My XM is off the road at the moment

[casalingua]

Hello all:

I have not been around for a while. My XM is currently gathering that rather sticky, dark dust that only accumulates in underground garages. I had to take the plates off it in February because they don´t do SORN here. Despite throwing a thousand euros at welding rusty bits where the rear subframe meets the floor pan, more rust has cropped up. And there are a few other niggles which mean it will take a temporary licence plate and a drive to Germany to get the work done affordably. In the meantime we haven´t actually really missed the car, to my surprise. I mean in practical terms. The odd time we rented and mostly I´ve discovered how easy the trains are here. What I do miss is just having a rare, strange car to swan around for no reason at all.

Some of my other interests have been reading about the Opel Senator. Some of my affection for the Peugeot 604 is heading towards this car, possibly because it seems much less frightening to own one of those than a 604. Does anyone here secretly admire the Senator? I am thinking of the Senator A and not the last version, the Senator B (based on the Omega A).

Finally, I wondered if I could draw your attention to my side project run with some exiles from Car Magazine. We got fed up with being hidden from the front pages of the magazine´s website when the forum was sidelined to an obscure button on page nine thousand and four. So we hid ourselves at our own blog called driventowrite.com. This website allows me the room to write a bit more which some of you noticed I was prone to.

Here´s a run down of recent stuff. If you like feel free to take a look and comments are welcome on all topics. Our current monthly theme is engines. By a coincidence, Jack Baruth at thetruthaboutcars has also written about the imminent demise of the V6 in the US.

A look at the engine ranges of VW, Opel and Ford. Who´s still got a V6 available? And a V8?
http://driventowrite.com/2014/08/12/the ... s-line-up/
One of the few reviews of the Lancia Thesis. We get regular visitors looking at this:
http://driventowrite.com/2014/05/12/200 ... v6-review/
We have a skewed look at classic cars in the form of the Archie Vicar archive. Vicar seems to have been a motoring writer from the period 1955 to 1981. This is about the 1959 Bentley S1.
http://driventowrite.com/2013/10/01/195 ... al-review/
An essay here about the changes in the fashionability of chrome:
http://driventowrite.com/2014/07/18/chr ... hierarchy/
This was a monthly theme introductory essay, about car badging.
http://driventowrite.com/2014/05/28/the ... and-words/
And finally, we have a few core interests. Jaguar is one of them and here we look at the success or otherwise if the Jaguar S-type and its face-lifted form.
http://driventowrite.com/2014/07/23/the ... g-the-war/

Regards,

Richard

[captainhaddock]

Well Richard I like your taste on cars. But why not asking what to do with your XM issues? you must have a really bad xM there?

Rust issues seem to be re appearing on more modern cars then yours. Especially Mercedes and Fords that I see around.
I am the lucky owner of 2 quite rust free XM's so where's the rust on your car!? I suppose you're close to a coast line?

[russ92xmsed]

I am a bit of a secret Lancia Thesis fan. I do like a Lancia and I do like the blandish Kappa range. That was a good read your article.
I do have on good authority, from a chap who interned with Alfa Romeo, that Lancia were forced to use the Kappa doors for the Thesis. Of course with different skins and window frames. But using these really affected the proportions of the car. Something small like that can dictate the rest of the design proportions. So in doing so, I think they got a very good compromise, however the Lancia design team were not pleased with this decision. I would have lowered the roofline a little, it does look too tall.

Anyway, hope you get your XM sorted out. Not fun constantly finding rust.

[djg]

That Lancia would indeed be a nice car if only you could live your life inside it. But I'd hate to get out and have to look at that front end... [emoji1]

[casalingua]

Thanks for taking a look at DTW, everyone.
We hope you liked some of what you found.

The Thesis looks good from the front and back. Underway it also has a classy bearing. But viewed side on it looks plain and a smidgin too short. I'd take the Lancia Kappa door story with a pinch of salt. The two cars have different side glass and so different frames. I think packaging got the better of aesthetics.