Just bought my first Japanese car!
Turbo Mini Forums

I was looking for a Fiesta for about £3-4k, but all I could find was crap. Two I looked at had a hardly a blob of oil on the end of the dipstick, at least a centimeter below the min mark! Both on Ford dealer forecourts!

So I was getting a bit pissed off with searching. Anyway, I took the Focus in to my old mates for an MOT on Tuesday. He had a Mitsubishi Colt 1.1 on a 55 plate with uner 30k on the clock within my budget.

Picked it up today, only £1350 to insure it for Evo to drive!

Seems a great little car. Great revvy three cylinder 12v engine with a raspy note. Could get 50mpg if driven right.

I did a search on here on "Mitsubishi Colt" and it twice came up in recommendations, so if it turns out to be crap, it's your fault.

Well chuffed at the moment!

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

Reliable, nippy....good buy :)

A bit more research has revealed that it was designed by a Frenchman and built in Holland!

Maybe the engine is Jap or is it just the name?

EDIT: The engine is built in Germany. It's not Jap at all

Edited by Paul S on 27th Aug, 2010.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

I don't think the technical design is from just one man so there might have been some japanes people involved ....

Rusty by nature

No doubt a French guy managing a multi-national design team, but predominantly Japanese.

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

Should be good then ;-p

Rusty by nature

:)

Saul Bellow - "A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep."
Stephen Hawking - "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge."

I liked the older generation better ...

Rusty by nature

I used to work at a mitsy dealership and we never had much trouble with them. Id make sure you go to a dealer and check for recalls. Most needed a software update. IIRC

Is it an auto or manual?
I loved the lil engines in these was like half a V6.
The engines themselves i think came from merc. They put them in the smart, although redesigned for this car.

I hope so cos' smart engines are a joke, not very reliable ...

Rusty by nature

Sorry it doesn't look good at all, a bit like a chinese cheese or cake in your case.

Smart engine suffered because ... well so ive heard from lack of oil changes, killing turbos on the smaller unit.
The bigger unit that i think is in the colt didnt suffer (no turbo).

On the smaller engine you had to vac out the oil iirc, or something like that. On all the bigger ones (1100cc) had a normal drain plug.

Only thing i didnt really like about the new colt was the huge front window and tiny side one. Gave it a big blind spot.
The old colt was great. Would of been awsome if they did a bigger engine tho.

these are great cars my father owned one for a few years and never had any problems with it, and that even done 50,000 miles without a problem (did have a servicing regular)