Month: July 2014

18 years of Tin Snail adventure

About ten minutes ago, I realised that it’s a very important anniversary. Yes, my wife and I have yet again forgotten our wedding anniversary. It was two days ago. We usually have to rely on friends to remind us.

Today really is an anniversary though. 18 years ago to this very day, I jumped off the number 18 West Midlands Travel bus in Cotteridge, Birmingham and after a short walk, picked up the keys to only my second car ever. A 1984 Citroen 2CV6 Special in bright red, called Sweet Pea. I paid £650 if I remember rightly, with my decision swayed by the replacement chassis it had, and the Reef sticker on the window. I was a fan of the band at the time.

Bad fashion-sense, good car-sense

It was with that car that I discovered the Deux Chevaux Club of Great Britain. I joined in October 1996 and the above picture is from the first event I went on Raid Tan Hill. This is a drive in the North Yorkshire Moors that still takes place every year. It was by far the furthest I’d ever driven from home. We even stayed in a hotel. That was possibly the first time I’d ever done so. Oh to be young, free and with 2CV!

Sadly, I was no better at dealing with rust than I am now. 2CVs were cheap, so I eyed up a really small welding bill and spend £750 buying a 2CV with a better body from a specialist, who then replaced its rotten chassis with the one from under my red special. Now I owned my first Portuguese-built 2CV! I’d also started a ridiculous cycle of only owning cars for six months, or less. It still persists pretty much!

Me, my friend Louise and Misty the 2CV

Sweet Pea’s engine sat in our shed, but not for long. I soon tired of poor Misty and sold her. For about what she cost me to buy I seem to recall. A rare occurrence! I replaced Misty with a £375 Dyane called Mildred Mildew the Marshmallow. I’ve lost some of my creativity I feel since then when it comes to car names. Mildred’s engine burnt almost as much oil as it leaked, so Sweet Pea’s heart was installed. I did that job with a club friend. What an experience! Drive to friend’s house, rip car apart, drive home with a different engine powering it and no two-stroke hue from the exhaust.

Sadly, I don’t seem to have an electronic photo to hand of Mildred, nor Jemima Puddleduck, Abby-Jo, the Skoda 105Lux, Collette (a free 2CV!), a Peugeot 205 or my first BX, purchased in 1999. Yes, I owned all of those vehicles in just three years! I bought a brand new Daewoo Matiz in 1999 as well. Clearly I was very young and very foolish (though I did like Purple Myrtle!)

I also owned this in 1999.

Me on the right, with my Acadiane. Dyane posers are still friends. Taken in 1999 I think

My first van and also my first left-hand drive vehicle! A 1984 Citroen Acadiane called Wilma the Whirlpool for fairly obvious reasons. Gosh that van was fun. If you think a 2CV leans a lot on bends, you haven’t seen anything until you’ve witnessed a fully-laden Acadiane Mixte (with rear seat full of friends and camping gear) cock a rear wheel on a roundabout! It was very rotten sadly and a failed restoration attempt saw it carted off for spares.

These were truly joyous times. I’d jump into whichever aircooled machine I owned and would drive all over the place. Mildred the Dyane covered 14,000 miles in her year with me. The poor thing only got serviced once! I wouldn’t have known what a kingpin was, let alone where to grease it. I had friends at university and I’d nip down to London to visit for the night, or help them move to Hull. We once drove all the way to Blackpool and back, from Birmingham, to try and catch a Radio 1 live show that had finished by the time we got there! Via Liverpool…

Petrol was about 60p a litre and friends would scrape the pound coins together so we could go off on our great adventures. In the summer, the roof would be rolled back and good times were had by the bucket load. Almost every weekend would involved driving some crazy distance to attend a 2CV camp somewhere. I recall discovering understeer and oversteer on a wet, Lincolnshire road, five-up and somehow surviving. That was in Mildred. We also took her greenlaning in Yorkshire, surprising a group of trial bikers. How was a car that cost less than £400 so much fun? You can see why I’m often loathe to spend more.

