One Lady Owner

fletch

I for one am not impressed when I read a car ad and it says "Only one lady owner". She's probably had the car since new, never had it serviced, looked at tyre pressures, brake wear, changed the oil etc... Most women drive a car and unless there is smoke billowing out the exhaust or the thing won't start, they just keep on driving it, regardless of a maintenance & service schedule. Boy racers may drive their cars a little harder, but in general they like their cars to be running right & looking clean & tidy.
Just my opinion....feel free to object.

Silvera

I too would be a bit dubious when I read 'one lady owner' (e.g. the car could be registered in her name, but driven by husband/partner).

However, I would definitely NOT buy a car that belonged to a 'boy racer' !!

bazz26

As you said when I hear this I tend to examin things like the brakes, clutch, body panels, gear box, etc in more detail.

AlienGav

Silvera wrote:

However, I would definitely NOT buy a car that belonged to a 'boy racer' !!

haha!

Don't be silly Silvera!

We'll put a new clutch in it before we sell it to you! lol

fletch

AlienGav wrote:

We'll put a new clutch in it before we sell it to you! lol

lol lol

BrianD3

I for one am not impressed when I read a car ad and it says "Only one lady owner". She's probably had the car since new, never had it serviced, looked at tyre pressures, brake wear, changed the oil etc... Most women drive a car and unless there is smoke billowing out the exhaust or the thing won't start, they just keep on driving it, regardless of a maintenance & service schedule. Boy racers may drive their cars a little harder, but in general they like their cars to be running right & looking clean & tidy.
Just my opinion....feel free to object.

No objections here, I agree 100% In my experience, women are especially hard on gearboxes and clutches with crunched gearchanges and unnecessary clutch riding common. I was in a car with a girl the other day and watched in horror as she held her car on a hill for about 2 minutes using the clutch only :eek: I pointed out to her the error of her ways and I got a lecture about how men are terrible drivers, we cause all the crashes blah blah blah :rolleyes:

Another thing I find is that females tend not to give a sh*t about whacking their car's wheels off a kerb when parking. I have never seen a car owned by a female which didn't have signs of bad kerbing on both front wheels. Obviously, this doesn't do the tracking and suspension any good either

Then you have little old ladies who drive very low mileage but it is composed almost entirely of short journeys with a cold engine. Result: disproportionate engine wear. Oil probably never gets changed or checked either.

Finally, it has been shown that women have more minor accidents and scrapes than men. The resultant minor body damage is often shoddily repaired resulting in poor paint finish and greated chance of premature rust.

BrianD3

zapata

Yup, i skip over those ads aswell. No objections here.

highdef

There's a little old lady at the end of my road. She drives a 98 Subaru Vivio- Tiny little car. Anyway, she must think its an automatic as anytime I hear her driving past the house, the engine is screaming as she is till in 1st gear. For years I thought it was because I live on a short road and maybe she was not changing gear. However, last week when it was a bit warm, I was driving on the main road with the window down and she was behind me. Not only could I hear that she was driving in first (at about 40KMH) but I could actually here the limiter cutting the revs every second or so. How she has been driving the car like this for 7 years, I dare not imagine!!!

mike65

Its been proven, using rigorous scientific methods that 99% of women dont give a tinkers cuss for whats going on underneath any part of a cars body except the bootlid where the shopping sits! My sister is a fine example and she's no dolt. As far as I can tell she never lifts the bonnet to check anything. Like most ppl she simply relies on a dashlight assuming they all work.

Mind you thats not always enough, years ago I was listening to Gay Byrne radio show which featured a young woman who was driving round with a dash light showing, she did'nt think to wonder what it meant dispite seeing the thing on all the time the engine was running then one day she heard a grinding sound which became deafening and then the car stopped in a smelly cloud of smoke...yep the oil light had been showing for a week and she wrecked the engine.

Mike.

Ratchet

Silvera wrote:

I too would be a bit dubious when I read 'one lady owner' (e.g. the car could be registered in her name, but driven by husband/partner).

