Where have all the 90's hot hatches gone?!?

Thats the one! Near Westleigh Mazda in Leigh...... I'd never noticed it before last week so dont knwo how long its been there. Im popping round my mates tonight in Southend so might spot and have a look

 

rarely see anything interesting these days, all rusted or crashed away?

or so few and far between that those left are tucked up safe and sound?

 

Funnily enough see more mk2 Golf's than ever before and got a lovely looking stock mk2 Fiesta XR2 in white with original pepperpot wheels

Other than that appart from the granny driving the Nova 1.2 Merit I don't see many either.

 

I have actually started to notice a few more 90s hot hatches about recently.

Regularly on my way to work I go past a stripped and caged fiesta xr2 and a fiesta xr2i. I used to see a smokey escort xr3i as well on the way to work but havn't seen that for a couple of weeks.

There is also a mk2 escort in a shed I pass by (the shed is a new addition) and a sunny gti-r

 

used to see at least 2 or 4 mk2 golf every day, now hardly any.
even mk3 golf seems to be rarer...everyone buying oil burners?

 

mk2s are as rare as i can remember them being in southend now.

mk3s still soldier on, not that common, but they are the sort of car that would shrug off an astroid.

the boy racers have well and truely moved on from saxos, theyve not lasted at all.

1.6 civic hatchbacks make popular "performance" material and 2.0 clios,

 

Just been upto the scrappy, on the way a mint xr2 came past. Thinking about it I must live in an area populated by fords, I was taking a Ford up there as well.

I do ok for old vw's around here, plenty of mk2s around still, a fair few mk1s as well still kicking about and loads of mk3s and mk4s

 

If I'm honest I don't remember the last time I saw a fast 90's hatch flying about. Now and again I se the odd Mk1 or 2, Golf, maybe because they ‘jump out’ at me as for the Fords - don't remember the last MK3 or 4 I saw, and when I did they only looked a bad MOT away from the scrappy. Pre 182 fast Clio, not for years. AX GTi’s not for at least 5 years which was about the same time I last saw a 205 GTi.

I think the Golf Mk2’s, Clio 16v and Escorts you saw everywhere 10 years ago have been replaced by the Subaru Impreza, Civic Type R and the Clio 182 and worst of all the poor Mk4 that’s be Chavved to within a inch of it’s life.

Just the same really, affordable 10 year old cars bouncing along the bottom of their depreciation curves, bought just the same way as I bought my first Golf – I’ve got x how fast can I go?
All the ones from my youth are ether scraped or owned by loyal fans who covert them and only bring them out on Bank Holidays. Actually when I say I haven’t seen any for years, that doesn’t include Bank Holidays, usually I’ll be cruzing down the M4 to some ride spot and I see huge numbers of different types of cars in big convoys going to some meet or other. I’d rather that that seeing another Mk2 Golf doing 90 through McDonalds Carpark at 2am.

 

In Montrose at the moment we have....

My Mk2 16v
a blue H plate 8v Golf
a red e plate xr2
a blue 1.9 pug 205 gti
a black xr 4x4 sierra

And thats about it, hopefully the good weather will bring more out!

 

Dont get alot round here in the week, come the weekend if the suns out there seems to be loads about, i do love being out and about in old hot hatches.

 

I saw a Mk1 Fiesta Supersport parked up at Tescos about an hour ago.
Black with the orange/red stripes down the sides.
Not the tidiest...but obviously still being used.

I always liked them.

 

Where have all the hot hatches gone?

I has mostly been collecting them in my garden.

 

i miss my cavalier GSI, i loved that car!!

as mentioned before most of these hot hatches and super saloons are like alot fo the older golfs are weekend / garage cars

there is a woman at work who has a lovely white XR3i, there is also a guy with a nice cosworth 190e but that is only out when its sunny, shame its not an evo 2!

 

I see quite a few old fast fords around , but having the ford engine plant just down the road means that bridgend is a bit of a hotspot for the ford lovers , no bad thing imo .

Can i add a few sleepers to the list of forgotten hot hatches .

toyota st lift back - rare even back in the good old days
And my personal favorite of which ive owned two
Saab 99 turbo - first euro production turbo by a week , almost all of the 501 offical rhd import saloons have been eaten by the tin worm , but i do still sometimes see an old combi coupe on my travels . Hoot to drive , massive 80's turbo lag and despite its weight one of the best handelling fwd cars ive driven and a werid ability to steer on sheet ice .

had a few SD1 rovers in my time too , but a little big to be hot hatch , the 3.5 vitesse was a corker but again was falling to bits even before it left the production line .

Good old bl

In the old days the shells used to rust around a perfectly good engine , with modern production methods a perfectly good shell gets scrapped with worn out mechanicals .

which makes me think , with the hot hatch and gti brands so diluted these days , what modern cars will we look back to in 20 years and consider a classic .

ive wandered off topic again havent i ... i'll get me coat .

 

i remember my mates dad having one of them with a 2.016v redtop engine
the thing flew!

there was 3 of them in Newport, 2 red and a white one

 

Nissan bluebird zx turbo, ubber rare, in all honesty crap

Nissan sunny zx coupe, ubber rare, not bad little cars

Oh and Nissan cherry turbo (wtf)

 

My mate from work had a Fiesta RS Turbo up until about a month ago. It was tuned to the nuts and was apparently putting out something like "190hp".

Unsuprisingly it went wrong. First the starter motors kept going I think he said it was due to the lack of a heat shield, then he blew a hole in one of the pistons. 3k later and he gets it back from the garage for the gearbox to go a week later. He gave up and sold it.

He did also own an XR2i which had an entire industrial kitchen roll in the passengers footwell but that got sold too. The only Fiesta that's been reliable is his daily mk2 1.3 Auto with a genuine 40k on the clock and 1 elderly female owner.

 

saw a nova today.

not seen one of them for ages. still look **** though

 

Ace cafe in N/W London is the place to see some mint 90's hatchbacks.

VW night is full of mint Mk2's.

And you tend to see loads of RS Turbos, s1 & 2's flying about, as well as old XR2i's and Fiesta RST's.

Many of them are still out there, but are more than likely kept in the garage and not driven daily.
I hate chav owners that run those sort of cars into the ground. Thats why we dont see as many as we used to.

 

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