As I’m getting older, I am becoming more impulsive and this isn’t always a good thing, especially where cars are concerned. For instance, today I went out with a friend to find him a new car and ended up coming home (well after the weekend I will) an MG ZS180 for myself.

It all started like this. I got a telephone call from my good friend Steve a couple of weeks ago, asking if I had any ideas on what sort of car he should get. His criteria consisted of five doors, something reasonably quick and something reasonably interesting for around the £2500 mark. I had a few ideas, but the one he picked up on was the MG ZR.

After the first couple of silly suggestions, like the 2002 ZR120 with no service history, he came up with a silver ZR160, around 70 miles away at bang on the £2500. The only snag, it wasn’t available for viewing until the weekend. As he still hadn’t driven one, let alone sat in one, I suggested that we find a car locally to try, even if he didn’t buy it. I didn’t fancy doing the one hundred and forty mile round trip only to find out he didn’t like the seating position! Scanning the local rag turned up two at a dealer a couple of miles away, so off we trotted to look at the cars.

The place is quite a large used dealership but walking up and down the rows of various vehicles, it became apparent that the cars we had come to look at were, disappointingly for my friend, no longer there. There was however a metallic blue MG ZS180 sitting there. Now, those of you that have read this blog before will know I have a bit of a soft spot for these cars, especially in face lifted form. This particular car however wasn’t the later version, but it was a reasonably clean 53 plated car with only 70k on the clock and a service history.

I twitched. Looking round the vehicle it appeared to be very straight and clean with only a stone chipped nose sullying the exterior. Inside, however, was perfect despite the awful dash shine that used car dealers do insist on using. I twitched again, and headed towards the sales office to get the keys. After a quick enquiry about how much they would offer me on my Civic, I was out on the road test driving the creamy V6 motor.

Surprisingly, it was incredibly well screwed together, with no interior rattles or squeaks, despite the hard second rate plastics used on the lower dash panels. Handling was still taught and no noises from the suspension. The only bad point appeared to be a rattling noise coming from the engine bay, an almost tappety sound. A quick mobile internet search revealed that it is a common fault caused by a faulty actuator switch on the variable inlet system. Cost for repair, free – if you are proficient with a soldering iron!

Now, for as technically good the Civic is, I have never gelled with the car. It is quiet, efficient, cheap to run and completely reliable, it just has no soul, nothing to emotionally attach me to it. The MG on the other hand makes nice noises, the interior is flawed, but some how charming and in general it has character. For any petrol head this is enough of a reason to swap a car….. so, that’s exactly what I did.

As for my friend Steve, looks like I’m going to be taking a 140 mile round trip tomorrow and I’ll guess I will just have to stay calm if he doesn’t think the ZR has a big enough boot!!