2026 Car Predictions! | The Car Podcast #69
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Car
Caterham 7
The Caterham 7 is a small, light sports car that is very fun to drive. It's known for being simple and focused on performance, making it a favorite among driving enthusiasts.
Car
Volkswagen Beetle 1976
The Volkswagen Beetle is a famous car with a unique round shape. The 1976 model is one of the last versions of this classic design, which many people love for its history and charm.
Car
Land Rover Defender
The Land Rover Defender is a tough SUV that can handle rough terrains and is great for outdoor activities. It's known for its unique look and strong build.
Car
Volvo 244 DL
The Volvo 244 DL is a car known for being very reliable and good in winter conditions. It heats up quickly, which helps keep the windows clear of fog.
Term
engine size
Engine size is how big the engine is. Smaller engines can get warm faster than bigger ones because they have less space to heat up.
Car
Porsche 911S
The Porsche 911 is a famous sports car that has been around for a long time. It's known for being fun to drive and has a unique shape that many people recognize.
Car
Volvo 850
The Volvo 850 is a car made by the Swedish company Volvo. It was popular in the 1990s and is known for being safe and practical, especially as a station wagon.
Car
Volkswagen Id Buzz
The ID. Buzz is a new electric van from Volkswagen that looks like the old VW buses. It's designed to be eco-friendly and has a lot of modern technology.
Term
EV
An EV, or electric vehicle, is a type of car that runs on electricity instead of gasoline. They are better for the environment because they don't produce exhaust fumes.
Term
pre-heater
A pre-heater warms up your car's engine or inside before you start driving, which is especially useful in cold weather. It helps the car run better and keeps you comfortable.
Car
BMW i3
The BMW i3 is a small electric car designed for city driving. It's made with eco-friendly materials and has some cool tech features.
Company
Clifford
Clifford makes car alarms that help protect your vehicle. Some of their alarms can even start your car remotely and keep it warm while you're away.
Car
Audi A8
The Audi A8 is a large, luxury car that offers a lot of comfort and high-tech features. It's designed for people who want a very nice driving experience.
Car
Ferrari F355
The Ferrari F355 is a sports car made by Ferrari in the 1990s. It's famous for being fast and stylish, and many people think it will become even more valuable over time.
Car
John Cooper Works
The John Cooper Works is a special version of the Mini Cooper that is made for better performance and racing. It's named after a famous car designer who helped make the Mini popular in racing.
Brand
Pagani
Pagani is a brand that makes very expensive and fast sports cars. They are known for their special designs and are made in small quantities, making them very rare.
Car
Jaguar Ftype
The Jaguar F-Type is a stylish sports car that is fun to drive. It comes in different versions, including a hardtop and a convertible, and has powerful engines that make it fast.
Term
horsepower
Horsepower is a way to measure how powerful an engine is. The higher the horsepower, the faster and stronger the car can be.
Term
supercharged engine
A supercharged engine is one that has a special device to push extra air into it, which helps it make more power. This makes the car go faster than regular engines.
Car
TVR P450
The TVR P450 is a sports car made by a British company called TVR. It's known for being fast and having a powerful engine that helps it go quickly.
Term
two-wheel drive
Two-wheel drive means that only two of the car's wheels get power from the engine. This can help the car use less fuel and be lighter than cars that use all four wheels.
Term
four-wheel drive
Four-wheel drive means that all four wheels of the car get power from the engine. This helps the car grip the road better, especially in bad weather or off-road.
Car
Jaguar Ftype Convertible
The Jaguar F-Type Convertible is a beautiful sports car that you can drive with the top down. It's known for being fast and fun to drive.
Car
Jaguar Fpace
The Jaguar F-Pace is a stylish SUV that has a lot of room inside for passengers and their belongings. It's known for being fun to drive and looking good.
Term
V8
A V8 engine has eight cylinders arranged in a V shape. It's known for producing a lot of power, which is why it's often used in high-performance cars.
Term
V6
A V6 engine has six cylinders arranged in a V shape. It's known for providing a good mix of power and fuel efficiency, which is why many cars use it.
Company
Alpina
Alpina is a company that takes BMW cars and makes them even better by improving their performance and luxury features. They create special versions of BMWs that stand out from the regular ones.
Car
Alpine 110
The Alpine A110 is a small, sporty car that is very light and fun to drive. It has a unique look and is great for driving on winding roads.
Car
Ferrari 360
The Ferrari 360 is another sports car from Ferrari that came after the 355. It has better performance and newer technology, which makes it popular.
Car
Ferrari 355
The Ferrari 355 is a sports car made by Ferrari that was popular in the 1990s. It's known for being fast and stylish, and many car lovers admire it.
Term
993
The 993 is a version of the Porsche 911 that was made in the late 1990s. It's famous for its design and is loved by many car fans.
Term
996
The 996 is another version of the Porsche 911 that came out after the 993. It introduced new designs and features to the 911 lineup.
Car
Ferrari 456
The Ferrari 456 is a luxury sports car made by Ferrari. It has a stylish look and a strong engine, which makes it popular among car lovers.
Term
synchro
A synchro helps your car change gears smoothly when you're driving a manual transmission. It makes sure the gears are moving at the right speed so they can fit together easily.
Term
Euro 6 compliant
Euro 6 is a rule in Europe that makes sure cars don't pollute the air too much. If a car is Euro 6 compliant, it means it meets these strict pollution limits.
Car
Audi RS3
The Audi RS3 is a fast and sporty version of the regular Audi A3. It's known for being fun to drive while still having a nice interior.
Car
Porsche 911 GT3
The Porsche 911 GT3 is a super-fast version of the 911 sports car that is built for racing but can also be driven on regular roads. It has special features that make it handle better and go faster.
Car
BMW M3
The BMW M3 is a sportier version of the regular BMW 3 Series, designed to be faster and more fun to drive. Many people love it for its power and how it feels on the road.
Car
BMW E92
The BMW 3 Series is a small luxury car that many people like for its comfortable ride and stylish design. It's a good choice for everyday driving and has a reputation for being fun to drive.
Car
BMW M5
Car
BMW E28
The BMW 5 Series is a larger luxury car that offers a comfortable ride and lots of features. It's great for people who want a nice car for work or family trips.
Car
Lancia Lambda
The Lancia Lambda is an old car from the 1920s that was special because it was built differently than most cars at the time. It helped change how cars were made.
Car
Lotus Exige
The Lotus Exige 410 Sport is a very light and fast sports car that is built for racing. It's designed to be super fun to drive on the track.
Car
Lotus Elise
The Lotus Elise is a small, very light sports car that is really fun to drive. It doesn't have a lot of extra features, but it's built for people who love the experience of driving.
Car
Volkswagen Golf GTI
The Volkswagen Golf GTI is a sportier version of the regular Golf car. It's fun to drive and has a lot of space for passengers and cargo, making it a great everyday car.
Car
Volkswagen Golf
The Volkswagen Golf is a small car that is very popular because it's reliable and easy to drive. It has a good amount of space inside for passengers and their things.
Car
Aston Martin DB5
The Aston Martin DB5 is a very famous and stylish sports car that was used by James Bond in movies. It's known for being luxurious and fast.
Car
Bmw X5
The BMW X5 is a fancy SUV that has a lot of room inside for people and their stuff. It's known for being comfortable and having nice features.
Car
Mercedes-Benz 190E
The Mercedes-Benz 190E is a small luxury car from the 80s and 90s that many people still like today. It's known for being well-built and lasting a long time.
Car
Aston Martin V12 Vantage
The Aston Martin V12 Vantage is a fancy sports car that has a really powerful engine. It's known for being beautiful and exciting to drive.
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Hello, and welcome to the Car Podcast with Chris Harris and his friends being recorded
just before the first full working day of 2026.
Because none of you really worked last Friday, did you?
This is episode number, what shall I say, Numero Swassant Nof.
Work that one out for yourselves.
Fa-na, fa-na.
But it is 1 before 70.
I won't bring myself to say it, because Chris Cooper will melt, because he finds it so funny.
He's been sending us all sorts of weird images this week to celebrate it.
Quite shocking, actually.
That's a lie, that's a lie.
He's gone a sort of puse colour, it's quite interesting.
I'm slightly hot under the collar now, yeah.
Okay, let's start with something that's pertinent to this time of year,
but not to Neil Clifford, who's currently sitting in the warm, sunny climbs of Melbourne.
The rest of us are freezing our cojones off in the UK at the moment.
Chris Harris, sorry, Chris Cooper modelling the Chris Harris on Cars Gile, which can be bought.
From where?
Shopify, is it?
Shopify.
Mr. Producer.
Very good little garbances, Shopify.
ChrisHarrisonCars.com, I'm told by our producer.
So let's start off with what's the car with the best heater?
Heater.
