The Tank Chronicles Chapter 1

Would you buy a car that reminds you of this?
(July 5, 2009 - Source: Hamish Blair/Getty Images Europe)

French cars: they’re meant to be stylish, temperamental, loaded with personality and - dare I say it? - je ne sais qoui, aren’t they? You kind of expect a french car to give you wow and worry in equal measure.

The Swedes, on the other hand have  a coolness about them, a calm, even temperament. Less overt but steady and reliable. And even if a Swedish car were to expire after many years of trustworthy service, you’d expect her to do so quietly, with dignity and with little fuss.

I guess if I were to use Tennis as an example, I would think of a French Car as Henri Leconte - talented, unpredictable, occasionally making you laugh. And the Swedes, well take your pick from Bjorn Borg, Stefan Edberg, Mats Wilander…generally steady and unflappable chaps who do very well and who rarely let you down.

So, when I was contemplating a replacement for the Honda Airwave I’d run happily for 8 years, I narrowed the list down to two estate candidates - a Nissan AD Resort and a Citroen ZX Wagon. The former would be no-frills, plasticky but generally easy to fix. The latter would be a little more striking and recognisable, and being the less complex model in Citroen’s lineup, probably easy to maintain too.

I trawled through Mudah.my and sought opinions on the Citroen and generally had my mind set on the French car. I even viewed one which looked good on the screen but turned out to need far too much work in real life. Peeling paint, torn interior, mechanical issues… I walked away. The price was good so I became quite confident I could find something I liked under RM10,000.

Visits to used car dealers didn’t yield much - an AD Resort that refused to start, and a ZX that looked good but needed minor work. I quite liked the latter and asked a mechanic contact to view the car and assess it so I could make an offer but 3 days of stormy weather were his excuse for not going so I never managed to get back to the dealer on that. Then one day in Selayang, I met a dealer who drove up in an old Volvo 240 GL. It looked good propped up high on large 18” wheels. The paint was rather distressed (which we thought was intentional) but the interior looked fine and the engine sounded smooth. It was his personal car and we chatted for almost an hour about cars. He showed me a couple of pictures of AD Resorts that had been done up - 300hp in a 25-year old Japanese tinbox? OK that one had Wow! - but were out of my budget.

I won't show pictures of the engine and interior, but must admit the owner had done a marvellous job with this car.  This particular one had no price but the one below was looking for a new owner at about RM14k.

Adry was enthusiastic though and over the next two days he continued to send me pictures of AD Resorts in varying states of repair. We narrowed the possibilities down to 2 models and I made arrangements to have a look at them.

In the meantime, I came across a ZX that looked beautiful on screen. A shiny blue (Subaru blue lah, not Barisan Nasional blue, as the owner eventually told me), it looked the part at just over RM10,000. I made an appointment to view the car.

About the same time, Adry sent me a picture that was to change my whole direction - an old Volvo 245 Wagon. A car that was pushing 30 years old - a good 12 more than the blue ZX - but which looked in good nick. So suddenly, I had a whole new option - the first Swedish car I’d ever considered owning.

The more I thought of the Swede the more I liked it. The car would not just be conveyance, it would also be the platform to advertise the new ‘thing’ we’d be doing in Balik Pulau in Penang and I figured the Volvo would have the recall factor and visibility.

I eventually did get to see and test-drive both cars. The ZX was really pay-and-drive as it needed no work whatsoever. It was a truly beautiful and beautifully kept example of the ZX. The owner was even going to change the front suspension bushes as he didn’t like the ride. The Volvo, on the other hand, had rough edges which needed work. Quite a bit of small and minor things - missing wipers, an aircon fan switch that didn’t work, a speedo that also didn’t operate, and so on.

This picture from Mudah really was how the car turned out to when I eventually saw it, as my pictures below show.

This was perhaps the most difficult decision I had to make and I agonised over it for a few days. I gave myself a final deadline, had two looks at each car, even went to the extent of measuring the boot floor-to-ceiling height to see if my bikes would fit inside.

The photo that started it all. Though this wasn't the actual car that became The Tank. This was an even older unit which was in very bad shape though the pictures didn't show it. I did like the rims in the picture but am very happy with the ones on The Tank.

The Tank on the morning I paid for her.

The comparison list was long but it ultimately could be summarised, most amazingly, thus:

“The French car would be the rational choice and the Swede would be the emotive one.”

Besides the image of the Volvo, I was also more confident she would get the right sort of attention because the workshop just across the road from Pedal Inn was a Volvo specialist. I’d sent my Honda there for some attention and they had done a decent job so I was not concerned about maintenance.

So, after not-sleeping on it (I really did spend a restless night or two) I finally opted for the Volvo. When I picked her up I found that none of the work had been done so we spent an afternoon at a workshop getting some things sorted out.

The next day I put new shoes on the old girl which I was now affectionately calling The Tank. Although the tyres on her still had ample tread, I always change the tyres on cars I buy as they’re the only contact patch with the road and you never know what damage may have been inflicted on them by the previous owner - kerbed wheels can be damaged internally and could blow out at speed.

Pian the mechanic at Gombak who fixed up a few things and did a wonderful job. Warm and kind-hearted bloke to boot. Let me know if you'd like to send your car to him in Gombak.

The guys at Soon Loong along Jalan Penchala in Petaling Jaya put new shoes on The Tank. They do a great job at a great price. 

So here I am now, the owner of a Swedish car for the first time in my life. Read more about her in the next few chapters. I’ll talk about the fan switch that didn’t work but wasn’t broken, the wipers that didn’t work but weren’t broken and the horn that didn’t work but wasn’t broken…