Can it really be a full year ago that we were rounding up the prime beef, flatulent heifers and knock-kneed mooses (meese?) that made up our annual 51-strong parade of Sheds Of The Week?
Well, yes, apparently it can, because here we are doing it all over again. Only this time we're doing it for 2016 rather than 2015, as 2016 hadn't happened yet this time last year. Plus we've already done 2015, so doing it again would be stupid.
For some, 2016 has been a rubbish year. For the dedicated Shedman, of course, every year is a rubbish year, but in a good way. The average powerfully-built PH manager may not have all that much interest in average fuel consumption figures, but there does seem to be a fair number of us on here who believe in the conservation and/or recycling of cheap mobile metal. The £1,000-or-less motor that many people and most traders would be only too glad to see the back of can instantly become a beloved steed for the next lucky owner.
Now, please imagine the sound of an urgent Morse code message being transmitted as we go to... Market Watch! Ooh, how exciting!
Shed himself isn't interested in trends, as even the briefest examination of his wardrobe will confirm. He has however noticed fewer big-horsepower cars coming onto the sub-£1K market in recent times.
What does that prove? That meaty motors are being hoarded until fuel prices drop? That their values have increased with the Trumpian promise of lots more carbon-based liquid propellants?
More importantly, last year's Government decision to stop the transfer of unused tax from vendor to purchaser has greatly simplified Shed's job. He no longer has to factor in the value of x months' worth of tax - an amount that could nowadays be quite considerable if the old system was still in place. So, thanks Gov!
Last year, 25 marques were represented in our 51 Sheds. This year, our non-celebrity antiques hunt has roamed across 28 different makes. "It's always about German cars", goes the popular cry, but only 13 of this year's Sheds were from that neck of the woods. Six of them were BMWs, followed by four Audis, two Mercs - a surprisingly small number, perhaps indicating that old Mercs now fall into just two categories, classics or rust-buckets, with nothing in between - and a solitary VW.
Making up the rest were four Fords, three MGs, three Volvos, three Mazdas, three Alfas, two Fiats, two Lexi, two Jags and one each from Chevrolet, Toyota, Saab, Skoda, Jeep, Hyundai, Citroen, Suzuki, Mini, Honda, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Rover, Subaru and, erm, London Taxi. From this cosmopolitan selection we can now tell you our top 10, based on the usual scientific method of the amount of interest electronically expressed by you lot.
It's a top 10, remember, so even the worst one here is some sort of a winner. But some are undoubtedly a bit more loserish that others...
The A6 AllroadsLeadToTheBankruptcyCourt
The first Allroad to grace our Shedly columns had you lot fleeing in panic and stroking your beards in pretty much equal measure. It was an early model with the twin-turbo 2.7 petrol motor, five-speed Tip’ box and just about everything else that could go wrong in a car apart from the famously troublesome airbag suspension, which had already been replaced. Plenty of suggestions on the forum to accept the inevitable and break it for spares, but only the truly hard of heart would have done that as it looked great. A lot of (insert word here) for the money.
Jaguar X-Files
Everybody likes a Jaaaag – unless it’s an X-Type of course, because as any fule kno it’s a Mondeo innit. Well, no it isn’t actually. This smart low-mileage BRG specimen with creme leather was a 2.5 V6 4WD featuring spangly 18-inch Aruba wheels, one of which had taken a hefty thwack, and - saints be praised - a cassette player. Mmm, nice! Gandahar mused on the idea of a slowish six-pot X as a track tool that would take the blame for his rubbishy driving, while others aspired to a manual gearbox version or an (unfortunately never built) version offering a small degree of steering feel. Princeperch’s post about massive insurance premiums put the tin lid on the thread.
Serverrrn!
Who can resist a clean and shiny 7 Series with full service history, a decent reg plate and six months’ MOT – especially when it’s going for the ludicrous sum of £425? Sure, it had 234K on the clock, but that didn’t stop Daveco declaring it “Shed of the year”. Shed did forget to mention the biggest issue with old Sevens, namely the crumbly fuel tanks, but of course there were plenty of PHers on hand to remind him. In his defence, the tank wasn’t mentioned on the MOT, just a small oil leak plus some rubber and brake pads needed at the front. The worn Cruise control button told you all you needed to know about the sort of use it had been put to. At least one person was happy not to look a gift horse in the chops: it sold pretty quickly.
Nitrous Saxo VTR
The Saxo VTR is a decent runabout. You wouldn’t want to have a crash in one, as they have the structural integrity of a petrol-soaked condom. Plus the VTR is not as quick as the VTS – unless it’s got nitrous oxide injection, like this one. Stripped and lowered for track day foolishness, although not equipped with the (for this car) mandatory rollcage, this tidy little Cit had a 75hp N2O kit on it that was worth a grand on its own. Most thought it was all rather ace, though there were some intent on removing the jam from the doughnut by issuing ominous warnings about exploding manifolds and the like. So what if they were right? In terms of fun per fiver, this MOT’d mighty midget could hardly be beat. “I’d have that”, said Gary29. “Mad, bad and dangerous to know”, summarised canucklehead.
