First Cars Thread
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Not the actual car. The paint job was not nearly as good.
When my parents bought it for me, they had to replace two tires. Those cost more than the car.
I'd be driving down the road at about 35 mph, start to upshift, then realize that I was in the top gear.
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I
can'twon't answer this, because it's a "security" question on at least one web site I use. I will say, though, that my first car was a huge, old battleship handed down from my grandmother when she got too old to drive it any more. I'd guess it got maybe 10mpg going downhill with a stiff tailwind.
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Im still driving my first, a 2005 Chevy Impala. I'll try to remember to get a couple good pictures. She may not be pretty (deer made sure the front is multicolored..) but I still love her.
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I don't have a picture of the Chevette my parents gave me, but this one is a close match to it:
http://assets.blog.hemmings.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/Chevette_02_1000.jpg
Mine was a two-door, though. This Pontiac Acadian (a rebadge of the Chevette) is closer, even if it isn't the same year:
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@ScholRLEA A friend of mine referred to his as a 'vette.
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@Greybeard A friend of mine referred to his as a "Shove-it"
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@Greybeard
I got the old Renault Clio from my mother as a graduation giftIt got me from point a to b ...
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Here's my first car:
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@asdf said in First Cars Thread:
Here's my first car:
The problem is, I don't know if that's the joke, or nodebb choked up.
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i'm a youngun.....
'course i was a late bloomer when it came to cars.... i was 22 at the time, and only had my paper license (not even 2 hours old!) when i bought it from the dealership.....
still...... yeah. for once i feel young!
that's pretty rare these days.
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I'm pretty sure this was the color of mine, but mine wasn't this rusty.
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My first
carmotor vehicle:A gift for my 15th birthday. It was older than I was, it didn't run and it didn't look as good as the one in this picture. My job: Have a running bike by age 16 and 9 months when I could legally ride it.
I stripped it to the frame and resprayed everything red and black because that makes it go faster. Stripped the motor and gearbox, replaced exhaust valves because they were burned out and that's why it didn't run. Replaced broken rings while I was there.
I didn't quite make the 16 and 9 months deadline, I was nearly 17 when I finally got it on the road, but the feeling of accompilshment and the skills I learned doing it were, and still are, very valuable.
I had many good times on that bike.
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I had two first cars. The one that I really wanted and lusted after was my 1969 Camaro Z/28 (I never ran the numbers, but it probably only had the badges and was not a true Z/28) with a very hot 350, a Muncie M22 "Rockcrusher" transmission, 4.10 geared 12-bolt rear end with a limited slip. I got it for Christmas when I was 15 and had about 9 months to work on it before getting my license so I spent my own money on painting it metallic teal green with metallic black racing stripes, recovering the interior in black leather, fixing the factory a/c and putting in a CD player and new speakers, etc.
I loved that car and drove it all the time because it was 1995 and gas was ~$1/gallon. (get off my lawn!) But, my mother did not think I would drive it all the time, and it was really not practical for doing much more than traveling around town, etc. The 4.10 gears did it no favors on the highway where it would get single digit MPG. So, my mother also gave me her 1990 Thunderbird Super Coupe which I drove when I needed to go very far out of town.
Both cars were manual transmissions. I was 18 or 19 before I ever drove my first automatic transmission, which I remember very well because as I came to the first stop sign I locked the brakes up and slammed my brother in to the dash as I went to push in the clutch out of habit and crammed the brake pedal to the floor.
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@cartman82 said in First Cars Thread:
The problem is, I don't know if that's the joke, or nodebb choked up.
Why not both?
(It was a joke, there's no image.)
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@Polygeekery said in First Cars Thread:
locked the brakes up and slammed my brother in to the dash as I went to push in the clutch out of habit and crammed the brake pedal to the floor.
I laughed (and upvoted) because I did exactly the same thing when I first drove an automatic.
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My first car was a Ford Fiesta Popular.
Tiny engine and 4-speed gearbox that meant it really topped out in speed terms at 75 mph — you couldn't go faster even if you wanted — but it was light and fun to drive if you were actually good at making it work.
It also rusted like hell.
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I'm still driving my first car!
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Look at all the rich gits whose parents gave them a car. I blew the last of my overdraft on this old banger so I could get to the job centre and interviews.
1.9 turbo diesel, insurance cost nearly as much as the car
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I'm a skinflint, and also think that you need a steady income before you get a car, so I got my first car rather late:
(1995 Supercharged XJR)
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This was my first. It was "gunmetal purple", or "lavender" if you asked my mrs. It was a terrible car. Because of a problem with the air intake "thing", in hot weather it'd idle at 3000-4000 revs. It was super fun though, not managed to get my subsequent (bigger engined) cars to go as fast.
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@Boner my wife had one of those when we met. Awesome little car for throwing around corners. Pity they ruined the looks when they overhauled it
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@Jaloopa What was your wife doing driving a man's car? I once read a review that said it cornered well because it had a wheel on each corner, but you had to work the gearstick like an egg whisk. And yes, they did ruin the new one, hopefully it isn't as susecpible to rust though.
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@another_sam said in First Cars Thread:
many good times on that bike.
Normal people use the backseat of their car for that
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@Boner said in First Cars Thread:
What was your wife doing driving a man's car?
What makes it a man's car? The lines are quite feminine
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@dkf said in First Cars Thread:
4-speed gearbox that meant it really topped out in speed terms at 75 mph
You speed demon!
Three on the tree. Topped out somewhere between 55 and 60.
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@Jaloopa said in First Cars Thread:
Look at all the rich gits whose parents gave them a car.
oi! mine wouldn't even cosign my loan!
