litre tank which gave it a range of around 500 miles at 26 Mpg.

I agree with some ofBen01s comments but the rubbish cars I had were all bought brand new so should have been okay. I remember having to replace a rusted through exhaust on my Marina almost immediately after the 12 months warranty expired. The Allegro was a joke. I spent about 2 months of my first 12 months ownership in loan cars. Bear in mind that these cars cost around £1300 brand new which equated to a year's salary so they weren't actually cheap. I have checked a payslip from 1974 when I bought my Marina so know this is accurate. My wife and I have owned cheap cars in the last few years. She currently has a Fiat 500 which is amazingly good for a cheap car. We ran a couple of Ford Fusion diesels which were also totally reliable and comfortable. None of them could be called a 'bad' car. The premise that all bad cars are cheap is far from true. Not that long ago BMW had the 'nikasil' engine issue which particularly affected cars in the North of England where there was more corrosive sulphur in the petrol. The bigger engined BMW Z3's had a nasty habit of pulling diff carriers out of floor pans due to bad design and weak spot welds. Mercedes from the Early noughties were rusting through panels in less than 2 years. I think this shows that some very expensive models are 'bad cars'. Don't ask me about my experience with my late 2014 Mini Cooper which I bought new......

Back in the 80's I was a village bobby. My elderly Ford Fiesta diesel van was replaced with a smart new hatchback with a twin revolving roof blue light box instead of the single revolving beacon.. Every time i operated it i noticed a scraping noise and the lights didn't seem to be revolving as fast as expected. Upon inspection i found that the blades of the revolving mirrors were trying to cut their way out through the blue plastic . Basically when fitted by workshops the box had been firmly bolted to the roof not allowing for the roof curvature of the car and the now deformed light unit was causing the mechanism to foul the cover.... spacers duly fitted and all was well.

Here are pictures of 2 of my favorite cars. This model Z3 was i believe the only version with factory front indcator lights. The rear lights were the same as the Z3M

My first new car was a 1974 Morris Marina 1.3 Super Coupe. That wasn't good. Kangaroo clutch due to oil seal issues in the bellhousing. British Leyland was a dreadful apology for The British Car Industry.

Worst car - 1976 Austin Allegro 1300. bought new ,at 700 miles the cylinder head gasket blew -from there it just went downhill, paint falling off, seats coming unstitched . failed its first MOT as the metalstick bushes holding the rear radius arms on were 'coming unstuck'. total disaster and was replaced with a 1979 ford escort Mark 2 which according to DVLA is still SORN. Oh i forgot 1990 Vauxhall Cavalier SRi. loved the car but it had to be re-shelled back at the factory when 7 months old because of serious rust. apparently there had been a problem in the paint shop and some bodyshells had been exposed ot moisture before painting. Perhaps then the Ziebart rustproofing worked. Best cars 1. 1983 Golf GTI 'Campaign' in Llasa Green. one of only a 1000 runout GTI mk 1's in a range of colours -Llasa being probably the best.(Now being copied by unscrupulous people I believe). 2. 1992 Mercedes Benz 300CE. Bought 10 years old with only 10,000 miles and never previously driven in the rain. 3. 1999 BMW Z3 'Orinoco' run out modle of the early body shape but fitted with the later twin vanos 2.8 engine. beautiful looking but a beast to drive. 4. 1990 Honda Civic Vtec (Breadvan shape) One of 400 cars imported to meet homologation rules for racing. The only downside was they had deleted the power steering fitted ot the rest of the range and parking was a nightmare, but acceleration was breathtaking. 5. 1990 Mercedes Benz 190E -an all time great. bought after i read an article entitled 'running a Mercedes for the price of an Escort'. My 3 Lexus that I have owned in the last 2 years have to be at the top of the pile for reliability.

Quick Update. Received an email this morning from the new owner saying my order had mistakenly been sent 2nd class post as it was only one item. Well it arrived this afternoon by Royal Mail. The address on the delivery note is; Omega Products Group Ltd, Unit 2 Mintsfeet Road, Kendal LA9 6DE. Telephone is 01539 795 920

Just a heads up. Chemical Guys UK based in Scotland has ceased trading. I have an outstanding order which I am trying to resolve with PayPal. Last Saturday I received a phone call from a guy who said his company had now been appointed by Chemical Guy US to represent them. He said he knew I had an unfulfilled order and stated it would be despatched to me next day delivery on Monday 16th.Well unsurprisingly nothing has happened so be careful if you intend ordering from their updated website. Might be prudent at this time to order from Slims.

Hurrah, my car is back. Paintwork is now all good. Apparently the tailgate was totally repainted under warranty as corrosion damage at Lexus Leicester and the rear doors have been refinished to such a good standard you cannot see any colour variation. Likewise the rear bumper and the black textured area has also been properly refinished. Car looks amazing now. They have also supplied a new service book fully stamped up so all is as it should have been when I first collected it.

I haven't been able to use my garage since I sold my BMW Z3. Fortunately my wife's Fiat 500 lives there now and the RX is under the carport.

