Ben Marshall - Dad Cars: A Mitsubishi Space Wagon, a Fiat Punto, Jag XJ6, Lotus Elise and my older brother's Gran Turismo car! S8E8

It was always just, you know, what's the best thing that I could get for a small amount of money. And the cool thing about it, I suppose, is that it was an MPV, but it's got more of like a an estate silhouette. I can't recall ever seeing another one other than the one that we owned. Looking back, that was when I realised from the earliest age that there was going to be something with me with cars. But they're mega in terms of dad cars, in my opinion.

Welcome to my dad's car. Enjoy.

Welcome to my dad's car, a podcast discussing our personal relationship with automotive nostalgia. And you know what? It doesn't even have to be about your dad's car. It can be your mum's, your grans, your parents, guardians, or even a neighbour's. If it made an impression, let's talk about it. How are we doing?

All right. Can you hear me?

Yeah. Been here long.

No. Not too long. About 30 seconds. Yeah. How's things.

Yeah, we're okay.

Yeah, we're all right.

Good. How are you doing, Ben? Hello.

How's it going, guys? You alright? Not bad, yeah. How are you? Yeah, yeah, I'm good, thanks. Yeah. Yeah, really good. Thanks for the invite. I appreciate it.

So for the benefit of the tape, we're joined by Ben Marshall, who some of you may know as Dad Cars on YouTube. Um, bumped into Ben up at the Classic Car Show at the NEC what a few months back, November. We had a bit of a chat, and yeah, you very kindly said you'd come on and have a chat with us. So um, do you want to tell people a little bit more about dad cars?

Yeah, yeah. So yeah, dad cars, as you said, predominantly is uh is a YouTube channel, but I do stuff on Instagram as well. Yeah, yeah. But it's it's basically me making content on exciting cars with my children because I've got four young children and I love cars that you would not think could be used as dad cars, so like two plus twos, super GTs, 911s, M cars, AMGs, you know, just exciting stuff that you wouldn't normally associate as being a dad car. That's what I'm just obsessed with. And for me, there's nothing more exciting than being with your children and making memories in an exciting car. And then I make YouTube videos. I do car reviews showing child seats going in the back of these exciting cars and and stuff like that. But I think what maybe makes my channel unique is that my children are actually part of my videos as well. Nice.

Is that like a full-time gig for you, Ben? Or is it alongside yeah, it is.

Oh, great, okay. Yeah, yeah, full-time. Yeah, nice. Yeah, no, I was I was crazy. I just I just went full time with it straight away. Belief. And basically for like 18 months, I was just hemorrhaging cash. But at the time I owned an Aston Martin DB9, which I called the Dad B9. Um, I saved up, worked really hard throughout my 20s, early 30s, and having a V12 Aston Martin was a dream of mine. Yeah, but I owned that car outright. So what I did is I decided I'm gonna take a sabbatical from what I did before, and for you know, six months, a whole year, basically until my money runs out, I'm just gonna try and do this thing full time. I'll blow all of the money that I've got in that Aston Martin. And if the channel's not viable by the time I'm driving around in like a £1,000 Facebook marketplace hatchback, then I can spend the rest of my life sleeping at night knowing that I gave it my all. But the the reason why I felt like I couldn't lose is because if I say if I did it for a year and it ended up me having to stop doing it, well, I'd have like 50 odd videos of me driving these incredible cars with my children. And even if no one else watched them in 20 years' time, me, my children will be able to look back at these memories of me driving a Ferrari for the first time with my three-year-old and you know, stuff like that. So that's why I think I sort of just went into it feeling like I couldn't lose. But fortunately, um, yeah, like after about 18 months, got some sponsors and and the uh the subscribers and returning viewers got to a certain level where now it's actually viable. Brilliant. Yeah, I mean, I'm I'm not driving around in like my dream car yet or anything like that, but at the moment it's it's viable, and um, yeah, hopefully it continues to be viable as well. Yeah, yeah. What are you gonna do when the kids get big? Yeah, I don't I don't know, see adopt, borrow some, just borrow some, yeah. Yeah, well, really looking into the future, I can picture me being a granddad in the future and then going back to like old school dad car reviews, but I'm doing it with my grandchildren. That's true, yeah. If I said to my children, like, look, I'll have them one day a week while you're at work, I'll look after them. Yeah, you know, I'll come and pick them up from you and I'll bring them back after they've had their dinner and stuff like that. And then if I get to go take my grandchildren one day out in exciting cars and make video, I think that would be hilarious. But in the meantime, yeah, we'll say here's my plan actually. So when they are teenagers, because I've got all daughters as well. So I've got four daughters. When they're teenagers, I'm anticipating that they're gonna be look, it's not cool spending time with dad. They love it at the moment, they you know, they they really enjoy it. But when they're teenagers, probably not cool to spend time with dad, right? But when they're teenagers, I'll be able to say to them, Look, if you want to come and help me do a bit of videography, if you don't want to be in the video, that's fine, you know. I'll pay you some money. That'd be cool, wouldn't it? So, you know, rather than them, you know, working lots of hours in a shop or something like that, maybe they'll they'll be like, actually, yeah, I'll come and uh I'll spend a day away with dad in cars.

