Cars you despised for so long then gave in

So this past summer my track car Tot (2011 Mazda2) met a wall at Mid Ohio and was a total loss.

I put off buying something else for a while trying to figure out exactly what I wanted... and happened to see a white 2019 GTI Rabbit Edition for sale locally. 

I have HATED working on German cars, and basically everything about them for a long time... But it just drives SO GOOD and is an order of magnitude faster than the Mazda2 was... And it really doesn't NEED anything to make handle well and be fun. It has the DSG which is really a spectacular gearbox. The lighting package is what I really love though. The active LED headlights make it so I can actually SEE at night. The high beams are like turning on the sun. The interior is nice as well. This stupid car has really won me over.

On a side note, I have several friends who are big into these things, and I've driven a REALLY well set up DSG car on track before which definitely left an impression on me that probably led to this.

Who else has had a "bah I'll never buy one of those" kinds of cars that you eventually flipped and got one and loved it?

I wouldn't say despised, more "feared" is the appropriate term for me.  German cars.  Always wanted to pull the trigger, but was always too scared.  I decided to do it and jumped head first into it...have several German cars at the moment.  Damn, I love these things.  None of them are VW, I think that's a bridge too far for me right now.

I didn't give Corvettes the respect they deserved until I saw a C5 Z06 lay waste to an entire field of tooner tuned imports at the Car and Driver Superfour Challenge on 2003 or so.

Still don't want one, but I respect the heck out of their capabilities.

Kind of the same situation with german cars. I think, like a lot of people, for a while I only knew of modern porsches as the 996 and early 997 era with the $10k paperweight engines and questionable 996 styling. i remember about 7 years ago a friend mentioned their long term car ownership ambition was a cayman and my first thought was "ew, why?" Fast forward 5ish years and I ended up with a 981 cayman s and can't really see myself ever selling it.

Not a specific car, but I've always been a manual transmission fanboy. But over the last year or so I've realized that I'm ready for a (good) auto trans daily driver. I was thinking about it and I can't really remember a specific time since I stopped occasionally autocrossing my DD that the manual trans has contributed positively to the driving experience. It's not to the extent of going out of my way to get one asap, but whenever I'm finally done with this car it's replacement will probably be an auto (or maybe electric, depending on how far into the future it happens).

I drove a friend's GTI recently and honestly it was overall a bit underwhelming, but the active headlights are probably the best headlights I've ever experienced. My cayman has active xenons and they're not as good as the GTI lights.

Prius. It's still the anthesis of a performance vehicle, but I can be enthusiastic about the one thing it does well: Deliver great MPGs

Ironically, I never much liked VW golf/gtis for no apparent reason (maybe just the idea that they're all driven my 22-year old fanbois).

Of course, I drive a 2018 GTI now.

Also, when I was younger I had something against e30 BMWs (I probably thought they were douchey yuppie cars and were over-hyped as the "ultimate driving machine.") I bought my first one in my mid-30s and have owned 3 or 4 of them now (depending on what you count). 

On the flipside, as a teenager I always wanted an XJ Cherokee. Thought they were so cool. I bought one in the early 2000s and found that I really hated driving it, and sold it after like 2 years. 

The moral in this story is that apparently I didn't know what the hell I was talking about until I was in my mid-30s lol. 

irish44j (Forum Supporter) said:

The moral in this story is that apparently I didn't know what the hell I was talking about until I was in my mid-30s lol. 

Quoted for the kids. 

In reply to dps214 :

Same-I have a love/hate relationship with the 996/997. The engines are straight trash-just design flaws and cost cutting all around and the community is...not my favorite. At the same time, it's just a super unique platform and the 2+2 means there is room in the back for kiddo. 

For now though, I am one with the Prius #Daddywaggon

I was an Audi fanboi back when they still made somewhat reliable cars you didn't have to remove the entire front end to service. Wanted nothing to do with BMWs. Then I bought an E30 to race...and wondered why I hadn't drank from the well of the sacred Roundel earlier.

I've since lost my faith, however. Modern ones are not DIY friendly. So, full circle.

