Lacessit

I bought a 1973 XB Ford Fairmont, exactly as pictured. Cheap plastics manufactured in Broadmeadows kept falling off. The engine was OK, but the radiator was under-designed for a 4.0 litre straight six. It did not like mountain climbing. Four on the floor. As it aged, the steering got more and more vague, with about three inches of free play. Its major design flaw was the drain scuttle under the windscreen wipers, which only had one drain outlet. As a result. water pooling at the other end of the scuttle inevitably caused the steel to corrode, as it was only protected by a cathodic E-coat. Any time it rained, the plush floor carpet got soaked, and rotted. I eventually gave up trying to keep it dry, and retired it to a friend's property west of Euabalong as a hunting vehicle. It was still going strong with its oversquare motor when he sold the property, and I gave it to a kid from one of the neighboring stations.

The dogs are not on a lead. There is no way of knowing whether he has control over them in all situations. IMO a month in a Thai jail would be enough to adjust his anti-social attitude.

In my era, it was quite common for VW Campers to have opaque side and rear curtains, plus a front partition to ward off nosey parkers.

Apart from other quality considerations, American cars became rust buckets anywhere salt was used on the roads to clear snow. OTOH, the Japanese worked on assembly designs, substrates and passivation treatments to increase corrosion resistance. I can remember being shocked on my first visit to the US by the number of vehicles with rusted out door panels and fenders. In Australia, they would have been put off the road. My 19 year old Vios does not have one speck of underbody rust. Admittedly it is in a fairly mild environment, but that's still an impressive achievement.

Ah, the bugeye Sprite. I remember dicing with one. I was OK in the straight, he slaughtered me on the curves.

The Japanese rose to pre-eminence w.r.to vehicle quality after inviting an American statistician, W. Edwards Deming, to Japan. Automotive history might be very different if his own countrymen had listened to him. Nowadays, it's the Koreans who are making seriously good vehicles. And the Chinese are coming. The Germans have mostly sold on cachet and snob value, IMO sometimes not supported by quality of vehicle and support services. The Mercedes logo is called the three-pointed suppository for a reason. Last year, my son bought a Hyundai Kona N. Its performance is quite scary in N mode.

Oh dear. That spear to the front on the VW, which also functioned as a steering column, could be lethal even with seat belts. No doubt the Buick was luxurious, my father owned a Studebaker of similar vintage. Did you ever bother to check the fuel consumption?

The temporary migrant worker visa has minimum wage requirements and working conditions imposed by the Department of Labor. Farmers want the cheapest labor possible, so they can make a profit or even survive as a going concern. Illegals enable that. Farmers will either push up prices to keep going, or quit. Either way, the product on a supermarket shelf gets more expensive. I have no issue with the US deporting bad guys, but it seems to me America is shooting itself in the foot if it exports illegals who just want to work, and send money back home.

While I have never owned one, I did like the pregnant pastie look of the Standard Vanguard. Come to think of it, I have never owned a British make, although all the Brits in Australia seemed to stick with them.

IIRC that was the time when Volvos were considered to be indestructible. I still remember the ad where they stacked 8? 9? Volvos on top of the other, to prove the strength of the safety cage.

I bought a new Honda Civic in 1974, the first car I had with aircon. Brilliant small car for its time. The kerb mass was 800 kg. Today, it is 1300 kg.

IIRC the top speed was 70 mph. AFAIK we never got the A35 in Australia, only the A30 and A40. It was succeeded by the Morris/Austin 1100, which was quite revolutionary with the hydraulic suspension.

There are doctors and nurses in the sh!tholes of the world working to prevent disease outbreaks from reaching countries such as the USA. They are employed by the WHO. For example, wild poliovirus is still endemic in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Then there is Ebola and Marburg in Africa. The village idiots celebrating the withdrawal of the USA from the WHO should be careful what they wish for. Viruses and bacteria don't recognize national boundaries.

