Innholdsfortegnelse for March 20, 2019 i Autocar

IT’S ALMOST A decade since then-Lotus CEO Dany Bahar’s infamous Paris show launch of six all-new models, none of which ever got close to seeing the light of day. In fact, the trio of sports cars Lotus does make is the same now as it was before even Bahar arrived. The company’s morale has been low, its Hethel HQ run down and future plans always far enough away to remain a dream rather than an imminent reality. Yet when Geely took over Lotus 18 months ago, we thought the good times were set to finally arrive at Lotus. The Chinese giant’s guardianship of Volvo has been the industry’s standout success story of the past decade. Now there are similar positive signs at Lotus, too. Unlike Bahar, new Lotus CEO Phil…

Ineos Automotive has confirmed its Projekt Grenadier will use BMW-sourced petrol and diesel engines in the first of a series of upcoming announcements about its new hardcore 4x4. The model – created by chemical company Ineos, which is owned by Britain’s richest man, Jim Ratcliffe – will be revealed in 2020 and go on sale in mid-2021, the firm has confirmed to Autocar. A host of different variants, bodystyles and wheelbase lengths for the new model are planned as part of its brief as a back-to-basics 4x4 to fill the void left by the original Land Rover Defender. Around 25,000 units a year is the ultimate production goal across its various derivatives. Ineos believes this spiritual successor to the Defender can be profitable at that volume even though Land Rover…

MERCEDES-BENZ HAS given the GLC Coupé crossover SUV a mid-life facelift, including new 2.0-litre diesel and mild-hybrid petrol engines. Design tweaks are similar to those on the recently refreshed regular GLC, with the Coupé getting more pronounced A-pillars, a revised rear diffuser and a diamond radiator grille. Inside, the GLC Coupé features a 12.3in digital instrument display and a choice of a 7.0in or 10.3in infotainment screen.…

TURBOCHARGING HAS EVOLVED over the past few decades from being a novel, if laggy, gadget for gaining cheap power to much more than that. It has played a huge part in giving all fuel-burners a new lease of life, taking a lead role in reducing emissions. Turbochargers allow downsizing, the shrinking of petrol engines into smaller, lighter, more efficient engines producing fewer emissions, without compromising power and torque. They also feed diesels the massive amount of air they need for lean, air-rich combustion. In the beginning, engines were naturally aspirated, relying on atmospheric pressure to draw in air. So getting atmo engines to produce more power and torque ultimately means increasing the capacity. Hence that famous American saying: ‘There ain’t no substitute for cubic inches.’ Boosting air into the engine…

TOYOTA HAS SAID that the GT86 coupé will be replaced with a new second-generation model developed in conjunction with Subaru. The new version of the four-cylinder lightweight four-seater will sit beneath the recently launched six-cylinder Supra two-seater in an expanded line-up of Toyota sports cars, which will also make use of the firm’s GR Sport brand. Following the launch of the Supra, there were reports that the GT86 may not be replaced. Confirming that Toyota intends to develop a new GT86, European marketing boss Matt Harrison said it has been “a successful ‘halo’ product for us”. He added: “Supra is not to replace that car. They are for different audiences and are different products. We see a situation where they will sit alongside each other.” The original GT86, launched in…

Between drives of the regular DS 3, we also had a (very) brief go in the pre-production E-Tense, the pure 134bhp battery-electric DS 3 Crossback which might sneak into showrooms before the end of 2019. Its battery pack sits in an H layout below the front seats, the rear seats, and along a ‘transmission’ tunnel between the two, with the motor and inverter and control unit under the bonnet. That way it doesn’t intrude on interior space, save for slightly reducing the rear passenger’s foot-room beneath the front seats. Popping the bonnet shows the ‘engine’ bay to be pretty full, as usual, with the inverter and a heat pump occupying a large area beneath the plastic cover, with the permanent magnet-synchronous motor mounted lower down. Like all cars on this…

1 VOLKSWAGEN GOLF R ESTATE Quite simply the best fast, four-wheel-drive, practical family wagon that money can buy and our class leader. Difficult to dislike, really. 2 SKODA OCTAVIA vRS CHALLENGE 245 ESTATE DSG Front-driver only, but there’s plenty of dynamic excitement to be had here. Comes with that famously huge boot, too. 3 AUDI SQ2 QUATTRO S TRONIC Sure-footed handling and serious straight-line poke marred by mute steering and a serious demeanour. Not particularly spacious either. 4 JAGUAR E-PACE P250 R-DYNAMIC AWD Jaguar’s stylish E-Pace is our pick of the current line-up of fast, affordable performance SUVs. 5 CUPRA ATECA 2.0 TSI 4DRIVE DSG Not quite the driver’s car we’d hoped it would be. That engine’s impressive, though; and its cabin is plenty spacious.…