When I was a kid in the '80s I thought AMC Eagles were the dopiest looking things ever.  Now I think they're pretty dope, indeed.

In reply to flatlander937 :

My "hate" was the Jaguar XJS  damn sedan, Taxi cab, to replace the beloved XKE?   
    4600 pounds to replace 2700 pounds?   4 seats to 2 of a proper sports car?  Air Conditioning and Automatic?  
    OK, an interesting engine brought over from the XKE  but then saddled with EFI  ?  
      I'll wait for the proper replacement.  Then as the troubles brought about by labor problems under the new management of the BLMH and their lack of investment in proper development of the XJS.  
   Suddenly the supply of XKE's dried up and prices reached insane levels. The  XJS seemed worthy of a second look. 
 In hindsight I understand Sir Williams marketing decisions. Why the XJS had to replace the XKE. Small volume constructors could no longer compete  with the automotive giants.  10,000 units  in a good year would put even a well managed company in receivership.  30,000 was the new minimum.  Then only if it served another function with a major producer.  
    

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

I wouldn't say despised, more "feared" is the appropriate term for me.  German cars.  Always wanted to pull the trigger, but was always too scared. 

This is where I am, and honestly GTIs are on my list.  I dont know enough about them to make an educated decision, but I really like the packagee.  Hatch, manual, torsen, and not CTR/Veloster N

ProDarwin said:

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

I wouldn't say despised, more "feared" is the appropriate term for me.  German cars.  Always wanted to pull the trigger, but was always too scared. 

This is where I am, and honestly GTIs are on my list.  I dont know enough about them to make an educated decision, but I really like the packagee.  Hatch, manual, torsen, and not CTR/Veloster N

I promise I'm not trying to turn this into a GTI hate thread, but has anyone driven one back to back with a non-LSD GTI (or other comparable cars) to assess the LSD performance? I drove a friend's car with the LSD and would swear it had as little or less forward grip as my very open differential fiesta st which was not at all what I was expecting. My car does have slightly more performance oriented tires on it though.

Also, the GTI LSD is very much not a torsen.

Mustangs. I got caught up in the tuner culture because of the first Fast and the Furious and hated all things domestic. 

It was an abject lesson in removing everything around the car and just enjoying it for what it is. 

dps214 said:

ProDarwin said:

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

I wouldn't say despised, more "feared" is the appropriate term for me.  German cars.  Always wanted to pull the trigger, but was always too scared. 

This is where I am, and honestly GTIs are on my list.  I dont know enough about them to make an educated decision, but I really like the packagee.  Hatch, manual, torsen, and not CTR/Veloster N

I promise I'm not trying to turn this into a GTI hate thread, but has anyone driven one back to back with a non-LSD GTI (or other comparable cars) to assess the LSD performance? I drove a friend's car with the LSD and would swear it had as little or less forward grip as my very open differential fiesta st which was not at all what I was expecting. My car does have slightly more performance oriented tires on it though.

Also, the GTI LSD is very much not a torsen.

It absolutely works. You can change the effectiveness under adaptations in the "lock electronics" module. The steering gets VERY heavy on full strength with no other changes.

On the stock settings, there's definitely a delay and it's not super noticeable locking up.

I had wheel spin problems with my (open diff) Mazda2(all 97whp!)... The GTI doesn't have any problems doing stupid things like acceleration from a stop while wheels are turned. This is also with sticky tires on the 2 vs all seasons on the GTI FWIW.

There's also the possibility that the one you drove had bad fluid, failing pump, worn clutches, etc.

calteg said:

Prius. It's still the anthesis of a performance vehicle, but I can be enthusiastic about the one thing it does well: Deliver great MPGs

Yup.  I always laughed at them...and the people who drove them.  Then I decided to bite the bullet and give it a try because of my long commute.  I had a 2010 Prius and absolutely despised it, so I thought my pre-concieved notions were accurate (I still hate it and will never have another).  But I recently bought a Prius C and have done a 180 turn.  At 99hp, it's no performance vehicle.  However, 47mpg while cruising at 75mph and 50, 55, 60 mpg while driving around town is something to respect.  I couldn't be happier with it.