In fact, I HAVE found a picture of Mildred! Here on the right, with her friend George.

My mate’s car George, and my Mildred Mildew the Marshmallow

Life got more serious though. That setting-down stuff seemed to occur, and not just with partners and sensible jobs (yes, I’ve had plenty of those too). In 2000, a red and white 2CV stole my heart. My first Dolly. She’s still mine now. She must be Spécial.

18 years since my first 2cV, owned this one for 14!

FutureFear: Driverless cars

I was astonished to discover last year that I like electric cars. There I was thinking of how much an internal combustion engine is a key part of the driving experience. Turns out I was wrong. Now though, all the talk seems to be about cars with no driving experience at all. This I dislike very much!

I’m not sure why there’s such a fever about driverless cars at the moment. Perhaps it has something to do with Google getting involved, and their large promotional budget. Certainly, the news are going crazy about it today. I wish they wouldn’t!

Driverless cars are nothing new really. Since the advent of the automatic gearbox, engineers have been trying to automate as much of the car as possible. Arguably the first driverless car was a Citroen DS developed here in the UK.

Huge computer in the rear replaced driver

That used cables in the road for steering purposes though. Not very practical really. You can see why they chose a DS though – a futuristic car with a futuristic technology!

You see, it’s quite difficult to replace the human brain. Robots and computers are good at menial tasks, or crunching a lot of data. But driving a car is not a simple process. If it was, we would have got around the task by employing chauffeur monkeys by now. I’m sure of it.

It doesn’t stop me from hating the idea of it. I like driving! Ok, so driving in traffic jams isn’t much fun, but I’d rather avoid the jams than find a more pleasurable way to drive in them. For a start, I get nervous enough as a passenger in a human-driven car – even when that car is an AC Cobra being driven around the Silverstone Race Circuit by a very experienced driver. I still felt like asking him whether this was perhaps a bit too quick.

It’s a control thing. I can just about cope with an automatic gearbox – if it behaves in a manner I expect – but the idea of a car driven by technology fills me with horror. If technology was that good, we wouldn’t need airline pilots, train drivers or captains on ships. Computers are quick, but can they really make the sort of judgements driving requires?

I’m not sure it’d be any safer for us actual drivers if the roads were filled with driverless cars either. Computers go wrong. A safe process would be for the car to stop if it detected an error. Would we find ourselves swerving around rapidly-stopping cars? Would a computer-driven car be more or less predictable than a human?

Frankly, if you want to get somewhere without the ‘tiresome’ business of driving a car, do us motorists a favour. Leave the car at home and catch the bus. They’re amazing. You just sit there and end up at your destination with no work at all! It’s true.

Rover – first week review

A week today, I was sitting in The Midlands, frantically browsing the internet to find a car to buy and drive home in. The things we do to avoid three hours on a train.

Eight days and 250 miles later, I’m very pleased with the way my emergency purchase has panned out! In the past two days, I’ve been tackling issues. The wheels have been balanced to cure an annoying wobble and the loose catalyst heat shield has been silenced with an exhaust clamp. I’ve also had a new oxygen sensor fitted, which means the Check Engine light has finally gone away. A frustrating rattle from the back end turned out to be the bars that hold the boot open. A bit of insulation tape padding cured this. Obviously, there was a fair ol’ burst of sticker removal too.

Rover receives rectification

But the more I drive this car, the more I like it. A lot of people seem to write the car off as nothing but a Honda wearing Rover badges. That’s seriously unfair. Honda were not at all keen on the MacPherson strut front suspension for a start, preferring double wishbones (as used on the Japanese-market Concerto). Rover won out though, using its experience at providing good European-friendly suspension. It’s a good history too, when you consider the different techniques used – baffling bulkhead-mounted springs on the Rover P6, Hydrolastic, Hydragas, rubber cone, torsion bars. With the Rover SD1, Spen King even proved that a simple live rear axle with coil springs could be good!