However, I would definitely NOT buy a car that belonged to a 'boy racer' !!

i don't know, i did lots of work for boyracers and once there is no tacky body modification and LCDs sticking out of every hole, i don't really mind. Seen bad cars and the ones driven by

the same guys, which were coming all the time to put good oil/filters, HT cables good set of brake pads(sometimes vented brake discs)
good sparkplugs and many other things. they certainly do spend money.

i know there are extremes but if you manage to get car before gets trashed , you may just end up with much better car then the one from one lady owner. Driven sometimes without oil or coolant, marked windscreen(thx to old wipers) and car which was trashed by her boyfriend which later advised her to sell it and get new one. Possibly the only work he did on the car, was to visit this buyand sell dude for tacho calibration

I think that’s the other extreme

Car always has to be checked, there is always a lemon out there

30-6shooter

The worst ones are a modifyed civic or some yoke stating 1 lady owner, when its obvious its not a girls car. I think a lot of them ones are case of the boyfriends insuring the girl as main driver and themselves named for cheaper insurance??

AMurphy

If my mom is anything to go by, I'd not buy anything she owned. Not that she is a bad driver or anything like that, just that she should really have a Land Rover, cannot afford one, but uses the car as though it were a Land Rover anyway.

Our man in Havana

I remember many years ago as a child going to look at a car in Dublin, 1 lady owner etc. My dad looked over the car, 4 bald tyres, rust to beat the band. he opened the bonnet and pulled out the dipstick and it was dry as a bone, I kid you not. Needless to say he made his excuses and left in disbelief.

fletch

ntl Technical wrote:

There's a little old lady at the end of my road. She drives a 98 Subaru Vivio- Tiny little car. Anyway, she must think its an automatic as anytime I hear her driving past the house, the engine is screaming as she is till in 1st gear. For years I thought it was because I live on a short road and maybe she was not changing gear. However, last week when it was a bit warm, I was driving on the main road with the window down and she was behind me. Not only could I hear that she was driving in first (at about 40KMH) but I could actually here the limiter cutting the revs every second or so. How she has been driving the car like this for 7 years, I dare not imagine!!!

Mental image in my head of her bet up against the windscreen 2.

ds20prefecture

My mother is 73, and drives a 98 Polo with very low mileage.

The reason is not short journeys, just that she uses the car rarely.
Her wheels are flawless
The car is serviced regularly (and not just mileage wise).
The car has one or two minor dings and scratches that are normal on a 7 year old car.
It's an automatic (only because some of her expat children have forgotten how to use a clutch) but she managed not to wear out the clutch or gearboxes on the many cars she owned before this one.
She does not sit on the white line all day at 40kph with her face pressed to the glass, but rather drives confidently with the rest of the traffic.

Is it the human condition to broadly generalise, citing few examples, and then spread the word as "gospel"? In this case we are trying to generalise the behaviour of about 50% of the population.

ambro25

ntl Technical wrote:

There's a little old lady at the end of my road. She drives a 98 Subaru Vivio- Tiny little car. Anyway, she must think its an automatic as anytime I hear her driving past the house, the engine is screaming as she is till in 1st gear. For years I thought it was because I live on a short road and maybe she was not changing gear. However, last week when it was a bit warm, I was driving on the main road with the window down and she was behind me. Not only could I hear that she was driving in first (at about 40KMH) but I could actually here the limiter cutting the revs every second or so. How she has been driving the car like this for 7 years, I dare not imagine!!!

I knew I was right to buy a Scoob for reliability!
As posted herein before, 1 lady owner is all good and fine only if
1) it checks out in facts (no previous owners, single or partner drives another car that may be seen on drive).
2) the car checks out good (irrespective of man or woman ownership and use - e.g. in respect maintenance record, signs of kerbing, mechanical wear etc.).

I've only ever bought one car as a "1 lady owner", that was from a main dealer and the only thing this piece of info 'did' for me was to ensure (after checking, obviously) that I would be the second owner, not the 5th/6th/etc.

fletch

ds20prefecture wrote:

My mother is 73, and drives a 98 Polo with very low mileage.

