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With 4 litres, who needs aerodynamics?

The demise of the real mini is one of the saddest things in car history. That the name was bought out and attached to an expensive car vaguely reminiscent of the original design, to me, only rubbed salt in the wound. Hey ho, the story of the British motor industry: iirc, even Bentley belongs to VW now

Having said that, I certainly wouldn't mind one. The BMW Mini is only available in India as a high-price import.

Cars I always fancied but would never own certainly include Subaru. Volvo I have fancied since the days when they made wardrobe-shaped estate cars (station wagons to you USAians I think). And Saab.

@dBel84, how is the interior of the Mini these days? I hated the dials-on-stalks thing they did with their early models. I knew a guy involved in that design, but kept my mouth shut! Interestingly, he had one of those Hondas with four-wheel steering.

 

2012 impreza, just hit 50k miles


Great car, good gas mileage, reliable, good amount of space inside.
Upgraded audio system a lot with Helix DSP unit, nice Helix component speakers in the front, nice subwoofer, sound deadening.
Also go some cheap wheels on facebook marketplace that I think look nice.

 

My girls named the cat "Fluffy" and the car "Calamity Jane". Poor Fluffy was suffering from Leukaemia and has gone on to cat heaven (the picture is about 10 years old).

 

I'm probably hated by the local fern fondler brigade. My other car is a 2003 4Runner; 4.7L V8 and full time four wheel drive. But I do like to go skiing, and getteing there and back, so 4x4 is what I drive

Rob

 

They wouldn't be too happy with my 6.75L daily driver either. But I'm retired, and it takes me about 3 months to get through a tank of petrol. I suspect most of them are filling up more than once a week in their 1.3L hybrids....

 

Had to trade it in for a minivan, but this is my favorite picture of a 6 speed A4 I had for barely a year.

 

The Locust Abortion Technician: 1991 Civic DX 3-door, prairies, summer 2003.



Even after cleaning the radiator, for weeks afterward it overheated and smelled of toasted insect.

 

In about 1988, I was driving a 13 or 14 year old first-generation Civic. It was a cast-off from a friend's mother.

In 2003 I was driving a British Accord, ie a Honda labelled "Rover"

 

My first Honda was a 1981 Accord LX 2-door hatch. It was a stick, and I knew a spot where I could get air. I have an affinity for ridge roads and river roads. We had a red 2007 Fit (Jazz) until scoring this 2012 2nd gen beauty last year. Full throttle will not get you into trouble until near redline in 3rd. I’ve added stabilizer bar and new front disc and pads. Just turned 40k miles.

I love the enthusiasm and appreciation of great small cars that ask to be wrung out.

 

The Fit is a station wagon with the back seats down

 

Well, that is the point of a hatchback. Most practical body design possible without driving something much bigger. The Jazz is a nice size. Not much bigger than my VW Polo, but more space.

 

^ 2012 GTI. Owned since new.



^ 2005 Suzuki Aerio SX AWD. Owned from new, but died last year from mold infestation. Tried saving but the infestation was thorough and decided to just let it go to junkyard. Was otherwise super reliable. Sad. Still haven't replaced. Less need during covid so we work around one car life to save dollars. If had to buy now Id be most keen on a new Accord or Civic: passenger space, manual option, price.

 

I'm surprised @Zimmer266 you can have a Fit in Maine. Low ground clearance would scare me in the winter if I was driving on the state roads away from Southern Maine + Auburn/Lewiston. Maybe if you get snow tires that'll do the trick for the Fit.

After considering getting a Subaru, I'll keep my low mileage 2015 Fit for now due to I just don't feel like a car payment at this time....even if the Fits to me aren't the best in doing long highway driving with its small gas tank and ok seats. Downside with small cars is they don't do a good job with bumps on the road, so my GF get super car sick when she is in my Fit when doing 100 round mile trip from my apt to my dad's house.

But at the same time, there's plenty of room in the Fit when you put the rear seats down and super easy to fix....but I want to be a granola so bad and get a Subaru....but it is a waste in FL for AWD. Damn it I'm cheap on money. GF just got her license and after originally thinking about selling my Fit for below market value, GF and I will just get $5k-$6k and get a decent used car from the private market for Point A to Point B. Basic Honda/Toyota is just what she needs.

@Philimon Honda is scaling back their manual options for their cars. They are mostly saving it for the Sport trim of the Accord/Civics. If you are fond on hatchbacks, the new gen Civic Hatchback is about to be released and it doesn't look like a hot mess compared to the previous gen. If I had to get another Honda new I was considering a basic trim Civic hatchback with some minor extras. Should still be around $22k-$26k before everything else.

Speaking of price, it is sad but not shocking that Honda no longer sells their cars below $20k anymore. The Fit was the last model that you can get new below $20k (when I got my Fit brand new it was $16k before everything). Since no one was buying Fits they just stop selling them so they can push the HRV as the small car option (which is a Fit but lifted up), but then charge $22k to start on the base trim, gross.

