Latest Articles
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Top Tip 11:Is there “the right time” to buy a car
Yes of course there is. Like any sales situation car yards, especially a dealer with multiple sites, does a reconciliation at the end of the month. This is how they pay the salesmen. If you go in at the end of their cycle, usually the end of the month, you’ll find they are very keen…
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The Hot Hatch Hoedown: Mini JCW, Honda Civic Type R and VW Polo GTi
The hot-hatch niche is chockers with Shockers, but some are truly tasty and here are three tasty titbits. For those who have read my stories in the past will know I loathe non-existent suspension that has the merest few millimetres of travel. It is almost always coupled with tyres that are nothing more than smears…
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Things I hate most when I’m driving: 04 Trucks, there, Ive said it
Domain tunnel, Melbourne Trucks, especially the huge multi-trailer semi’s that drive long distances between our major cities. You have to ask yourself why they are there at all. After all, there are rail links, some of the electric, that could do the job tomorrow. Any late night drive on the inter-capital city highways shows just…
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SAAB Production stopped yet again
Things over at SAAB are not going so well. Their production had stopped for financial reasons a few months ago. The Chinese stopped by and helped out by buying a few cars and giving the parent company a bit of a cash injection. Sadly, while the cat was away, the mice got bored and stopped…
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Things I hate most when I’m driving: 05 Speed Cameras
Surely speed cameras are among the most hated objects on the planet. Whether point-to-point, fixed or mobile cameras, they are seen to be nothing more than revenue raisers for the local authorities. Police and government say no, it is a mater of safety. “We’re trying to change driver behaviour” they say, but a recent audit…
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SAAB in trouble again: finance deal has fallen through. UPDATE finance now OK
The NEW 9-5 is safe. We test this car in a few weeks time! WooHoo! All is not well over at SAAB’s H/O in Sweden. The finance deal which saw support for continuing development of new models has gone wrong. The Chinese investor seems to have gotten cold feel. It is very sad as SAAB…
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Top Tip 10: What Do All the Car Letters and Numbers Mean?
Mercedes 63 230SL Pergoda What do the numbers and letters mean? You would be forgiven for being a little confused when trying to decipher the seemingly impenetrable wall of gobbledegook involved in car names. You get “GLE” or “SI” or “350”, but none seems even slightly hinting at a meaning. Badges are usually there to…
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Things I hate most when I’m driving: 06 Parking Metres
I know, I know. Parking metres aren’t strictly speaking a “driving” matter, unless of course you’re driving around like an idiot looking for one. They say space is limited. They say it’s a way to share the space and to stop people from parking there all day. They say it’s not about revenue raising. Sadly…
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Aussie Road Trip pt3: The convertible, Lexus IS250c
The last part of the Byron Bay Odyssey” is about the car itself. Firstly, we could not take a pic of the “2 Bags Test”. The IS failed miserably. Only 2 microscopic bags could be stowed in the boot with the roof down. Roof down? Of course the roof is down. That is the only…
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Things I hate most when I’m driving: 07 Caravans!!!
Whose monumentally stupid idea was it to allow cara-bloody-buggery-vans on the road. When I go on holidays, I don’t inflict it on everyone else one the road. I don’t do 90 in a 100 zone or 80 on 100kph single lane roads do I? No! I have never been able to understand the allure of…