Best new/used car test drive stories

[VTJUNK]

Alright, some stories in another thread got me thinking about this. Let's hear your best test drives of cars that you were considering buying, or were just driving for the hell of it.

A friend of mine wants to look at a new 95 VW Jetta. We go and take one out with the salesman riding in the back. After driving around town, taking some back roads, some highway type stuff, we head back, driving rather fast. The salesman is telling us about all the features, and how good these cars are, and I notice we are going down a hill that levels off quickly for a railroad crossing, then continues down hill. You would normally slow to about 20mph to cross this part of the road. We hit it at about 50. The car sailed down hill and bottomed out, rebounded into the air again, almost going off the road. He gathered it back up, and turned to go back the dealership. The salesman was white as a ghost, and didn't say a word. We got back, parked, got out, and my buddy says "I'll take one, just not this one" He bought one and put 340,000 miles on it before selling it.

[Huskinhano]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

Nothing quite as exciting about your story but mine was this. After many years of driving 4 cyl cars from the late 70's to the mid 80's, I went to look at a 85 5.0 5 speed LX hatchback in January of 86. Like a moth drawn to a fire I suddenly found all the torque I had been missing for years on that test drive :. The saleman was happy to get back. Yes I did buy it! ;D

[Schtauffer]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

My dad drives like the old grandpa he is. When I was growing up, he always frowned on "hot-rodding around" and the such (unless there was someone in front of him, then it was balls-to-the-wall in the passing zone with my mom smacking him and telling him to be a better example to us kids). Anyway, a couple months before my 16th birthday we went shopping for an S-10 for me. We test drove one (with him driving, of course, since I didn't have my license yet), and he flogged the thing. I said something about not thrashing it, and he told me, "When you test drive a car, you TEST it to make sure its not gonna fly apart after you buy it."

[BangShift McT]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

Heh-heh...oops.. ;D I knew I'd spill some of these stories sooner or later...

I'm one of those guys who likes to go teasing dealerships just to see what murder I can get away with. I've driven lots of cars, cars I knew damn well I could not/would not buy but wanted to test anyways just to say I did. Between I'd say 2000 and 2007 (last time) I've driven probably deep in the hundreds of cars just for the hell of it.

Best two stories:

1) When I got home from Iraq the first time I had my heart set on a new GTO. I still do, but I digress...anyways, I had a friend in a S. IL Pontiac/GMC dealership, and they had a badass black 6.0/6-speed with the different nose, scoops, wing, tail...car just made me a drooling idiot. He knew my story, knew I probably couldn't but managed to pry the keys and off we went. We disappeared about 15 miles out of town to a very isolated piece of farmland with him driving, he'd roll into it just to tease me up and I was sitting there like a teenage kid at a stripclub just before it gets good. We get to a four-way intersection, he pulls off and we swap seats. Now, I'm not an asshole on these kinds of drives, I'm a firm believer in "you break it, you buy it" and I didn't have $35,000 falling out of my 4th point of contact. But when he saw me bog off and start driving it, you know, sanely...well, I don't take kindly to being called a "pussy". So I did a 1-4 run and cooled off about 75. He rolls his eyes. So I U-turn, go back to the intersection, and just before I get there, ask him if he saw anything.

"Nope."

;D

Two 360*s followed by a tail-wagging run to 130. OH MY LAWD...when I got home later that day my dad wanted to know what orgy I had been attacked by (and where he could find it).

2) When my '99 Blazer's front spindles snapped, I had to make a hasty trade to not get stuck with a $8,000+ repair bill on a SUV I f'n hated anyways. Well, with my options, the choice came down to two vehicles: the '01 Ram 1500 5.9 and a '01 Camaro SS hardtop, 6-speed, black and red. They were within $25 in price. The testdrive loop for this dealership was up the road to the overpass, cross overpass to highway, get off two exits later and return to dealership. I babied it. On the onramp, the guy goes, "If you ain't gonna drive the car, let's just go back now." Bark first, bark second...I would have taken it home too, with one major hiccup: Best insurance quote I got was, no shit, $860/month. Roughly, an entire paycheck. I would still kill to have one of those, too...

[Gary 351C]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

One Friday afternoon in the summer of '81 I was driving around waiting for my friend to get off work. I decided to stop at the local Datsun dealer and look and see what they had sitting on their used car lot. Sitting in front of the showroom was a brand new tu-tone blue and silver 280-ZX Turbo....OOOH! While checking it out a salesman came over and asked if I wanted to test drive it, he didn't have to ask twice. Being only 17 I had never driven a turbocharged car before and even though it had an auto trans, when that turbo kicked in it was pretty cool!