The reason is not short journeys, just that she uses the car rarely.
Her wheels are flawless
The car is serviced regularly (and not just mileage wise).
The car has one or two minor dings and scratches that are normal on a 7 year old car.
It's an automatic (only because some of her expat children have forgotten how to use a clutch) but she managed not to wear out the clutch or gearboxes on the many cars she owned before this one.
She does not sit on the white line all day at 40kph with her face pressed to the glass, but rather drives confidently with the rest of the traffic.

Is it the human condition to broadly generalise, citing few examples, and then spread the word as "gospel"? In this case we are trying to generalise the behaviour of about 50% of the population.

Well there are exceptions to every rule & I am more than willing to accept/believe that your Mother's car is mint. It really annoys me when people start taking issue with generalisations, it is a fact of life that they exist and cannot be ignored

Ratchet

fletch wrote:

Well there are exceptions to every rule & I am more than willing to accept/believe that your Mother's car is mint. It really annoys me when people start taking issue with generalisations, it is a fact of life that they exist and cannot be ignored

true, cars will have to be checked at the time of purchase regardless of the owner. People have always different opinions in regards to car conditions and what;s good for you could be just average for me and vice versa

Beruthiel

fletch wrote:

I for one am not impressed when I read a car ad and it says "Only one lady owner". She's probably had the car since new, never had it serviced, looked at tyre pressures, brake wear, changed the oil etc... Most women drive a car and unless there is smoke billowing out the exhaust or the thing won't start, they just keep on driving it, regardless of a maintenance & service schedule..

ppffffff
what a load of twaddle, I do so love sweeping statements.

I drove a motorbike for 10 years and serviced it myself
when and if I ever get a car, I'll also do as much maintenace as I can on it

now
my bloke on the other hand
I had to show him where the oil dip stick was in the engine of his car :rolleyes:

fletch

Beruthiel wrote:

I drove a motorbike for 10 years and serviced it myself
when and if I ever get a car, I'll also do as much maintenace as I can on it

I'm happy to hear it.

ds20prefecture

fletch wrote:

It really annoys me when people start taking issue with generalisations, it is a fact of life that they exist and cannot be ignored

This is either very witty or very sad. Let's assume the latter.

It is a fact of life that generalisations exist - but that does not make the generalisation fact.

They most certainly can, and should, be ignored. By definition, they are subject to the personal prejudices of the generaliser.

fletch

ds20prefecture wrote:

This is either very witty or very sad. Let's assume the latter.

It is a fact of life that generalisations exist - but that does not make the generalisation fact.

They most certainly can, and should, be ignored. By definition, they are subject to the personal prejudices of the generaliser.

I never suggested that a generalisation implied a piece of factual information, I merely suggested that they cannot be ignored. Much in the same way that you assumed my comment to be sad. Anyway...at the risk of going off topic...I think I will add a poll to this thread to get some statistical feedback.
Once again, the poll will rely on peoples opinions which will be generalisations but hopefully based on past experiences

Imposter

I think everyone here criticising the generalisiations is being a bit harsh as the "one lady owner" line is meant to be seen as a generalisation albeit a different one than was taken here!

fletch

Imposter wrote:

I think everyone here criticising the generalisiations is being a bit harsh as the "one lady owner" line is meant to be seen as a generalisation albeit a different one than was taken here!

Very good point

alias no.9

I agree that the tone of this thread does appear, for the most part, to be attacking the 'one lady owner' marketing technique rather than attacking women. If anyone takes a look at the damaged repairables section of the buy and sell, from time to time you see adds in there for cars with crash damage with the one lady owner tagged on. I've always found that quite humorous to say the least.

ds20prefecture

alias no.9 wrote:

I agree that the tone of this thread does appear, for the most part, to be attacking the 'one lady owner' marketing technique rather than attacking women.