I'm sure the the way the world's going, that'd probably be a subject in its own right at school, won't it? Before long, I'd imagine.

That is the most common answer to that question now in schools is what you want to be when you grow up. I was at like a um like an end-of-year parents thing where they had a projector up and it was showing each of the children. It's so sweet, they're just like holding a little sign up saying what they want to be when they grow up, and some people saying like doctor, footballer. But I'd say about 40% of them were saying YouTuber, TikToker. Really? Wow. Yeah, so it's mad, right? Yeah, it's crazy. So yeah, hopefully that's my plan. So when they're teenagers, hopefully they think what I'm doing is cool. And if I can incentivize them, even if it's I don't know, maybe if one of them doesn't want to be on camera anymore, but then they might want to do some editing or something. Yeah, I'd I'd love them to be involved with me, and and hopefully if I've done a good job, you know, raising and making nice memories with exciting cars, hopefully at least one or two of them actually becomes a car enthusiast as well. But you can't force it, it's in your it's not law of averages, you've got a good chance there, haven't you?

One in four.

So yes, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's it.

Yeah, I'm hoping.

I've got two daughters, and John's got two daughters as well. So um mine yeah, they're not fussed really by cars. They have gone out in the 944, but um, yeah, they say it's cramped and a bit noisy and all the all the rest.

Mine are absolutely not interested. In fact, I think I said before on here, like if I've gone to like a local car show or something, or if I've taken a picture of a car that I see in the street, one of them will say, Oh, looking at boring cars again. You'd probably send it to Andy, won't you? Yes, I will, yeah.

Yeah, it is true, and and it's it's um it's something I'm very conscious of. So I always try to try to make it so that it's very enjoyable and also it's always completely up to them. Yeah, because occasionally I'll I'll review a car, which I was supposed to review with one or two of my children in the back, but on the day, for whatever reason, I'll say, Right, who wants to come with me? I've got this Lexus on the drive or whatever. And sometimes, occasionally, they're like, No, look, I'm just I'm not up for it today. Yeah, so then I just review the car by myself, but I enjoy it so much more when I've actually got little ones with me. But more often than not, though, they're actually arguing about who goes in these cars, and then yeah, like they'll see they'll see a little clip or video or something like that, and then they'll be squabbling about what you got to go in the back of that car, and it's got screens in the back. Like, that's not fair. Yeah, yeah. So it's it's actually quite nice. And then we always go for ice cream as well after a film and a review. Nice.

I was gonna say that's my hook of if I do go to look a car thingy, it's there'll be ice cream there, so you should come.

