Background: For the last 10 years my wife has been driving a '99 VT Commodore 5.0 V8 manual sedan, which has been a fun and generally reliable car, but it's overdue for some repairs, and uses 12L/100km, which isn't doing any good for the environment, or our bank accounts.
So, we had been on the lookout for a second reasonably priced Astra CDTI (see thread here:
https://ozvolvo.org/discussion/2527/2006-holden-astra-cdti/p1 ) with the intention of buying one before the rego on the Commodore runs out in March next year.
In the meantime this '07 Astra SRI 2.0 Turbo came up for an excellent price, and we decided to go for that instead. It's done 140k and has a few little scratches and marks, but has full service history from two previous owners and looks like it'll be a good car.
We paid $5700 with rego to May next year from a wholesaler that my workplace does a lot of work for, they are typically around the $9k mark online. He paid $5200 for it, and had it advertised for $7999. This highlights the benefits of having a positive relationship with your customers.
We wanted to spend less than that on a second diesel Astra, but it's our five year anniversary and it seems like a fun and practical(ish) gift.
Some pics taken today, it needs a wash:
The engine is rated at 147kw (200hp) and 262nm, and has the same 6 speed manual box as the diesel, but the final drive ratio is lower. It's pretty zippy, and the traction control works overtime in the wet if you don't drive it lightly. It has a "sport" button on the dash which sharpens the throttle and steering response, and stiffens up the electrically controlled shocks.
It has various standard issue bells and whistles like heated seats, climate control, higher spec stereo, 18" rims etc, and a previous owner tinted the windows which was nice of them.
It's very different to drive to the diesel, which has 120kw (150hp) and 320nm, both cars feel quick and fun to drive, but in very different ways. The diesel has full torque available from 2000rpm upwards and you pretty much just need to put your foot down in whatever gear you happen to be in, and it'll get up and go. This one needs to be driven a bit harder to get it into boost, but is ultimately faster, and feels sportier.
It needs a few little things done to get it up to scratch, a swaybar end link, rocker cover gasket, and some better front pads and a light machining of the rotors to get rid of the shudder caused by the cheap pads. I've already bought all of the parts, I just need to find time to take it off the road for a couple of days and get it up on jack stands.
Some muppet has painted the calipers red and it's flaking off and looks terrible, so I'll have another go at painting them while it's apart. I also think the current generation of Victorian number plates look terrible, so I'll get some of the slimline black and white plates in the next couple of weeks.
There is a huge amount of performance gear available from the UK for the engines in these, it's going to be hard to avoid the temptation to mod it (bowling ball named Homer type situation).