The chairman of the bored
A terrible amalgam of reeking fibreglass, flat windows and external hinges, this twelve-foot-tall Metro should really have been stuck on the top of a scrapper’s advertising hoarding. Instead, someone had MOT’d it, so it found itself on sale in the PH Classifieds for something near the top end of our £1,000 budget. After 140 posts veering wildly between celebrating its wonder and killing it with fire, there was no general consensus, but the comment from Bill – “Appalling! Well done” – nicely expressed the conflict. TristPerrin suggested the insertion of a T16 Turbo engine, which was a bit less unsavoury than Shed’s own moneymaking idea for it. At least you can’t imagine it suffering a rollover.
Great eight
The arguments for and against poverty-spec limos will doubtless continue to rage in PH barge threads for many years to come. Audi’s built-to-last aluminium A8 has a lot to commend it, and this clean 2.8 decatted example with under 100K on the odometer seemed like remarkable value at 620 quid. Most PHers gave it a respectful salute, and the vendor’s nephew came onto the thread to reassure any doubters as to the quality of the car. There was the odd beardy note of caution about the automatic gearbox, and about the cost of spares – £6,500 power steering pump, anybody? – but the most commonly used word was “awesome”. Learn2MergeInTurn praised its “creamy waftyness”. He probably meant creami waftiness, though. 157-month PH lurker Ianeldy went further. He bought it, and then told us that the oil pressure light had come on at the end of his first motorway run. Ulp.
One lady owner MG ZS
Ah yes, the ZS 180. When PH’s Roveristas weren’t face-palming about Shed’s mistakes regarding the VIS system, most of them were content to big up the surprising performance and endurance of the 175hp V6-powered granny car, presented here in low-mileage, stainless-exhausted ‘one lady owner’ guise. The seller’s keyboard seemed to be stuck in Caps Lock mode, but Shambler distracted us from that with his tale of “sailing past” a depressed Porsche 911 Turbo owner on a Knockhill track day in one of these, having earlier claimed a BTCC front-row qualifying time at the wheel after two laps on road tyres. Memes of Jay out of the Inbetweeners claiming to have completed FIFA 17 predictably followed. Mrtwisty sympathised with the Porsche owner, on the grounds that his engine had clearly expired.
Baggy BMW 330Ci
Another high-miler, with 209K up, this E46 in reddish with M3 alloys, dirt-black grille and tar spots aplenty was openly described by the seller as being in “poor cosmetic condition”. But should that really be an issue when you’ve got the six-second 0-60 performance of a big BMW six under your right hoof? Overseas PHers in particular were open-mouthed about the value, while the detailers were drooling at the prospect of attacking it with cutting compounds and rattle cans. There were plenty of pics from proud owners who had done exactly that to their own E46s, with fantastic results. A lively discussion ensued about the methodology of small dealers turning cars over without even washing them, and folk were still posting to the main thread a month after it went live. None of it mattered though, because the car was sold halfway down page one.
Audi A6 snoozemobile
Our second most popular Shed of 2016 was arguably also one of the most boring cars of the year. But that was what made it exciting. It was a bog-basic, steel-wheeled C4 model Audi A6 1.8 from 1996 that some rep or other must have stretched his allowance to in preference to a properly-specced A4. The current owner had been using it as an airport barge for the last four years and clearly loved it, despite it being painted in Doom Blue and having a dishcloth-dull interior. No power to speak of, but also nothing much to go wrong. That appealed to a phalanx of old-schoolers who admired its “plain, functional and well built” quality (R400TVR) not to mention its “decent ride quality, not designed for a lap of the Nurburgring, just a lap of Surrey” (Krikkit). Others hated its minicab persona, to which Toaster riposted with a speedo shot of his 323,000-mile A6 Avant. W124 called it his “favourite Shed ever…I don’t know why really, it speaks to me of incredibly low running costs, reliability and great joy to be had trying to make it go fast”, while jith launched a strong and well-considered defence of the A6 in general, and the dullest-engined ones in particular.
Ex-plod Volvo
Hearing blokes talking about secretly tuned-up ex-police cars is only slightly more interesting than listening to them banging on about their SAS mates, but when there’s a 250hp 2.3-litre turbo five under the bonnet, large quantities of industrial-grade BS can be forgiven. Our BIB Volvo T5 Shed had been de-Battenburged and looked sprightly enough. The steering wheel was all but transparent, a bit of a giveaway of heavy use, but at the same time an odd one considering the relatively low mileage of 168K.
Jacko had a bit of a mutter about “ex Police barges always seem to be driven by fat pretend coppers who hang round computer markets and have a mobile phone in a belt holster and a key chain”. Theories were expressed about it being the property of a high-up who hadn’t been droning up and down the motorway system all day or screeching around council estates in search of tracksuited miscreants. Others were more cynical, believing it to be a simple case of clocking. Certainly, there was little useful info in the paperwork about whether or not important stuff like cambelt, turbo or clutch had been replaced. If all that was good then you would have had yourself a 250hp estate from the good old days, according to Editor Dan who had just put in a shift with some traffic lads bemoaning the disappearance of Volvos from the police fleet.
There we have it then, this year’s Sheds of the Year. Come back at about the same time next year when we will give you next year’s Sheds of the Year. That’s how it works, you see. Simple but fun.
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