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toXXin wrote:No, because my parents were into their Fords, Vauxhalls and MGs.

So it did influence you then - reverse logic

Yup, definetly. Both parents have always loved cars and motorsport, and as a result so do I.

My Dads owned a few "decent" cars in his past, best being a yellow Mk2 Ford RS2000. Recently he's had things like a Vauxhall Omega MV6, BMW 528i Sport and the Scooby WRX STi.

Then last month he got a brand new Audi A6 3.-TDI with the S-Line pack rolling on 19s.

But it's my Mam thats given me the Dub influence. She had a Scirroco GT when I was younger, and then a Tornado Red Mk3 Golf GTi (only 8valves ). So when I got my Polo it was her telling me to get alloys, spoilers and lower it and stuff

Criz wrote:Brother drives a Calibra Se5, horrible to drive and theres allways something wrong with it allthough never anything major. Would go back to VW if he had the money.

Just wait till the cam belt snaps

couldnt really say but i'd err on the side of "possibly", including learning what to avoid. mums cars more positive than dads, oddly...


parents first car when i was around (admittedly too young to remember) was a wood panelled mini clubman. conked out a few times on a french holiday and was scrapped upon return. no effect.

mums first car - fiat 127. no discernable effect, though its shape resided in the wierd matrix between maestro and mk1 polo, so p'raps thats why i like the somewhat ill-hewn looks of both?

after that a mk2 panda (ie the more familiar type with a full grille) 1000CL (it had a radio and rear wash/wipe...) in flame red. 4 speed, natch (1985..). regularly she tried to break the sound barrier in it and i beleive succeeded at least once. this possibly setting a pattern for me. was sold on in early 90s to some daughter of a friend who promptly wrapped it around a lamp post inside of a week. everyone involved gutted, particularly as she walked away unscathed (worlds first crumple shell i guess!). dont know why it was sold really, considering the replacement......

....a hand-me-down grey 205 1.1 (4sp!) from an aunt. less said the better. a total dog, and ugly with it. yellow graphics on charcoal grey metallic paint? sick. dont know what happened to it. think it was euthanised into a canal probably, or part-exed with great speed once a head of cash was built up.

partexed for.... a punto. one of the early jobs. 75SX 5-door in a lush blue colour and a star of a car. handling could be a bit wallowy, the ECU kept playing silly b@stards (wow, i so love running on 3 cylinders! ..or 2!! thank you mr red ECU warning light!), and of course it ploughed through clutches and a gearbox too ---- other than that, entirely faultless. that and how its door lost the battle against a tree branch in a worryingly easy fashion.

would have one myself but held back by the above caveats! (mk4 polo a decent replacement?)

since that got passed on because it was becoming a pain in the arse, she moved on to my grandad's rover "family discount" thingamajig. getting not really enough money off highly overpriced and underqualitied cars. first a red 25, low-tune 1.4 3-door (bad idea), then swapping it in the 3rd year for a silver, 5 door, hi-tune one (ie its a valver... worse to drive at the town revs she usually uses, and delivers an awesome kick in the back on the rare occasions she enters the 4-5000 range). so far its up to about 16000 miles and has already had various random bits replaced - like a boot lock that simply fell apart. hmmm.
think i'll pass on the rovers...!

(that's her current car, and the one that's shown me she hasn't learned anything of basic maintenance in the last 20+ years. had to ask me for help because she was baffled by checking tyre pressures, oil and topping up washer fluid. felt like replying wordlessly, by throwing the manual at her.... its no harder to fill the washer than the petrol tank after all. the things we suffer with!)

dads in the meantime were pretty dull and a fair way further out of my current and possibly lifelong league.
string of company car cavaliers, which were alright..... and the GSi turbo that was far more than alright
there was one duffer out of the lot which reacted badly to french scooter juice whilst on another holiday... towing a caravan... and ended up with a specific output of about 20hp. uh oh!

interspersing that, a proton saloon (awful, leaky thing, but comfy seats),
a beemer 320 estate (he fancied a bit of RWD fun, but got shot of it VERY quickly after it's flakiness became all too apparent),
Rover Sterling 827 - boxy to look at, but a total leather-clad space battlecruising beauty of a car on the interior, and disturbingly economical despite the fantastic 2700cc and auto box... sadly killed by all 24 tappets giving out - he would have repaired it, too, but the bill was over two grand!
a Xantia turbo diesel 1.9 (great fun!) SX, traded up after a short while to a petrol 2.0 automatic (bad knee forced abandoning clutching) VSX. he wasnt too happy about the enforced loss of speed (2nd in particular is CRAP) and economy on that front, gutted even more when the TD automatics hit the market a year later but he couldnt afford to replace it.
several years on and he's still got that 1997 xantia, for which he grabbed a "P174JNR" plate as he meant to pass it to me on my 17th! (family initial - 17th - "for junior" ), using it as a day to day shopping vehicle and for putting lots of stuff in for light deliveries of his (failing) businesses goods around the country... mega miles, and several minor things have gone wrong but the main parts of the car are showing remarkable resilience. it's an unkillable, slow, thirsty sod!
also joining the stable, a Volvo 240 estate. i'd certainly have one, its a total mad max type of car! body work is solid as a rock even though the doors feel flimsy and made of range-rover tinplate. holds the entire world and its spouse depite being not very much wider than a polo (length and height you see), goes pretty smartly, and isn't ever so thirsty (but, with a 2.1 you're not going to set any mileage records). enormous steel wheels, jacked up suspension, somehow corners real good even though...

his partner had a clio when they met, i borrowed it for a while, it was kind of like the punto but more lightweight. alright car... just.... irredemably french

oh, and if it counts, my brother has an astra.

no-one i know has a polo however, or has/have had any of the other cars i'm properly seriously looking at. no skodas, no Seats (well, family friend has briefly passed through arosa and leon..), no other polos or golfs, no astras other than bro's, no fiestas etc etc.

odd? maybe.