I digress. Rover also had the main say on the interior, and that’s one reason it’s such a happy place to sit. It’s one of those cars that just feels ‘right’ as soon as you clamber aboard. There’s a hint of Honda-esque low scuttle, but it’s not too low. Visibility is superb and the steering wheel, which has a surprising amount of rake to it, feels wonderful in the hand.

This is a lovely place to sit

What really impresses is that it’s nice to drive quickly, but also relaxing due to the lack of engine revs. I was pretty sure it’d be a rev-happy monster, and it just isn’t. I also thought it might be a bit genteel – perhaps because the flat cap brigade like them so much. It isn’t though. It has a lovely poise about it when cornering, and the steering is surprisingly pleasant. A touch light perhaps, but not alarmingly so.

The power steering pump does make alarming noises though – I fear for its future! Other than that though, the car seems really good. I’m hoping to get the sill patched up tomorrow and then it’s just a case of driving it and seeing how much I like it in a few week’s time!

Well, almost. I do have one big problem with the car and I don’t know what to do about it. Dating from 1992, this car is a late pre-facelift model. But it now wears a later grille and later two-tone bumpers. At this age, it should have grey bumper and grey lower body colour. The rear lights are also incorrect later items and of course that silly 200GTi rear spoiler is definitely not right! The alloy wheels are from a later Rover too. It’s very wrong. EDIT – actually, this car is from a rare period when they did have body-coloured lower edges and small indicators, but no fancy grille.

Many details are incorrect. Do I care?

But, I’m not sure I’m really bothered. My 2CV is nowhere near stock condition after all. It also has the ‘wrong’ bumpers and many detail inaccuracies. I wanted to put my own stamp on it and I did. Why would I try and make it look like original factory spec? Is it not better for a car to show how it has evolved over the years?

So, I’m not sure I care about the wrongness of my Rover. It’s a nice looking car as it is, so let it be, let it be.

Video: Rover 416 – initial thoughts

This one took a bit of making. Sadly, my laptop is increasingly unhappy with the world of video editing, so this one isn’t as clean-cut as I’d like.

That’s a shame as I feel the car deserves better! I’ve been busy today getting the catalyst heat shield repaired and yesterday I managed to quieten the rattle you’ll occasionally here from the rear of the car. A spot of wheel balancing completes the minor jobs that have really improved how the car feels.

Regardless, here’s my real world video review of my 1992 Rover 400.

The best Rover since the P6

With the mileage covered since purchase on Tuesday now standing at over 210, I’m able to reflect more on my feelings about the car. I don’t feel any disappointment that it isn’t a 600 – I will still own one at some point.

There’s naturally a big nostalgia kick with this car. The 200 (project R8) was launched in 1989 – the year I started Secondary School. The 400 saloon followed on early in 1990. In 1993, I had my school work experience at the Land Rover factory, and I still remember being driven up to the Gaydon test facility in a Rover 200 – though I can’t recall which engine it had. I do remember that the bloke, a test driver, borrowed it from a colleague, and then gave it a darned good thrashing. “It’s good to blow the cobwebs out,” he said. As he spent his days driving the Discovery Mpi, he was probably glad to be driving something with a bit of oomph…

Rover’s high point?

A few years later, my dad owned a 414 – an M-plate one, so fairly near the end of production for the R8. I was driving myself by then, so don’t have many memories of travelling in it other than the occasional time I borrowed it. These cars were everywhere at this time though, especially if you travelled around Longbridge – where the cars were built alongside Honda’s Concerto.

This may cause arguements, but I reckon the R8 was the first Rover since the P6 that was actually any good. Don’t get me wrong, I like pretty much everything Austin-Rover/BL built, but the R8 was a real move forward. Maybe that was the influence of parent company BAe, but I’m sure it has more to do with the increasingly happy relationship that Rover and Honda enjoyed. The Triumph Acclaim was the first flowering of this relatoinship, but really was just a Honda Ballade with different seats. The SD3 Rover 200 that followed was pretty good, but also clearly very Honda, even if the 216 used a Rover engine. The Rover 800 may have shared the Honda Legend’s underpinnings, but managed to look and feel very different indeed. A shame then that build quality was just not quite there.