Yeah, yeah, that's it. It's just yeah, trying to make it fun. Yeah, but my children, so they are um they're all still quite little, so like eight, and my youngest is three, but they know more about cars than my wife does, like now already. Really? So my wife is driving like a different car that we've got for some reason, you know, like a press loan or something. My daughters would be like, No, you've got to press that button to get the blowers on. You know, they're they're they're already coming out with um things, which I think just being around it and spending time with me. And I think what it is as well, they see me get excited when they make an observation or they've learned something. Oh, this is like this is a like the Porsche that we went in, which had the red seats, and my face lights up, and I'm like, Yeah, it is, yeah. Do you remember? And like, yeah, I remember. And because I get so excited about it, I think they pick up on that, and maybe I don't know, subconsciously they think, Oh, hang on, this is knowing these things is quite cool. Dad thinks it's cool, so yeah, it's it's worth me knowing about. But at car events, I could get stuck talking to other boring, bold men about cars for too long. And I've always told them a rule like you know, they can pull my hand, and then I've got to like go to end the conversation to go. Because look, guys like us, we could literally be in a rainy car park with two cars and we could talk for an hour to somebody else if they've got like an interesting car, right?

Yeah, yeah.

But children that can get a bit too much, can't it?

Yeah, very quickly.

Yeah, okay. Um, what's your earliest car memory, Ben? Okay, so my earliest car memory is being in my dad's Mitsubishi spacewagon. So I grew up in a family of four as well. So I had a brother and two sisters. Cool. And yeah, so it's a seven-seat Mitsubishi space wagon, and it's white as well. So it kind of looks like if you imagine like a milk carton, you know, like a cardboard like milk carton on its side, it just literally looks like that, you know.

Yeah. I had a godparent with one actually. Oh really? They had a silver one, yeah. Oh, okay. We've not had one come up, I don't think, as yet on the podcast, but yeah, they had one.

You know, I've not I've not seen, I can't recall ever seeing another one other than the one that we owned. And the cool thing about it, I suppose, is that it was an MPV, but it's got more of like a an estate silhouette. And yeah, it was and it was Japanese as well. So I don't know, there was something quite cool about it. I I can remember being in that as well, and a couple of times just having strangers coming over to my dad once they saw four kids getting out of it, and strangers going, Oh, is it that got seven seats? Oh, you don't suppose you should fancy selling that. So I don't think there was like many of them around, like where we lived. And uh yeah, I think it was actually quite cool, like in hindsight. Yeah, but my probably yeah, my earliest vivid memories of being in the third row of that, where it's got the windows, which you know it's just got like a little clicker that kind of opens it up like half an inch at the back. And I used to get travel sick as well in cars, going all the way up to see our family. My dad's family lived in North Wales, um, in Anglesey up in Hollyhead. And so, you know, coming from the south coast all the way up there, it felt like we were in a car forever. And with me getting travel sick as well, being in the back of that, wasn't pleasant at all. It was just, yeah, it was like just in the hurt locker for what felt like forever. Do the seats face the right way in the back of that? Yeah, so they face they face forward. So that was the interesting thing. Yeah, you used to be able to get the estates as well, like the C classes and things, which have got the little fold-up seats that face backwards, right? Yeah, even worse for travel sickness. Oh, yeah, I'm still like it now. If I if I get into like a taxi where it's got the rear facing seats and the journey's longer than five minutes, I'll I'll start getting motion sickness now from it. So even on a train, I've got to sit forward on a train, it's really weird. But yeah, that's my my earliest memory, is that car? But the car before that that my dad had was a cavalier. Okay, yeah. So um getting one cavalier, a green one. I only remember it from pictures though. Um, and that would have been the car that I was collected from hospital in as well.

Yeah, yeah.

But yeah, no, so it's it's the space wagon.

Was your dad um was he into cars at all, Ben, or was he just sort of getting stuff to get him through the sort of family life, as it were?

