Help with a change of car.

I can just picture the scene! My other half suited and booted on the back of a three legged nag climbing up this side of the island to the mountain road wheezing, coughing and spluttering and in need of a change of horse halfway up! Mind you it'd be downhill all the way on the other side. It's also a twenty six mile round trip. Nahhhh, I don't think this is gonna work because he'd need 'driving' lessons as well.

 

I used to lend mechines out to people i knew, the same happern to me, so i put time limits on them, but that didn't work, So it's no lending from me now, they got quite upset about it, so i just largh at them

Any way, why don't your OH go and get the digger, you can drive that to work and level the track on the way in and out

 

Shame, when I lived in a farmhouse nearly half a mile from the nearest road I found a Bedford TK coped well with the track.

 

Or, in the case of my one and only Japanese car, it goes and goes, slowly, until the radiator bursts without warning, with the temperature registering as normal, and then shortly after blows its cylinder head in the most spectacular fashion I've ever seen. It went BANG, and when I checked under the bonnet to see, steam and smoke was coming from:

* The new gap where cylinder head meets cylinder block
* The new gap where exhaust manifold meets cylinder head
* The new gap where inlet manifold meets cylinder head
* The new gap in the thermostat housing
* Assorted hose junctions
* And finally, somewhere towards the bottom of the block

I didn't even bother to think about fixing it. It was dead. The only time it moved after that, it was assisted by a winch and a recovery truck, and its final journey was to the scrappy.

 

If it's not going to get a lot of use, then the Mk1 Mitsubishi L200's are getting cheap here on the mainland. Tough as old boots, and will double up for other jobs when you need to carry a largish load.

As a rule I say avoid Japanese (parts can be mega dear, and modern Jap diesels are grenading the engines far too much for my liking), but the L200 is a good tool.

What about a Daihatsu fourtrack. They rot, but are cheap.

 

Thanks Longk but they're to big and to juicy.

 

Not as bad as you'd think, although they are large.

You could go mad and seek out a 2CV - loads of ground clearance on those, and a good giggle to drive!
Or you might even consider an old Renault4. Both are pretty rugged.

 

That is the sad truth. I would avoid a modern diesel and go for petrol every time. But the Japs do seem to be especially fragile for some reason. Of the five engines we've done for the lease company that we look after, all have been Jap diesels.

 

It was a Toyota Carina estate. Managed a whopping 82 bhp from that 2 litre turbo diesel engine before it blew up.

 

I had a Mazda RX7 - nuff said about that sad episode