Another cool one was the time me and my friend test drove a new Dodge Omni GLH Turbo, that thing hauled ass! For a four banger.

Strange thing though, growing up in Newport Beach Ca we had exotic car dealers from one end of town to the other. I never got up the nerve to go test drive anything REALLY fast like a Porsche, Ferrari or anything. I figured they'ed see me comin' a mile away and have to leave some kind of deposit or something.

[Ron Ward]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

In 1998, my then-wife and I were shopping for a new car. Not just any car, but a Dodge Stratus R/T with a 5-speed. It seems nobody here in Topeka wanted a manual trans car on the lot so we had to look in other towns. We found one in Leavenworth. Nice car, too. It was dark forest green metallic (a Mopar trademark, I guess) with tan leather and a sunroof. Anyway, the Mrs. is sitting in the back and the salesman is sitting up front with me. He says, "Let's see what it'll do." That was all the invitation I needed. I romped it hard in first, wound it up to about 6 grand and powershifted to second. The sound of the engine slamming against the firewall got the attention of all three of us in the car. I went ahead and banged 3rd with the same result. I tapered off, put it in 4th and told the salesman I was no longer interested in the car as I didn't want to have to deal with the broken engine mounts.

Ron

[bdbowti]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

I have way to many to even post lol. That used to be my favorite past time was scaring the crap out of dealers. That 1-2 and 2-3 powershift will usually turn the bravest of dealers into pasty white dudes with a death grip on the dash or grab bar lol. I have had dealers screaming from the back seat "boy i have a wife and two kids at home!!!!" Ahh the fun of youth i miss it so. One of the last cool dealer trips i took out a 90 ZR1 they had in the used car lot. I asked the salesman where the full power key was and he was like ??? i told him it turnos off extra injectors so you can give the car to a valet without them destroying it. He couldn't believe that a key would make it go faster. Well we pulled out and i was getting into it and around 4-4500rpm the car would just fall on its face. He still thoguht it was pretty fast though. Well when we got back the manager was coming up to the car and was like hey you forot the other key i was like OH YEAHHHH. Fired it back up and took off again this time where it would die off before it just took off and broke the tires loose and buried the tach in the red. Car was sideways i was bangin scond gear and made another run up to 7000rpm banged 3rd and let out. I look over at the dealer and was like now that's more like it. He was just sitting there motionless with this look of horror on his face and finally was like i think i need to cahnge my shorts lol!!!

[Schtauffer]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

Then there was the time my wife and I stopped at a local Dodge dealer to check out the new Chargers. The sales lady took us out in a Hemi R/T on this twisty narrow mountain road. The car had like 12 miles on it or something, so I took it pretty easy, not wanting to abuse a brand new car. Then my wife got behind the wheel. It wasn't a brand new car after that. I was scared, cuz my wife didn't really know the road very well. The sales lady in the back seat slid on the slick leather from one side to the other, and tried to act all cool like nothing happened. When we got back to the dealership, she put a tremendous amount of pressure on us to buy one, but couldn't come up with a good enough deal for me.

[VTJUNK]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

I've had two transmissions go while I was test driving. One was a 97 Cobra, ran it hard through the gears a few times, turned around, took off in first, went to grab second, The shifter would not come out of first. Drove it back 4 miles in first gear.

Second one was a used car, 86 Mustang GT. Somehow managed to lose second gear. I wasn't even beating on it.....Yet. Brought it back and told the dealer what happened. The guy was pissed, said he drove it right before I did and there was nothing wrong with it. Yeah right, he was the one who probably broke it. He sold it that way, never fixed it. The kid that drove it thought he was the baddest thing ever. We used to mess with him, we knew he didn't have second gear.

[Huskinhano]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

Slightly off topic and don't mean to hijack the thread but still somewhat on the topic of test driving a car at the dealer ship. It was a story a few years ago at a Ford dealership where a mechanic posted on a Mustang forum where he told how he took out a customer's Cobra Mustang. He went on to explain how he totally abused the car and made fun of the woman who owned it as well. Little did he know to the woman belong to the same forum but also read the post and recognized the dealership. It was all over the net. I believe the mechanic lost his job as well.

