1996 Civic EJ9
‘The car I impulsively bought instead of buying a sensible modern, diesel estate’
Where do I start with this one? The noble steed, the unlikely hero and the car I’m perhaps most known for. This Civic has basically become the face of the channel, and to be honest… it deserves the spotlight.
I’ve never had a car as reliable as this, nor have I ever had anything so boring, yet exciting. It was originally bought as my daily driver and soon proved its worth after covering 50k miles in 2 years without a single mechanical fault.
In recent times, it’s required a considerable amount of welding and TLC, which presented plenty of new challenges for me on my journey to maintain, and build up this little gem on a budget, and with my own hands.
2002 S2000
‘The car I couldn’t stop dreaming about, the one that means the most’
Looking back, I don’t know if I’ve ever been quite as happy as when I picked this thing up. I’d longed for one of these for ages, I’d become obsessed with watching edits of them until the early hours, speccing out modification plans and looking around the clock for the perfect example.
I bought it as a somewhat tired, low mileage standard example. Right away I needed to rebuild the brakes, fit a new set of tyres, replace the timing chain tensioner and give it a full service.
From there it’s snowballed into a rowdy, grin-inducing giggle machine, fulfilling my childhood racecar fantasy. Truthfully, I think I might have sent it too hard, and I’m now looking to refine it and make it a bit more useable/ less stressful to take out. We’ll see…
2006 R53 Cooper S
‘My first proper car. Fun, sentimental and seemingly cursed…’
This car definitely paved the way for everything automotive. This was my first enthusiast car, and it was one heck of an upgrade from my 1.2L Vauxhall Corsa.
My dad took me to view the car and I instantly fell in love with it. Whining supercharger, classic British Racing Green paintwork and awesome handling, what an awesome car.
This was the first time I modified a car too. At the peak of my first ownership, it had coilovers, control arms, a reduced supercharger pulley, a top-mount intercooler, and exhaust and more.
In recent times, it appears the car doesn’t like me all that much. Perhaps its sad I sold it, and bought it back. Either way, it’s now repaying me for saving it… by breaking all the time.
Compared to my Hondas, this is definitely the one that tests my patience. Thoughts have crossed my mind to sell it and buy a bike… I guess we’ll see where that train goes.
