Puma replacement

[laurenscar]

I had to get rid of my Puma back in 2001 when my daughter (who now owns the silver car to the left) got to the wrong height to sit in the back (There's an age when kids thigh bones are too short to reach the seat edge, but too long to comfortably stick out straight from the seat).

At the time I had a really well paid job with a very generous car allowance and I looked at all sorts of cars. Amazingly, perhaps, I ended up with a Skoda Octavia vRS which was great. I did almost 100,000 miles in it from new until 2008 when I finally decided it was time for a change.

I ummm-ed and ahhh-ed at the prices of E46 BMW M3s, but in the decided I didn't really want to spend that much money and bought my other option a Mazda RX8.

Now lots of people will no doubt snort at that safe in the knowledge that they are slow, use more oil than fuel, need an engine rebuild every 30K miles, etc, etc, etc.

Sadly none of that has been the case and the RX8 continues to be one of the best cars I've ever driven with such incredible balance that it's hard to imagine it can seat 4 in comfort and costs so little.

Fuel costs are a bit high (although I never got more than 32 out of my 1.7 Puma!), but everything else is cheap (even RFL as mine's pre '06).

Great car, I'd recommend it to anyone looking for something a little bigger than a Puma

M

 

[evilrob]

Interesting - Yip nearly bought one of those the other day!

 

[YOG]

And cheap to buy, I considered bidding on this:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/190581586838?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

 

[melinamotor]

I like everything about them, apart from two things:
a) I only live 4 miles from my office so would worry about the health of the wankel on such a short commute.
b) Although a practical solution the little rear access doors look like a design afterthought even though they were far from it.

Otherwise they are indeed lovely looking cars with terrific handling balance.

 

[oilburner]

Am trying to resist the temptation of this one http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201140419290866/sort/priceasc/usedcars/model/rx8/make/mazda/radius/40/postcode/cv78gt/page/1/quicksearch/true?logcode=p" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;!

 

[Neil]

They are ridiculously cheap at the moment. I'm not sure if it's the fuel consumption or horror stories of expiring engines that are responsible.

 

[yippeekiay]

I'd say a bit of both.

I've never seen so many in my life since I started being interested in them....weird how that happens. There's even one for sale round the corner i.e. less than 200m away and I can't even remember ever seeing it before....lol.