Any suggestions on 1st Cars???

[1X83Z]

Unless you are literally made of money, and can find an insurer who is actually willing to insure you at all, forget an MX-5 for a teenager in the UK. It'll. Never. Happen.

Can someone explain to me why this is? Obviously in the States it'd be relatively easy to get insured on a Miata as a first car. Why are they so strict in the UK?

 

[Famine]

Can someone explain to me why this is? Obviously in the States it'd be relatively easy to get insured on a Miata as a first car. Why are they so strict in the UK?

High insurance grouping prices kids out of it - the 1.8 is group 14, I think. Cost of typical crash (usually spinning into a ditch and rolling over) is high too. Price of repairs is high (shares few parts with other Mazdas - brake discs and interior switchgear with MX-3/MX-6 and that's about it) too. Too.

 

[ExigeEvan]

Wow, I'm almost the same age as you and I knew years ago that a MX-5 was never an option. Hell, RWD isn't an option.

Get a Mondeo, it's cheap to run, insure, repair and there'll always be someone to buy it off you.

 

[1X83Z]

High insurance grouping prices kids out of it - the 1.8 is group 14, I think. Cost of typical crash (usually spinning into a ditch and rolling over) is high too. Price of repairs is high (shares few parts with other Mazdas - brake discs and interior switchgear with MX-3/MX-6 and that's about it) too. Too.

Crash costs and repair costs should be similar in the States - still not understanding why it's so much more expensive in the UK.

 

[Tornado]

I'd imagine less roads for similar amounts of drivers, which probably equals more accidents. Or something.

 

[Dave A]

We have lower accident rates per 100,000 drivers than the US and lower fatality rates. Driving in the UK is just a very expensive luxury for most people. Out of curiosity, what would you expect the average cost would be for a new driver to insure a Maita in the US?

 

[JCE]

If the car was paid for and you only wanted the basic legal requirement in Texas around $140-160 per month for a 17-18 yearold new driver with no driving history. That's just liability insurance, which basically means you are covering the other person's vehicle if you hit it. Not property (mailboxes etc) and your own vehicle.

 

[Dave A]

So that's about £75-£85 per month or rounghly £900-£1020 for the year. I had 1.2 liter SEAT Ibiza as my first car, it cost me £1860 (that's over $3600, over $300 per month) to insure under third party, fire and theft which is the basic insurance. A Mazda MX5 would have probably cost twice that to insure. This is the one area I envy the US, driving is cheap over there.

 

[TopHat]

Sure is, I might want a Miata.... Only if it's black with the lift-off hardtop.

 

[=V8 Power=]

If you are a safe driver then getting a newer used car isn't really a problem

I don't know about British cars but theres really only 2 cars that come to mind to me after I read your post: Chevy Camaro and Ford Mustang
Both blow away your 0-60 in 9 seconds (thats un-godly slow BTW) and can be found for very cheap as long as you stay with V6s

However those cars are kinda useless in day to day life which is why I agree with someone else who said get a pickup. Again speaking from my American knowledge of cars, V8 pickup trucks are cheap to buy, cheap to insure, RWD or better yet 4x4, sound sweet, and pretty fast.

 

[YSSMAN]

Unless you are literally made of money, and can find an insurer who is actually willing to insure you at all, forget an MX-5 for a teenager in the UK. It'll. Never. Happen.

You're going to stack your first car (or at least you're going to have a crash inside the first 3 years). No ifs or buts. Especially if you're dumb enough to try drifting on the public roads. Don't get something to drive - get something disposable.

Whats funny is that you can insure a Miata MX-5 for pretty cheap here in America, no matter how old you are. I was looking into buying one last year (at the time had just turned 19) and it would have cost me less per month to insure the MX-5 at the same rates compared to my Jetta. Granted, it wasn't a huge amount, roughly $40 USD (about 20 quid) a month. But with snow, my incapability to adapt the cold, and my reluctance to spend money on anything unless I have to, I decided it isn't wasn't worth it. However if my Aunt/Uncle wanted to sell it to me today, I think I'd buy it anyway.

...Most people are right when they say you need a beater for the first few years. I had mine for two years before my near-head-on that totaled the Fox. You're bound to have accidents, or maybe even "the big one" eventually, and you'll want something nearly disposable at that rate. Maybe you should review the Top Gear 100 Quid Challenge for a good idea for a cheap car...

Just think, if you lived in America we would have more than enough cheap RWD cars for you. You could get some old GM G-Body for a couple hundred bucks, beat the living hell out of it, and just rebuild it if anything goes wrong.

 

[JCE]

The thought of a mid-80's Buick Regal comes to mind doesn't it YSS. And if any American car enthusiast doesn't know why then you need a labotomy.