I would say no, as we have had a mixed bag of cars depending on where my dad was working, etc.

I can remember we had quite a few escorts, a Mark3 in beige which my dad in his yoof did up, fitting an alarm, lowering it and putting XR2i alloys on. There were the facelifted versions (ya know with the bigger plastic bumpers), we had a red and a white one of those (both company cars).

Then there were a few Vauxhalls, an Mark2 Astra SRi in white, that was quite nice in its day. There was then a Cavalier SRi and a really really sheddy Cavalier that wouldn't start in the rain and had the most annoying axel whine.

There was then a Renault 18 TS, that was alright, but became unreliable in the cold (no suprise there!).

Then there were a host of Company Renaults, Meganes when they first came out (think my dad had been given atleast 2 of every variant available whilst working for Renault), numerous Clios, loads of Lagunas, Safranes and Espaces.

Then my dad went through a Japanese phase with a Nissan company cars, and eventually ended up buying a Mitsi Colt. There was then the Proton phase (the less said, the better!), and now he has an Espace.

And thats just my dads cars, havent covered my stepdads yet. But you get the idea. Dubs weren't in the family.

Karl.

No
Parents have had fords, triumphs, austins n rovers, hondas n MG's

although my mum now has a brand new polo, i inherated her rotro
till i could sell it and buy a decent car.
have always loved VW's Used to work for them to, and as seems to be the theme i too have hankered after a GTI but have never been able to afford 1 yet but there's still plenty of time

Matt

my choice in cars is similar to my parents is only similar as the cars my parents had when i was little are the same now! me mum was rushed to hospital expecting me in a type 2 double cab pickup which we still own today!

plus my dad has always told me that veedubs are good and a polo is a good place to start!

we have 5 veedubs in our family and since i have been around, none of them have been sold!

yes, we haven't got 5 (soon to be 6) vw's on the drive for nothing

bstardchild wrote:

toXXin wrote:No, because my parents were into their Fords, Vauxhalls and MGs.

So it did influence you then - reverse logic

No, because if they did, I would've had an Astra, an XR2i and an MG Metro to name a few...

Just realised.. and you may all laugh at this and call me an idiot flat cap wearing old man if you wish.. I've got a bit of a thing for late 80's / early 90's rover group cars. Not all of them, obviously, you wouldn't catch me dead in a metro (especially as several of my friends very nearly were when my friend's absolutely legendary old metro ended up spinning, ploughing through a few road signs and ending up upside down in a crumpled heap in a ditch ), but for many years my mum had an MG Montego, it was pretty much the car I grew up with. Fair enough, it was a very average example of a rover with some MG badges stuck all over it, but she got it for £300 when I was 5 years old, and finally scrapped it when I was 11 after the clutch went. During those 5 years it's main duty was towing an extremely heavy horse trailer with two pretty heavy horses, along with the entire family and a weekend's worth of camping and horse gear. Given that it was bought believing it was going to be dead within a year as a cheap runabout, and given that it had a very tall gearbox that was amazingly unsuitable for towing, I think the fact that it lasted that long was commendable really. Plus, it was very comfortable, never once broke down until the clutch finally burnt out (at the bottom of a hill on a dead end street with two horses on tow ). Since then I've just had a thing for rovers/mg's of that era.. and I have to confess I quite like some of the new ones as well. Sure, the new rovers are complete old men's cars, but they're bloody nice ones if you forget the badge on the front. And whatever people may say about MG's being rovers with a body kit, you get in one and feel what they've done to the handling and the engine and you'll change your mind quick enough. My dad has a ZS120.. smallest engine of the range, but bloody hell does it shift, and feels perfect too.

Shame they still haven't given up the crappy old flexi keys that feel like they're going to break every time you turn them in the lock though

So anyway, to conclude I would definately say my parents' choice of cars has affected me now.. for better or for worse

So scores update should be:

YES - 14

NO - 12

I just bought my MK4 Polo because I like it!!!
My mum has now bought a MK5, which i like better than mine, biatch!!! In the past she's had a Mini, Fiesta XR2 and a Nissan Micra (god knows what went wrong there)
My dad has always had company cars, Cavaliers, Mondeos, Astras, Vectras etc. so not much inspiration there, I'm trying to convince him to but either an Impreza or an Evo VIII but haven't had much success yet even though it's the type of car he's always wanted.

StevePolo wrote:I just bought my MK4 Polo because I like it!!!
My mum has now bought a MK5, which i like better than mine, biatch!!! In the past she's had a Mini, Fiesta XR2 and a Nissan Micra (god knows what went wrong there)
My dad has always had company cars, Cavaliers, Mondeos, Astras, Vectras etc. so not much inspiration there, I'm trying to convince him to but either an Impreza or an Evo VIII but haven't had much success yet even though it's the type of car he's always wanted.

IMPREZA = NO

EVO = YES VERY MUCH SO

toXXin wrote:

bstardchild wrote:

toXXin wrote:No, because my parents were into their Fords, Vauxhalls and MGs.

So it did influence you then - reverse logic

No, because if they did, I would've had an Astra, an XR2i and an MG Metro to name a few...

So yes they did influence you! Negatively!

Not at all, because I was all set to buy a Corsa or a Fiesta until I bought PVW at Heathrow Airport and read the MK3 Polo buyers guide.

No reverse psychology (spelling?) involved, I blame PVW!