Another spec me a used car thread :)

[herulach]

The mother inlaw has a giulietta, and although it looks nice, I wouldn't want to do a lot of miles in a stretch in it. Its quite noisy inside, and the seats are pretty mediocre.

I have a C30, and can't reccomend it highly enough - if you need to be able to use the back seats then an S40/V50 is essentially the same thing. Mines a D3, which is plenty quick enough and does a comfortable 55 on a run. If you shop around a d4/d5 will do about 50 and knock the 0-60 down to about 6.5s IIRC.

The bobby basic sound system is meh, but any of the upgrades are actually half decent, helped by the fact that its an incredibly quiet place to sit - even on 18" wheels. 10k will get you into a 2010 with half leather.

It sounds a bit concieted, but I do a huge number of long trips with work (manchester > edinburgh twice a month, manchester > hull/grimsby about the same) and wouldn't choose anything other than a volvo for that type of driving. I've spent periods in rental 3s, A3s and Golfs, and all of them are much more tiring to drive a long way, despite being 'better' cars.

[DanceswithUnix]

It sounds a bit concieted, but I do a huge number of long trips with work (manchester > edinburgh twice a month, manchester > hull/grimsby about the same) and wouldn't choose anything other than a volvo for that type of driving. I've spent periods in rental 3s, A3s and Golfs, and all of them are much more tiring to drive a long way, despite being 'better' cars.

I think that proves that different cars fit different people. I had a V50 for a few weeks and found it really uncomfortable, the interior I just found annoying. The wife flat refused to drive it after a few days!

I came away thinking that Volvo had ruined a perfectly good Focus chassis.