The R8 changed that. It had the quality but you also felt that Rover had a far larger say in the design of the car than what had gone before. Honda’s double-wishbone suspension was replaced by good old MacPherson struts up front and a clever-Accord-esque four-link rear suspension. The driving experience was a great deal better too, with far more concession to the European market. Greater ride comfort allied to improved (if still not perfect) ergonomics. Now the 216 used a Honda engine while the 214 used Rover’s new K-Series engine. A great engine in my experience, ruined by cost-cutting and production issues that harmed reliability. Something British Leyland knew a lot about! Head Gasket Failure became sadly common-place, but far less so on earlier cars. When it began production, it was a corker – 96bhp from just 1.4-litres and also 45mpg economy. It made Ford’s Escort and Vauxhall’s Astra seem woefully outdated.

The Rover 600 was perhaps even better, being more like the 800 and looking very different to its Accord sibling. But all was not well. The re-skinned 800 was not entirely successful, hindered by a need to retain the flat roofline of the earlier model. Then BMW took over and the Honda relationship was utterly doomed. 1995’s new Rover 400 was also a good car – the ride in particular was especially fine from personal experience – but it somehow lacked the clean-cut lines of the R8 and the view of it has been somewhat tainted by the fact that it remained in production, as the 45, until the very end of MG Rover in 2005. Also, the main beam was absolutely hopeless. I certainly remember that! We flogged it and bought our 1986 Mini instead. I think the headlamps were better.

Our previous Rover 400. Looks were always a bit bland

So, I shall just bask in the enjoyment my R8 gives me. It demonstrates just how good Rover could be, and perhaps could have remained if the Honda partnership had been maintained. After all, platform sharing is no bad thing. Just ask Volkswagen.

Rover 416: Residue Removal

I’d hoped to have started work on one of my videos by now, but I had a sticky problem. As you’ll recall from yesterday’s Blog, the Rover came covered in stickers. Most were removed yesterday, but some nasty residue was left.

Being keen as ever to avoid spending money, I raided various cupboards for various potions. WD40 can sometimes be good, but not this time. White Spirit was similarly hopeless. Brake and Clutch cleaner was very, very good, for a few seconds. Then you were left with an even bigger sticky mess than you started with. I even resorted to petrol, which did remove the residue, but turned it into very sticky, petrol-stinking globules. Even then, I was still having to use a credit card (not an actual credit card obviously as I hate them) to scrape the sticky gunk off. Ugh. Horrible!

Eventually, I dug out my bottle of Turtle Wax Bug and Tar Remover. It doesn’t spray particularly well, but it doesn’t evaporate either. I gave areas a good soak, then rubbed very lightly with a cloth and left for another minute or two. Then it was out with the non-credit card again for yet more scraping. Bloomin’ hard work, but the gunk I was scraping off was at least not sticky with this treatment.

The end result is a car that now looks really good from only a few feet away rather than at least 30 feet.

A couple of day’s of graft have paid off well

Yes, I’ve left the blocky door graphics and Hamster Racing stickers for now. I quite like them. It has been very fulfilling to see the car emerge from its stickered state. I’m up to about 160 miles in it now and I’m really enjoying it. With the 108bhp Honda D16 engine under the bonnet – a single-cam but 16-valve unit – it has more than enough power. Not that it’s a rev-heavy monster – it really isn’t. I love the generous spread of torque it possesses. Most unusual for a multi-valve engine, but perhaps due to the unusually long-stroke – 90mm compared to a 75mm bore. That’s unusual at a time when ‘square’ engines (where bore and stroke are very similar) were the rage. For instance, the K-Series has a 79mm bore to 75mm stroke – great for power, but not so good for low down grunt.