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I had one of these (but with more rust):
https://www.whiskyonline-shop.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Nissan_Micra_front_20071212.jpg
It was powered by an asthmatic gerbil and required written notice if you wanted to go up a hill. On the plus side it was incredibly reliable (because it had very few parts to go wrong...) and I got many years out of it before the garage told me, kindly, that it would have to be taken out and shot as the daylight through the floor was an MOT failure and there was no good metal left to weld anything to!
I got it to 100 once down a very steep hill. I think so anyway, it's hard to tell when your eyeballs are vibrating that much.
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@Cursorkeys said in First Cars Thread:
I got it to 100 once down a very steep hill.
Since I know you are European, I choose to read this as km/h. It is more amusing that way.
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@Polygeekery my first geared motorbike would mostly top out around 60 (100kmph). I once got it to 80 down a really long, steep hill, crouched right over the tank. The engine sounded like it was going to explode
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If we are counting "family car I got to drive":
Except, an older model, without any of these fancy bells and whistles, like the red/black stripe at the bottom.
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@cartman82 I can't find any good pictures online, but for me the "
family carfarm truck I got do drive" was a 1980 Dodge Power Wagon 250 flatbed, standard cab with a 4-speed manual. It had the famous Dodge 360 ci V8 in it, but it also had slightly leaky head gaskets which caused no major problems other than rapid spark plug fouling. One of my daily chores was to yank all the spark plugs and clean them. It also had a 5-digit odometer so the true mileage on it was anyone's guess.
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@Jaloopa said in First Cars Thread:
insurance cost nearly as much as the car
The first car I bought on my own (1993 Mazda MX-3), IIRC the car payment was $210/month and insurance was $280/month.
No tickets on my record and no accidents either. They really rake young drivers over the coals on insurance costs.
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@Erufael Here it is:
Soooo much better than the stock ones.
...I'm not gonna ask why it's rotated. Last time that happened clicking the damn thing actually worked.
Anyway. 2005 Chevy Impala 3.4L V6 with.... ~168k miles on it. And those are not stock headlight buckets, I got a pair of these:
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@Erufael I just replaced my 2005 Impala last week. It definitely rode better than my new Corolla (not that the Corolla has a bad ride).
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@mikehurley Sweet. I love this thing. Right combination of just about everything.
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@Erufael Well. Except the inside lights on mine dont work at night. I have another pic of that, gimme a minute.
ETA: Okay, i lied. I used to, but idk where it went. Instead I have a red LED light strip from Walmart attached to the shroud thing above the gauge cluster so I can actually see them in the dark.
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@Erufael Yeah. Good size for hauling DIY stuff. I stuffed a few 12' pieces of floor moulding in it. I have long legs and wear leg braces so the main reason I got the Impala 10 years ago is I fit. It's impressive how well I fit in all the smaller cars of today (Cruze, Focus, etc). The Corolla is very comfortable.
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@mikehurley Yeah it is. The trunk is huge. My dad has an 08 Kia Spectra, which is tiny compared to the Impala. If we need to get anything of medium or larger size, we have to take my car.
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@another_sam said in First Cars Thread:
but the feeling of accompilshment and the skills I learned doing it were, and still are, very valuable.
The best lesson my father ever taught me was how to solve my own problems. One of the ways he did that was by having us build my first go kart. I learned a lot about engines, how they work, how to engineer things on the fly, see possible points of failure, how to think through things and figure them out for myself, etc.
I certainly hope I can figure out how to give my sons those same teachable moments.
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The first car I bought:
First gen Mazda RX-7 (1982).
N.B.: not a picture of it, but it was the same model / color
No piston, no valves, no problems. Rotary power :p
The number of speeding tickets I got with this
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@Erufael said in First Cars Thread:
Instead I have a red LED light strip from Walmart attached to the shroud thing above the gauge cluster so I can actually see them in the dark.
I have one of those, too! Stupid Kia electrical problems--dash lights work except when the exterior lights are on. Go figure.
A bunch of googling suggested it's a particular ground fault in the dimmer, but nobody wants to describe how to replace it, I can't fit my head that far under the dash, and I don't want to pry too hard from the front for fear of breaking something.
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@FrostCat Dimmer is the same problem on mine. It has to do with the automatic lights. When it kicks into night mode, the lights turn off inside. Technically they're just on the dimmest possible, but same result. I don't know about the Kia, but the dimmer is a $400 part for the Impala cuz apparently it controls all the lights (the headlights/park lights and dimmer are all the same control).
Apparently you can also just take the dimmer out and clean the electrical contacts, and it will work for another 5 years. But that would entail taking out part of the interior, and fuck that.
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@Erufael said in First Cars Thread:
Apparently you can also just take the dimmer out and clean the electrical contacts, and it will work for another 5 years. But that would entail taking out part of the interior, and fuck that.
I wouldn't mind doing it if I could figure it out. But like I said, I can't see the back side, and from the front, shoving a big screwdriver between the dimmer and the frame around the module and heaving didn't seem like it was going to cause the switch to pop out. It's probably a screw in the back that requires a 90° bend to use or something stupid.
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@Erufael said in First Cars Thread:
When it kicks into night mode, the lights turn off inside.
The crazy thing on my car is, it's only SOME of the dash lights that go off! The red gear icons stay lit, the green ones don't. So if you're in R you can tell, but not if you're in D. TDEMSYR!
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@FrostCat Honestly, I wouldn't either, I'm just really afraid of accidentally fucking something up.
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@FrostCat Why not just take it in to the dealer for maintenance?