Driving around Europe

[XA04]

How tall are you?

I wanted a big car, and now that I have my Megane it's plenty big and spacious enough. A Vectra is too big IMO, for a learner. It'll be a bastard to park, I promise.

You can take friends around in most medium-sized hatchbacks with rear seats. Hell I've had five people in my Cinq. The only real problem was that it was so slow.

I'm 6ft 1" last time I checked, which was about a year ago, so maybe a little taller now, I'll have to check. But I'm not skinny either, not but not fat. Inbetween.

[herulach]

Hmm, I just noticed that. Well I guess it's due to the fact that I will be on my dads insurance policy.

Edit: btw was that on your policy? (600 a year?)

That was fully comp, but it would have been about 400 tpft, this on my mums policy

[XA04]

Tpft?

[Rave]

I agree that there's no reason not to get a big car (I.E. mondeo/3-series size) as your first motor after passing your test. My parents insured me on their Nissan Prairie after I passed my y=test aged 17, and that's a big, longm wide car. After a cautious first drive round the block I was fine and never had any trouble driving it.

However, a 316 would be a daft first car IMO, way overpriced for what you get, and young person + BMW = massive insurance bill. In my experience insurance companies don't take much notice of insurance groups for young people, they look at if a particular model of car gets crashed by young drivers or not. That's only a gut feeling of course, but it seems that way to me.

The advantage of buying a Mondeo instead of a Focus (or a 406 over a 306 etc. etc.) is that they depreciate faster, so even though they were more expensive new they can actually be cheaper secondhand. If you don't want to go with 5labs suggestion of a £200 banger (which is a good idea IMO) then I'd consider a late 90s 406 turbodiesel. Diesels are a better bet for a Euro roadtrip because in a lot of Europe Diesel is cheaper than Petrol- and you get better economy.

[5lab]

the problem you have with the fiesta is almost certainly just due to that car - i'm 6'3 and fit in most cars, although the person behind usually suffers..

[XA04]

Is a Corsa (C) smaller or larger than a Fiesta SI?

[Howard]

Corsa's Probably slightly bigger

[Howard]

I'm 6ft tall and I had no problem driving a Cinq, one of the smallest cars around

[schmunk]

Corsa Cs are plenty big enough for the driver - I'm 6'0" and the seat can go a lot further back than I need it.

And the seat goes up and down, as well as back and froward.

[XA04]

Corsa Cs are plenty big enough for the driver - I'm 6'0" and the seat can go a lot further back than I need it.

And the seat goes up and down, as well as back and froward.

That's good that the seats can move up and down, in the fiesta they only go back and forward.

[XA04]

How about a 2.0 1998 Galant? Insurance doesn't seem to be that high, on my dads policy I'm getting about £800.

[Howard]

Who's going to be paying for petrol? Bigger engines will be thirstier than small engines. Ditto road tax, etc.

[XA04]

Who's going to be paying for petrol? Bigger engines will be thirstier than small engines. Ditto road tax, etc.

I shall.

Didn't think about road tax.. does the size of the engine actually affect the price of the road tax?

[Howard]

It does if the car is older than 2002. below 1.5 = £105 per year, 1.5 and above = £170 per year.

THink about petrol costs too, especially if you'll only have a part time job. It's not cheap

[XA04]

..damn, that's expensive .

[Howard]

Owning a car isn't cheap


Peugeot 106 tbh.