They only have 5 loan cars apparently and in fairness it is a 218 mile round trip to them from my home. It was never forseen that they would have my car more than 4 days tops. Still their ct is nicely run in now as I have done 1200 miles in it so far and there will be at least another 250 on it by Thursday. It had 135 miles when it arrived.

Well my car has been with the dealer now for 2 weeks for some bodywork rectification which they failed to do when the car was prepared for sale. It was due back a week ago but at the 11th hour I had a call to say that the work was substandard and the car needed to visit the Lexus bodyshop to be properly fixed( I Had already pointed out that my local very good smart repair guy had said it needed a bodyshop repair) I see from the 'My Lexus' app the car was at a different branch of the dealer on Friday. I have been told it will be returned late Thursday. Some of you may have seen the expensive fiasco I've had with the new loan car. As you can imagine I'm pretty fed up with driving a ct200h for 2 weeks plus when I previously owned GS300h and now the 450h.(have travelled over 1200 miles in the ct) I have suggested that as a goodwill gesture they might care to put an extended warranty on my car as its been back with them for almost as long as l had it. We shall see what happens.

Or a dab of clear silicone....

The icon in the screen is only there when in reverse. It allows you toselect the yellow guidelines, the golf marker flags or the 'criss cross' yellow lines in addition to the yellow and blue guidelines.

Pretty fed up at present. My car was due back with me at around 3pm so I arranged to work at home today. At 2.30 i had a call from the Sales manager at the garage to say that he wasn't happy with the quality of work done on my car and that he wanted it to go into their Lexus approved bodyshop rather than on site bodyshop to ensure the job wasn't going to be rejected. I then learn that they probably want it for another full week. He said that they had tried to buff out some of the scratches in the paintwork but they were still visible. I explained to him that My local 'smart repair' guy had told me that it needed a proper bodyshop repair and that I had explained that before the car went back to them. The Garage guy told me that one area of concern was the patch of corrosion on the tailgate and I again explained that I had been told it would need a bodyshop to blend it in properly. I am supposed to be getting a call tomorrow to give me a timeline for the work. Ah well -Back to the CT200h then 🙂

Well hopefully my RX450h is coming home tomorrow after a full weeks absence. Looking forward to it. The CT200h has been better than expected during a total of 624 miles covered in that period. I have refuelled fully 3 times and the average mpg has been 54.1. Yesterday saw a round trip of 240 miles to London so fuel consumption is not at all bad. I have got used to the hard ride and the seats are comfortable - more comfortable than my IS300h F sport , but not as good as my 2015 GS Luxury or my RX450h. I have somewhat changed my mind on the performance. It is adequate in normal driving, but for overtaking rather sluggish. Why aren't the folding door mirrors automatically folding when locking the car? The speed limit function from the camera is also random -often picking up the signs from side roads and missing the ones on the road you are driving along. This was especially noticeable in London (where you want it to be correct). Today on the motorway it showed me that the speed limit was 120mph...... Active cruise and lane assist are far superior to the offerings I had on a late 2014 mini cooper, but sometimes restting the cruise speed at the higher end would want to restrict me to 35mph (switch off and on cleared this). All in all fine for a week, but wouldn't rush to buy one at this time.

Good choice. Like you tried the NX. Found the ride so harsh and uncomfortable and within 10 miles my back ached. Also lacked the performance of my GS. The RX is so much more comfortable (although I have a late series 3). Enjoy 🙂

Just refuelled and tankful to tankful over 300 miles was 53mpg. The computer said 57 so rather optimistic. Compared to 46mpg from my previous 2015 GS 3 weeks ago not an impressive figure.

Well the windscreen on my loan CT300h was replaced today at Autovision in Gloucester. Chatting to Rich who runs the business I queried about the camera/auto lights/ wipers needing recalibration as I know autoglass make a deal about this. He says that everything is swapped over without touching any wiring and the screens are supplied with the camera mountings installed so no re-calibration is needed and everything should work perfectly.

It wasn't my local dealer that supplied my RX. The local dealer supplied the parts for fitting the screen (delivered to the screen fitter this morning). Good news is that my dealer said if I can return the unused screen trim parts next week they will refund me the £147 I paid for them.

Windscreen now fitted this morning. the guy that my local dealer booked it with does not normally do work for them. left the car for 2 hours and a very professional job. He only used the screen and none of the extra fixings so I am hoping i can get a refund on them as they total including VAT over £147.

nice looking car. Please tell us more

I understand the curiousity. I think at the moment I just want a properly functioning vehicle as quickly and efficiently as possible - I know that Mike at Lexus in Cheltenham struggled to find someone who could do the job quickly -I suspect this intense heat is giving the auto glass trade plenty of work. Certainly the crack in the screen is now about 18 inches long and quite distracting in the sunlight. I am looking forward to my vehicle returning on Tuesday.

The issue there in fairness is that this is a car that was first registered on Monday this week and one would expect it to have Lexus glass- especially as people on this forum reckon all the fancy light sensors and collision avoidance systems never seem to work right with replacement non -lexus screens. I have spoken to the guy who is going to fit the screen and he says if he doesn't use any of the surrounds etc i might be able to get a refund on them.