Hey Dreamer! (Jono)

[Kenneth]

I saw a Barina trying to duck in and out of traffic on glenfield road this morning... It reminded me of you and I had a good laugh. :D

[dreamer]

I saw a Barina trying to duck in and out of traffic on glenfield road this morning... It reminded me of you and I had a good laugh. :D


LMAO!!

Those were the days.
For those that don't know, In 1997 My first car was a 1992 Mitsubishi Mirage GLX that got written off by a third party within it's first year of me owning it.

From the insurance payout I paid off the Mirage and brought a "interim" car.
A 1990 Holden Barina 1.3 SOHC Carburated 5 Door Manual.
I drove this from Tauranga to Auckland 5 days a week to go to Uni, and it only cost me $48 in gas. It got a new headunit, amp, subs, mags, short shift kit, big bore exhaust and extractors, Rammed Cold Air Induction, Panty Hose over the tail lights, black head light covers for the front (that got taken off every night) and suspension over it's lifetime.
Kenny thought I was "odd" for driving such a girls car, and for driving it like it was a race car. But it never failed me... much!

At one stage it even had a 1.3 Injected engine from a mates Suzuki Swift that had crashed... however, that engine only lasted a month because I took the Barina for a race around the Taupo Centenial race track... but I hadn't upgraded the brakes! With Severe brake fade - and 130KM/H coming down the back striaght... Only choice I had was to drop down through the gears... until the Conrod went through the sump.

Swapped the original engine back and the car is still going... I sold it approx. 6 months ago after 7 years and 420,000KMs.

This is what it looked like (Mine was GrandPa Blue)
9176


My Fiance brought a 2002 Barina SRi back when it was new.
The SRi completly changes the way a Barina is looked upon.
1.8L Injected 4 Cylinder in a light weight hatch back, Sports Suspension, alloy wheels with Directional tyres, ABS, Air bags, Air Conditioning, Cruise Control and Blauponkt CD player with steering wheel controls.
Fabulous car that would beat my Holden Calais VL 3.0L Straight 6 every time.

We Sold this car 2 weeks ago for $3,000 less than we paid for it 3 1/2 years ago!

9177

Cheers for the trip down memory lane Kenneth. :2thumbsup

[Kenneth]

Nice write up :)

Thought you might get a laugh out of it, glad I could be of assistance ;)

[bradc]

Thats some damned good resale value, why did you sell it, was it just an amazing offer that you recieved from someone?

[dreamer]

Thats some damned good resale value, why did you sell it, was it just an amazing offer that you recieved from someone?

6 Months ago we had:

Mine:
1987 Holden Calais VL 3.0L Striaght 6 (RB30)
1990 Holden Barina.
1992 Mazda Familia
1998 Mitsubishi Legnum VR-4

Hers:
2002 Holden Barina SRi
2003 Ford Mondeo

We're planning a wedding and buying a house, so having 6 cars between the 2 of us was out of the question. We made a compromise. I sell 3 of my 4 cars, and she sells her Barina SRi. Great compromise heh!

We bought the Barina SRi cheap... $16,500 as an "ex-demo" car. Although, It had only done 1,000Kms at the time. I did some price research, and we put it on Trademe.co.nz for $13,995 3 weeks ago and got an offer of $13,500 within 1 week. We were very suprised at how quick it went!

So now we're left with:
Mine:
1987 Holden Calais VL 3.0L Striaght 6 (RB30)
1998 Mitsubishi Legnum VR-4

Hers:

2003 Ford Mondeo

I've decided the Commordore is not for Sale - it is way too much fun to drive in the wet! And will the VR-4 go? Out of my cold dead hands!

The Mondeo is a company car which is being replaced with a 2006 Mitsubishi Lancer VR-X wagon in 2 weeks :evilgrin:

[You See]

Great to hear that Jono....those Mondeo's are a heap of junk! ...how many of you spent at least 3 mins looking for a way to open the boot??

[dreamer]

Great to hear that Jono....those Mondeo's are a heap of junk! ...how many of you spent at least 3 mins looking for a way to open the boot??