The original post says
"I for one am not impressed when I read a car ad and it says "Only one lady owner". She's probably had the car since new, never had it serviced, looked at tyre pressures, brake wear, changed the oil etc... Most women drive a car and unless there is smoke billowing out the exhaust or the thing won't start, they just keep on driving it, regardless of a maintenance & service schedule ..."

For me this is generalising how "most women" treat their cars, rather than objecting to how some people sell their cars as "one lady owner". The tone of the replies has continued in this vein.

Fletch cites my mother as "an exception to the rule". By this logic my wife, 4 of my sisters and 3 of my female friends are also exceptions. My other 2 sisters and two other female friends are not exceptions - do they prove the rule? A number of my brothers would treat their cars very badly (although none of my male friends do).

I was/am attempting to show some balance in the thread, as there were a number of messages that were generally derogatory towards how women in general treat their cars. The views espoused about women in general were contrary to my own experience of actual women I know.

Obviously we would all prefer to run with the generalisation, so I'll exit.

Duckjob

ds20prefecture wrote:

The original post says
"I for one am not impressed when I read a car ad and it says "Only one lady owner". She's probably had the car since new, never had it serviced, looked at tyre pressures, brake wear, changed the oil etc... Most women drive a car and unless there is smoke billowing out the exhaust or the thing won't start, they just keep on driving it, regardless of a maintenance & service schedule ..."

For me this is generalising how "most women" treat their cars, rather than objecting to how some people sell their cars as "one lady owner". The tone of the replies has continued in this vein.

Fletch cites my mother as "an exception to the rule". By this logic my wife, 4 of my sisters and 3 of my female friends are also exceptions. My other 2 sisters and two other female friends are not exceptions - do they prove the rule? A number of my brothers would treat their cars very badly (although none of my male friends do).

I was/am attempting to show some balance in the thread, as there were a number of messages that were generally derogatory towards how women in general treat their cars. The views espoused about women in general were contrary to my own experience of actual women I know.

Obviously we would all prefer to run with the generalisation, so I'll exit.

I don't see how you can have a discussion about what 'one lady owner' means to someone buying a car without discussing what their perceptions of lady drivers are.

Don't be so sensitive, for gods sake.

De Hipster

fletch wrote:

I for one am not impressed when I read a car ad and it says "Only one lady owner". She's probably had the car since new, never had it serviced, looked at tyre pressures, brake wear, changed the oil etc... Most women drive a car and unless there is smoke billowing out the exhaust or the thing won't start, they just keep on driving it, regardless of a maintenance & service schedule. Boy racers may drive their cars a little harder, but in general they like their cars to be running right & looking clean & tidy.
Just my opinion....feel free to object.

Just as long as you don't generalise or anything?! My car has had one garage & two lady owners...best looked after vehicle I've ever been in contact with, I'm practically a qualified mechanic by now.

ds20prefecture

Duckjob wrote:

Don't be so sensitive, for gods sake.

I assure you I am not. I am merely trying to offer an alternative view based on my own experience of how the women I know treat their cars. For some reason this seems to anger people, so I will stop.

Gerry

How about we step away from generalisations, and speak from our own experience.
In my own experience, the number of female drivers who I have personally observed demonstrating a very poor knowledge of the clutch and gearbox is a bit higher than that of male drivers.
Its just one aspect of driving. I know male drivers who drive too fast and aren't great drivers for many reasons.

Capt'n Midnight

fletch wrote:

I for one am not impressed when I read a car ad and it says "Only one lady owner".

Worse she could have it serviced several times a week .. One lady owner always reminds me of..

AMurphy

re; She's probably had the car since new, never had it serviced, looked at tyre pressures, brake wear, changed the oil etc... Most women drive a car and unless there is smoke billowing out the exhaust or the thing won't start, they just keep on driving it, regardless of a maintenance & service schedule ..."

I also assumed the point was the sellers/dealers that quote such... should be horsewhipped or have their head examined, not that women are inherently mechanically inept. A lot of guys are pretty bad also.

