I have always chuckled at Skoda/Lada jokes, some of them are a bit clever, but never believed them. I have always had a soft spot for oddball and unloved cars, and can usually see the good in them. We had a 1991 (?) Lada Niva and it was a fun little car. We had it serviced by a really nice Russian-born mechanic who was very enthusiastic about them, and it was pretty reliable, though caused some severe headaches at times. We had trouble with it not trying to start (no starter motor action) and Yurek removed and rebuilt the starter motor, all the repair bits were available but not a whole starter motor. It was a cow of a job because on right hand drive Nivas the steering box is in the way, so he had to dismantle so much to get it out. Of course it still did the same, so the starter motor came out again and was re-re-built. Still no better. We asked to buy a whole new starter motor but they were not imported. Eventually I found the problem - part of the "Australianizing" of the cars, done when they arrived in Australia, included fitting a relay between the ignition switch and starter solenoid - to make it more reliable... The relay was a local Aussie addition, so wasn't mentioned in the repair manual. (Genuine factory manual.) It was up in an awkward spot behind the radio. It was an Australian made Bosch relay and had become dodgy - a new relay and all was well.
We got it to 135000 km and it was absolutely pampered, including being garaged at night and waxed every six months, but rust was breaking out everywhere and we were fixing things that had already been done a couple of years before, like the water pump. So my partner declared it had to go. We enjoyed it while we had it, but never again. Traded it in on a SB Barina which was a delightful car, another model that people say was an unreliable dud but ours was like new after 280000 km, and it was a gem to drive. We traded that in after about 12 years ownership on my partner's current car, the Skoda Fabia. The Barina would have been a great cheap car for somebody, but we checked up with VicRoads and it appears to have never gone back on the road after we traded it, it probably went to the wreckers because it had high km and the model had a bad reputation, but it was immaculate, mechanically perfect and had the full service history with it. A crying shame.
People rave about their reliable Toyotas but I have never driven one that I found remotely pleasant to drive.
I toy with the idea of buying some unloved model older car and a Skoda 120L is high on the maybe list. (It would have been a P76 but look at the price of those now...) All the worthless orphan oddballs I'd love are becoming valuable, bugger it.
Russell, I wonder if I saw that Lada you mentioned? I lived in North Melbourne for about 18 months in the 1980s. There was an importer there who dealt with Russian farm equipment (from vague memory), they had a beige/mustard coloured Lada in the showroom and I saw it on the road once or twice, possibly on trade plates? I can't remember now if that one was sedan or wagon, but it caught my eye. This was before Nivas were being sold here.
www.facebook.com