“We made mistakes before 2013 but we have come back” Your family owns a slice of a European car company that makes a couple of million cars a year. Your name is on the hubcaps, literally, so the way your family firm does business is as important as its success. What kind of person do you want to run it, to safeguard its future and to make it pre-eminent in an arena where distinctiveness matters? These questions run through my mind as we walk through PSA’s glassy out-of-town Parisian HQ towards the corner office of 52-year-old Jean-Philippe Imparato, Peugeot’s CEO this past two and a half years. We’ve not met before but his reputation precedes him. Imparato is PSA chief Carlos Tavares’ (and the Peugeot family’s) choice to devise, orchestrate…

Opel-Vauxhall knew it was onto something important when it launched the GT X Experimental coupé crossover in August last year. The concept, briefly driven by Autocar, showed off the sporty appeal of its raised coupé styling as it had never been seen before, and its dart-like styling demonstrated the packaging opportunities afforded by designs like this. Opel-Vauxhall has never said the car would be made as is, but insisted many of its influences would make production. It should be seen as “a brand manifesto”, designed to show that future models would be more imaginative and stylish than those of the past. More recently, Kia has used the same high-riding crossover format for its much-praised Imagine concept, recently revealed at the Geneva motor show. It is part of the company’s surge…

QUESTION My friend has a budget of £15,000 for a premium-brand car. She has tried a Mercedes-Benz A-Class but is 5ft tall and can’t reach the pedals. Any suggestions? D Wortham, Dartmoor ANSWER As manufacturer of the NSX and Civic Type R, and with a history of great engineering and innovation, perhaps Honda could fit the bill. That being so, allow us to recommend the Jazz, a neat little hatch driven happily by many vertically challenged folk, my petite sister among them. JE QUESTION Would I be stupid to buy a new car that’s about to be replaced by an all-new model? Amanda Howse, Newcastle ANSWER No, so long as you negotiate a big discount or good trade-in allowance to cover you against the extra depreciation the car will suffer…

Mazda 3 MPS £10,200 MPS: the letters stand for Mazda Performance Series, which you’ll have to get used to explaining every time someone asks why you’re driving a Mazda 3. Tell them you’re driving it for the thrill of its 2.3-litre four-pot that uses forced induction and direct injection spark ignition to generate 256bhp, or more than the Mk5 VW Golf R32 and Audi S3. So why have so few heard of it? Largely because the MPS put all that power down through its front wheels, whereas its aforementioned rivals do so through all four. Granted, it has a mechanical limited-slip diff and a steering-angle-sensitive throttle damping system but torque steer remains a problem. The car was launched in 2003 and expired in 2013. Aim for a post-2009 facelift car…

An expert’s view MIKE AUTHERS, FOUNDER, MGMIDGETS.COM “Midgets are little but that’s what makes them so much fun. The handling is great but safe, too. But it’s getting harder to find good ones. Not so long ago I’d have a dozen in stock, but at the moment I’m down to one. It’s a fully restored, former Downton Engineering 1971 1275cc Midget for £19,450. Body condition is everything; you can always replace mechanical parts easily, but beware of cheap, poor-quality copies. My favourite is a late-1960s 1275 with chrome bumpers and wire wheels.” Buyer beware… ▪ ENGINE On A-series 948cc, 1098cc and 1275cc engines, check the oil pressure and for signs of oil smoke and fumes. The 1275cc engine is popular with DIY tuners so look for signs of ham-fisted tweakery.…

“The Model Y Performance gets 280 miles of range, a 150mph top speed and 0-60mph time of 3.5sec” The new Tesla Model Y, due in 2020, will offer “the functionality of an SUV, but ride like a sports car”, according to company boss Elon Musk. The new electric crossover is the company’s fourth mainstream model and can seat up to seven people. It offers up to 300 miles of range in its highest specification. The Model Y was unveiled at Tesla’s Los Angeles design centre and takes visual cues from both the Model 3 saloon and Model X SUV. It has a glass panoramic roof but does not retain the gullwing doors found on the more expensive Model X, instead using pillarless doors like the Model 3 and Model S.…