Boring stats aside though, the engine suits the car very well. It doesn’t feel like a car to fling into corners with abandon in the same way that it doesn’t feel like it wants you to utterly thrash it. That said, it is very composed when cornering, it’s just that the numb steering doesn’t really encourage you to go for it. It almost has that classic Mercedes-Benz feel of making you just want to relax. What’s the rush? You don’t get stressed by gearchanges either, as the shift is delightful and rarely needed. It’ll slog its way up hills with no downchange needed. Wonderful.

There is still that Check Engine light, but reading the blinking light on the ECU tells me it needs a new Lambda sensor. Shouldn’t be too expensive if I can get the old one out of the exhaust manifold… At least it’s nothing serious.

“How will I get home?” Part 2: The steed

Part One Here

Having said goodbye to the Maestro van and it’s happy new owners, I now had to do that public transport thing. A browse on my phone told me I needed two changes. I bought tickets – £2.30 well spent – then went and asked at the ticket office which route I’d actually be taking! The lady told me, then said my train to Birmingham New Street was about to depart. I said thanks and ran to the platform, forgetting the route as I went.

I quite like a bit of rail travel, and I do mean a bit. There’s something very interesting about the comings and goings – all those human stories going on all around you. However, I’d committed. I wasn’t going to catch a 3-hour train home, I was going to catch 3 trains and buy a car! At New Street, a very helpful guard from London Midland told me not only where to get off the train, but also how to find the next one. It was at some Smethwick station I’d never heard of and it seemed to have several levels. There, I caught a train that looked like it had steamed straight out of the eastern bloc.

I’ve never seen a train like this one before

No destination board, no helpful signs on board, though the seats were fabulous. I settled back and eagerly awaited an announcement to tell me I was on the correct train to Stourbridge and not heading off to Siberia. Thankfully, it came. Some time passed, and I eventually arrived at Stourbridge Junction. Here I was collected by the owners of my new motor vehicle. After a spot of sight-seeing (they were checking out an MGF they’d spotted for sale) we arrived. A rudimentary check was carried out, paperwork signed and the Maestro van balance was handed over. Just £300 and I had a newer car with tax and test and a collection of stickers that needed removing.

A quality purchase and no mistake! I think

It was an unusual experience. I’d not driven a Rover R8 (these 200/400 models) since my Dad owned a 414Si many moons ago. I seem to recall that after a session on a private test track, I discovered that the steering was horribly light at naughty speeds. Sorry Dad. Some things never change. I found myself on the M5 before long, and the steering was rather too light at speed. There is a shimmy at the wheel too, so I’ll get the wheel balancing checked.

It goes nicely though. It’s an engine that’s quick to rev, but not particularly punchy. Perhaps the unfashionable long stroke is to blame for that. To be honest, I’ve always felt that this engine was a waste of space given how enthusiastic the K-Series 1.4-litre engine is. That has 96bhp compared to the 108 of this model, but there’s very little real world difference. Maximum torque is produced at a rather high 4800rpm but the torque curve seems quite flat. It’s an engine happiest between 2000 and 4000rpm, which is good. I didn’t want to rev it as I’ve no idea when the timing belt was last replaced…

The clutch isn’t ideal. It has a long travel but is also very light with little feel. I remember feeling much the same about a later Rover 414 ‘bubble’ we owned a few years back. It ate up the motorway miles with little drama though, demonstrating an excellent main beam but letting the side down with a somewhat jiggly ride. Perhaps the alloy wheels and 55-profile tyres are to blame. They’re not really my cup of tea (and nor is the boot spoiler, taken from a 200 hatchback).

How to deal with a ‘Check Engine’ light

It wasn’t all plain sailing. The seller had admitted in his advert that the Check Engine light kept coming on – but as he’d driven to Benidorm and back without issue, he’d decided not to worry about it. I attempted to cover it up with some random black gunge that was dotted around the interior.

