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I've been meaning for a while to start a thread for my Mk1, but have been waiting for CBRVWOC.org to come back online as I did have one there...
Anyway, the longish story roughly goes...
Prior to getting my Wife's Bora, I've only ever bought Japanese cars, and mostly Toyota's. My best mate has a Mk5 GTI, and the thing is just amazing... This convinced me to consider VW for the wife's car as they just have so many more features for similar money to a decent Japanese car... Long story short, we ended up with a high km's, dirt cheap, V5 Bora, and we couldn't be happier with it...
After 10 years of riding my CBR-250RR (Great bike that just kept going and going), I decided that it was time to start thinking about getting myself back into a car... I considered getting another Jap car for me, but nothing really interested me in the sub $1500 price range... Even though I'd never previously considered getting an older dub, the Bora had been treating us well, so I started to look around. I've always liked the shape and styling of the Mk1, so that was high on my interest list.
I saw a couple Mk2's and Mk3's, but they just didn't look quite right. That said, I very nearly bought a VR6 Mk3 Vento, but, when I found out it was an Auto, that idea was binned... Then I saw a late model Mk1 Cabby, and just fell in love... It had that lovely classic Mk1 shape, was significantly newer (Mk2 age), and to top it off, it was a convertible... Unfortunately they were all way over $3000 for anything that didn't require a ground up rebuild... So the idea was shelved...
A couple years later, I was still riding the same CBR-250RR and the idea for a Mk1 Cabby was still smouldering there... This time around, I just knew that I had to find one... However, it did have to be registrable with minimal effort, as it was to replace my bike as my transport to work... So, once the finances from the wife had been cleared, it was decided that I would get about $1250 to buy myself a car... At such a small figure, I was expecting to wait for a while for an appropriate car to make itself known to me, but I checked everywhere I could think of... Here, ebay, gumtree, all cars, every other car sales site in Australia, etc... All the Mk1's I saw, were either $500, and really crappy, or over $3000, and still mostly crappy, and that included the hardtops...
I was just about to give up for the day (yep, only day 1 of looking), when I had a thought... I called my local mechanic, and asked if they knew of any cheap older dubs for sale... Intially, they said "no, sorry don't know of any"... Then he asked me what I was looking for, so I let them know that ideally I was after a late model Mk1 Cabby. Instantly he said, "hang on a minute", which confused me due to his previous statement... When he came back, he says "grab a pen and write this number down", which I did, still confused... Then he goes, "we have a Mk1 cabby here in the shop, that the owner can't pay their bill, but their car is in decent enough condition, except the 'psyco' inspired stab holes in the roof"...
I was thrilled... I called them straight up, and was give a brief history of the car. Turned out that they had been trying to sell it for a while. They had even fitted a brand new roof to it in order to sell it and within 3 days of the For Sale sign going up on the window, someone decided to stab the roof about 15 times. They told me that they wanted $1200 plus the cost of the mechanics bill for it... It was more than I wanted, but it was close enough that it warranted a good look... So, I eagerly awaited the end of work, and took off to have a look at the Cabby...
When I saw the car, I was surprised at just how good it looked... It was straight, no obvious signs of rust, had nice wheels, and it even had 2 months rego to boot. On the phone I had been apprehensive when I was told that it was white, but in the flesh, it looked great, especially when coupled with the Maroon roof... So I took it for a drive... I was once again surprised, it had 200k on the clock, was built in 1990 from a 1970's design, but it drove almost as nicely as the wife's Bora, and better than most 2000 model Jap cars... So I just had to have it...
A bit of bargaining with the previous owner, a discount of the work down by the mechanics, and I had a deal... It worked out to be $1500 all up, including the inspection and transfer fees, so it really was only just above what my budget had been... The best part was, that just 6 hours after first looking, I had found, bought, and was driving it home...
Here is how she looked when I brought her home...
Anyway, the longish story roughly goes...
Prior to getting my Wife's Bora, I've only ever bought Japanese cars, and mostly Toyota's. My best mate has a Mk5 GTI, and the thing is just amazing... This convinced me to consider VW for the wife's car as they just have so many more features for similar money to a decent Japanese car... Long story short, we ended up with a high km's, dirt cheap, V5 Bora, and we couldn't be happier with it...
After 10 years of riding my CBR-250RR (Great bike that just kept going and going), I decided that it was time to start thinking about getting myself back into a car... I considered getting another Jap car for me, but nothing really interested me in the sub $1500 price range... Even though I'd never previously considered getting an older dub, the Bora had been treating us well, so I started to look around. I've always liked the shape and styling of the Mk1, so that was high on my interest list.
I saw a couple Mk2's and Mk3's, but they just didn't look quite right. That said, I very nearly bought a VR6 Mk3 Vento, but, when I found out it was an Auto, that idea was binned... Then I saw a late model Mk1 Cabby, and just fell in love... It had that lovely classic Mk1 shape, was significantly newer (Mk2 age), and to top it off, it was a convertible... Unfortunately they were all way over $3000 for anything that didn't require a ground up rebuild... So the idea was shelved...
A couple years later, I was still riding the same CBR-250RR and the idea for a Mk1 Cabby was still smouldering there... This time around, I just knew that I had to find one... However, it did have to be registrable with minimal effort, as it was to replace my bike as my transport to work... So, once the finances from the wife had been cleared, it was decided that I would get about $1250 to buy myself a car... At such a small figure, I was expecting to wait for a while for an appropriate car to make itself known to me, but I checked everywhere I could think of... Here, ebay, gumtree, all cars, every other car sales site in Australia, etc... All the Mk1's I saw, were either $500, and really crappy, or over $3000, and still mostly crappy, and that included the hardtops...
I was just about to give up for the day (yep, only day 1 of looking), when I had a thought... I called my local mechanic, and asked if they knew of any cheap older dubs for sale... Intially, they said "no, sorry don't know of any"... Then he asked me what I was looking for, so I let them know that ideally I was after a late model Mk1 Cabby. Instantly he said, "hang on a minute", which confused me due to his previous statement... When he came back, he says "grab a pen and write this number down", which I did, still confused... Then he goes, "we have a Mk1 cabby here in the shop, that the owner can't pay their bill, but their car is in decent enough condition, except the 'psyco' inspired stab holes in the roof"...
I was thrilled... I called them straight up, and was give a brief history of the car. Turned out that they had been trying to sell it for a while. They had even fitted a brand new roof to it in order to sell it and within 3 days of the For Sale sign going up on the window, someone decided to stab the roof about 15 times. They told me that they wanted $1200 plus the cost of the mechanics bill for it... It was more than I wanted, but it was close enough that it warranted a good look... So, I eagerly awaited the end of work, and took off to have a look at the Cabby...
When I saw the car, I was surprised at just how good it looked... It was straight, no obvious signs of rust, had nice wheels, and it even had 2 months rego to boot. On the phone I had been apprehensive when I was told that it was white, but in the flesh, it looked great, especially when coupled with the Maroon roof... So I took it for a drive... I was once again surprised, it had 200k on the clock, was built in 1990 from a 1970's design, but it drove almost as nicely as the wife's Bora, and better than most 2000 model Jap cars... So I just had to have it...
A bit of bargaining with the previous owner, a discount of the work down by the mechanics, and I had a deal... It worked out to be $1500 all up, including the inspection and transfer fees, so it really was only just above what my budget had been... The best part was, that just 6 hours after first looking, I had found, bought, and was driving it home...
Here is how she looked when I brought her home...
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