Irish motoring in the 1980’s

JoeA3 wrote: »

Yes! I remember those, the "Flair" Fiesta van. I think Ford put an XR2i style bodykit on them and they were dirt cheap to tax/run, so they were all the rage with young lads with a few quid around that time... I definitely had a spin in the back of one a couple of times.!

Carvans in general were very popular in the 90s. The 305 van seemed to be everywhere.

iHungry wrote: »

...was going into the motorfactors in the ilac centre as a boy and drooling over spotlights and dreaming of them on my dad's Bluebird.

This just brought back another memory watching fellas trying to wire up cibie spotlights to there escorts seemed a complicated job cos would walk past two days later and they were still at it or the rally sunstrips on the windscreen the shell ones were popular definitely great days

RandomViewer wrote: »

No need for a 4 x4 when you had a 305, brilliant van

There's a mint red one that goes around kildare regularly

RandomViewer wrote: »

No need for a 4 x4 when you had a 305, brilliant van

I suppose they had high ground clearance, good towing ability and cheap to run. Farmers loved them.

Not sure how many Escort MkII RS2000s made it to Ireland. Many remember it as Doyle's car from the Professionals. Loved it, with the wire mesh headrest. Worth a right few quid today

JoeA3 wrote: »

Yes! I remember those, the "Flair" Fiesta van. I think Ford put an XR2i style bodykit on them and they were dirt cheap to tax/run, so they were all the rage with young lads with a few quid around that time... I definitely had a spin in the back of one a couple of times.!

In-laws only got rid of theirs that they bought new. Too much rust to save.

Mmm. My father had a couple of Mk.I Granadas, with the 2-litre Pinto engine. They were a magnificent thing back in the day, considered the king-dick as 'twere, at a time when Mercs were seen as a slightly oddball car from Eastern Europe. After that he had a 2.8l Mk. II Granada Ghia, with Cologne V6, automatic transmission, deep-pile carpet, aircon, etc. My mother had a couple of escorts as well as a Fiat 127 - the latter had terrible gearshift linkage problems, causing the otherwise rather saintly lady to swear like a wounded Dutch pirate. :pac:

Diesel cars were few and far-between, consisting mainly of the Peugeot 504. A local GP did have a diesel Golf at one stage, which was considered a very unusual and expensive Teutonic masterpiece around where we lived.

The Hillman Hunter was highly regarded among the young gentlemen about-the-place, as was the Corolla K-30 a little later-on - I had one of those. They did tend to crumble into dust, but those engines were astonishing. One friend-of-a-friend had one with the driver's door welded shut. The same fella would happily drink ten pints, hop in via the window like the Dukes of Hazzard gone wrong, then trundle away home. But that was alright, because his brother was a guard - "Mike! Mike!! If I catch you driving in that condition again, I don't care who's brother you are, I'll fuckin' do ya!!" :pac::pac::pac:

If I think of any more, I'll post again. :cool:

AngryLoner wrote: »

AXE TAX STICKERS!

That reminds me - ISTR no-one really giving a shit about tax, including most guards. :pac:

Fritzbox wrote: »

Were Ford Granadas also built in Germany as well, in Cologne?

Yes. The Mk. I was built in Dagenham as well. But as far as everyone was concerned back then, Fords were Irish cars!

Started driving 1979. First car was a FIAT 127c just like this
Had a heated rear window ! No radio so put in a National Panasonic cassette player as didn't want to make any holes for an ariel. Was very important to always keep a pencil in the car. Insurance was with PMPA and collected books and books of green shield stamps from the petrol, til they went.
£10 filled it for the week. Had matching wooly seat covers and steering wheel cover.:D Happy days.

Fritzbox wrote: »

Indeed, all Fords were Irish! I still remember ads on TV in the 1980s for the Ford Cortina Cashel and Ford Cortina Tara limited editions.

In the UK these run out models were the Ford Cortina Crusader. So, the names had to change coming across the Irish sea.

Arthur Daley wrote: »

The second gen Fiat 127 was very popular here. The long forgotten Mark III barely sold for a year before the Uno put Fiat back on top in the supermini class. One of the best selling cars of all time across Europe

My granny had one. Complete rust bucket in the end but they were good to keep going. Fiat had a great market here and in much of Europe that they just threw away in the early 2000s.

The Scorpio was a posh version of the Granada. Not used on Cortinas

Friends of ours had a rust-brown Austin Maxi. They used to bring it to France on holidays in the early 80's.
The damn thing didn't have a fuel-gauge, just an orange light which told you that you had only a couple of miles to go before it was empty. Yep, great!