After a quick stop at Telford, I decided to remove some items from the boot that were rolling around. I should have left them as I accidentally dropped the heavy bootlid (because of that spoiler perhaps) and bent the latch. No chance of fixing it so I had to push on with another warning light displayed. Perhaps the spoiler actually does generate downforce (yeah, right) as the bootlid stayed pretty much closed all the way home.

The drive home gave plenty of room for reflection. I hadn’t got the car I wanted, but I had got a nice car. My 600 dreams will have to remain on hold for now, but I shall enjoy some Rover/Honda motoring in the meantime. Work has already started on stripping the stickers off. My fingers are very sore!

Here’s how she looks now.

Most stickers gone, some residue remains

There’s a good car starting to emerge I reckon, though I did accidentally wire brush a hole in the nearside sill! A common rot spot. Even with the wrong grille and silly stickers though, it’s a reminder that the R8 was a really good looking car.

Yes, wrong lights too, not as wrong as spoiler!

So, naturally any new car has a To Do list. What’s to do here? Firstly, more stickers need to come off. I’m not planning to get into Hamster Racing anytime soon, though I do like the block pattern on the front doors. In mechanical terms, I need to deal with a loose catalyst shield. It rattles in a rather unsettling manner, removing the acres of streed cred that driving a sporty Rover provides. I’m going to have to have a good hard think about the timing belt too. I may be able to do the work myself, which would help. I aim to find out what’s wrong with the Check Engine light too. There are some simple on-board diagnostics.

I’ll see how I get on with it though. I suspect it’ll stick around longer than the Maestro van did, but only because it isn’t a van. It’s so nice having visibility again!

“How will I get home?” Part One – Delivery

This is a long post so please bear with me. It details yesterday – a day of adventure, discovery and reckless blind purchasing!

I left home at 9:30 and headed to Telford. The day started badly when I miscalculated how long it takes to drive to Telford. I was aiming to be there for 11am, my sat nav just laughed and said “no chance!” I was determined to prove my sat nav wrong, as it can be a little too smug. However, traffic conditions on the A470, A489 and A483 conspired against me. I was in the Maestro van (I’ll get to why later) and enjoyed the overtaking grunt it, rather surprisingly, possesses. However, every time I got past a truck, there was another one. Or a tractor. Frustrating.

There were two reasons for going to Telford. One was to check out a Volvo 940 I’d spotted on Ebay. The second was to meet someone who’s assisted with a feature I’m writing. I was half an hour late for the Volvo visit, and apologised for such tardiness. However, the car wouldn’t start. That was the end of that. I headed off for my other appointment, which ended up including a short spell of greenlaning.

After that, my plan was to go and check out a Rover 600 diesel I’d also spotted on Ebay. I’ve never owned a 600 before and it really must happen at some point. Perhaps this was my chance. It was a marvellous opportunity. The Maestro van buyer, who’d already paid a deposit, agreed to meet me at Birmingham International station. If the Rover was alright, I’d ask the buyer to give me a lift to Coventry or get a train. Then I’d drive home in the Rover. Sorted!

It was an ambitious plan. Perhaps too ambitious. I didn’t want to believe my sat nav when it directed me to a particularly dishevelled looking car sales yard. I couldn’t see another one though. I bravely wandered in. The car was in their overflow yard. One of the chaps jumped into my van with jump leads and we proceeded up the road. The car had clearly been sitting for a while, which was odd as the Ebay ad said it had an MOT from June. The jump leads were knackered and eventually we gave up. Even a Mitsubishi Shogun failed to provide enough juice through the frayed leads. So, back in the van, grab a jump pack and finally, the thing ran.

I drove it around the yard and found it was ticking a lot of boxes. Then we drove back to the main sales plot – the chap driving my van. The Rover had a wheel wobble but seemed ok really. The airbag light flashed occasionally and I reckoned the nearside rear arch would need some welding before too long, but not bad. That’s when we discovered it didn’t actually have an MOT. I was a bit annoyed by this stage. When the bloke said “I’ll put a fresh MOT on it but won’t take a penny less than £500,” I considered the entire lack of any service history, the 181,000 miles, the engine bay piping held together with cable ties and decided to go for a drive.

