After advance warning of impending severe illness (MOT Cert full of advisories and a quiet word of advice from friendly Mechanic) I recently sent my well loved 2.5 estate to its final resting place. On an 'R' plate and driven from new, meticulously maintained etc. etc. so parting was painful - however, I'm retired now and we all need to move on. So under some pressure from The Management, and a reluctant "seeing sense" on my part, I agreed to downsize to a Volvo V50 - super-smooth 5 cylinder engine and still the utility of an Estate body, albeit somewhat smaller - it seemed a good move. To cut a long story short ... darn, too late for that, I have found the ride 'choppy' and uncomfortable, but worse, the throttle pedal is too far to the left to make room for the wheel arch, presumably. (I'm disabled and I find the pedal position causes me pain in my dodgy right leg). These things weren't particularly obvious on the test drive and there was a strong element of "it's bound to feel different after the Omega and I'll get used to it" in my thinking. Well, it did, and I haven't! I'm sure the V50 is a fine car but after 15 years with the Omega there's no contest. To add insult to injury, I reminded the Dealer from whom I purchased the Volvo and px-ed the Omega for scrap that I had not received the Certificate of Destruction from him. His reply was that the car was not actually scrapped as intended but was sold at auction last week for £25 more than the price I got in px against the Volvo.
So now I've put the Volvo on FleaBay and I'm trying to find a mint 3.2 or 2.6L auto Omega Estate close to home in Hertfordshire. I actually went to see one yesterday but only remembered this morning that I forgot to ask the Dealer why the security key for the wheels was not in evidence. Otherwise the vehicle was in great condition for its age (2002) except for a "ticking" sound typical of a cam follower that hasn't got its oil supply. There did not appear to be any oil on the dipstick so that might be a reason. Best give that one a miss p'raps and keep on looking. But I'm a picky Old Git so good ones by my standards that are located within a reasonable distance from home are not easy to find.
Ho hum; as the stranded whale said "Life's a beach and then you die".