Audi will introduce an A4-sized electric saloon in 2023 as part of its growing range of E-tron models. The brand launched its flagship E-tron SUV last year, with the sibling car version, the E-tron Sportback, going on sale later this year. At the recent Geneva show, Audi revealed a Q4 E-tron SUV concept, which is due in late 2020 in production guise alongside an E-tron GT four-door sports car. Audi design boss Marc Lichte said the brand would also develop a saloon that will be offered at a similar price to the Q4 E-tron. “There will be [electric] SUVs and low-floor sporty cars such as the E-tron GT, which is our ‘halo’ car,” he told Autocar at Geneva. “There will be an E-tron GT in the [A4-sized] segment as well.…

INFINITI IS WITHDRAWING from western Europe because Nissan’s premium arm is no longer considered a viable business in the region. Production of the firm’s two UK-built models, the Q30 and QX30, will end at Nissan’s Sunderland plant in July. The company will cease all European operations from early 2020. The move is part of a global restructuring plan. Infiniti will shift its focus to North America and China, with smaller operations in eastern Europe, the Middle East and Asia. The car maker launched in mainland Europe and the UK in 2008, but has never taken off here. The company has just 60,000 customers in Europe, 10,000 of whom are in the UK. Infiniti cites no sustainable way of investing in the electrification technology needed to reduce its fleet emissions in…

Bugatti has decided the form its second model to sit alongside the Chiron will take – but the decision on whether or not it will make production now rests with the Volkswagen Group. Company boss Stephan Winkelmann hasn’t confirmed the model type, but it will be usable every day and bring a new bodystyle to the brand – likely therefore to be a high-performance crossover. Winkelmann was in charge of Lamborghini when it created the Urus, so has experience in diversifying performance brands in this direction. Winkelmann told Autocar: “The brand is ready for the second car, but it’s not me to decide.” The second model would have to be “a real Bugatti in the segment, or create one” and be “a reference for other manufacturers”. The new Bugatti is…

BMW’S ELECTRIC i models will continue to help push forward the brand’s design in the future, according to the firm’s design chief. Adrian van Hooydonk said that the radical styling of the i3 and i8 has been used to inform new BMWs. “When we launched i3 and i8, they were quite radical and far from the norm for BMW, but now they’ve become an integral part of our brand,” he said. “That opened doors for us that we didn’t even know were there for the design of our general cars. You see this in the [current] models: it’s a cleaner form language and that was all triggered by the first i cars.” Van Hooydonk said design of the i4, an electric 3 Series equivalent due in 2021, has been signed…

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This is probably the most regional car BMW has designed. Its big-grilled largeness is aimed at buyers in America, the Middle East, China and other Asian markets, and judging by the enthusiasm with which it was viewed by colleagues from Dubai, it looks as if BMW has hit the target. These buyers are offered a version with a petrol V8 that we won’t get, its twin exhausts spitting dune-assaulting promise even at idle. European buyers, who will need to think hard about where they might park this seven-seater before committing, can choose between the 335bhp V6 xDrive40i sampled here, a 192bhp xDrive30d or a 290bhp M50d. The X7 shares the recently renewed X5’s platform, but it’s substantially bigger than that car, occupying a footprint 5.15 metres long and 2m wide,…

MIRA’s Dunlop handling circuit isn’t the ideal home for any four-wheel-drive crossover hatchback, but a performance-branded one ought to be able to hold its own here: and the SQ2 did indeed offer credible performance and handling poise. Body movements are a bit more pronounced than would be expected of a comparable hot hatchback, as you’d imagine of a car with a higher centre of gravity. The SQ2’s steering, meanwhile, is less communicative even when experiencing high cornering loads than you might wish for. But, while the car’s natural bias is towards stability and gentle power-on understeer, the handling is usefully sensitive, and a bit adjustable, to a lifted throttle. The SQ2 shone brighter on the low-friction surface of our wet-handling circuit, where it set a lap time beyond the reach…

A simple question deserves a simple answer – but don’t expect one here. This question was asked on social media by Matt Miller in response to news that we were heading to Amsterdam for our first European test drive of the Tesla Model 3. “Interested to see how you think it compares to the standard, uppity sports sedans. Would you own a Tesla Model 3 over an Audi A4 or BMW 3 Series?” Well, would we? After the big build-up, is this the car that could finally make the electric vehicle usable, affordable, practical and viable for people not as a replacement for a city-hopper or school-run supermini or a family’s second car, but in place of a proper, good-sized, fairly high-mileage executive saloon? We had 36 hours, last week,…