This:

Can be turned into this:

Which is faster than these:

 

[TopHat]

GNX FTW. Too bad you are in the UK.

 

[JCE]

Not to get more offtopic but I'd love to drive the GNX in Germany and let it fly. I wonder what kind of time it would get on the 'ring? Rather rubbish suspension vs very high acceleration? 8:45 or so I'd imagine...would love to see someone do it.

 

[daan]

but theres really only 2 cars that come to mind to me after I read your post: Chevy Camaro and Ford Mustang

Do you know how many Camaros are for sale in the whole of the UK on Autotrader.co.uk right now? (Autotrader is our biggest, best known and most used car sales website and magazine)

24. Two four. Twenty four.

153 Mustangs though....

However those cars are kinda useless in day to day life which is why I agree with someone else who said get a pickup. Again speaking from my American knowledge of cars, V8 pickup trucks are cheap to buy, cheap to insure, RWD or better yet 4x4, sound sweet, and pretty fast.

As has been pointed out. We don't get pickups. And at nearly £5 a gallon, it would be commercial suicide to get a V8, and impossible for him to insure.

 

[=V8 Power=]

As has been pointed out. We don't get pickups. And at nearly £5 a gallon, it would be commercial suicide to get a V8, and impossible for him to insure.

Sucks to live in the UK...

gas is about $2.00 where I live or about £1

 

[1X83Z]

I'd imagine less roads for similar amounts of drivers, which probably equals more accidents. Or something.

It must be that - it's the only thing that's logical.

GNX FTW. Too bad you are in the UK.

I'll never forget in one of the major magazine's 50th anniversary issues (R&T or C&D) they tested the Countach in one issue and in the very next issue tested the Grand National. The Grand National beat the Countach in 0-60, despite a power rating of 230 and, as they put it, being "shaped like a dishwasher." Most under-rated car of all time, methinks (in terms of horsepower).

 

[JCE]

Actually Buick (under)rated the GNX @ 275bhp, but with more torque than god on the first day of the earth's creation...360lb.ft of torque. That is just madness! And GM/Buick UNDERRATED IT! Leave it to GM to produce a mad accelerating car and kill it off because it was faster than the Corvette at the time. Remember this bad boy?

It used basically the same engine and had the same power output...which GM rated at 280bhp and 360lb.ft. of torque.

*edit*
We are so off topic...maybe we should start a new thread. lol

 

[Sakiale]

Yeah, after I get a nice RX7 or Z-car or something, I want either a GNX, a Syclone or a Typhoon.

 

[1X83Z]

It used basically the same engine and had the same power output...which GM rated at 280bhp and 360lb.ft. of torque.

The Typhoon and Syclone ran 280hp 4.3-liter turbocharged sixes - the GNX ran the venerable 3.8-liter turbo six. Different engines, though you did qualify it with 'basically.'

Either way - the damn cars were fast.

 

[Wolfe]

Both blow away your 0-60 in 9 seconds (thats un-godly slow BTW)

O NOES THE WORLD WILL END IF I CAN'T MERGE ONTO THE FREEWAY AT LEAST 5 TIMES FASTER THAN EVERYONE ELSE!!!!1!!11!

I bet you go into uncontrollable spasms and black out whenever you come within 50 feet of an old VW Beetle, what with its 20+ second 0-60 and all.

 

[Sakiale]

VolksWagon Bus FTW!!! Top speed of like what, 55? My dad drove his friends for a week and it was deadly slow--we had to floor it just to keep up with traffic! Cool car though, for sure.

 

[JCE]

The Typhoon and Syclone ran 280hp 4.3-liter turbocharged sixes - the GNX ran the venerable 3.8-liter turbo six. Different engines, though you did qualify it with 'basically.'

Either way - the damn cars were fast.

Don't the 3.8L and 4.3L share the same bottom end? I always thought the 4.3L was just the enlarged displacement truck version of the 3.8L. I am probably wrong...

 

[YSSMAN]

Don't the 3.8L and 4.3L share the same bottom end? I always thought the 4.3L was just the enlarged displacement truck version of the 3.8L. I am probably wrong...

The Buick 3.8L Turbo engine is based on the old Fireball design that first appeared in 1962, the first V6 in an American car. The confusion comes from the fact that Buick had increased the bore of the engine to match it's own 350ci V8 program from the early/mid '70s.

The Chevrolet 4.3L V6 on the other hand is basically a Chevrolet 350ci V8 with two cylinders chopped off the rear end. Surprisingly, they still build them for the Silverado... Its an engine that just won't die...

---

A lot of people forget that the 3.8L Turbo sat in the Pontiac Firebird for one year, and while doing so created the fastest production Firebird until the 2002 Trans-Am WS6. Pretty impressive for late-'80s technology, a testament to how powerful that engine really was.