Now it is just Kia/Hyundai left who are still selling new cars for below $20k nowadays. I still have trust issues with their QC, but I have to admit that their QC has greatly improved and there's tons of happy owners of their lower end cars out there (the Kia Soul being one of the big ones).

 

Very nice.

VW imported a tiny number (100, I think) of Polo GTIs into India, a few years ago. Pretty good value for money, actually, but still far more than I could afford.

 

Honda Fit w/ Manual transmission was actually a very fun car to drive around town the few times I've driven one. Great example of "probably more fun to drive a slow car fast than driving a fast car slow"

Also a real shame they replaced it (like what every other car company is doing) with a small SUV. Hate this small SUV trend of the past several years.

 

Getting the Fit back in 2015 with a manual saved you $1k.

So hate the price increases over the last few years, mostly due to Americans willing to pay for these prices with the chip shortage and crossover love.

 

Practical body design, yes. 1988 Citroen BX16, owned 1996-2001; bad scans of bad old prints...





Great for field trips - the rear seat cushion folded up behind the front seats so the rear seat back could fold flat and level with the rear compartment floor, giving enough room to throw in two bikes without removing the wheels, and if you weren't too tall, to stretch out and sleep in it.

It had the classic and fabulous-riding Citroen oleo-pneumatic suspension, which would settle down when not in use (as in pics) and could be jacked up for short periods when extra ground clearance was required. I tried driving up a volcano at full elevation once, would have worked but being front-wheel drive I lost traction as things got steep.

Last vehicle I owned that had a carburettor. I miss those things.

Confirmed hatchback fan ever since, the last being a 2005 VW GTI which I had to sell when we reduced to one vehicle; despite cajolery, Mrsdegraded refused to learn to drive a standard.

Now I conform to the stereotype: the day after my retirement, we bought a station wagon.

 

I grew up with Citroens. My dad liked them for their reliability and affordability. We started out in the early '80s with a Dyane, which was a variant of the 2CV. You could hand-crank it to start the car - which we had to do in winter a couple of times. Our last was a diesel BX.

Fun fact: the St. John's Ambulance organization attended our high school rugby matches. They had a BX for use as an ambulance because the interior was big enough to transport people and the smooth ride, thanks to the oleo-pneumatic suspension, meant that it was ideal for taking people who'd suffered bone fractures or breaks to the hospital.

 

I would pay extra for manual transmission option. I think most people would say the same as its more an enthusiasts proposition and not an economic one especially with automatic now being more efficient.

What I keep reading is that higher riding cars arent as terrible in ride and handling as they used to be due to better chassis design (stiffer) etc. So in normal driving you arent sacrifing so much to get that higher riding vehicle. Crosstrek 6-speed is something Id consider. I dont need the height advantage but more desired options are given to these better sellers. Regular height Impreza only gets a clunky 5-speed and worse interior standard.

Ford stopped selling cars in NA aside from Mustang. Ford Escape SUV is just a lifted Focus (still sold elsewhere as a normal height Focus with sporting versions). New Ford Bronco is something to be thankful for though.


^ Manual option available.

 

Just to add to the Honda Jazz/Fit love fest here, we had a 2010 model Jazz from new until early 2021 and despite some flaws I miss it. At the time my sister in law was working for Honda Turkey so we got around 15% discount and completely maxed out the spec - panoramic glass sunroof, auto wipers and lights, etc. We got the automatic which seriously sucked as an auto, but it had paddle shifters so I drove it 100% as a manual without a clutch pedal and honestly it had enough power as long as you worked the gearbox well and kept it in the powerband. Also, our traffic here sucks serious balls, so the lack of clutch pedal did help sometimes. Interior and boot space was superb for its size and it was close to the perfect city car for Istanbul - amazing visibility (important when anybody may do anything at literally any moment) and not expensive enough to worry about scrapes and scratches after the first couple.

One thing it did not excel at was inter-city driving which we do a lot of in the few years since our son arrived (easier than domestic flights with kid stuff to carry). I semi-regularly do 7-9 hours driving in a day and with the Jazz it'd take me a whole day to recover from the experience. We replaced it with a 2020 116d sport hatchback which by comparison absolutely slaughters long-distance driving. Cruises at 160-180km/h for hours on end (hooray for empty brand new 4-lane toll roads and non-existent speed enforcement) without even noticing the speed and the tank never seems to run out.

But... choosing where to park it in the city becomes some kind of complex constrained optimisation problem with the objective being to minimise the potential paint/bodywork damage the car suffers from other people in adjacent parking spaces. Yes, it's cheap by BMW standards, but for us it was a shitload of money. Also visibility sucks ass compared to the Jazz. It's like car designers have just given up on the concept since parking sensors and reversing cameras became standard. If like me you actually prefer to use your own eyes and judgement to park a modern car you're shit out of luck. Also the sensors go completely apeshit like I've just reversed over a family of puppies when there's still like 30-50cm of space left. Drives me crazy.

Excuse the crappy cameraphone photos: