www.zxrworld.co.uk

me and my supervisor were chatting at work the other day putting the worlds wrongs to right, whilst talking we came across the subject of old classic cars and how the next generation arent going to have proper classics because lets face they've stoped making classics now they just make cars!! Now im a fan of the older cars, like the mk1 gold, series 1 m3 and the merc 190 cosworth to name but a few, and i love to here stories about the fun my dad had fixing his cars up and daft stuff he did in cars like the cortinas, capris and chavelles, but all these fun old cars are a dying bread now and are hard to find and when im old enough to afford to buy and run one they are going to be all gone from either car cancer (rust) or some bellend has raped them round a tree.

This got me thinking, even now when they arent that old i found it hard to find a good L1-L5 model for reasonable money, but whats getting at me is, in 2o odd years when my son/daughter says to me "dad i want a bike" and i say "when i was your age i had a 400 and it was the most fun i ever had with my clothes on" (odviously if it is my daughter its going to be the only fun she will be having coz she damn well better keep jer clothes on lol) and i can tell em stories about the laughs i had screaming about the country roads and dozy cock-ups ive made and we can all have a laugh, but at that point am i going to be able to find them a zxr400 worth even looking at let alone riding, and if not what can they ride?!? what is beeing made now that is going to be as fun to ride as the pocket rockets we all know and love?

as far as i know there is nothing beeing made for the younger rider, or not not even younger just someone looking for a fun bike to shoot around on.

now this upsets me a little bit for 2 reasons 1.becuase i want my kids to able to have the fun i'm having 2. (trying not to sounds soppy here) i want them to feel like they can make friends with good people, with one common intrest like evry1 on here can and probly has, owning or having owned the amazing zxr400, but there not going to be able to because the bikes being made now arent going to be worth having a real following like the zxr400 has because, although the are amazing machines, thats all they are, machines.

sorry to bore yas but i just had to get that 1 out.

proper cars like zephyrs, consuls, zodiacs, mk1 cortinas etc etc?? don't suppose bikes nowadays will rot as much as said formentioned cars due to frames being made of alloy, if you think back 30 years to 1979 there's still quite a few 1979 bikes around so maybe in say 2025 there may well be more alloy framed bikes about like an L5 zxr400?? so our kids may well still have the chance of owning such a fab bike.

i suppose its down to us now to get a good zxr400 and keep it in storage for another 15-20 years or hope that kawasaki see sense and build another zxr400 in the future??

i think thats what needs to happen coz none of the big names are making bikes for young riders, they make 50 and 125s for teens and 600+ for the older rider or people who can afford to insure them etc but nothing in between that i know of.

yeah i spose you rite on the rotting thing but althought he 400s were made to be abused these only so much punishment they can take but hopefully ther will stil be a few about.

What were all the old 'classic' cars, though?

Just average priced cars that did the job better than anything else? If so then you can bet Impreza's, Skylines and Evo's will be the future classics, just like the old Quattro's and Cosworths!

The slightly rarer cars will be Noble's and Elises, and there are a few like Corvettes which will still be classics even when they bring new ones out.

Classic bikes have to be somewhat iconic, like the GSXR1100, Fireblade and KR1S - So it'll be the '98 R1, Aprilia Mille, Hayabusa, and the earlier mental SM's.

I think a lot of it is just relative, or a good bike/car that the manufacturer stopped making too soon after it had left it's mark.

classic cars have character mate, i don't mean when you drive em, when you look at em. Spot the 2 that don't have character?

to a point jamz bout subarus, skylines etc being future classics you are right, but im talking about your everyman classics like cortinas, zephrys, capris, alegros, imps, the sort of thing your dad or mam would pick up for a few hundred when they were teens-early 20s and f**k around in till it died coz they were faily inexpensive to run and insure etc much like the zxr400.

I'm with Jamz on this, I think 'classic' will always be the generation before e.g:






So when we're all driving around in our thought controlled, levitating, capsule...things, we'll look at a ford mondeo and say "they don't make em like the used to"

yeah but then u will drift from mondeo to that peugeot 306 and think thank f**k for that haha

raynaldo03 wrote:yeah but then u will drift from mondeo to that peugeot 306 and think thank f**k for that haha

Can I argue here that a Mondeo ST24 is a modern classic?

no jamz!! just no!! nah onyl kidin u can argue what u want matey i think what you think of as a classic is up to u, i personaly am in love with the mk1 golf gti, and some ppl think they suck camel.