Eitehr way, there may be something in the statment.
eg, "The Ma" again, very capable woman behind the wheel of anything. Taught me how to drive, passed 1st time and still between the ditches (touch wood... no, no stay away from the trees).
Religious about observing maintenance schedules, etc. I did most of it anyway, so.
However on one occasion when the water pump sprung a leak,... drove till it overheated and stopped. Then when it has cooled down, drove the rest of the distance home, where it stopped again and remained stopped till we rebuilt the engine. So I got a little more maintenance work that time.

If it had been an oil light, she would probably have driven home and informed me "the oil light was on all day".

I think there may be an attitude difference. ie, getting home saftely may be important than an engine.

Generally I would put no great importance in the statment, "lady driver", not any more than I would on high or low mileage, Though you'll have to admit the statment "teenage male driver" is one you'll never see on the banner.
Inspect the object

Victor

One comment I had from a mechanic was that "little old dears" never, ever do their own maintainence and always go to a mechanic, hence it hasn't been Gunthered by some guy who thinks he knows how to maintain things.

DubTony

Capt'n Midnight wrote:

Worse she could have it serviced several times a week .. One lady owner always reminds me of..

And I'll bet she's burnt out a few clutches in her time.

Tony

greglo23

serious generalisations going on here. as a mechanic with more than 30 years experience i can safely say that men are far worse at maintaining their cars than women. my female customers would ring me or call if they thought something was`nt right with the car whereas the males tended to drive on until the car stopped. as for little old ladies i blame the car salesmen, all of whom i would`nt believe if they told me they were lying, who should be pointing them at autos. look at how much cars have changed in the last 30 years . most older people drove anglias or morris minors with heavy clutches. you could rest your leg on the clutch all day and do hardly any damage. iv`e seen cars come in to me with no disks left, and i mean gone completely and the guy says i thought the brakes were a bit poor. i saw a renault 5 one day with 2 pieces of wood holding the pistons in the calipers and i had to stop your man from driving it away. the basic problem in ireland is a lack of proper driver education and lazy cops who only want to hand out speeding tickets instead of enforcing the rest of the rules of the road. rant over!!!!

AMurphy

Oh, nothing like a good quality rant to start off the day.
However, this morning I passed a Jeep (doing about 55~60) with a very-very wobbly minature spare on the rear.
Odd, I thought, never seen one wobble like that before, as I got closer, a quick inspection revealed the wheel to be on inside out. (nuts too maybe).

Male driver.

magpie

Mind you thats not always enough, years ago I was listening to Gay Byrne radio show which featured a young woman who was driving round with a dash light showing, she did'nt think to wonder what it meant dispite seeing the thing on all the time the engine was running then one day she heard a grinding sound which became deafening and then the car stopped in a smelly cloud of smoke...yep the oil light had been showing for a week and she wrecked the engine.

I either know that girl, or someone that did the same thing. :rolleyes: Her replacement car then lost the drivers door after about 2 weeks when she opened it in the path of an oncoming bus. Some people just shouldn't drive.

AMurphy

This was told me by a coworker of many moons ago. She decided she'd check and top up the car fluids, (an old Mini at the time).

Anyway, after several buckets of water to top up the coolant, her brother became suspicious and decided to check out why it needed so much water to top it off.
Engines would take about 5 gal of water when you put it in the crank case.

Fortunately draining/replacing the oil immediately prevented any damage.

otoh, my Mom's car got a puncture, so some helpful men assisted in changing the wheel, but did not know enough about cars to install the nuts tapered side in. Fortunately she did and reversed them.

Re, opening doors. Cannot remember exactly what the wife of a former boss did... something like reversed out of the garage with a door open, or drove in with a bike stuck on top.... not a good thing to do with the Hubby's Porsch.

My wife managed to bang her vehicle off both mine and my brothers reversing out of the garage. Nothing serious, but did manage to drive my car in front of a "boat" with no brakes about a week later. That snapped off the front wheel and bent the chassis beyond repair... Beat out the wing with a 2x4 and a mallet, fitted a scrap wheel and strut and it ran for another 2 years that way. Hardly NCT approvable,?
The "boat" got written off.