Alfa2Evora

Just for a laugh as I had a bit of time to play with, I decided to see what shopping around would get me. Short answer, a requirement for a Resus team to be close at hand. Go Compare - 'best price of £3787 with an excess of £750 through Sterling Insurance - who? Confused - 'best price £11246 with a £525 excess through Doddle Insurance - again who? Positive bargain that one Didn't bother with the meerkats as they're probably too busy scoffing their discounted coffees and pastries.

£512 for the renewal on my 2010 (somewhat modified) NA through Admiral as part of a multi-cover policy, up around 10% on last year but then I did report the car park incident, which although the other party's insurer is fully covering the repair (now 7 weeks in and £12k and rising), I suppose the fact that I had a bump at all now makes me a greater risk. I was going to shop around but there aren't that many companies that will entertain the number of modifications my Evora has and my experience of doing so for my daily driver put me off even starting the process. It's a 2010 Alfa Giulietta 1.4 which is probably worth not a lot now with 135k miles on the clock. As part of the multi-cover policy, Admiral quoted £397 for it (also up 10% with only a windscreen stone chip claimed last year) so I of course absolutely jumped at the 'best offer' found for me by the opera singer of £1547, .

Even although it's unlikely that the Evora will be ready in time, I'll still be coming to this. I'll meet you at Hermiston Gait and tag along behind at a discreet distance in the insurance/rental car company's idea of a Lotus equivalent, .

If the Evora is back from bodyshop then I'd be up for it. Will let you know nearer the time.

In a somewhat last minute decision when the Evora finally went into bodyshop last week, I decided to take up the other party's insurance company's offer of a temporary replacement car. I had been intending to use our Alfa but it's getting a bit long in the tooth now and I just had that little niggle in the back of my mind about placing my reliance for transport solely with it. Anyway, it took a couple of days for all the admin to filter its way through from insurance company to rental company then for them to locate and deliver a suitable 'equivalent' vehicle to me. Well, I can only presume that the Lotus Evora was unknown to them and on looking online, the search for 'Lotus' brought up the Eletre as this is what arrived at my door at lunchtime, ......... A Hyundai Tucson self-charging petrol hybrid. Relatively quick off the mark in a straight line but hit a twisty bit and a Lotus equivalent it most certainly aint! Could have been worse though I suppose - could have been of German origin and then I would have had to alter my driving style completely. "Indicators? What are these 'indicators' you speak of?"

About 3.30pm today (Sat, 24 Feb), Chrome Orange Evora travelling west through Linlithgow High Street. Only saw it after it was past as I was inside a shop but a 400 I would think judging by the rear wing.

You're lucky on that Andy. The vehicle tax system is a shambles with all the different sets of rules that apply depending on when the car was registered. My NA, because it's older than a 2017 registration year, is £395/year otherwise it would be just £180 if it had been stuck in storage and not registered until after 2017.. Do you know anybody looking for a nice 2.0 Turbo SAAB Estate? By pushing out 1g of CO2 per km over the limit that would have had it in the same tax band as the Evora, it's costing £675/year, . Now off the road and on SORN until I part company with it.

No, retirement hasn't caused Alan to lose the ability to count - there were 4 Lotus in attendance, only I had to disappear sharpish (before the above pic was taken) to visit Jennifer in the nursing home.

I'd be up for that then I can nip back into Linlithgow and visit Jennifer at the nursing home before lunchtime.

Indeed it is Andy (or should that be It/That? ) - wouldn't dream of it going anywhere else and the other party's insurance accepted my 'specialist car, specialist repairer' comment without demur. Just got to see what they give me as an appropriate courtesy car as apparently I'm entitled to one from the 'premium' range - so that'll be a Hyundai i20 rather than an i10 then?

I'm still puzzling over the sodden carpets conundrum. I tried the supplementary seal solution championed by @Lee Valleley on my S1 but sadly to no avail. If anything the problem has got worse because whereas before the water seemed to be making its way to the bottom of the door then tracking in under the sill trim panel before dropping down the bottom section of the A-panel into the footwell, it's now just pouring straight over the top of the sill trim panel if the regular puddle I find there is anything to go by. So, it's back to a bit more head-scratching while the carpets remain nice and dry in the airing cupboard and I run around with all the alloy flooring panels exposed pretending I'm in an overgrown Elise, .

Yeah!!!! 4th of March can't come soon enough. That's the date I've been given for the Evora to go into bodyshop as all the required parts have finally been gathered together - I don't know what it took to achieve it but the Unobtanium mines clearly managed to get some product out the door eventually, . It'll only be a few days shy of 18 months since it was so rudely trampled on by the X5 in the hospital car park, but finally the wrongs are going to be righted and I can look forward to my P&J regaining her stunning good looks. It'll be great too, to fill up my weekend diary with shows and other motoring-related events. I wonder if I can sue for 'emotional distress' over all the days out I had to cancel last year? That's the modern way of doing things after all, isn't it?

Now you know - never trust any advice you get from this guy.............................

Well, it's official or at least as far as our local supermarket is concerned - Christmas is over, as they've now got these on display in the 'Seasonal' aisle, .

SAAB J29 Tunnan This example from the Swedish Air Force Historic Flight visited the airshow at Prestwick a few years back - they fly better than they look apparently.