“Raw but not too raw. Capri, but without the pudding over-egged” Even now, 33 years on, you don’t have to search far to find pockets of hardcore Ford lovers still outraged that a bunch of disconnected bosses in Dearborn killed the Capri. The name, the image, the affordable style – plus 1.9 million sales – should have kept a great car alive, they will argue to the grave. Sadly, this enduring love for ‘the car you always promised yourself’, along with its steadily rising classic prices, obscure the fact that by 1986 the Ford Capri had run its race. Front-wheel drive was taking over, Ford dealers were having a great time selling XR3i hot hatches and the Capri’s secret weapon, a close under-skin relationship with Ford’s volume saloons, was disappearing.…

Swiss miss for manufacturers At the Geneva motor show, it was clear that the organisers were trying to fill gaps in the exhibition halls created by absent friends; for example, the 70th anniversary display of Abarths, which had little fanfare. The absentees will no doubt have their reasons, but it will result in missed sales they will never account for. I am replacing my current vehicle with something in the Golf class in the next 12 months. Attending a motor show gives one a chance to sit in and get a feel of a potential purchase without having to visit a dealer and be pushed by an overeager salesman. So thank you, Ford, Hyundai and Opel (Vauxhall), for helping reduce my shortlist. Those I did look at in Geneva were…

MILEAGE 19,357 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT To see if a utility vehicle is an endearing everyday vehicle Ever wondered why you see serious off-roaders with their front numberplates relocated to the roof rack? Well, now I know. And for this enlightenment, my gratitude to Mitch McCabe, Autocar videographerr and a man who, very kindly, agreed to wade the Toyota Land Cruiser Utility very gently along the edge of a shallow pool while I took a couple of panning photographs. On the return leg, he thought the pictures would look a bit more splendid if he took a run-up. He was right. So as well as getting a more dramatic picture, I’ve had a front numberplate to reaffix, which means something else to write about – an always-welcome bonus for a…

MILEAGE 82,8117 BMW 320 Just when we get a late-winter heatwave, the Baby Shark throws a minor tantrum. I was walking back to the saloon in the sunshine when I noticed something was hanging down. It was definitely a belt. I popped the bonnet and there it was, the auxiliary one to the air-con pump. I must admit it had been a bit quiet and hadn’t been wheezing at me like usual. The system needs some work anyway, so that becomes a definite ‘to do’. It isn’t snapped, so I might as well reattach it. Might be straightforward. Might be more of a challenge. I’ll let you know.…

If the seventh-generation Volkswagen Golf GTI isn’t the best everyday hot hatch in recent memory, it can only be because the faster, fitter, four-wheel-drive Golf R is even better still. For track days and B-road thrills, you’ll want a Honda Civic Type R, but no other hot hatch gets close to the union of performance, athleticism, comfort and refinement that characterises both the GTI and the R. As they near their sixth and fifth birthdays respectively, VW dealers are overflowing with approved used stock at half the price of a new one. The GTI emerged in early 2013, only a handful of months after the sixth-generation Golf was superseded by the much-improved and substantially lighter Mk7. With 217bhp from a turbocharged four-pot, the GTI was brisk without being rampantly accelerative.…

RENAULTSPORT CLIO V6 Papa would have gone white if Nicole had turned up in one of these rear/mid-engined rarities. It was produced from 2001 to 2005 in limited numbers and had no back seats, which, on second thoughts, the old man might have approved of. First out was the Phase 1 with 230bhp. However, it was heavy and barely faster than the cheaper Clio RS 172. The Phase 2 of 2003 got an extra 25bhp and more refinements. It’s the better car but the Phase 1 is still a hoot. Most start at £20,000 but not this 2002/02-reg example with 86,000 miles that went for £13,750.…

The message was as bleak as it was clear. “If Europe is pursuing this legal target, there is no single business case for cars the size of the Up,” Volkswagen sales and marketing boss Jürgen Stackmann told Autocar at the recent Geneva motor show. These are words being echoed around the automotive industry, triggered by incoming legislation to reduce emissions and enforce higher minimum safety standards, both of which threaten to add significant cost to cars already being sold on paper-thin profit margins. The city car is facing extinction. One source Autocar spoke to estimated that the profit from the sale of some city cars is as little as £100 per car for the manufacturer and a further £100 for the retailer. Servicing usually nets another £100 of profit, but…