Old fashioned word for HVAC, whatever you want to call it.
Let's start with Chris Cooper.
Well, it's very apesite, because it's fricking cold in the UK here.
UK is actually quite a cool country, I know we had a nice summer last year in the UK.
Other countries have lots of seasons, we seem to have two now.
Do you remember when we were littler? Neil and I might remember this.
But the advert came back, about 2019 as well,
for the Buwek for cereal called ready-break.
And the advert for ready-break was pictures in the 80s when Neil and I were at school
of children going to-
That mannish is old as well.
I'm old.
You've seen it as well.
Kids going to school, normal everyday British scene.
And the kid that had ready-break for breakfast had this sort of red warm little glow
around them, all the way around them, and looking happier than the kids who didn't have ready-break.
To me, car heaters should make you feel like the ready-break commercial.
It's as simple as that.
What's got the best heater?
It used to be the old London taxi.
Remember those London taxis?
Where you get in the back, and somebody had been smoking in the days when you could smoke,
and the wind has all been down, and it was freezing as Freddy frostbite.
And you just whack on the heater.
It had three settings, hot, very hot, and seventh level of Dante's hell.
And within seconds, the whole of the back of the cab would be nice and tasty.
So when Caterham were looking for a heater for the Caterham 7,
they put London taxi heaters in them.
And it would make a Caterham 7.
I had a first had a Caterham 7 road car in 1995.
And at the time, it's sort of my only usable road car.
So I'd have to go everywhere in it in the winter as well.
But with the London taxi heater going Harry Flatters in the footwell of the Caterham,
then I reckon that was the best heater in the car.
So if ready-break did cars and heaters, it would be a Caterham 7.
That's the best car heater.
Very interesting. The one I had wouldn't warm my feet.
But there we go. I must have had a different heater in it.
No clippard.
Cars were just always better in the olden days, weren't they?
I mean, heaters were better.
We're becoming a bit sort of predictably old farty.
But actually, new cars are very good.
We're going to come to that on another podcast, I think.
I think it's all about the old...
I don't know why. Is it an environmental thing?
Have they changed the way heaters have been designed and developed
and manufactured to improve the climate?
Wonder whether it's because somebody will tell us this.
When a car is warming up, the emissions and the environment
are best served by the car engine heating up first.
Yes, I think it is that.
So it's burning fuel properly.
So only once the car engine is sort of heated up,
I think, does it allow your tootsies to start getting warmer,
which is why I think you might be right.
Because there was sort of...
Well, I'll get to the chase.
I bought a year or two ago a one-owner Volkswagen Beetle 1976.
And this car had been...
I was on the second owner and there's a book.
There's a tiny little notebook with every single service,
every single journey, every single fill-up of petrol for this car since new.
It's an amazing thing.
Absolutely fucking pointless to own this car,
apart from the fact that it's an amazing little vehicle.
If you start that up, put the heater on.
Within two minutes, you are absolutely like a lobster
being boiled in a pot of hot water.
It's amazing.
And the best judge of heaters, I think, are wives.
Wives are the experts, or partners, let's say, partners, partners.
My wife loves anything lovely and hot in a car.
Heated seats, heated steering wheel,
heated armrests, as we talked about last week.
And she always says, why can't cars get hot anymore?
You know, we're driving around, actually,
this lovely defender, new defender.
You can't really get it that hot to the point
where it's sort of ridiculously hot.
In the end, it warms up so it's okay.
But we were used to that almost suffocating hot in the 70s and 80s.
You almost can't get that anymore.
So I think it's called Progress Neal.
It probably is, but it's a shame, really,
because we've lost, particularly when you can have the sunroof open.
You know, one of the best things of the 80s and 90s
was sunroof open, heater on.
Does it really work as nice and toasty anymore, does it?
There must be a technical reason why this has happened.
Managed thoughts.
My first thought was that driving with the heater on in a catering
or with your sunroof open is like all of these shops
with their doors open in the winter,
blasting out heat into the pavements.
I'm not convinced it's a terribly green thing to do,
but I think there is an absolute, my childhood winner.
And I completely agree.
The observation is that 30, 40 years ago,
cars heated up much more quickly and they got hotter.
I completely agree with that.
And I think there's an absolute winner to this.
It's the Volvo 244DL.
You've never seen a car that heats up as fast
and demists as quickly as this car.
My dad was a GP, his partner had a 244DL.
It was a 244DL estate.
And my God, that car was superb in the winter.
It was just a killer.
You'd get in it leather.
So that was always rather incredible in the early 80s.
Leather seat.
He had a 244DL with leather seats.
He did.
Wow.
That's posh.
I mean, this was luxury.
It was just incredible.
Was it the America or the UK?
This isn't the UK.
UK in basing stoke.
I love that car.
It's just a super car.
And then you got into this thing.
Was it going to play in Spanish?
I'm sorry?
Can you remember?
Can you remember the registration plate?
I don't remember the registration plate.
Oh, for fuck's sake.
It would have been registered, I think, 1981, 81, 82, something like that.
On a W?
Yes.
On a W, yes.
Probably a W.
Very good.
Duran Duran's first hit, W.
So this thing, you could get in the middle of winter, pull the door shut.
Honestly, he turned the ignition on, bang, baking hot inside.
And it could be misted to the eyeballs.
And it was just completely clear glass.
Fantastic car.
The Swedes really knew how to get a car going from freezing cold to a sauna in four seconds.
The quality of the buttons in that car have almost never been surpassed.
Yeah.
Strong.
So I do remember what I wouldn't normally do here, because I'm trying to think of cars
in my experience that heat up really quickly.
Well, if you've got good heated seats, it doesn't really matter as much.
And most of the cars I've driven in the last 10 years have heated seats.
I'm spoiled like that.
So I thought, I'd Google what car heats up the fastest.
It's not the question that was being asked, but it seems to be implicit in the point of agenda was,
because the heat is a heater.
It's not a question of, you're not going, oh, that's a nicer heat than the other heat.
It's all just heat, isn't it?
So really, the most important thing is heating up.
Sure about that.
Well, yes, there are ways of the heat being distributed throughout the cabin,
but I don't think you feel different harshness really.
You can control that.
So first thing that came up, which irritated me slightly was that there was a piston head thread.
I thought, I don't want to give pH.
We give pH too much airtime.
I love them, but we give them too much airtime.
Your love's going on there.
It was soaking up his love.
Yeah, frankly, I do.
No, no, no.
I know, I like to, I like to, I like to, I,
it's where I started, piston heads.
I like it.
Yeah, I love it.
I love the forum.
So I, but actually, you know, I'm being sarcastic.
We love, we love all things pH.
And it was a thread from about 15 years ago where some guy goes, it was a great question.
It said, I've got to drive, I've got a new job and I have to drive to the station.
I think it is, and it's only five minute drive away.
What car should I drive that heats up the quickest on the way to the station?
Standard pH.
I think it was a genuine question, but there was a somen,
so much sarcasm in the early answers that involved coat, hat, all the other stuff
that was totally unhelpful.
But what struck me was a several, it started, I just couldn't give you the whole thing,
it was a long thread, people, people started to ask the question,
which you wanted to hear was, does a big engine car heat up quicker than a small engine car?
And the answer is, for the most part, it seemed small engine cars heat up quicker.
For the simple reason that they generate a lot of heat,
just as quickly as a big engine car, but their radiators have far less liquid in that
needs to warm up to get the heater matrix warm.
Yeah, so the liquid has got to move in a smaller journey around.
So actually, smaller engine cars seem to be better at this, the bigger engine cars,
and newer cars are worse at it, because as Chris Cooper rightly pointed out,
the startup phase of a modern car is the one that's really scrutinized
by the people that test for emissions.
So there's lots going on.
Fans are trying to dilute stuff.
I mean, maybe.
That's not so much now, but there's lots going on.
And the priority, and the priority isn't so much keeping your turkeys warm
as keeping the emissions police happy.
So all of this goes out the window for me, because I've had lots of small engine cars,
some of which always warmed up well.
I've never had a Porsche that warmed up as far as I wanted it to.
So the Beatles are real.
That's a really good piece of knowledge for me, because most 911s,
they're called 911s, were a struggle.
And of course, the early ones, you've got all those freaking levers,
and you've got the dashboard bit where you never quite know where you're sitting in the...
Impossible, impossible.
You just sort of leave it there and hope you don't get a fly in your eyeball.
But I think, actually, Manish is right.
The best car I ever owned for this was made by a Swedish company,
because they just know what they're doing.
And it was an 850 estate car.
It was diesels, and diesels shouldn't warm up as quick as petrol's anyway.
And it was just great.
And with the combination of the heated seat and the heater,
it was just fantastic in the winter.
There's a reason why they know how to keep turkeys and bottom warm up there.
So for me, it's a diesel.