 

[1X83Z]

Don't the 3.8L and 4.3L share the same bottom end? I always thought the 4.3L was just the enlarged displacement truck version of the 3.8L. I am probably wrong...

Nah - the 4.3 was developed from the 5.7-liter V8. It shares nothing with the 3.8, to my knowledge.

 

[JCE]

The Buick 3.8L Turbo engine is based on the old Fireball design that first appeared in 1962, the first V6 in an American car. The confusion comes from the fact that Buick had increased the bore of the engine to match it's own 350ci V8 program from the early/mid '70s.

The Chevrolet 4.3L V6 on the other hand is basically a Chevrolet 350ci V8 with two cylinders chopped off the rear end. Surprisingly, they still build them for the Silverado... Its an engine that just won't die...

---

A lot of people forget that the 3.8L Turbo sat in the Pontiac Firebird for one year, and while doing so created the fastest production Firebird until the 2002 Trans-Am WS6. Pretty impressive for late-'80s technology, a testament to how powerful that engine really was.

Yea, that GTA was one bad mofo. Thanks for the history lesson, now I know the difference. My brother just bought a brand new Silverado with the 4.3L in it and I swear the engine and interior look exactly the same as my dad's old '93 GMC. That engine isn't very good in the power department...unless you add a turbo that is.

 

[1X83Z]

Yea, that GTA was one bad mofo. Thanks for the history lesson, now I know the difference. My brother just bought a brand new Silverado with the 4.3L in it and I swear the engine and interior look exactly the same as my dad's old '93 GMC. That engine isn't very good in the power department...unless you add a turbo that is.

It's crazy reliable though - there's a reason they've been using it for over two decades.

 

[daan]

I'm sure there was a topic around here somewhere that does not contain American V8s, pickup trucks or Buick GNXs.

 

[Famine]

Crash costs and repair costs should be similar in the States - still not understanding why it's so much more expensive in the UK.

I'd imagine less roads for similar amounts of drivers, which probably equals more accidents. Or something.

It must be that - it's the only thing that's logical.

Think again - the average American driver is twice as likely as a British driver to DIE for every mile they drive, never mind crash.


As for crash and repair costs being similar in the US... The car itself costs nearly twice as much to buy in the UK in the first place ($21k compared to £19k)!

To start off with, the MX-5 1.8 is a group 14 (from 20) car. Now comes the actuarial calculations.

The typical British road is a narrow, 2-lane affair (MX-5s aren't really used on open motorway because they're rubbish at 80mph and prefer bends). When something goes wrong, you end up off the road - where there's walls, ditches, sheep and so on - rather than remaining on the road and able to recover and continue on. The typical MX-5 crash in the UK is, thus, one where stoppable force (car) meets immovable object (planet) and, more often than not, involves the car going over (it's a hard car to flip, but drive it into a ditch at 60mph and all bets are off). When an MX-5 goes over, somebody inside is going to die. The repair costs are steep enough as it is, but deaths cost insurance companies a hell of a lot of money.

Now, factor in a typical teenager crash. Just about every teenager will crash inside the first 3 years. The usual teenager crash involves their mates in the car (though only 1, in this case) and the phrase "Yeah? Watch this!" and ends with several vehicles with blue flashing lights. This is why hatchbacks are expensive to insure - hatchbacks are driven by teenagers, and teenagers turn them into modern art.

So, teenagers are expensive to insure. MX-5s are expensive to insure. Teenagers in MX-5s... No. And the fact that kids are priced out of owning faster cars could be proposed as a contributory factor for our twice-as-safe roads compared to the US.

 

[KSaiyu]

Your best bet is, as most others have said, something cheap to run and fix. The Panda wouldn't be bad, I started off in an Uno and they can be fun little cars to drive, and as for other cars it depends on your circumstances. I mean, would you be a named driver, because this can open up a few more cars into your range (Someone said a BMW 316, and this is a possibility since I know someone a few years younger that drives one, but he's a named driver). I wouldn't really recommend that though because of the risk of crashing and getting used to driving without supervision.

I don't know your budget, but practical, but interesting cars I can think of including some "expensive" ones are:

Fiat Uno/Panda (Have to recommend my first car of course)
Peugeot 106/205 GTI (French build quality, but they make the best hatches)
Ford Ka (Suprisingly good)
VW Golf GTI (Mark 1 or 2, don't bother with a 3 and you probably can't afford a 4 or 5.)
Honda CRX (I've seen some seriously quick ones, so if you plan on sticking with the car after the first few years this could be good. Not sure on the insurance for a brand new driver though....)

Honestly you'd be lucky to afford one of these, and boring as it sounds it may be better just to stick with a crappy car and get your No Claims up.