IceNineBack to cool stuff @jackyan and @GruffHarding
Green is always a winner I say and again it keeps on winning
https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/chevrolet/oldsmobile/listing/5760414342
Gruff HardingHow are you going to explain the purchase after hitting a fifth division win?
Anyhoo, a few beauts today, but first this - get it and you too can pick the car of your choice
https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/other/other/listing/5761689924
Number two - is purple your lucky colour? Better hope so, because British reliability
https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/austin/1100/listing/5761804800
Jack Yan (甄爵恩)@GruffHarding @IceNine Ah, but was yours twin-carb with the 1300?
I'd hope so!
Thing I like about older cars, you lift the bonnet and can immediately recognise an engine!
A nice honest car, with honest description
I think @BobLefridge left it sitting out the front for a few years
On the beach
https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/fiat/124-spider/listing/5765339931
@IceNine @GruffHarding @BobLefridge I think this shows how restrictive Trade Me is with descriptions. The seller probably wanted to write Fiat 124 Sport Spider but couldnʼt.
@jackyan @IceNine @BobLefridge https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/ford/cortina/listing/5762087452 when I win lotto tonight I an gonna buy this, then get it repainted in Sherwood Green. In honour of the one I bought from mystic Granddad
Bob LeFridge 
Tidy vehicle, but $16k for a Cortina?
@BobLefridge @jackyan @IceNine https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/toyota/corolla/listing/5766979559 what's worse is we used to buy these for 500 bucks in the the early 90s
@GruffHarding @BobLefridge @jackyan
That and 323s were just everywhere
Some times they'd pass a warrant, but oh the rust
@GruffHarding @BobLefridge @jackyan
I knew I should have waited - 1.7L sewing machine
https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/other/other/listing/5776548241
@IceNine @BobLefridge @jackyan is the singer a sport version of the hunter, i'e more gauges same rubbish performance.
@IceNine @BobLefridge @jackyan I'm still here fellas 😁, I've just been a bit distracted with let's say admin, but all is well 😁
@GruffHarding @BobLefridge @jackyan
I found a cracker though 😆
https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/toyota/hilux/listing/5788409900
John Cortexiphan@yakmoose @GruffHarding @BobLefridge @jackyan
They buffed the engine out!
@IceNine @yakmoose @BobLefridge @jackyan https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/subaru/brumby/listing/5920872214 I found the perfect classic!
@GruffHarding @yakmoose @BobLefridge @jackyan
So did I!
Not as eyecatching this one, and you'll have to travel a bit further Gruff than Happy Valley, but it is half the price.
I'm sure Bob had at least two of them and also did some dodgy mission in one too, but there's not many vehicles which don't tick those boxes. Nissan Cube perhaps?
https://www.trademe.co.nz/a/motors/cars/other/other/listing/5939871462
Nah. I never owned anything big and thirsty like the Sunbeam.
But I did desire a Brumby for a while. Fifteen years ago they were around $2,500 for a decent one. Suffice to say, I'm shocked at the current prices.
@BobLefridge @jackyan @GruffHarding @yakmoose
Have I finally found a car you and your brother didn't get up to no good in?!
You have us wrong. My brother and I were actually pretty discerning in our choice of vehicles. Like Gruff says, there were quite a few five hundy cars.
Between us we owned a few Vanguards, a weird fibreglass thing called a Mistral, 20-30 Morris Eights, one Morris Minor, one Morris J4 van, one CF Bedford, one Citroen GS club, one 1949 Singer Sports, a matching pair of MG Midgets and that infamous Fiat 500 which was involved in a reported "high speed (!) chase" round north Dunedin.
I've also owned a VW Variant (yellow), an Alfa Romeo GTV2000, a Saab 900, a 72 MGBGT, a Ford SIerra wagon (bland), a pair of Triumph 2500s, a Telstar (bland), the sad little SJ410 living at the back of my drive, one Escudo (bland), two Suzuki Swifts and seven Subarus.
That's all. Perfectly normal.
@BobLefridge @jackyan @GruffHarding @yakmoose
An infamous chase in a Bambina?
I thought the only one even close to a chase was an ex-cop I knew who pulled one over on Moorhouse Ave here, doing 88.
He asked the driver how he managex such a speed - driver pointed at the Colombo Street overbridge behing him.
@IceNine @BobLefridge @GruffHarding @yakmoose What you need are three Fiat 500s, and steal back some gold that Mr Bridger took off you in Torino.
The Fiat adventure was a bit like that. Strap in for a long story.
My brother had bought a faded but serviceable, red Fiat 500 for a couple of hundred bucks. Cars were cheap in the mid 70s.
We'd been told that there was an almost identical Fiat in a car sales in North Dunedin with a $600 price tag, so one night we went for a look. We parked our Fiat in the car sales' driveway and checked out the other vehicle. Very similar, three times the price. All good.
As we were pulling out of the car yard, some dooberry in a huge yank tank thought we were stealing the other Fiat, so he chased us, flashing his lights. We knew a few narrow streets around the gardens area and managed to give him the slip. A Fiat Bambina vs a massive v8... it was quite exciting.
We parked up with our lights off until we spotted him again, then we powered up and headed south. Naturally he chased us, so we led him past the Central Police Station and sure enough, he pulled over leaving his engine running, car door open and rushed inside. We went to the Octagon and grabbed a burger from Big Daddy's.
Later, we popped into the Police station to see what was up. After we explained the identical Fiats, the cop laughed and said, "When we received a report of a Fiat 500 driving around the north end at high speed with its lights off, we were skeptical."
We all had a good laugh. Afterwards, we referred to the incident as "The Night of the Fiat 500."
And I still have a place in my heart for Fiat Bambinas.
@BobLefridge @jackyan @GruffHarding @yakmoose
That is Fiatastic!
Just imagine if there were also an overbridge to really get things going
Or a road-rail bridge like on the West Coast
@IceNine @BobLefridge @jackyan @GruffHarding
Taieri Gorge Fiat Railway …
@yakmoose @BobLefridge @jackyan @GruffHarding
Let's go crazy and strap a JATO propulsion unit to it like the urban myth from about 1998
@IceNine @BobLefridge @jackyan @GruffHarding
Roads? Where we're going, we don’t need roads ….
Supplementary Bambina story
Actually... I didn't mention this because my brother only owned it for a couple of weeks, but he stupidly bought a modified Fiat 500 with a two litre engine and fat tyres. It was an ugly little black thing and the rear tyres scraped on the guards. The two seats were in the back because the engine took up so much space. This car was the evil twin of the earlier Fiat.
He drove it from Wellington to Auckland and stayed with me out at Titirangi. I had a nice rental in Wood Bay with a little bridge over a stream leading to my driveway. And that's where the buggered engine finally shat its pants and died.
Damn thing blocked my driveway for a couple of days until I had it towed.
@BobLefridge @yakmoose @jackyan @GruffHarding
At least when my Sirion decided to spit a belt out for everything whilst on a bridge, it was doing 100 at the time. Just clutch in and coast to a safe spot
At the steaming metropolis of Red Jacks