And anyone that works in the car industry
that knows more about this stuff than me, please come on the comments
and disprove all the stuff I said there,
because I'm not saying it's factually correct.
I'm just putting two and two together.
There's a cheating answer.
Go on.
I just sort of reminded of it this morning.
Keith, who works in the farm, has gone away for a few days.
And his ID buzz, it's just outside the office here.
And I moved it this morning, where everything's completely Arctic.
It must have been at least minus one.
And I moved it literally five feet.
But within half a wheel turn, it was pumping out hot air.
Ah, that's the EV.
Because it doesn't have an engine.
It doesn't have a water jacket or coolant you're trying to heat up.
It's just got, it's had to resort to what your granny would have had.
You know, a two-bar fire plugged into the mains
or whatever the EV version that is.
So it goes straight away.
I have to say, when I got that this morning, I thought, that's quite good.
That's sort of the answer.
I think the pre-heater thing is a thing that we,
I mean, all cars should have that, shouldn't they?
Particularly for the UK, they do now.
The only problem is with it is it's all too complicated, isn't it?
Because you've got to set the timer and you've got, you just want a button.
And actually the i3 has it, or you've got that little triangular button
that you can set to do a certain thing.
And the clever people wisely have set that to do the pre-heating.
So you can just press one button and the car will be warm
when you go outside in 20 minutes.
That is a really cool feature that.
Yeah, I agree.
That stuff's been around for much longer than we realize as well.
People that lived in really cold climates, Canadians, Russians.
I remember going, first time I went to Moscow, O2, I think it was,
I was amazed at how sophisticated the pre-heating stuff was.
You know, you had a Clifford car alarm,
one button did your garage door, the other one started the car up
but kept the doors locked and it all warmed up.
It's been around for quite a long time,
but the EV really does help with that.
What was the first car to have a solar powered sunroof
to keep it cool when you were away from it?
Was it the Honda Insight thing?
It was the Audi A8.
No.
Wow, that's clever.
Right, let's move on.
Now this is good, this is speculative.
Car that will go up in value in 2026, 2026, nothing silly.
I don't know who wrote brackets, nothing silly.
This podcast is supposed to encourage silly things.
I ask all three of you to ignore nothing silly
and if you want to say something silly, feel free to.
Let's go first to Manish.
Okay, so my silly one, I think a Ferrari F355,
I think if you get a very nice minty one,
I think that that is going to go up in value,
not just this year, but I think in future years.
I think the classic Ferrari, that's the first of them
and I think that's the one.
And for my not silly, I think of a Mini Cooper,
the 2.0-litre, the Cooper Works.
I think you can get those for not crazy sums
that don't have crazy miles on them that are beautifully specced.
I don't mean the yes, I mean the John Cooper.
I can see those becoming quite collectible actually.
They're very beautiful cars,
they're going to be pretty indestructible too.
They would be my two punts for 26 actually and on.
So I was the one who suggested nothing silly.
In a slightly unforced moment of defensiveness on my part,
what I sort of meant by that was, you know,
Pagani who, I mean, yeah, that's all the plutocrats stuff.
I was thinking stuff that we might, well, at least,
that's the left-hand side of our chart,
managed me might be thinking of in the next few months.
I reckon it's a number of Jaguars.
I reckon the Jaguar F-Type is going to be a really good winter buy
and by spring and summer end of the year,
I've thought of all the notes that are happening
because I've been looking for one.
I've been looking for, I've actually been looking for two.
Well, the same thing, but two different answers.
One is one of the original VAS from like 10, 12 years ago
when they first came out when it really was a TVR
with an automatic gearbox.
And then right at the end, they did a really subtle thing
which is, we're going to come back to this another time,
which is the, is less horsepower actually better for the next car.
They did a P450, which was the five-liter supercharged engine
they'd had forever, but not with 520 or 590, 450 horsepower.
It was a two-wheel drive version.
They did a four-wheel drive version,
which I kind of think is not really what I'm interested in
because it's heavier and more complex and so forth.
And it won't take it out on horrible days.
And so I've been looking for a P450 F-type convertible
and they've all gone.
And the ones that are there,
looking like they're already more than they were this time last year.
So I reckon for lots of reasons, F-Pace as well,
that was always quite a good car.
I picked the convertible one for a two-car garage a couple of weeks ago.
I think they are, I think they're whopping cars,
the rear-wheel drive 450, whopping car.
Good car.
That's what I do.
I think that's a fair point.
No Clifford.
I think it's hard to stray away too far from Jaguar, isn't it?
And F-type.
Actually, the thinking man's one.
Isn't that the V6, not the V8?
I thought about that.
The V6 has got a terribly shouty when it starts up.
It's got that massive bark and I think the V8 ones are rather lovely.
I know they've got a bit too much going on
and the less power is a good thing,
but actually the four-wheel drive one is a weapon.
Yeah, it's a good car then.
I think the good thing about the fact that new cars are not as good
is suddenly all the old cars,
which are literally like a quarter of the price of the new cars,
are all so much better, aren't they?
Pretty, that F-type is a gorgeous looking car.
I had a list of, yeah, I had, I mean maybe,
and we have to stay positive, maybe BMW,
I'm sure BMW are going to do a brilliant job with Alpina,
but maybe Alpina as an investment.
I don't think you can get too far away from that.
Jaguar I had, and of course they're not making the Alpine 110 anymore.
That's more of a long-term hunt, I think, the Alpine 110,
but in the end, and I'm going to agree with Manish,
but not agree with Manish,
the thinking man's 355 is a 360.
They made so many more of those, Neil,
that was the only thing, so many more.
360 is the 355.
That's because they're better and more people like them.
I think that's, I think it's the world have more money.
I think it's a similar analogy to 993 into 996,
and we're talking about investment or money,
cars that are going to go up in price,
and I think the 355, my view is, it's already done that.
It's already a bit frothy, the 355,
where I think 360, because it sits in the shadow of 355,
and it's a better car, like a 996 is a better car than 993,
maybe less emotional, less historic,
but it doesn't have that move from air-cooled to water-cooled
and all that drama, it's fundamentally a better car.
I think better looking.
So I would go 355, sorry.
Do you think the 360 is better looking?
The 360 is better looking.
I do, I actually, I'm not taking the piss,
I'm not being clickbait here, I'm not being Daily Mail,
I'm actually, I do actually think it's an incredibly pretty car, 360.
No, no, no, no, you did not answer the question.
Do you think it's better looking than a 355?
Yes, it's been consistent about that, Chris.
Neil has been very, very consistent about the 360.
It's interesting you say that, I saw, there was,
didn't somebody, one of the dealers that you frequent, Neil,
which is all of them, but one of them, I'm sure over Christmas,
had a little thing on social media, was it a 360 Stradale with a manual gearbox?
Well, DK have had a few of those.
That must have been one of theirs.
And I looked at this and it was, it had those beautiful challenge wheels,
which always make a big difference.
There's no fraud, they look, they don't help those wheels.
And I thought that's actually quite a nice looking car.
And I suppose it was a fabulous looking car, I think.
I can sort it, and almost a 355, it's,
there's a bit about that, which is, I bought too many Snickers bars
to put an emergency placement in the car, and I've had many Snickers that I want.
I actually think it is a better looking car.
Yeah, I do, I do actually, I think the dash is nicer.
I think the back is as good.
I think the front, I think the front is better.
I think the side profile is lovely.
And it's 50 grand.
You can go get yourself in a manual 360 for just over 50 grand.
Can you?
That's a winner.
What?
I don't think you're buying a good manual 360 for 50 grand.
It doesn't last that long on this car.
You used the word good there, I didn't.
Yeah, there is one on car and classic, and I'm like, I've found it, the 50 grand 360,
and then you read it all, and often it says manual in the beginning,
and then you look at the photos, and the gear knob is about that big,
and it's not really a manual at all.
But I think probably 55, 60, you can get one.
I know we don't like being negative, but you're just reminding me of something
we do need to discuss at some point.
What's the most irritating thing you can discover in an advert in a car?
It turns out not to be true, and it's when they say manual,
you go to the interior pictures.
Yeah, I hate that.
There's a lot of that.
Could you imagine anyone that you know who was looking for a 456 manual for two years?
And can it be coming across that one?
456 manual, really?
No, just kidding.
I've been to see stuff where I've been a bit lazy, and it just said manual,
and I'll go, I've just driven all the way here.
That's not as you described it.
It's a bit different.
Well, this is fascinating to see, so I actually was lucky enough to spend time
in what must be one of the best 360 manuals on the planet.
It was part of that RM sale in Zurich that I did a video on probably in September,
and a friend of mine bought it.
It's in a very dark metallic red.
It's probably called Rosso Not Racing Red or something.
It's a manual with a very dark beige interior.