[CJTORINO]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

years and years ago, a friend and I went to check out a used '69 GTX for 1500.00
wasnt too bad a car, had some dings and doinks,
but it was an original drivetrain car, still had the 440 super commando/ 727 auto.
The interior was in okay shape, and I thought I could fix what ailed the body easy enough.
I asked the guy to start it up, and it turned over and caught pretty quick, no smoke, no unusual noises, so we all hop in and take it for a spin, with me driving.
it drove okay, shifted fine, and accelerated right up to about a hundred,
thats when the owner decided to tell me the brakes were shot.
as we headed for a sharp, 10 mph right turn.
with some pumping on the pedal and some creative down shifting,
we made the turn, tires squealing and body leaning.
I was pretty mad. and passed on an otherwise nice GTX.
my friend still talks about that test drive. must have made an impression on him.

[Scott Liggett]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

When I was 17 I fell in love with this 71 Pontiac Catalina that was hot rodded with a 455 that was sitting in a used car lot. It was jacked up, had chrome rims, and side exit dual exhaust. Looking back it was definitely kid owned by the way it was set up (The six spring separaters in each of the rear springs is one example). It was charcoal gray with black interior and had about four layers of window tint that made looking out like seeing under water.

Dad went with me to test drive it. He told the salesman riding with us that he wanted to see how it went through the gears under throttle. He mashed the pedal from a dead stop and the car went sideways as the tires went up in smoke. He feathered the gas to get traction then mashed it again once it hooked. The car lost traction again when it hit second, squealing the tires again. He kept in it until it hit third gear and it chirped the tires again. Dad said hold on when he decided to see how good the brakes were by smashing the brake pedal and letting go of the steering wheel as he did. The car did stop straight.

Up to this point, I have never seen my Dad drive any other than an old lady on the way to bingo. I was impressed that he really could drive when he wanted to. As for the car, that drive proved to my Dad that a 17 year old shouldn't have it. It proved to me that I wanted even more to the point that I got two horrible jobs that summer so I could buy it. Dad spent all summer trying to talk me out of it. He couldn't do it. I even wanted to give up going to Europe for a month for vacation with the family so I could continue making money to buy. To make things worse, I drove by it going to and from my night job busing tables at Anthony's Restaurant in Omaha. Every night on the way home from work, I'd stop and get out of the car and just walk around it in the lot. Dad finally relented and agreed to help me get it if it was there when we got back from Europe. It wasn't there when we got back.

20 years later, if I find another one, I'd probably buy it right then and there.

[KeithTurk]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

Back when I was in the Army one of the instructors that worked for me had his family coming into town for the weekend.... and he told me he was going to pick them up at the airport... Since he only had a 928 Porsche and a Toyota pick up ... I asked " Just exactly how are you going to do that"

His answer was simple... "You drive into the Chevy Dealer... inquire about that new Impala SS you've been wanting... Offer to leave your Porsche for collateral and tell them you really want to keep it for the weekend so Your wife can tell if she likes it too..."

I saw the guy do this 3 or 4 times over the years.... No kidding... ( obviously rotating brands of cars as he went)

Keith

[TheSilverBuick]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

After working at two different new car dealerships the allure of driving a "new" car simply because it's new doesn't often do anything for me. But I remembered this one just because I thought it was/is a classic Ford/Chevy rivalry.

When I worked at a Ford Dealership we had an LT-1 powered '97 Camaro traded in, had about 80,000 miles on the clock. Thing ran as good as the day it rolled off the assembly line. So my job as a sales porter was to clean, wash and gas the cars when they sold or as necessary. One day me and another sales porter were arguing over which was quicker, that '97 Camaro or a brand new '02 Mustang GT with the 4.6L. I was on the Camaro side. Well one day the perfect opportunity came up, for what ever reason we were handed tickets to put fuel into the Camaro AND a brand new Mustang (not because they sold, just because they were low) and the gas station was a few blocks away... He hopped into the mustang which had a 5-speed (which his personal car was a claimed 11sec Civic so he knew how to drive a stick) and I got the Camaro with an Auto Trans. We lined up four times and the Camaro walked away from the Mustang each time, the last two times I eased off it until his front bumper would line up with my door and lay into it again to start creeping away. I got a pretty good laugh out of it telling him the new Camaro LS engines were even better and Ford has a lot of catching up to do :P That's still my stance today, but I prefer Firebirds.

[VTJUNK]

Re: Best new/used car test drive stories

Hey Rebel, I had a 70 Catalina 2 dr hardtop with a 400 in it. Grandparents gave it to me as a graduation present. It was a AZ car (no rust) and Gramps had it painted and the interior redone before I got it. It was a great car, fully loaded with power everything. I don't have it anymore, blew up the engine and it sat for a while before I sold it to a guy who had a thing for 70 Pontiacs.