i'd love to know how come of you managed to get quotes at my age for gti's and such like for 1k and just over. so unfair! [:^(]
I spent 3.5 years hacking about in a 1.0 Mini - a giggle at less than lunatic speeds. Turned 21 with 4 years NCB and insuring a 16v GTi was relatively painless. It IS worth the wait. I put mine on limited mileage insurance (8k) and after 5 months I'm having to raise it to unlimited. A GTi is about as much fun as a daily drive can be.
I drove a (god forbid, and i say these words under my breath) <whisper>Nova</whisper> for my first car. Soon got bored of that though, got my obligatory 1st crash out the way in 1 month, killed the Nova and bought a Mk1 1600 GTI. Fantastic, never looked back since. Also havent had an accident since my 1st month driving (6 years ago). Edited by: Deako
Personnally I wish I'd gotten a GTI for my first car. I hate my Driver now, and if it had been a GTI I would still be intrested in it. The Driver lacks any kind of get up and go that I want from a car, and I get left for dead in my slow ar$e car. I don't see the point in moving from mk2 Driver to a mk2 GTI, I can't imgaine there being much differnce. Cheers, Jamie
Well from my mates' most that have over 75hp, YES 75hp- have crashed their car. I've waited patientially, and becuase of that, next year when i finish uni at 21 i can finally insure and look after the gti i wanted. Don't waste your money insuring high gti cars when young, no matter how careful driver you are. Its just not worth it. Yeah your mates might be impressed, but don't give a sh*t. I tell my mates i did spend 4000 in insuring a car during my first 3 years of driving, but next year starting my own insurance will cost me a bit! But age does counts for a lot! get a 1.6 mk3 if you have to, but 1.3 polo gt is the best performance!
Most of my mates had an accident within the first year of driving, in many cases it was a case of too much speed and not enough talent. Engine size didn't factor into it at all (1.1 Fiesta, chevette etc). If you can afford the insurance the go for it, but its well worth getting no claims under you belt as soon as you can as insurance doesn't get cheaper until you're much older [:^(] As for me I had a 5 year old 1600 mk3 escort when I was 18, went like stink but handled like pooe, I sold it within a year. Insurance was 900 fully comp which was quite a lot of money then
Exactly. Don't know why people are saying that with a bigger engine you're going to crash... It's a GTI for god's sake, it's not a TVR or an old Porsche! With those supercars you've got to treat them with respect and driving them isn't easy at all. But a GTi!! easy peasy!! just got to be careful.
Yes but only for a short 5 minute drive, so that doesn't really count. I wasn't blown away lets put it like that. Cheers, Jamie
Naive comment. With a car capable of more speed people are likely to push them harder. Without the skills/experience to control that speed its an accident waiting to happen.
For the record, I was 18 when I got my Mk1 GTI and that was in 2000. So not too long ago. I got stung on the insurance but my point is, it was worth it. I could have bought a driver or what have you but paying the extra to insure a GTI was worth it whenever I went out for a drive on a quiet back road, or got a nice comment from someone in a petrol station.
U must have a fu*king quick Driver then u rev it past 4.5k? Every one here that owns a 16v knows it all about that
anyway, back to the q of what car you should get... i reckon either a mk3 golf 1.8 driver, or a mk4 ('94-'98) polo 1.6 glx...both aren't that bad to insure really, and both are pretty decent spec (golf driver has gti interior and spoiler, polo glx is fully top spec with 16v bumpers/seats and you can find them with leather and a/c). polo also has abs. i'd go for the polo (my girlie has one as her first car) as it'll be easier to find a better example (rust on arches is only serious prob), they tend to be driven by older people (and thus don't get crashed, and thus have better insurance). do insurance quotes first (try elephant.co.uk, put it under your name with your mum as named second driver - it brings quote down!), anything over 1200 a yr is too much for any car IMO. just to add...when we were doin ins quotes for the girlie, the 1.4 polo was almost the same cost....so made sense to get the higher spec'd car (the 1.4's are all poverty spec). same went comparing the golf driver to the 1.6 or 1.4. Edited by: acf8181
swings and roundabouts on insurance, some folk seem to be jammy and get a good deal, other pay through the nose for it.
I seem to have paid the same amount for insurance all my life... ie. aroun 600-700 a year. Started out with a 1.8 passat fastback back in 95ish and these days i'm still paying the same, but for business cover with mods on a group [cough] bora.
is very true....i'm having a good time of it at the mo (400 FC on mr2, i'm 24 with 21 yrd old girlie on it as well), but a couple of years back it wasn't nice (1200 FC on a 1.2 when i was 20!). Edited by: acf8181
I never said my Driver was quick. I just wasn't that impressed by the GTI. But it was only a short drive on a trading estate. I do rev my Driver quite hard, around 4k when I'm pushing it.......which is most of the time. I put a Weber carb on it because the Pierburg needed replacing. But that won't give me much of a bhp boost. I just found the GTI not as quick as I thought it was going to be. Cheers, Jamie