It's not done many miles, and it's mint.
None of the plastic comes off on your hands.
And I drove around in it for a few days.
It's absolutely lovely to drive.
It's got really lovely control weights.
I remember that, the clutch is easy.
The great thing is the gear shift is good, but it doesn't take seven hours to warm up.
Some of the old cars, we've got to start it in a second,
and then watch out for that, snagging that synchro when you go second to third, all the stuff.
But, you know, as an object of beauty, it's not a bad piece of work,
but anyone that tried to say that was better looking than a 355 needs lobotomising in my book.
But to drive, to drive, to drive, I'd have it over the 355 by a mile.
It's the first time I was really testing cars.
It was a huge leap forward in terms of the way it drove.
But you forget they had lots of problems too.
Who remembers the headlight problem, where they created these complicated
lenses to get to magnify the power of the bulbs.
But the problem was, in extreme sunlight, they became a magnifying glass
and started to melt the perspex covers.
They catch in fire and all sorts.
It's a fascinating car.
But yeah, I don't want to be the prepareds of misinformation.
You're not buying one for 50 grand, and I think...
Yeah, I think it's a nice looking car, but it's not...
Yeah, I think you could buy a majority stake in one,
and then the minority stake is always going to be worth less.
I think it's a very interesting question.
If this question had never offered so much choice of answer,
that's what I like about this question, because I found myself thinking,
this shows that the new car makers are a bit fucked, because we're sitting here
getting so frothy.
If the question had been, what new cars are you looking forward to driving this year?
Not that many.
But when I was thinking about a car that will go up in value, I'm like,
well, you could just pick, just pluck some out of the air like you guys have.
I agree with all of your choices, by the way.
I think absolutely spot on.
But you could just go on.
You could sit here and probably choose on 50 cars.
But then I thought, well, what criteria would I apply?
But there are things that I talk about with some of the cars
I bought in the last couple of years.
So for me, anything that's fun to drive, it's Euro 6 compliant.
It's got dials on the dashboard and not a screen.
When you get in it, you don't have to turn all the lane departure and the speed warning off.
If you do that, the vent diagram is still huge of cars whose last iterations or
generations are more desirable than the current cars.
So you could use Golf Mark 7.
You could use Audi RS3.
You could, I mean, so many cars you can choose.
But there's a weird one for me.
And I think I've got a vested interest.
But I think 991 Porsches look rather lovely to me.
They've come down in value a bit.
And I particularly think if you're lucky enough to have a 991 GT3 touring,
you might be in quite good shape.
They're quite rare cars.
But I think 991s, they've come down quite a lot.
And I just suddenly say, look, better and better looking.
And so I think they're good new.
But I'm obviously choosing two.
But the one I'd absolutely choose is I think the V8 M3 is going to have a stellar year.
I think people are really waking up to these.
These E92, E90 M3s, they were slightly weak everyday cars
because the fuel tank was so small and they had some issues.
But now that's a recipe of car that you can't buy anymore.
It is true.
V8 normally aspirated.
They sound fabulous.
They're great to drive.
There's not many good ones left.
And I think those that are good, I'm just going to do this now.
So for me, V8 M3.
Good call.
We should have a little, we should ask Clever Jason to do a little index for us.
And we should report on it quarterly.
Such a good idea.
That's a great idea.
Like we've established a little market place in some sort of tokenized futures
of uprising values of things.
Clever Jason works in that sort of world, doesn't he?
He could be a market maker.
So we ought to, well, I'll drop them a little note tomorrow.
And Paul, do we speak to our very good friends at Car in Classica we love dearly
and say, why don't we build into the app a kind of car speculation game?
That sort of thing.
Yeah.
Fantasy football for cars.
How much would Neil Clifford love that?
I already invented something this morning that was called Chock Trumps.
So we're going to have a set of playing cards.
I've decided.
Chris Harris on cars.
Nice trumps.
I got.
Yes.
We should have that.
I got those for Christmas.
There is a, could be a collab with those top trumps as well.
Oh yeah, they're good.
It's going to form part of our merchandising strategy.
This time next year, Rodney, etc.
Yeah, I'll be, I'll be in.
All it says here is orange warning light.
And I want to, I want to pass this over to Chris Cooper so he can explain what orange
warning light is to us or how we should interpret it.
Well, it was deliberately written.
So my cocos arrived.
Thank you, Kirsty.
Thank you very much, Lynn.
Um, it was deliberately brief, which is unusual for me, granted.
Because it's wherever you want to take it.
Um, in the old days, orange lights on cars were things you should have to do something about.
You couldn't just ignore them.
And they kind of only meant one of three things.
Not enough water, cars overheating, not enough oil, cars about to lunch itself,
or not enough electricity because the alternator's not working or whatever, blah, blah, blah.
Now, and I know this because I had an orange light last week in the sausage.
What?
I had an orange light.
In fact, that's not quite true.
I had like freaking 13 or 14 different orange lights at different points
with all kinds of little acronyms coming up.
So in the old day, it would be, you know, orange light would come on.
And it might say engine.
Okay.
I know where to start looking.
Last week, when the orange light started coming on, it said WBA slash Straccom downlink lost.
I might have made that up, but it was something as incomprehensible as that or
front, front assist ADAS questionable.
Yes, Mr. Harris.
When I asked at this point that are you like me, that when that happens,
I just go, ah, it's the alternator because everything electrical shit itself.
I just think that these days, when that happens to me.
Well, I think we all do this.
I stopped and turned it off and on again.
Because that's what you do with these things.
This is what you do in technology.
You do with the vacuum cleaner or the kettle wall, it just turned on off again.
And irritatingly, it works and then it didn't.
It worked and then it didn't.
So it all fine.
In fact, actually, it happened briefly when I went to that lovely Ledmore place just before
Christmas with Clever Jason and the lovely chap, Peter, who helps run that.
And look after some extraordinary lovely cars there.
He said, don't worry, popped into Ramsey and popped in this tablet thing into the OBD,
which I think means on board diagnostics, that what it means.
And he said, I'm just canceling all these fault codes.
And it did make a difference for a while, then it all came back anyway.
So orange warning lights are not as helpful as they used to be.
Because you can't sort of, you can't fix it with a new battery or more water or an all change,
or checking the belt on the alternator.
But the main reason, you can go anywhere with this topic.
But the main reason why I raised it, apart from I'm sausage free for a while,
is I found a dealer and I said, this is what's been happening.
And they said, I wouldn't drive it.
Why don't you phone your recovery provider and they'll recover it to us, which is what I did.
So I called the AA and they were brilliant.
They were really good.
So the first chapter turned up.
He said, look, I know what you said.
We have to diagnose it ourselves.
I'm pretty sure we're going to have to recover it, but please bear with me.
I know it's he could not have been more pragmatic,
customer orientated, expert, sensible, empathetic.
And he said, look, we'll have to recover it.
So there's a bit of a couple about how they could do what time I was.
It's been Christmas and New Year.
I was down with the flu.
So I was feeling really, really shit.
I'm really sorry for myself.
And then so second recovery truck, both recovery drives are really, really good.
First one said, actually, we can't do it tonight because we can't put it somewhere
because the dealer won't take it tonight as it turns out.
So I became first thing in the morning, really, really helpful.
Call me when he got to Swindon, dropped it off at the Porsche Center Swindon,
confirmed it's all been done, blah, blah, blah.
They were all really good.
So, and I think the reason why we're good is, and this is me with my one of my
professional head ransom, they'd realized that organizations realize that it's a customer,
not process.
If they stuck to a process, they'd have pissed me off within five seconds,
but they listened and they helped.
So I thought this is another excellent example of us picking up an organization.
We have no commercial relationship with whatsoever.
But I thought, well done the AA.
I thought that was really good.
They handled my orange light conundrum really, really well.
And if you don't give us some money by next week, we'll edit that and change the RAC.
Exactly.
Right.
Let's move on to Manish.
I have one recurring nightmare about orange light and it's an airbag nightmare
because if you've ever seen...
I should have just said, I've just asked Manish a question about yellow warning
lights when he bought four, five, six last year.
Yes, I do remember one episode where 15 came up at once, followed by a complete loss of power,
followed by your diagnosis.
I'm asking Mr Majuro whether he's got any problems with American presidents,
isn't it really?
I remember what you said.
You said it's the alternator.
It was brilliant.
It's just the alternator.
No, it launched it.
My recurring nightmare is not about Lola, but if you see ads that show you airbags inflating
at the speed of sound and stopping crash test dummies going through windows,
I think they're pretty traumatic.
They're pretty traumatic things.
And I think people who do survive airbags, even if they've got their seatbelts on,
often look somewhat bruised.
And I'd say when an airbag light comes up, I do have it.
In fact, my Audi actually had a recall for this.
