Went to Car Craft earlier, did the deal and ended up driving home the new toy :-)
It's a Ford Focus ST170, which means a little bit bigger in the body and a 170bhp engine. Kinda like the XR3i to the RS Turbo if you remember back to those days ... It's silver and I may end up taking a snap of it some time. 6 speed gearbox, which will take a little getting used to after the 5 speed in the Puma. Half leather seats with lumbar support (nice!) and cushion height adjustments.
It's a bit of a wrench passing on the Puma but with the MoT test coming up in August, I really couldn't afford to keep it. The little silver buggy has been a very faithful servant over the past 7 years and has given a good bit of fun too. Shame Ford don't make them any more ! Trouble is though, the MoT would have needed :
Brake cables redoing
Handbrake fixing
ABS/Traction Control repairs
I knew about the brake cables from last year, when it was an advisory note. The handbrake's been fairly useless for the last few months. That didn't overly concern me as the handbrake only works when a car is stopped. The linkages are different to the link from pedal to brake and the feel of the brake pedal plus the stopping ability said those were working just fine. (Except for some strangeness probably related to the ABS!)
There's probably some more things too that would have needed fixing, like the £1000 bill a few years ago when a heap of little things went wrong, all at the same time.
So - new toy ... and I have a guaranteed service & replacement warranty thingy that should keep it low cost over the next 3 years - well, outside actual cost of ownership that is. That's what comes with going up a size class ... The emissions are worse and we're starting to get taxed on those. Plus the economy isn't great, it'll use about 30% more fuel than the Puma. However, I only do about 7-8000 miles a year, so that's no big deal for me.
Congrats on the new toy! I have had Focus's (or is it Foci?! LOL!) as hire cars before and they are good little cars. I even got a turbo one once which was fun!
ReplyDeleteI had a XR3i's. I used to love it.
I missed out on the XR3i - I knew someone who had one but when it came time for my first proper car, it was an Astra Mk1 1.6. One step away from the original GTE :-)
ReplyDeleteFun car too - it rightfully got the "Buggy" tag. Pretty old though, it had so much rust on the front valance that it looked like it had a beard.
Congratulations on your new car! It sounds quite wonderful....Six Gears??? I haven't driven a "Shift" car in so very many years.....I would think it would be exhausting in Bumper to Bumper Traffic....lol!
ReplyDeleteI always found it sad to say goodbye to a wonderful trusted car....I drive things for many many years. My car that I have now is almost 20 years old...And it works GREAT! Rides beautufully, etc. I hope you have much luck with this new toy....May it serve you even better than The Puma!
It's not so bad in bumper-bumper traffic - if the pedals are set up well ... My mum's Mazda is a bit awkward there, it puts my right foot in an uncomfortable position.
ReplyDeleteMost of the time in traffic, I can be lazy and just use one or two gears - it's fine unless I'm stuck for ages, then it starts aggravating the soreness I tend to get from having leg muscles that are bigger than average :-)
The leg muscles let me Run Real Fast when I get the chance, so I can handle a little cramp occasionally in return :-)
PS I reckon the Astra nearly melted its clutch once ... We were stuck on the motorway for about 4 hours doing about 1 mile. Clutch pedal started feeling a little strange after a while ...