It all started with my Dad (he has had almost every piece of shite you can think of and I love going through his old motor's with him over a beer). He had when it was a year old a Renault 21 Turbo. I loved that car, F reg Ph1 in Red can't find the reg number anywhere as I would love to find out if it's still around. Anyway I always promised myself one when I was old enough to afford one (I was 13 when he had it first time around).
Roll on another 8 years and my dad relived his youth with another 21 Turbo (Red Ph1, E reg this time). I was working at a company called Fleet and Lease in Knutsford Cheshire (anyone remember them?) as a valeter/driver whilst studying. He kept the 21 for about 3 months and then declared he was too old for a boy racer machine, so I sold my Cavalier GLi to a mate and bought the 21. Fantastic car and I loved the performance it gave especially on the motorway in 4th or 5th 50-70 mph (it was as quick as a Diablo apparantly
). Anyway long story short I had about 12 of the bloody things over the next 9 years, my favourite was the Quadra as it was very planted and felt a lot more stable than the 2WD variant. Here are 2 of the said beasts I had:
And the cheapest car I have ever bought, £50 this one was
OK so the grey Quadra was my last as it caught fire on the M6 and was written off. 6 months prior to this the Wife and I went to visit Belgium where our family name originally comes from and a world record attempt at Zolder race Circuit. The world record was to have the most Renault "Sport" cars on the track at any one time. This of course included Renault Alpines and there were hundreds of them. I thought they were the bees knees and would have to try and find one when I got home to upgrade the 21 as I had enough of them by then to be honest.
Zolder Circuit World Record Attempt, not sure what the final outcome was to be honest as I didn't really care but it was a good weekend all the same.
So with the insurance money in my pocket (I was lucky and got a good payout for once as they balls'd up an agreed value which I hadn't even agreed on) I bought my first Alpine:
It was the 2.8 non Turbo PRV engine shared with the Volvo 760, Delorian and Peugeot 604 amongst lot's of others. It was an entry level one which had various paint and elecrtrical issues. I really liked it, the way the windscreen wipers "clapped" together and the open mouth's at the petrol station when you opened the bonnet to fill up. Along with the "What is it?" I was asked on many an occasion. It just lacked the Turbo push in the back I had with the 21's. I knew what was due next, a GTA Turbo!
So after a trawl on ebay I managed to find another entry level GTA with paint and electrical problems:
This one decided to brake down twice on the way home from picking it up, oh how I laughed (not). Fault was traced to a non operational front fuel pump, yes it has 2 fuel pumps one at the front to feed the rear swirl pot and rear pump. That was an expensive learning curve but useful for the future. I enjoyed the red GTA Turbo for about a year then found another "bargain". I had to buy it as it was in a lovely Dark Blue Metallic and had a history file as thick as War and Peace.
It's the first car I have bought which had a pet name by the previous owner. "Merlin is his name" the seller proudly announced. "Why?" I ask. "Because he can do magic" he replied. I quickly paid him and shot off. Told the story to my wife and kids and the name kind of stuck. Anyway I really loved "Merlin" and even found some nice Azev wheels for it which transformed the look. After a couple of years of ownership I find out I'm redundant at work so the car has to go. I sell it almost straight away then 2 weeks later get another job, bit of a knee jerk reaction which I regretted at the time.
Settled into my new job I see 9 years redundancy pay from a previous employer plus the money from Merlin sat in the bank getting no or little interest, time for another Alpine. I wanted an A610, problem was only 67 were ever sold to the UK and again my budget was entry level (there is a pattern here)
Not sure how but I managed to find 5 for sale at the time and went down to London to view 1, Northern Ireland another. They were all over priced or ruff. Anyway the best one I found was just down the road from me in Crewe, it was over budget but worth it. I knew as soon as I saw it on his drive that I would have to try and buy it.
I kept it for 2.5 years (the longest I have ever kept a car). I managed to crash it when going too fast from a roundabout onto a motorway slip way. It got repaired to a hight standard but I never felt right with it after that. I got offered very good money for it after it had been repaired and looked it's best so with a heavy heart let it go.
I have broken quite a few GTA's(as per my RIP thread) in between for spares to keep other Alpine's and mine on the road and so have got the bug pretty bad. I currently have a fire damaged GTA which is getting repaired by a certain specialist in Derby, hopefully it will be ready for the spring when I can have a rear engined blast again!
Happy New Year to you all!