There was a small chance, it said, of the tank that contains the liquid
that inflates the airbag exploding and putting fragments in your eyes.
So please bring it to your local Audi dealer for this.
But seriously, there was a big recall on A4 Avons from 2007 for that exact reason.
I mean, I get your big point, Chris, that in the old days it was simpler.
It was engine oil or water.
But it's not hugely helpful.
There's a great big orange engine sign going engine.
And orange isn't red, and it's not green.
So what are you supposed to do?
You know, what I'm supposed to do.
You know, I was like that kind of, should I stop?
You know, should I try to get to the next garage?
Should I switch the car off, start it again?
I think orange is particularly unhelpful.
I think with these things, they should be red or green.
I think orange is a bit of a red herring.
I think it's a very good suggestion.
That's got to be a t-shirt, isn't it?
Orange is a red herring.
No clip them.
Yeah.
Orange is a red herring.
I think orange is a red herring.
Orange is a red herring.
I really hate the engine warning lights.
And you see people when you're getting taxis in weird countries, don't you?
Just driving around, ignoring them.
And I can't do that.
It's a rather walk than drive along with an engine warning light.
But actually, they're a rip-off, I think, because the car never breaks down, does it?
If you imagine if all cars, including old cars, had this slightly fake warning light,
they'd all have them on, wouldn't they?
If we drive the rounding cars from the 60s and the 70s and the 80s.
So I think it's commerce.
And the other little warning light that brings to mind for me is the BMW service light.
Oh, I miss those.
I really, really hate that light.
Did you?
I do, because it's not there in my view to be helpful, even though they say it's there to be
It's there for you to spend money and be annoying to tell you you've got to go and get the car
service every 12 months.
And I've got a, you know, like Chris, a lovely E28 M5.
And that bloody thing, you know, I adore it.
I won't sell it.
I do a thousand miles a year.
It feels like every three months I get in it.
And this bloody service light is on reminding you that you've got to go and spend another
500 quid to change the oil.
So I think dash warning lights in general.
I've got one little story.
I bought a Bentley Arnaj T of a car auction website, actually.
And I met the guy, what could go wrong here, in the Tescos in Hammersmith.
Yeah, I don't know why, why the hell was I doing?
You look back on life, don't you think?
What the hell was I doing there?
Anyway, so I bought this beautiful car for super rare spec.
Iridium green chocolate leather.
Fantastic car.
Very rare.
I think only one of one in that color, of course.
That's what it said in the ad anyway.
Only one of one that I could find.
Anyway, within a week, the engine warning light came on.
What a surprise.
I took it to my lovely friend Pat, the mechanic, in Bermondsey.
And he said, mate, this happens all the time.
It's got a fake thing on the exhaust that blows cold air into the emissions thing.
You know, it's basically the fake Volkswagen emissions cheat.
But the problem is the switch or the sensor or the fan, that goes wrong.
There's nothing wrong with the car.
Just drive it around with a warning light on,
because it's going to cost you about 1,800 quid.
So I'm like, forget that, reset it, and we'll find someone who maybe
wants to take the next ownership of this car,
because I'm not spending too grand on that.
And of course, this car now, bless it, it's like a Bentley Boomerang.
It gets passed around from owners that then spends a week of absolute enjoyment.
And then this bloody warning light comes on.
And in fact, the car is for sale now.
I think it's had 97 owners in the last three months,
just because of this fake bloody German engine warning light.
So I think I'm cross with engine warning lights.
I think we've hit on something here.
And I think both of you nearly have put your finger on it.
If I think about my professional life, when huge complex corporations are looking at
how they're doing on stuff, and they've got big dashboards of everything,
and there's this fashion that has been for a long time of red amber green.
The status, is it red?
Is it really in the shitter?
Is it green, okay?
Or are there some issues?
And the problem with that is, if you aggregate and aggregate up,
everything is always amber.
Of course, of course.
It's useless information.
Exactly.
I think the warning light is a terrible invention, because I've never had a major
instance in a car forewarned by a warning light.
I normally get told, I normally see it on the dash after the event.
A gauge with a needle tells me the story of what's going on,
as long as it's functioning, and they are most of the time.
For example, I give you BMW, you've mentioned BMWs,
in an old BMW, because they were great cars.
It's one of the few manufacturers to have a little red light,
that would illuminate if the water temperature became too high.
But before that, you could watch the needle creep up.
When it got into the red, the red light would illuminate.
I'm not really interested in when it illuminates.
I'm interested in the journey between the vertical and getting towards the light.
So the gauge helps me.
Same with all of that's the case.
But I've never had a car tell me just before it blew up.
We're about to blow up.
It's just never happened.
And the engine warning light, the engine logo of doom, which is all too often orange.
I mean, how many times have I ignored one of those,
and something went really badly wrong?
Answer?
Never.
Don't think ever.
If I'm honest with you, I think I judged it.
The car wasn't right, but normally, I was in a car that was modern enough,
that the ECU, the Controlling, it went into some sort of approximation mode,
because a lambda sensor had gone, and it probably was overfueling,
and it made the catalyst a bit wet for a few days.
But really, that's as bad as it got.
The lovely Daimler, for example, the engine warning light came on
whilst I was driving somewhere, which just means stop.
What had happened was there was a tiny pipe on the back of the manifold
that's either part of the heater or something.
I don't know what was going on.
No, not the heater.
It was an emissions pipe, I think.
Anyhow, it had cracked in it, and it just made a bit of noise.
That was it. That's all the matter was.
But the light came on, and if I played by the rules,
I shouldn't have driven it any further.
However, fast forward to three weeks later,
after the lovely guys at Swallow just fixed it,
the timing chain we knew was a bit loose.
The timing chain jumped a tooth, at least one tooth.
No light came on.
What you realise is that, sort of with Neil,
the light was designed to make you go to the garage, to have a chat.
Of course, it was defensive,
but I've never had a light save something catastrophic.
No, that's right.
And also, this comes back to the orange-ness of them.
Orange is quite a friendly colour.
It's not a colour of warning.
And also, I guess a lot of this discussion is about BMW.
BMW is of a particular era.
All of their cabins at night are suffused
with a lot of orange downlighting.
With little pinpricks in the ceiling.
So, orange is a light of warmth and comfort.
So, when you see another orange light on the dashboard,
you're like, it's just an orange light.
If it was bright red or bright white, I'd go,
fuck me, I better stop.
But orange is just like, leave it.
So, I'm not very good with warning lights.
I'm sure someone who was looking after the Lotus Exige
that I ran as a long-term on Autocard magazine
that I probably blew up will say.
But if only you'd looked at the red light.
But the brilliant thing about the original Lotus Elise was,
it had the most useless warning light of them all.
It was red.
Now, we often have, was it Ignition 1 and Ignition 2?
Yeah.
You turn the key.
So, Ignition 1 will let the radio play.
Ignition 2, your dashboard lights come up.
On Ignition 2, on an Elise, I think this is right.
Series 1 on Exige.
If you sit for a couple of seconds,
if the oil light stays on a bit longer,
that means it's low of oil.
So, you have to wait.
But no one tells you that.
And my light apparently came on.
And I didn't turn any more oil in it.
And she went, boom.
But, yeah, orange warning lights.
I don't get it really.
And I'm definitely more like the taxi drivers
that Neil describes.
I'll drive around in a,
I've had cars that have done 10,000 miles
with an engine warning light on.
And I couldn't give a shit about it.
I leave it on, I don't care.
Just couldn't care.
We've solved that one.
I think so.
Car adverts are all the same, discuss.
I'm going to go to manage first on this.
I quite enjoyed researching this
because it gave me an excuse to do something
I love doing, which is watching old adverts.
I just love old adverts.
And, you know, it just,
just literally, we all remember the Nicole Papa Clio ads.
There isn't any voiceover in those ads.
There's no spec about the Clios.
They don't say it's a one point, it's a Clio,
one point eight or two, two, nothing.
There's an old bloke.
He's taking a nap outside.
It's rather lovely French country pad
with his rather beautiful daughter next to him.
She checks to see whether daddy's asleep.
When she thinks daddy's asleep,
he legs it past their chauffeur,
ignores all the big limousines,
jumps into her Clio, meets her lover.
He wakes up.
He was pretending to be asleep.
He sees his daughter's gone.
He jumps into his Clio, goes to see his lover.
Just about makes it home before she does.
They're both a bit knowing.
And that's everything you need to know about that Clio.
It's fun.
It's wonderful.
It's beautiful.
The way it was shot,
it's driving through these gorgeous French villages.
You see it going through tiny arches.
You see it picks up speed.
It goes up a hill.
It goes down a hill.
It's got a great handbrake.
They were just fantastic commercials.
Lots and lots of non-verbal,
very witty explanations.
Or Thierry Henry who came after that with Vavaboum.