The Volkswagen Group is aiming to sell 22 million fully electric vehicles over the next 10 years and has 70 different models in the pipeline, up from the 50 it had previously planned. The VW Group, whose brands include Audi, Bentley, Bugatti, Porsche, Seat, Skoda and Volkswagen, had set the initial target of 50 EV models by 2030 in 2017. It now says that, by 2025, VW’s fleet CO2 footprint will be 30% lower than in 2015, with the total investment in electrification reaching £22 billion by 2023. The first two VW Group EVs to go on sale will be the Audi E-tron and Porsche Taycan. The firm says it has received around 20,000 ‘expressions of interest’ for each. These will be followed by models based on the new MEB…

Lotus will reveal an all-new sports car next year as its expansion under Geely ownership begins to bear fruit. The model is part of a five-year plan that has been signed off by Geely, new Lotus Cars CEO Phil Popham has confirmed. The new model will be based on a heavily revised existing Lotus architecture and will appear before the next-generation Elise, Exige and Evora models. They will begin to be launched in about three to four years once the new architecture that will underpin them has been developed. Next year’s new model will retain Lotus’s famed driving dynamics while being more practical and usable every day than the existing models, with improved ingress, egress, ergonomics and infotainment, pointing to the Evora as its most likely base. It’s a bridge…

BENTLEY SAYS THE new Continental GT V8 will be the “most agile” example of the grand tourer produced to date. The new model will be launched in the US later this year and reach the UK in early 2020. Available in coupé and convertible form, the new machine swaps the third-generation’s 664bhp 6.0-litre W12 engine for a 542bhp 4.0-litre twin-turbo V8. The new powertrain, which produces 42bhp more than that of the previous-generation Continental GT V8, develops 568lb ft. The coupé version achieves 0-60mph in 3.9sec and a top speed of 198mph. Bentley says the new model, which will be lighter than the W12 version, will be “lively and engaging” to drive and have a range of more than 500 miles. It features an eight-speed gearbox and active all-wheel drive,…

Bugatti hasn’t ruled out building more one-offs like the £9.45 million La Voiture Noire shown at the recent Geneva motor show. That 1479bhp car is based on the Chiron but heavily reworked with entirely new bodywork and an extended wheelbase. Asked if the firm could produce more bespoke machines, Bugatti boss Stephan Winkelmann said: “There are more and more customers asking for one.” He also said the brand was conscious of doing too many special editions of the Chiron, as it did with the Veyron, as customers “have to value what they buy” and not find the core product to be diluted. Bugatti has delivered around 150 of the 500 Chirons it will build, with the production run due to last for five more years. As for whether the Chiron’s…

Several things to consider here: DS as a premium brand, the B-segment SUV as a thing, the new DS 3 Crossback as the incumbent iteration of both, and the PSA Group’s brand-new small-car platform. We might get more questions than answers, but we’ll worry about that later. And so to the DS 3. The new Crossback, I mean, not the old DS 3, the rather charming three-door hatchback that in its warmer forms is rather good fun, and which plods along on sale for a short while longer. The old DS 3 has made the crossover (sorry) from being a Citroën to being badged as a DS in the brand’s new stand-alone form, but the supermini won’t represent DS for long – because DS is all about premium. PSA, DS’s…

Just as deliveries of the new 992-generation 911 coupé are getting under way, Porsche has launched the drop-top model as well. For the time being, you can only order the 911 Cabriolet in Carrera S specification and with a PDK gearbox, although Porsche will invite you to choose between two driven wheels and four. In due course, there will be a more affordable and slightly less powerful Carrera version and the option of a manual transmission, too. Porsche has done a lot of work on the fabric hood so it better mimics the graceful roofline of the coupé when it’s raised, and also to stop it from ballooning inelegantly at speed. It now better insulates the cabin and it can be raised or lowered in only 12 seconds, at speeds…

MODEL TESTED QUATTRO S TRONIC • Price £36,800 • Power 296bhp • Torque 295lb ft • 0-60mph 4.5sec • 30-70mph in fourth 7.8sec • Fuel economy 26.9mpg • CO2 emissions 159g/km (NEDC correlated) • 70-0mph 45.5m It’s testament not only to the design and engineering capacities of Audi but also to the unflinching confidence of its top brass that, even after a challenging few years, it continues to grow its model portfolio and to add choice to its showroom range. The axe certainly fell at Ingolstadt, on both product and people, at the nadir of the firm’s Dieselgate-related troubles – but to judge by the diversity of the new cars it will introduce in the UK this year, from the E-tron electric SUV to the facelifted R8 supercar, you simply wouldn’t…