So when we were driving down through France, we would all have to go in convoy in case the Maxi ran out of petrol and we needed to do a station-run.:p
So every 50 miles of so the driver would pull over near a French petrol-station, open the fuel cap and shake the car to roughly gauge how much fuel was left, before hopefully heading onwards!

The parents drove a Peugeot 504, classy car, I got my first car in 1981, a 5 door Renault 6, the gear lever was on the dashboard, I had to keep the car covered during the winter to stop it freezing,

Arthur Daley wrote: »

Interesting thing about the Maxi, it's big selling point was its cavernous cabin, it was a big spacious family car for the 70s. Even the name tells you it's a big practical thing.

It's dimensions are actually smaller than the current Ford Fiesta.

The father had a gold coloured one it was awful but came with a 5 speed gearbox and a wooden dashboard

Mongfinder General wrote: »

You could drive on a provisional licence on your own. I think my old man did it for about 30 years until he was basically made take a test about 10 years ago. Absolute madness in terms of who was allowed to drive back then.

I don't think it was legal to drive on the provisional. I remember reading the wording on my own, which was that it was OK to drive on your second year of provisional, but not before and not after. It was widely ignored though.

TrailerBob wrote: »

Now that I think of it, cars broke down a lot more back then. Reliability is in a different league now. Remember an engine fire in a Beetle, and a Renault 18 that just gave up on the way to bring us to school (sad day!!).

Yeah, it was very regular to have to give someone a push start on the road. I remember having to park my Opel Kadett on hills for months, to make sure it would start.

Motoring highlight of the 80s was working in the UK for a few weeks, and getting access to the boss's Granada 2.8 Ghia for the weekends over there. Bit of a change from my Fiat 127 at home. And of course, being the 80s, I had lots of emigrant mates in the UK, so I drove up and down the country each weekend, went on the tremendous piss on the Saturday night, and drove back up north on the Sunday.

George Dalton wrote: »

Cars in general used to smell amazing! New Fords in the 80's smelled lovely, BMWs weren't bad either but nothing could beat the smell of a Montego or Maestro with the velour seats. I saw one at the NEC Classic Car Show in Birmingham a few years ago and had to go over for a quick sniff. The lads still take the p1ss out of me over it

The Maestro and Montego weren’t especially popular here were they? I never remember many of them about really. Talking late 80s/early 90s when I first started noticing cars.
One family had a light blue Montego estate in my local village. That was about it though

beauf wrote: »

There were a decent amount of Maestro's and Montego's around. More so if you had a local Rover dealer. We had an Morris Ital for a while. Ours was well maintained and never gave too much trouble.

For me the 80s where all about the Sierra. It was a watershed going from square boxy shapes to curved. That's probably lost on people who weren't around at the time.

The other side of it was dominated by cars like the VW Jetta Mk1 and Mk2. We had a series of Mk2 Jetta's until we had the barge like Vento. Parents never went back to VW after that horror.

People loved the Vento didn’t they? It was the perfect Irish country car! Very popular in the 90s and well beyond. Or the Venito as my da called it.
My aunt had a diesel MK 1 Jetta and raved about it for years. Had the mark 2 which she hated- too slow and cumbersome I think.

Not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Renault Fuego was the wannabe yuppie and the Toyota celica was the posh yuppie's car of choice.

I had Datsun cherry, Ford escorts, golf GTI and then my favorite, Nissan Maxima which just happened to be white - same colour and model as the unmarked garda cars. Now that was FUN!

beauf wrote: »

There were a decent amount of Maestro's and Montego's around. More so if you had a local Rover dealer. We had an Morris Ital for a while. Ours was well maintained and never gave too much trouble.

For me the 80s where all about the Sierra. It was a watershed going from square boxy shapes to curved. That's probably lost on people who weren't around at the time.

The other side of it was dominated by cars like the VW Jetta Mk1 and Mk2. We had a series of Mk2 Jetta's until we had the barge like Vento. Parents never went back to VW after that horror.

Rover 213 would have been the commonest, rust prone but otherwise good wee car (Honda mechanicals) Metros sold okay for a few years until people realised how **** they were

Darc19 wrote: »

Not sure if it's been mentioned, but the Renault Fuego was the wannabe yuppie and the Toyota celica was the posh yuppie's car of choice.

I had Datsun cherry, Ford escorts, golf GTI and then my favorite, Nissan Maxima which just happened to be white - same colour and model as the unmarked garda cars. Now that was FUN!

Fuego was Renault 18, most were running the 1340cc , rear drive Celica would have been scarce ,

beauf wrote: »

Nissan Maxima and Camry for the time they were fast cars.

First gen Camry would have only slightly bigger than a Carina, Cressida was the Granada rival