Just again, there's something about the spirit of the car.
It may have been my sample selection, but I found three.
Audi I like to move it, move it.
Range Rover Sport, Losty Blue.
And the Honda Unstoppable Dreams ad.
Oh, that's an advert.
To dream, the impossible dream.
So I've got a thing.
By the way, Mercedes-Benz,
they have something called Date Night.
And what these have,
they've got these generic people driving these cars.
They drive them to generic places.
They have these generic relationships.
They have these really irritating voiceovers.
And lots of close-ups of dials and buttons.
I mean, it's almost like being told about the spec of a phone.
You know, a piece of really bad electronics.
It's very dull, very, very uninspiring.
Doesn't give the cars any character at all.
In fact, I couldn't really tell the difference.
I mean, you can, I think it was a guy, Richie,
who made the Range Rover ad.
It's certainly the guy from his show.
It's the one where, you know, he chucks the ball for the dog,
but ends up taking his Range Rover
and it shows you the thing coming up.
They made it, you know, it's about as close
as you can get sort of to an old truck.
They're very direct.
They're very obvious.
The character lines so thin
and they have to give you so much data.
So in short, the old ads, they were great.
And they were made by the masters.
These new ones, they just feel like
washing up liquid adverts.
You know, the new daz is so much better than old daz.
It's very interesting, isn't it?
Because obviously I agree.
I have lots of sympathy for the industry
because there's less money swimming around
and they have so many more areas they have to cover.
You know, in the old days, you could spread
your advertising campaign on Broadsheet,
Specialist Magazine and the television.
Now you've got to cover all these places.
Neil will understand this from his business.
You'll spread so thin if you want to have coverage.
You've either got to be brave, go all in,
and it would take a very brave person
to go all in on a television advert.
And they were spending as much as they were making TV,
you know, hour-long TV documentaries
on a four-minute or two-minute or 90-second spot.
So, but there seems to sort of be a depth of thought
and an understanding of how to present that product
in a clever way to the public that's lacking now.
And you look back at the great particularly car adverts.
They're just, they're connected with the audience in a way.
You look at the great Ford adverts.
And he just, even if he didn't love Fords,
he suddenly had the sense that Ford had built Britain
on its own after watching one of its adverts.
So, I get that.
What I find strange is that actually the skill
of brevity in filmmaking has never been stronger than it is now.
You know, social media is based upon
the brilliance of young people making short clips.
So, it stands to reason that this should be applied
to the motor vehicle now or soon.
And I think in many ways it is.
And maybe the advertiser,
the great films are not happening
through official channels anymore.
They're actually been created by individuals
and they live on Instagram.
There's some amazing stuff out there.
I don't do TikTok, probably should,
but although some lying bastard is representing us on TikTok,
but that's another story.
If anyone wants to go on to the TikTok Chris Harrison car's account,
it's a lie.
Go on there and call them shitbags for us, all right?
So, I think it's very interesting.
You could argue that there is great content out there
that's short form, very short form,
but it's not been created by the brands themselves.
Or if it is, it's been cleverly paid for by the brands maybe,
but it's going out through independent channels.
One never knows.
These car companies are clever things.
But yeah, they're not as good as they were.
And we won't talk about them for as long as we did then.
And I don't think this generation will look back and go,
do you remember the golf GTI advert
when she comes out of the news house
and throws the jewels away and the new coat
and then she stops and hobbers over the gutter
with the Volkswagen key.
If only everything in life was as reliable as the Volkswagen.
I'm talking about it 35 years later.
And we remember the name of the model, Paula Hamilton.
Amazing.
So yes, this podcast mustn't become,
it was all bad for the old days, but I don't know.
I suspect there are cleverer things going on than we realise.
And a lot of the very memorable short form content
that is currently being produced
might be brand sponsored or supported already.
Your thoughts, Neil Clippard.
I think it's, I agree with all of that really.
I think the challenge now is,
I suppose the challenge is that you, as you say, Chris,
there's not maybe as much money.
There's not much profit being made in the automotive industry.
Therefore, how creative can you be?
How bold can you be?
And what mediums are you going to put it through?
TV is so fragmented now.
Magazines are not being bought.
So what do you put it through?
You have to put all your marketing through digital.
You have to put it all through Instagram.
How do you create an emotional story,
complicated story through Insta?
It's quite difficult.
And also, maybe you're worried about alienation.
You've got to, so I think the truth is now,
they do, as I think Manish said it,
they do look like generic sopads
that are just designed almost like biscuits
or kitchen cleaner that you just put over a voiceover
in a language for that market.
So I think it's an area where I think it's a real shame
because there isn't as much creativity going on at the moment.
Or maybe we're just old farts.
Maybe we're not seeing the newness.
I worry that we are saying that.
But if you said to me now, name me an ad that you adore
of a car that you want to buy,
I don't think I could name it.
Sorry, yeah.
It was just a little while ago,
we talked about cars having almost national characteristics.
So if we were talking about cars 40 years ago
and I said French car, you'd think of something.
And if I said German car, you'd think of something.
I said British car, American.
And I think the same thing with an Italian car.
And I do wonder whether a little bit of this
is to do with this sort of national flag,
very idiosyncratic car,
a car that represents your nation,
a car that really, you know, it's all about your nation.
As that goes out of the window,
we get into much more generic cars
that need to conquer multiple territories.
Maybe that's also reflected exactly in that, in these ads.
They can't go around saying, oh, we're German cars,
or we're nicole and papa.
They can't say vavavu many more.
Or that German cars are really, really reliable
because that probably just doesn't mean anything anymore
in exactly that way.
The cars don't have the identities.
So how can the ads?
I think that's a good point.
And also, one thing I left out
is what I was saying before we come to Mr Cooper is,
your car companies and marketing departments
are judged really on offline and online responses and reactions.
They spend the money.
They've got to get a result quite quickly.
So you can't just have the luxury of that VW advert.
Yes, it was for a Golf GTI.
But really, it's just a Volkswagen brand statement.
And those are the ones that make the most memorable adverts.
When you can just make something beautiful or clever or funny
and you've not got to get a message across about technology
or a new model or something.
And that's when you can have some fun with the subject, can't you?
If you've got 35 seconds and you've got to fit in the fact
that it's got a seven-year warranty
and the spark plugs are really good,
then there's not much fun you can have with that.
So I think, yeah, I wouldn't want to be an advertising.
In the 80s, it seems like the best job ever.
Chris Cooper.
What prompted this question in my mind
was seeing a car advert, a current one.
I was watching something over Christmas.
And this is the other reason why it caught my mind.
I didn't know that the car company called Geely is called Geely.
I had Geely in my head.
Anyway, there's an advert doing the rounds mostly on,
I mean, who watches linear TV anymore?
We're watching, because I've had this bloody COVID flu thing
all over Christmas, done a lot of Netflix
and sitting under the duvet in front of the fire.
And there's a Geely car advert.
It's slightly irritating.
And I'm not a big fan of the car,
but I have remembered it.
And that's what God is talking to say.
Who can remember the last car advert that we remembered?
And I think possibly that's for all the reasons you've said.
And I think it's possibly also because of the unintended
consequence of good intentions.
I'm, to no one's shock or surprise,
I'm not, I don't have,
my brain doesn't work in the creative industries.
That's not why I do.
But I spend a lot of time working with heads of creatives
and heads of marketing and engagement and digital
and all the kind of things that now happen on here
and how this is changing the world of how complex
corporations deal with and engage with consumers.
And I've noticed two things that I wonder
whether are relevant to what we've just described.
Because all we've described is true.
And the first thing is an entirely sensible
and reasonable desire to measure results of marketing.
And we all remember that famous on the apprentice,
the UK version of the apprentice is chaired by now Lord Sugar.
Very famous.
Most people in English speaking will be aware of who Alan Sugar is.
Extraordinary entrepreneur, businessman,
agitator, leader of, you know, a very interesting guy.
He may not agree with everything he says
and all the things he believes in,
but he's a very, very interesting
and unbelievably hardworking guy.
And he would famously say on one of the tests,
I waste half the money I spend on marketing.
I just don't know which half it is.
So I think this desire to measure has ended up reducing
the understanding of what good car marketing,
advertising, what we're talking about, what we're interested in here is for.
And the other thing is more of a recent phenomena,
but having been under the leargy the last week or so over Christmas and New Year,
I spent a lot of time reading stuff about the subject we probably had more about in 25
than we realized, which is AI, artificial intelligence.
And even I can tell I'm not in that sector of creative and marketing
and all those kind of things that there's a loss of discussion, consternation,
debate about whether AI is going to decimate the creative industries and creativity
because it's quicker, cheaper, more productive, blah, blah, blah to throw it at AI.
And I find myself reacting to that with a mixture of
generally about AI, a mixture of excitement and curiosity on one side
and frustration and cynicism on the other side.