My first car was a GM product, secondhand 1948 FX Holden. A shrunken version of the American Chevrolet, adapted for Australian conditions. One could call it a drunken version as well, it wallowed on any rough surface like a ship in a storm. Steering was recirculating ball, somewhat more vague than rack and pinion. Coil springs front, leaf springs rear. Legend has it racing drivers would corner on the door handles. Terminal understeer. The brakes were genuinely awful. Drums all round, prone to overheating. No ABS. No power brakes or power steering either. The straight six 2.2 litre engine produced 45 KW, a laughable figure these days. The tolerances between piston and cylinder wall were so generous the pistons could be heard slapping on a cold start. No oil pump, splash feed from the sump. It was common knowledge the engine burned a pint of oil every 500 miles. Top speed 80 mph. Generator, not alternator for recharging the 6 volt battery. The low power headlights were changed from low to high beam with a small foot pedal. Gear change was a steering column shift, no synchromesh on first. Air conditioning was via window quarter-panels, the only form of heating was via the firewall separating the engine from the driver. I retrofitted seat belts, a windscreen demister, and turn indicators. The Holden's most positive feature was a bench seat which could be laid back for sexual adventures. This was back in the day when people lived with their parents until they bought a house of their own, and self-appointed morals police were at the front desk of every hotel and motel, demanding proof of marriage. The best alternative was a car, and bucket seats with floor gear shifts required extreme athleticism. I sold the Holden to the brother of a work colleague. He rolled it on a trip to South Australia, got out with a grazed cheek, thanks to the seat belt. I would say with its complete lack of safety features, most people from today's generations trying to drive the FX would end up killing themselves in a very short time. In hindsight, I think the Holden taught me valuable lessons in terms of defensive driving, and also driving within my limitations. What are your memories of your first car?

It might be something as simple as a seatbelt warning sign, or the handbrake being on. Or something more critical, like no oil. When all else fails, RTFM.

Another person with nothing constructive to contribute to the thread. Go back to pulling wings off flies.

I am wondering who has costed this operation, and whether they have factored in the compensation coming to those who are deported illegally. I guess it will stop when farmers leave their crops rotting in and on the ground, and start marching on Washington. Coming to a supermarket near you - higher food prices.

The files I am wanting to obtain are quite large, varying from 5 GB up to 100 GB. While the file transfer suggestions are helpful, they have limits unless paying. I am extremely reluctant to give my debit card details on the internet.

Or Thailand.

I don't know. IMO it's not like the West, where the low man on the sales totem pole gets fired.

Do you drink alcohol? Eat bacon? Smoke tobacco? Please post a link to a peer-reviewed study in a reputable journal which supports your opinion deodorants can cause cancer. A YouTube video of some quack won't cut it.

It's a long time since I was there, so my recollections may be out of date. IIRC there was nothing under 300K baht, anything older than that probably goes to the car tents. Odometers were usually 100K - 150K, lower readings got more expensive. Toyota Sure has a warranty of 1 year/20,000 km or 2 year/40,000 km depending on vehicle age. I tend to focus more on condition and odometer reading, than on year of manufacture. My auto mechanic in Chiang Rai loves my 2006 Toyota Vios, because he says it is so simple to work on. IMO the advent of cheap electric cars is probably driving prices down on secondhand ICE's.

Any rational person can see inequity is so deeply entrenched in America that three individuals there have more money than the bottom 150 million Americans. Musk, Bezos, and Zuckerberg. The USA is now an oligarchy. If you think Trump is going address said inequity, you're a fool. Who do you think helped him into power? When I was 20 yo, I could see a way forward in terms of getting a good education, a good job, and building a financial base. I paid off my first house mortgage in 18 months, paid cash for every home thereafter. What do 20 year olds have to look forward to now? Crushing student debt, a house mortgage they will still be paying off in retirement, and jobs where the tax burden they shoulder is far more than tax-dodging multi-nationals. IIRC Trump paid $750 in tax in 2017 and 2018. A janitor at one of his properties probably paid more. Capitalism is failing as the gulf of inequity widens.

Another option is a ToyotaSure used car dealership. They may haggle, depending on how much unsold inventory they have. Most auto mechanics in Thailand know how to work on Toyotas, and their reputation for reliability is well-earned. I am very satisfied with a late model Mazda 2 I bought from ExpatAuto.

OP, check out this website: https://expatautocm.com/ The prices are fixed, no haggling. However, you are dealing with people such that you don't need a Thai person.