Corvair vs. 18 year old

SVreX wrote: The best car for a new driver is a MANUAL transmission vehicle with a couple of scratches and minor dents (keeps the "pride" thing down, so not everyone and their boyfriend is wanting to pile in all the time). It is also good if the seats are a little bit ripped, no AC, no monster stereo, good fuel economy, easy to work on, and paid for in cash (preferably the cash of the new driver).

I disagree that it needs to be some beat to E36 M3 car. If it is a little cool, the kid will much more likely to take care of it and drive it carefully. I think a W123 would a great first car (except for parts cost). Reliable as hell, built like a tank, cool but slow. Some beat to E36 M3 car will just get more beat to E36 M3 and not maintained etc.

My experience in High school (5 years ago) almost no who had "cool" cars that weren't new cars given to them by their parents had very few accidents. There was a '69 Chevelle SS 396, Porsche 944, couple old flatbed diesel trucks that had been modified, Mustang II, Buick Grand National, etc. None of these got wrecked but I know of plenty of people who wrecked SUVs, Lexuses and modern econoboxes.

KATYB wrote: my cousin was given a brand new volkwagen golf in like 1997 took him 3 days to be laying upsidedown in a ditch cause he flipped it. then got another one and did the same thing 2 weeks later.

Bravo to his parents.

[seinfeld]I mean--who are these people?![/seinfeld]

More importantly than the car is some education...

http://streetsurvival.org/

failboat wrote: I think the biggest issue with the "our parents drove dangerous cars" argument is that there are a few key distractions these days. cell phones/smart phones, more features in cars to play with to start with...... Even if your teen kid was able to set aside the distractions and drive their classic car responsibly, you know almost no one else on the road is, and they are in the "safe cars" that will crush the old one. Back in the day, everyone was all driving the "dangerous" cars

And there were a lot fewer of them, as well.

MadScientistMatt wrote:

failboat wrote: I think the biggest issue with the "our parents drove dangerous cars" argument is that there are a few key distractions these days. cell phones/smart phones, more features in cars to play with to start with...... Even if your teen kid was able to set aside the distractions and drive their classic car responsibly, you know almost no one else on the road is, and they are in the "safe cars" that will crush the old one. Back in the day, everyone was all driving the "dangerous" cars

OTOH, a very minimalist car with a stick shift and no power anything can force you to ignore all these distractions and concentrate on driving. After showing my parents I could make an automatic equipped minivan move around without hitting objects, my parents put me in an '81 Datsun 210 wagon that was barely running. My dad's logic was, "If you can learn to drive that car, you can drive anything." He wasn't kidding - I ended up learning clutch control to the point that I later bought a car with a totally shot clutch because I was so used to very careful clutch release that I didn't even notice it was a problem. I had an uncle who took the "no distractions, no feeling of safety" to an extreme - when my (male) cousin wrecked a second car, my uncle took away his car and gave him a motorcycle. It worked, but I'm not sure I would try this with a girl. Actually, I'm not sure I would try this with any kid; that may be taking it a bit too far. I'd say a good first car is one that doesn't have anything blatantly unsafe and is not likely to bite you, but also doesn't pamper the driver and forces you to pay attention. So, naturally... the answer is Miata.

I learned clutch on an 81 B210 as well. My first car was a '69 MG Midget that I still own. It was slower than molasses, but had style, and only 1 passenger seat. I'd wager that one of the biggest distractions kids have is a car full of other kids. Also, the MG gave me a healthy respect for relative size and motion- I would always lose when the question of gross tonnage came up. That said, I drove the snot out of it, and wreaked every drip of that 65 gross horsepower.

ransom wrote: For the the right unusual person of that demographic description, it might be awesome. If it's not obvious that it'll be awesome, it's a deeply terrible idea.

QFT

note my uncle is filthy rich. bout each one of his kids a 911 for college graduation (the cousin who cant drive learned his lesson and doesnt drive the 911 drive around in a honda accord that bought himself and has dents on every body panel.

In reply to 93EXCivic:

I didn't say "beat to E36 M3". I said "a couple of scratches and minor dents".

I know A LOT of kids who are given new cars by their parents. Mistake.