Because that Geely advert, it's about a school girl
who talks about the features of the car through her school day.
For reasons because I'm not creative, I don't really, they probably go over my head,
it works, it's lodged. So what that said to me is I think it is the case
and manage it, but all three of you have said this really, really well.
I think for probably understandable reasons, car adverts have all ended up looking the same.
We were aware we've seen a car advert, can I tell you who it was? It wasn't.
The Geely advert made me stop and think to say it is still possible.
There is something, and I think one of the things I noticed in this is
lots of organizations, car makers as well, talk increasingly about trust.
When you see speeches from CEOs and chief marketing officers and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,
and stuff in the business domain, in the consumer domain, talk about trust.
So engagement, it used to be called selling, now it's called engagement.
And there are lots of good reasons why that's true, but actually what can be missed in that
is that love and excitement and passion.
So I think this is a little, alongside our challenge to the orange warning light,
I think there is more, there is more in possibilities for car advertising
and building passion for the car than recent years maybe has led us to believe.
That's a very positive conclusion.
And actually, when it's done right, it's one of the most joyous aspects of our car
environment, isn't it? A great car advert, it's just something we all talk about.
Can I just say no one talked about the Jaguar 00 ad out of the four of us.
It's because it's the new year, we want to have a good new year.
Let's forget all that shit it's done with.
No, just the point being, I mean, talk about memorable, talk about creative,
talk about something though that absolutely got it the wrong way around.
Extraordinary, and that really did create ripples.
And they were very, very proud of it at the beginning.
They were saying, oh, you're all talking about it.
Three months later, they were all out of a job.
I don't want to go into that, we've dealt with that one.
So let's go for mad prediction about cars for 2026.
No, Kevin.
I have a good one.
I hope you can hear me because my Wi-Fi is a bit shit and I do apologize.
And I wrote this down because it was really good.
It's obviously slightly sarcastic.
Aston Martin.
My idea for 2026 is Aston Martin are going to launch a new car.
Right.
It's going to be called the LS5 because Lawrence was sat in a meeting
and said, come on, guys, let's have some new ideas.
When was Aston Martin really successful?
I'll tell you when, when they named it after the owner.
And therefore this LS5, get Adrian in, he's going to design a beautiful car.
We're going to stop doing this 300 grand stuff because clearly we're not selling enough
and we're losing a lot of money.
So we're going to do, we're going to, what's the most, just remind me,
what's the most successful sports car of all time?
So they all sit in the room and say, it's probably the 911, Lawrence.
Okay. Well, we're going to target that, but it's going to be prettier.
It's going to be British and it's going to be made designed by the best car designer in the world,
Adrian Newey.
It's going to be 140,000 quid.
We're going to jump in the spot that Jaguar has stupidly left.
It's going to be pretty. It's going to be manual.
It's going to be twin turbo straight six, like the DB5, the LS5.
It's going to be made with super legera, lightweight aluminium.
And we're going to sell 10,000 and we're going to do what Bentley did with the GT.
We're going to turn this company around and it's going to be immensely successful.
And that's going to happen at the Geneva Motor Show in September.
I love it. I love the sound of it. My only issue is
I was horrified to see the other day that there was a BMW X5 that popped up on one of my feeds.
And I thought, Assistant X5, it wasn't that special and it was 100,000 pounds.
You ain't making the sports car to sell 140,000 sadly anymore.
The world's gone mad.
But I love the idea of the Lawrence Stroll 5.
That sounds like a bunch of people he took on a bombing raid to Guildford, doesn't it?
But there we go. Let's go to Chris Cooper.
So I came at this having sort of seen two things.
One was on the official F1 website.
There was an article by Lawrence Beretto on New Year's Day and he came out.
He had five predictions for F1 this year, which I thought were actually quite interesting.
I'll go through them really quickly.
Number one was Mercedes will reclaim the team's championship.
Second one was Formula One this year will crown another first time champion.
So George, Charles, Oscar, whatever.
Timmy.
Williams will claim their first win in more than a decade.
This is a quite mad one.
At least 10 drivers, 10 different drivers will win a Grand Prix this year.
And the fifth one is that more than five drivers will move teams for 2027.
And I thought that's quite interesting.
And then when I saw what happened yesterday,
so over the weekend, beginning of January, in the Medikas,
I thought, who knows what could happen this year?
So I thought, I'm sort of in the same area as Neil, not quite as fun as Neil's,
but I reckon one of Aston, Jaguar Land Rover and McLaren,
by the end of the year will have a different owner.
Yeah.
That's my mad prediction for this year.
I think at least one of those is definitely going to be the case.
Manish.
My mad prediction for the years that Ferrari will have a very dominant Formula One season,
at least 18 pole positions.
Lewis will take 17 of them, putting Charles into one crowned for the eighth time.
Charles will look like somebody who just needs to leave the team
because he's been so badly beaten and Ferrari will rule the Formula One waves.
Again, that is my mad prediction for the year.
They're going to section me straight off to this show.
I'm just in a pig flying across the...
What colour was it?
But there's the lovely levity about these answers that I want to repeat,
but I'm afraid, yeah.
I think there's a bit of doom and gloom coming on the car company business front.
So I'll give you a light hearted one.
I was with someone recently who turned around, quite naturally said to me,
it knows a bit about our world.
And he said, I don't think Lewis will get beyond testing this year for Ferrari.
Which I thought, as you said it, I thought it doesn't work like that,
but just because something's not happened before doesn't mean it can't happen for a first time.
So that made me think, okay, yeah.
I think a major car brand will cease to exist this year in a way that you'll notice it
because you're used to seeing the furniture of that car on dealerships around the country.
I think one might actually disappear this year.
And frankly, maybe it's time, you know, people aren't buying as many cars.
It has only so many brands of orange juice people want to buy, aren't they?
So, and it sounds awful.
I suspect there'll be one that we might not care so much about.
But there might be one fewer next year.
But I much prefer the idea of Lawrence Stroll naming, perhaps the last,
the last Aston Martin built under his tenure at Aston Martin.
I also like the idea that you might just call it the Stroll.
Like a leisurely GT.
What a great Stroller.
What a great name for a not very fast sports car.
I'm just going for it.
I'm just going, darling, I'm just going out in the Stroll.
I like that.
Right, two car garage.
Here we go.
Now, I'll do some research on this one.
This is from someone called the P-Rog, N-P-I-R-O-G-G.
Two cars with back seats for a 35-year-old with a wife and a child,
allegedly, a friend of his, obviously.
You live many hours away from decent driving roads, brackets, Amsterdam.
So, the fun car also needs to be a reasonable GT.
Or the daily has to be reasonably special to give, if you know, you know,
kudos from fellow petrolheads.
Back seats are essential since the five-year-old son joins you on road trips and can't be budget.
You've got to buy two cars for the price of a 996 Carrera 2 manual.
There's a lot going on here.
Oh, that's good.
I've got a funny feeling, if you've tried to blag this in the last five minutes,
you're going to come undone and end up with a very smacked body.
So, here we go.
Let's start with Manish.
Here, well, I had to look up the price bands for the Carrera, I have to say.
I think you could see that.
Anywhere from 17 to almost 50, frankly.
So, what did you go for, Manish?
So, there's the...
Yeah, I found, well, for 49 something, something, something.
What did it have?
Did it have gold bullion in the front?
Or what?
What 996 C2 is worth 50 large?
I had a turbocharger.
In the group chat, because I did...
Carrera 2.
You said Carrera 2, Neil Clifton.
It's very specific.
I know that.
Anyway, these are the two cars.
I went for a much more modest, I reckon, about 25,000 in total.
Okay, yeah.
So, 2003 XK8 convertible.
This is a Minter, 65,000 miles.
You should see, it's on current classic, it's coming up in five days.
I might buy it, it's so beautiful, this one.
You choose that car every week.
Oh, that, I did.
How dare you?
How dare you?
Just because you're in Australia.
How dare you?
Okay, and this is my, if you know, you know.
And this, this is in Poland.
Okay, unfortunately, this will have been auctioned by the time this episode goes out.
But my God, look at this.
A five, oh, come back here.
528i and E12 from 1980.
Yeah.
It's in Poland.
Look, just look at that.
Now, here's a really clever bit.
That is nice.
The wheels.
Apparently, what they've done is they've taken out the 2.8-litre engine and put in a 3.5.
And it all works.
It's done 600 miles since then.
It's been stored in some kind of super dry condition.
It's just the interior.
Looks like it's just come out of O'Rourke's.
I mean, it is a beautiful car.
So, I'm hoping.
What could go wrong?
Well, yes, but, but I'm hoping these are the two cars that, that win.
Because I think that's quite hard to beat, actually.
I like those two good cars there, Chris Cooper.