The perfect car. Almost.

I drove aimlessly in search of tea and wi-fi until I remembered my friend Charles lives in Balsall Common. He duly took a break from tinkering with Citroens to provide the required essentials and we sat down together and browsed Ebay. A 200,000 mile BMW 316 coupe (E36) was very local and only £400. Sadly viewing wasn’t possible.

I’d tried messaging a chap selling an ex-Banger rally Rover 416 with no joy via Ebay. Then a friend tagged me in a post on the AROnline Facebook page, where said car was being advertised. Communications ensued but by now I had to meet the van buyer. Off to Birmingham International I drove with a deal still not done.

The van buyer was delayed. This was very helpful! I sat in the van and phone conversations were held. “Hello. Can I buy your Rover? I’ve just sold my van and need to get home to mid-Wales!” The man from Stourbridge, he say yes!

The deal is on (this is the last shot featuring the Maestro)

I now had a frantic search for train details on my BlackBerry. I’d just about concluded such investigations when the van buyer arrived in a friend’s Mk2 Golf. Birmingham International has never looked so cool.

“What have we done?” ask the Maestro van buyers

There then ensued a bit of a panic as the rear doors refused to close. Frantic tool-less tinkering then followed with no success. In the end, the Golf provided a bit of string and the rear doors were tied shut. Quality! With paperwork completed and cash in my pocket, I rushed off to catch a train.

That’s the selling and failed-buy capers, stay tuned for what happened next!

What do I REALLY want?

My perilous finances mean I rarely get to buy a vehicle I truly want. That’s how I ended up with a rusty Maestro van. It was on the sub-list of vehicles I wouldn’t mind owning, but I can’t pretend it was on the Must Have list. Having already owned a Maestro hatchback, I knew the van would never impress.

I’m not sure I’ve ever really thought about exactly what is on the Must Have list. At school, I dreamt of owning a 2CV or a Dyane and a Land Rover 90 V8. I’ve ticked all of those off. The Landy was a bit disappointing (nothing fuel injection and a sports exhaust couldn’t remedy I suspect) but the 2CV has figured large on my fleet since 1996, occasionally joined by a Dyane of some sort. They’re utterly brilliant.

I think the Range Rover and Discovery were also on the Must Have list. I enjoyed my time with both but got rather fed up with the constant maintenance they seem to need. I seemed to spend more time working on them than driving them. Frustrating.

A Must Have vehicle – great fun. When it worked.

An Alfa Romeo V6 is naturally a Must Have, and I managed to tick off the Alfa Romeo 164 at the same time – albeit not in my favoured red/grey colour scheme. Still, it was a great machine and I’d readily have another.

The Citroen BX was on the Must Have list, but having owned seven of the things now, I think I’m going to have to relegate it to Wouldn’t Mind. There’s so much that’s good about them, but also much that frustrates. Definitely time for a BX holiday. Oddly perhaps, I don’t consider the DS a Must Have car. They’re actually too soft and large for my liking. Definitely a Wouldn’t Mind, but I think I could survive quite easily having never owned one. An SM is rather different. If I could ever afford to run one, I’d be foolish not to try. I need a Dream category too. The SM can sit alongside the Ferrari 288GTO and Series 1 Land Rover.

The Citroen GS/GSA is a car I still very much desire though, as I covered in a Blog last year. On paper, they tick a great many more boxes than most. Definitely a Must Have as I’m very keen to see whether I can run one as a daily. I’ll have to hurry up before they all disappear.

Perhaps more realistic on my budget, and certainly more likely to happen this year is the Rover 600.