The Audi SQ2 Quattro has proved itself a credible, fairly rounded performance car during our test processes, delivering a healthy quantity of driver appeal: more of that last factor, certainly, than you might have expected to get if you’d written this off as just another opportunistic, marketing department-driven Audi S-car. By landing four stars, it beats by half-a-star what the Cupra Ateca managed a couple of months ago. The Audi handles better than its Spanish rival, with more balance and even a bit of involvement when you go looking for it. It works better on the road, too, and has a simpler, more energetic character than the Ateca with which it’s easier to engage. What the car gains by being smaller and lighter than the crossover norm, mind you, must…

As a conversation opener, saying you’re the man who taught Brad Pitt to drive is hard to beat. Kevin Sadler is that man, although, to be fair to this modest mechanic, he didn’t teach him from scratch; rather, he taught him how to drive a Citroën Traction Avant. The Hollywood star had to drive it in Allied (2016), a wartime romance movie. Watch the trailer and you see him helming the old motor at a rate of knots through the narrow streets of Casablanca (the scenes were actually shot on Gran Canaria). Clearly Brad, as Kevin can now legitimately refer to him, was a good student. “I had to make sure he knew how to drive it but he picked it up very quickly,” says Kevin. “He was a good…

FEATURE The Autocar Bucket List The clocks are going forward, so there’s more time to get out and have fun in your car. Check out our tips on what you must do this summer FIRST DRIVE All-new Porsche 911 First UK verdict on the next-gen ‘world’s greatest sports car’ FEATURE Caterham with a twist We meet Jonathan Palmer’s bespoke creation – then drive it EVERY WEEK ROAD TEST Nissan Micra N-Sport It’s a peppy new supermini. Should the Ford Fiesta ST-Line be worried? USED BUYING GUIDE Mercedes-AMG A45 It was the fastest hot hatch the world had seen. Here’s how to buy a used one FIRST DRIVE BMW 1 Series BMW’s hatch has gone front-wheel drive. We get a first taste SUBSCRIBE autocar.co.uk/subscribe or see p28…

MILEAGE 1488 WHY WE’RE RUNNING IT We know the 720S is one of the world’s greatest driving machines. But is it an equally rewarding car with which to live? I hadn’t really planned to take the 720S on the track so soon, and for two reasons: the car was still running in and still fitted with mud and snow tyres. Normally, I’d not have gone anywhere near Silverstone that day. But this was no normal track day. Instead it was hosted by Mission Motorsport, a forces charity in which I have some small involvement. If you’re interested, they help former service personnel (and their families), many suffering from terrible physical injuries and many more bearing often even more disabling mental health problems. The mantra is ‘race, retrain, recover’ and, in…

Ford Puma Al Horsman has “always loved the looks of the Puma and the way it drives.” He used to have a green P-reg one and was recently looking for a smallish coupé/sportscar when he saw this black Puma. Al says: “It had only 64,000 miles with just two owners and full service history. Thankfully, it drove just like I remembered. The last lady owner had the car for the past 15 years and was only selling it because she felt unable to drive it any more. I paid £2500. Definitely worth that bit extra for a good one.”…

Vauxhall Corsa 1.4i 75 Griffin 3dr Price new £12,420. Price now £9942 ‘Let’s face it, us Brits don't like haggling. With the new Corsa Griffin, you don't have to.’ So says Vauxhall in its ‘All Griffin. No Bull.’ campaign for the special-edition Corsa. Really? So how come we’ve found a Vauxhall dealer happy to knock almost £2500 off the price of a 1.4i three-door Griffin? It makes the next line in Vauxhall’s ad – ‘A price that won’t leave you out of pocket’ – sound rather hollow. Life lesson no113: car makers who claim you don't need to haggle are talking bovine manure.…

If a Mazda MX-5 Mk1 or Mk2 is too Japanese and a Lotus Elise Mk1 out of reach, then get your mitts on a Midget. The two-seat MG roadster ran from 1961 to 1979 and for years has been popular with motoring enthusiasts on a budget. ‘Budget’ implies cheap, of course, and while £7000 is sufficient to secure a good chrome-bumpered car (more desirable than the later rubber-bumper variety), for anything tip-top you’re looking at well over £10,000. Fortunately, it won’t be money wasted since good Midgets are rare and their prices are only going one way. Unfortunately, it means dodgy sellers are getting on the bus and asking silly money for, at worst, thickly painted rubbish and, at best, bitsa-cars assembled from Midgets of all ages. In fact, we…