I reckon I've got this lick so well.
Oh, no.
My tongue is stuck to the windscreen in the minus three conditions we've got right now.
You don't have a ball there.
I thought it was a really clever one.
So, I, I reckon the budget for a 996 Carrera 2 manual, which I thought was a really interesting way
of setting the budget because they got us all thinking about how much.
I reckon about 28 grand of sterling pounds or 32,000 euros,
both of which are available on the car classic auction website.
Quite interesting combination is because you can kind of go one way or the other with what
in Peter O'Worg has suggested.
So, the GT car, the fun car, I love these and there are very few of them about.
It's a Carrado G60.
It's got, it goes on auction the day that this goes out, I think on Friday.
60,000 miles, I think it's got on it.
No, 90,000 miles has gone on it.
I reckon that will end up going for about 18, 19,000, looking at what's,
they're being sought after right now.
It's the other one though.
If you know, you know the daily, I'm really pleased with.
I'm very, very pleased with this one.
It is a stunning, this goes on auction on Thursday.
So, the day before this goes out on YouTube.
It is a BMW 750 IL.
It's a 2009 car.
Clear glass, the exclusive style, not Fandango wheels, beautiful tan inside wood.
That has done 60,000 miles.
I reckon that will go for about 78 grand.
I mean, it's just, I looked at that, I thought I need to make sure
I'm around and following that one because that just looks really, really good.
So, that's what I think.
Back seats, both a bit of fun, both quite special for the price of a 996 Carrera 2
somewhere in the middle.
I think that's going well.
We're doing well here, boys.
This is pretty good.
No clever, don't spoil it.
But first of all, when I read this yesterday and I did all my work being dyslexic,
I thought he lived in Amisham.
Kind of like cheeky bastards, there's some nice roads near my house.
Then I read it again this morning and obviously he's in Holland, which is a bit flat.
I then also realized that the guy has got a bit of a problem because he only needs one car,
because he's actually, he's designed a two-car garage with two cars.
Actually, they need to do sort of the same job, don't they?
I also love the fact that the comparison is he's got to sell his Porsche.
So, the wife has obviously given him hell.
You've got that stupid Carrera 2, mate.
We can't fit in the back of it.
So, now he's thought, I've got to trade.
We're not talking values anymore.
We're talking two-car tradings, which I thought was also a nice new concept for us.
My discussion, therefore, is actually,
if he wants two cars that are, frankly, quite similar,
he needs to get one that's going to be cooler, but will evidently break down.
And then he needs one that's a little bit more reliable, a similar type of car really,
but it isn't going to break down.
So, the first car, which is the emotional breakdown vehicle,
but is going to get him a lot of recognition in car meets, is an Alfa Romeo.
Beautifully parked on the front of this person's house, in a very rare, whatever it's called,
metallic-y, lovely yellow.
I think the beautiful parking adds value to it.
It does, yep, yep.
And it's got all sorts of what could go wrong upgrades, like KW coilovers,
new brakes, power flex, rebuilt suspension, in Zoe yellow.
That's clearly going to get him a lot of compliments and membership of the AA,
but it is the V6.
So it is beautiful.
And it's the right color for the AA as well.
Exactly.
The interior is a bit suspect, but I won't go into that.
So then I did then decide, maybe we go the G60 Carrado, but of course,
Mr Cooper has already chosen that one.
And frankly, that is a bit too similar to the Alfa Romeo.
So then I've said, if he wants to get, if you know, you know, recognized in car meets,
I'm going to go on the face of it boring, but really on the face of it, super cool.
I'm going Mercedes 190E, non-metallic navy blue with cloth interior, full Mercedes-Benz service
history, just a bloody fabulous thing.
I think it's in the auction.
It's currently at five grand.
Look at that.
It's got to be, that is, and it,
it's going to be like seven or eight grand that.
Two litre.
It's a two litre.
I don't know what else it's got on it because I can't really remember.
Oh no, I did.
Here we go.
Alloy wheels in original color, silver, presumably.
Zabrano wood, blah, blah, gray leather, gray cloth interior, everything.
Full service history from Mercedes.
It's going to be like eight grand.
So I think when the Alpha's in the Alpha dealer, broken down with a head gasket,
he can drive, he can drive around in the Mercedes 190E and feel equally as cool.
So I like these.
Yeah, good.
I've not gone too sporty.
So Aston Martin V12 Vantage done 100,000 miles.
That's the kind of tap that I'd see in top marks or auto trader,
auto car, and I'd go with doing a story on that.
I'm going to go meet the owner and we're going to find out why it's done so many miles.
We'll find out it was a tax eased as a mini cab for Luton airport or something.
So brilliant.
Just, I just, it's a great simple V12 British sports car that's done so many miles
and stands every chance of blowing up.
But until it does, you've bought an Aston Martin for under 12 grand and all your
mates are going to go, he's a genius.
And when that doesn't work, you've got the most beautiful three door eight valve golf
DCI on steelies.
It's done over 100,000 miles.
That's pro that's a car cockroach.
That's that's surviving the apocalypse.
And you know, you know, you know, just look at that thing.
Yeah, that's great.
Small bumper as well.
Small bumper early car.
Just a great thing.
Absolutely lovely.
Right, let's move on to music.
I'll get mine out of the way first.
So I was, everyone's watched this.
Most of the people that have ever listened to this podcast have watched 40 towers because
it's one of the great comedies of our, well, of any era.
It's just a fabulous show.
And I was watching that brilliant episode with Lord Melbrine.
Is it a touch of class?
Yeah, touch of class.
And there's that lovely moment where Basil tries to steal a few minutes and he prezes
go on his little tape players that were sort of flat with the speaker on the top that we
all had.
I have one as well.
Yeah, except play.
And she's civil says, what's that racket?
And he says it's Brahms.
Brahms third racket.
He shouts at her as she walks.
So I then got in the car and I listened to Brahms third racket with my kids.
And it's really rather lovely.
So go and listen to Brahms's third racket.
And I think you'll enjoy it.
Let's go to Manish now.
First working day tomorrow.
This is actually the first podcast.
I guess we're recording in the new year, isn't it?
Because we were called up on.
So I hope optimistically, but back right.
What the world needs now is love.
Oh, there we go.
I love a lovely message for the new year.
Chris Cooper.
I went very similar territory.
So I picked Tears for Fears Mad World.
There you go.
There you go.
Neil Clifford.
Well, I am in Melbourne, as I said.
And I was here in 1993, driving around in a Volkswagen camper.
And the song that I put on the Spotify yesterday just remind me what a brilliant bloody city this is.
And frankly, country is Stone Temple Pilots interstate love song.
It really reminded me of, well, being here 30 years ago, happy that I'm still alive without hair.
I'd hair then.
But apart from that, I feel exactly the same.
Long may it continue.
And let's just hope that up the road in Sydney tonight,
the English Batsman continue their good work that was cut short by poor weather.
And on that note, thank you very much from myself,
from Managed Pandy, from Chris Cooper, and from Neil Clifford.
And we will, having got this particular 1698 monkey off our backs,
move on to the adult planes of 17 next week.
Good night.
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About this episode
Predictions for the automotive landscape in 2026 take center stage, with lively discussions on car heaters, nostalgic favorites, and potential future classics. The hosts debate which cars will appreciate in value, with suggestions ranging from the Ferrari F355 to the Jaguar F-Type. They also explore the evolution of car advertising, lamenting the loss of creativity in modern ads compared to iconic campaigns of the past. The episode wraps up with a fun segment on two-car garage recommendations for a family man, showcasing a mix of practicality and excitement.
Alpine A110
Aston Martin DB5
Aston Martin V12 Vantage
Audi A8
Audi RS 3
BMW 3 Series
BMW 5 Series
BMW i3
BMW M3
BMW M5
BMW X5
Ferrari 360
Ferrari 456 M GT
Ferrari F355
Jaguar F-Pace
Jaguar F-Type
Lancia Lambda
Land Rover Defender
Lotus Elise
Lotus Exige
Mercedes-Benz 190E
Mini John Cooper Works GP
Porsche 911
Volkswagen Beetle
Volkswagen Golf
Volkswagen ID. Buzz
Volvo 244
Volvo 850
Original notes
Download Car & Classic’s app today to see our 2CG’s, and our weekly pick of our favourite listings: https://candc.li/App_Download_
This week, settle into the rhythm of 2026 with episode “soixante neuf”… We hope you enjoy!
(00:00) Intro
(00:40) Best car heater
(16:00) Car that will go up in value in 2026
(31:46) Orange warning light
(48:40) Car adverts are all the same
(1:05:24) Mad prediction about cars for 2026
(1:12:17) 2CG with Car & Classic
(1:23:03) Music
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The Car Podcast with Chris Harris & Friends
Chris Harris
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