Could this be me? Only scruffier? (man and car alike)

I know, a Rover 600 seems an unlikely choice for a Must Have but bear with me. Here are my reasons. First up, it’s a very attractive car. Richard Woolley frankly worked miracles to turn the turgid Accord the 600 is based on into one of the most effortlessly attractive saloons of all time. I particularly like the nose and how well it works with the typical Honda low scuttle. It rises very nicely up at the rear and is almost totally devoid of clutter. It’s clean and stylish. His design was penned in 1989 and even though Honda did almost all of the development and design work under the skin, the Rover managed to carve a unique niche for itself – far more so than the R8 Rover 200, Honda Ballade-based SD3 200 or Acclaim had before them.

Perhaps there was a bit less of a Honda with the 800 but, and I’ll lose friends here, that’s probably a good thing. The 800 always felt a bit let down by its interior appointments, especially as the cars aged. What the 600 has is a Honda-designed interior, but very much inspired by Rover’s interior designs. The clunky feel with chaotic ergonomics is replaced by smooth contours. Rover made use of a different colour palette to make the Accord interior seem somehow much more classy despite being largely the same.

To me, the Honda/Rover partnership was a supremely successful one and I wish it could have continued. Both companies learnt so much from each other, and proved that platform-sharing could create vehicles of very different flavours – something Volkswagen now exploits to the full. I love the feel of Honda engineering, having been particularly impressed with a 1991 Civic 1.4GL I owned a few years ago. The cars ‘feel’ like something Mr Honda himself would have approved of. Mix in some British class and you ended up with a very attractive vehicle – the R8 Rover 200/400 in particular was rightly very popular with buyers.

Rover 600 styling crisp and clean

With the 600, engine choices were initially just 2-litre or 2.3-litre four-cylinder Honda units. By 1994, Rover’s own L-Series turbo diesel was added to the range, and then the T-series-powered 620Ti – a proper wolf in sheep’s clothing with 140mph and 0-60mph in just 7.2 seconds now possible. A smaller 1.8-litre Honda engine was latterly available before production ended in 1998.

So, which one do I fancy? Well, probably not the 620Ti to be honest. Power corrupts and while the chassis can handle it, I probably can’t! I’d find it too tempting to get the turbocharger spooling up. The Honda petrols certainly appeal, perhaps with the automatic transmission for maximum waft. The diesel can deliver impressive economy though and as such a vehicle would be a mile-muncher for long trips, greater economy is probably the way to go.

One thing I do know is that I’m fussy when it comes to colour. Silver and grey are out – far too dull. That leaves solid red, metallic Nightfire red, light gold or the odd turquoise colour they did. Dark colours don’t suit the car too much. It actually works nicely with a brighter colour, which contrasts with that returning Rover grille. I’m certainly scouring the classifieds already, though my purchase budget is not yet there. Still, it’s always good to do your homework and I really need to try a diesel to see if I like it.

So, watch this space. See if I end up with a Rover I’ve always wanted, or some other random heap. If ever there was a time to try and rein in my old heap purchasing, this really is it. Hopefully I can, and can then discover whether the 600 is a car worth waiting 20-years for.

See the truly superb AROnline for more about the Rover 600 and many other tales

Maestro van – a few more miles later

Only a quick post as my family are about to descend upon me. I thought you deserved another update on the Maestro. I certainly wasn’t feeling the love after my recent mega-mile, cross-country trek to Luton. Perhaps I should have paid more attention to Google maps and just headed home via motorway. Well, as far as is possible anyway. Instead, I went cross-country on England’s poorly maintained roads and got angry with van suspension.

Not the worst vehicle I’ve ever owned. Is that a compliment?

I think it’s a valid complaint. After you’ve been spoilt by Citroen hydropneumatic suspension, anything else seems distinctly poor by comparison. While the van crashes around horribly when unladen, a hydro-Cit will ride just as well whether full or empty.
There is another solution though. Live in Wales! Now I’m back on nicely maintained roads, the Maestro’s weaknesses are less apparent. There’s no denying that the Maestro is doing the basics of what a vehicle should do very nicely. It’s getting me where I want to be with the minimum of fuss. It’s not the best vehicle I’ve ever owned, but it’s certainly not the worst. Not by a long chalk. That’ll have to do for now.

HubNut – celebrating the average!