As for the 996, that's one of the Germans that I bought recently.  Engine design may not be great, but it's a damn nice car.  I love it.

For me, it's Toyota hybrids.  SWMBO has a gen 2 Prius, and honestly, I hate thing.  It's a pain to work on, nothing ever comes apart right, and the engineering is just not good in some spots.  There are too many things on that car that either aren't durable enough, or are almost good, but they gave up before finishing.  So it feels a bit unfinished to drive and is generally not very likeable.  And it has that awful mid-2000s Toyota steering that I can't stand. 

But then, SWMBO's mom bought a shiny new Rav4 hybrid last year.  I've driven it a few times and it's an absolute 180 from the Prius.  The steering finally doesn't totally suck (although I already knew Toyota had fixed that on newer stuff), but the whole hybrid system actually feels finished and polished now.  It's much quicker to change output from the gas engine, so no more huge delay to get full power.  Regen braking actually integrates smoothly with the friction brakes instead of being an annoyance, etc. 

Any SUV. Too big outside, too small inside, heavy and inefficient for driving around. We live in a fairly rural area and a Subaru wagon was the right solution that let me feel smugly superior.

When it came time to replace the Sube I started looking at 4runners after seeing my buddy's 400k mile Tacoma. Found a babied 2005 V8 priced low and tripped over myself getting the wallet out. Weighs almost as much as 2 Subarus, uses gas like 2 Subarus, a little smaller inside than a Legacy wagon, but more solid at 212k miles than a Legacy with 100k, and you will have to pry it from my cold, dead hands.

Everything Nissan. I've despised them since I owned a 1983 Stanza 30+ years ago. Then I bought an Infinity. It was a very good car on and off the track until the engine let loose. 

The Germans on the other hand... I tried them, never again. 

Somewhere in the early 2000s, I had taken a look inside a then-new Buick Regal (some sort of weird promotional chance to win something). My reaction was that for something they were trying to sell as a near luxury car, it didn't look anything near like a luxury car. Definitely wasn't impressed.

Over a decade later, I was in need of a car that would carry the whole family - the E36 BMW convertible didn't have nearly enough room. I ended up giving Buick Regals a second look after realizing you could get the supercharged V6 in an inconspicuous family sedan, and they'd depreciated to the point they were extremely cheap.

American trucks, for the longest time in my younger years I despised everything American OEM, I was 100% Japanese OEM fanboy all the way. now I've had 2 chevy suburbans and now I have a ram and I work for GM. 

times do change 

dps214 said:

ProDarwin said:

SKJSS (formerly Klayfish) said:

I wouldn't say despised, more "feared" is the appropriate term for me.  German cars.  Always wanted to pull the trigger, but was always too scared. 

This is where I am, and honestly GTIs are on my list.  I dont know enough about them to make an educated decision, but I really like the packagee.  Hatch, manual, torsen, and not CTR/Veloster N

I promise I'm not trying to turn this into a GTI hate thread, but has anyone driven one back to back with a non-LSD GTI (or other comparable cars) to assess the LSD performance? I drove a friend's car with the LSD and would swear it had as little or less forward grip as my very open differential fiesta st which was not at all what I was expecting. My car does have slightly more performance oriented tires on it though.

Also, the GTI LSD is very much not a torsen.

Damn.  I thought it was.

Although reading about it, its an electronically controlled clutch diff, it should be pretty damn good.  For a daily I would prefer the longer service interval of a torsen though.

You all will hate me....Miata's. 

As a young adult, always saw them as a cute, girly car with no performance possibilities.   

Now, in my 40s, I sort of want one for a toy.

Vans. I  could not believe anyone would have one of those big rolling boxes.  I  was a suburban guy. Big difference, huh? Several years ago I had a chance to buy a Chevy Astro for $300. Used as a dog transport. Then took a job and got a Chevy Express as a company truck.  Still prefer a Suburban, but have a new respect for the van.

Grtechguy said:

You all will hate me....Miata's. 

 

As a young adult, always saw them as a cute, girly car with no performance possibilities.   

 

Now, in my 40s, I sort of want one for a toy.

This is not an uncommon story.