Hahaha
Luckily it's a stationwagon.
But trying to find the latch to open the bonnet... I gave up in disgust. Until a friend who had been caught out by the same thing finally finished his laughing fit, walked up to the front of the mondeo, leaned into the Ford badge sitting on the grill, and twisted it to reveal a key hole to unlock the bonnet.

FFS!

Horrible horrble car!
The only good thing about it is that it is free. Free petrol and free maintenance :2thumbsup

Really looking forward to the Lancer VR-X.
Our one will be Black.

9181

[You See]

lol ....now if only you two could convince to company to upgrade to the Evo IX wagon...there won't be any complaints there!..well except for the accountants, but what do they know bout fun! /pan

[bradc]

Those VR-X's are great looking cars, I think they come with the same 2.4 GDI engine that facelift Legnums came with.

You could have kept the barina for yourself for those long drives into work, instead of the commodore. Is it an RB30DET or just RB30?

[dreamer]

Those VR-X's are great looking cars, I think they come with the same 2.4 GDI engine that facelift Legnums came with.

You could have kept the barina for yourself for those long drives into work, instead of the commodore. Is it an RB30DET or just RB30?

The Commordore is a RB30, not an RB30DET. In it's current form it does 300KM's per 55 Litre tank.

I bought all the bits to convert it (maniford, turbo, intercooler, water and oil lines etc etc), but then I drove a VR-4. The commordore will never come close to performance. However, it is a hell of a lot of fun being real wheel drive. It is definantly not intended to be daily driven.

9183

Since owning the VR-4 I have since sold the conversion bits to a VL owner friend. I've opted to drop a Gen III V8 into it instead. That way I'll have a 2.5 V6 Twin Turbo 4WD, and a 5.7L V8 RW drive. I'll have both my passions covered!

My Fiance's Marketing Team have designed the signwriting for the new Lancer wagon and sent it through to us today...

9182

They got our hopes up when they used the Evo Wagon as the template... only for Marketing Team to later appologise for teasing us. It's only the 2.4L with the baby body kit. /pan

[You See]

Damn that would be one mean Holden with the GenIII ...finally a Holden that goes! :P
Don't ya just hate it when people tease! /haz

[dreamer]

Damn that would be one mean Holden with the GenIII ...finally a Holden that goes! :P
Don't ya just hate it when people tease! /haz
/Grrr

/pan /pan /pan /pan /pan /pan

This coming from Mr "If it ain't broke, mod it!"... How about you start actually driving your modded Beast the way it was intended - Race it!

Looking forward to finishing my Holden - won't be this year though. Thanks to the Wedding ... **Mumble under breath**

Opps - I've managed to highjack a thread that was originally about me!

[bradc]

You've got *those* headlights! Back in the day my dream car was a VL RB30DET Wagon with those headlights - don't ask ;) Love those mags by the way, are they 18's?

I think you need to smack the marketing team for teasing you, I bet they did it intentionally.

[dreamer]

You've got *those* headlights! Back in the day my dream car was a VL RB30DET Wagon with those headlights - don't ask ;) Love those mags by the way, are they 18's?

I think you need to smack the marketing team for teasing you, I bet they did it intentionally.

Yip. I've got *those* headlights :smug
The pop-up headlights is what originally made me fall in love with the Calais back when I was a kid.
I Wanted to buy a RB30DET Calais, but trying to find an original one in NZ is pretty difficult. There are lots in Aussie, but NZ only brought out a handful. Plus they over heated easily because the didn't have a proper intercooler, just a piece of pipe that connects to the Throttle body that is shapped like a heat sink to disapate the heat - being that is was sitting ontop of the engine it didn't work too well.

Yip - 18s.
18" x 8" to be presise. If my memory serves me correctly they're running 18x255x35
Advertising and Marketing people are Evil Blood sucking scum! :evilgrin:

[bradc]

My dad had a silver VL Calais wagon that had been imported from OZ, it was the only one I've ever seen with the popup lights, it was a V8 though.

Then we had VP, VS, and VT Calais's, all V8's, then we got the Monaro :D

[You See]

This coming from Mr "If it ain't broke, mod it!"... How about you start actually driving your modded Beast the way it was intended - Race it!
/haz /haz /haz