CARS

[Psyber]

if you can afford a maserati, your not going to be living on main north rd

Well I'd just left Prospect and was living on a dirt road outside Hahndorf at the time. I had to drive it carefully there too until I hit the bitumen. It still holds my cross-country record from Hahndorf to Mt Compass though, set back in the early 1990s.

It was a good car when it worked - but was off the road about 25% of its life in my hands. Friends tell me the current model is no more reliable. As I once said to the local Ferrari dealer an Adelaide, "Roberto, I have had two Italian cars - why would I buy a third!"

i must admit, i do think the italian cars are over-rated. Don't get me wrong, i like them and i'd gladly take one if it was going at a good price, but give me an Aston Martin DB9 anyday.

sorry to people who get the s**ts with posts that get off the topic. apoligies.

Just to avoid that problem, I thought a new thread was appropriate!

My other Italian car was an Alfa. Overall, the Alfa lacked the power of a twin turbo Maserati, but once a few basic things wrong with it were fixed it was the more reliable of the two. The basic things; poor shockers and not very reliable brakes. After a while I gave up on the dealer, concluding they couldn't fix it because they had no isdea how to, and I gave the job to Enzo of Enzo's Auto Service in Frome Street. The big problem was the traditional Alfa tendency to rust - their idea of a 6 year anti-rust guarantee was that they would keep repairing it free for 6 years then you were on your own.

After those two I vowed to only buy German. I currently drive a 1995 Audi S series. I don't want the newest car on the block - I just want performance.

Friends who have had Jaguars have had problems with them overheating, and we had a Range Rover in the 1980s which we kept for 13 years until its electrics starting to fail dramatically and it became a fire risk. I don't know whether Aston Martin have these traditional British car problems.

I sarted out as a Holden man, had a Datsun 260Z, for a while then moved to the European stuff as I could afford it.

[The_Bay_Boy]

i've got a Toyota Paseo, which i know is pretty much like a toyota corolla seca dressed up in drag to look like a sports car, but it gets me from A to B with no problems. But the thing i love with the Paseo is it's great fuel consuption. Needs petrol every 2 - 3 weeks. Which is great with todays petrol prices.

Whats fuel consuption like in the Maserati?

I saw an Aston Martin DB9 selling on ebay the other month for around $350k. Thats Crazy!!!!

[Psyber]

i've got a Toyota Paseo, which i know is pretty much like a toyota corolla seca dressed up in drag to look like a sports car, but it gets me from A to B with no problems. But the thing i love with the Paseo is it's great fuel consuption. Needs petrol every 2 - 3 weeks. Which is great with todays petrol prices.

Whats fuel consumption like in the Maserati?

I saw an Aston Martin DB9 selling on ebay the other month for around $350k. Thats Crazy!!!!

The Paseo is a nice looking car, and handles reasonably well. I have driven one as a loan car at one time. I also got a Renault Fuego once or twice.

The Maserati was a 1992 model 222E, which was a 2.5 Litre V6 with a two stage twin turbo system producing only 225bhp, but it did 0-100 K in 5.2 and was nice and smooth - no sudden jolt, but poured on power progressively from 2000 rpm from memory - the smaller charger cut in first at lower revs. Nice car, nice concept - if only the execution had been as good. Fuel economy was fairly reasonable, especially compared with the current V8 models, but obviously depended how you drove, and I must admit I drove hard and didn't pay the economy much attention in those days - it was tax deductible - so I am not too sure.

I think it was about on par with my current car, the Audi, which used to use about 14.5 L/100K. I know about this car's consumption because it has a display in the dash. What is interesting there is that since I have tweaked this one up to 206 Kw from its original 169Kw I am actually using less fuel - averaging 14.1 L/100K.. that is interesting - it is amazing what changing the chip and tuning can do! [Also replaced the divertor valve and increased the boost a little.]

I'd check the Red Book for value on the Aston before I put in a bid! It sounds a bit over the top to me - I would expect their second hand value to drop fast. It is interesting to go to the UK Yahoo site and then search second-hard car pricing there. Mind you I have an older friend in Adelaide who flew to England to buy the Maserati Ghibli Peter Sellers gave to Britt Eklund as a wedding present when they married - so he wasn't worried about market value.

[Psyber]

Choice - on tyres: "Only one model performed just as well in the wet as it did in the dry."

Does anyone know which one?

I used to subscribe to Choice magazine years ago to find the results of the testing because I supported that, but when they started moralising about what you should buy on socialist-moralist grounds instead of just telling you what performed best they got up my nose and I quit subscribing!

[Sojourner]

I dont know which the tyre was, yet I have always found Michelin tyres to be the best in the wet! - Being a fan of 1970's cars, they are the only ones that do good whitewalls which seem to be comming more into fashion lately!

[MW]

i've got a Toyota Paseo, which i know is pretty much like a toyota corolla seca dressed up in drag to look like a sports car, but it gets me from A to B with no problems. But the thing i love with the Paseo is it's great fuel consuption. Needs petrol every 2 - 3 weeks. Which is great with todays petrol prices.

Whats fuel consuption like in the Maserati?

I saw an Aston Martin DB9 selling on ebay the other month for around $350k. Thats Crazy!!!!

I had a Paseo until only 4 weeks ago when a B-double semi decided it wanted to be in my lane more than I did....was a great little car, agree with everything you said about it.

[the tractor]

Only just recently sold my German sports coupe.



















Was very happy with it but I had to grow up abit.