Yeah, no, he he wasn't growing up. My dad wasn't into cars. I think having four children as well, it never felt like we oh we didn't, we didn't have a lot of money. So it was literally just that, because even the car after the space wagon, like after my parents split up, and then my dad didn't need to have a seven-seater, he just got a a Fiat Punto after that. Oh right. Um, again, I think that might have been might have been a Mark I punto, silver one. I can remember that. Um, but yeah, so growing up, it was always just you know, what's the best thing that I could get for a for a small amount of money that serves the purpose sort of thing.

They did um Toyota, I think, did a space cruiser, didn't they? Which was a sort of similar kind of thing. It looked like Yeah.

That's what I thought you were referring to initially, because I remember occasionally we used to be picked up from school by someone that had one of those, and I remember that being like the first time that I'd got into like a car like that, basically, that was sort of like a van with seats where you could sort of roam around. And it's the first time I'd really sort of experienced a car that had been trashed by kids inside. Yeah, if you know what I mean. It had the sort of smell and because we we had a saloon car, so generally it was pretty, you know, it wasn't that bad, but I was sort of sticks in my head that does as being the first sort of I don't I don't know if they had a dog as well, maybe, but yeah, it was just a mess in there and but a good car side, like in terms of carrying a family around and everything that comes with it.

Yeah, yeah. No, no, it it's it's funny, like growing up for me. I remember even as like a teenager and then being a young adult, I always used to say when you talk about oh, how many kids do you want to have one day? I was always like, if I can afford it, I'd like to have four children as well. Just because that's what I was used to growing up. But where I'd always have sports cars and stuff, you know, even um in like my twenties and things, people say, Oh, well, you have to get rid of those silly sports cars and get yourself an MPV. So the MPV was always kind of the poison chalice sort of, no, there's no way I'm gonna throw in the towel, I'll figure out a way. But I don't know, as as time goes on, and and I do look, I I don't like I don't like boring cars. I don't like a car like a dad car, which is you know the traditional sense, something which which signifies throwing in the towel on your on your passions and stuff. But I don't know, I've got to come full circle now, and I think like an MBV is pretty cool because people doubt everybody just just buys crossovers and SUVs now, and they're not they're not practical family cars compared to you know an MPV, which would be a lot cheaper and easier to live with and a lot more practical and easier to park and things as well. Yeah, it's come full circle.

Yeah, we've been involved with Picasso's for a number of years now, and we did go into an SUV at one point, but like you say, size-wise, it's just like chalk and cheese in terms of like my wife visibility as well, it's just so much better, and yeah, and you can trash it and do what you want with it. It's they are good to be fair, for what you need them to do.

Yeah, and honestly, if you'd asked me in my twenties, oh yeah, when you have your four kids, you're gonna have to get a Picasso. Yeah, I would I would I would have been just disgusted by the idea of it, yeah. But I actually kind of respect it now, yeah. And you're right, like kids do trash cars as well. Um, especially people always comment on my videos and stuff because in my videos my cars are always like dirty on the inside of things like that. And and like, oh teach your children how to respect things and stuff. I said, look, they they bad respect things, we're not doing it deliberately, it's just like day-to-day, yeah. And it's just actually if you daily any car with four children, it's it's ridiculous to anticipate you're gonna, you know, maintain like 10 out of 10 sort of cleanliness and uh and stuff on the inside of it as well.

But yeah, unless you've got the time to clean the interior of your car weekly, it's just gonna I mean the amount of clubs and walks we go on, it's just it's inevitable, isn't it? That mud is gonna come in and food and everything.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I just fixed my wife's L405 Range Rover. I bought a cheap one for her a couple of years ago, and I just fixed it, got it back on the road, and then the first thing she did is she took it for a walk with the dog and the four kids in the woods, and it's obviously it's all wet and horrible and raining, isn't it? Yeah, and when they came back, I saw their muddy boots um and stuff by the front of the house. And my wife said, I'll go and have a look in the Range Rover that you've just got fixed. And it's got an all extended leather pack, ivory leather interior in her car, and a four across matching ivory Range Rover leather multima child seat as well, so they can fit all four children in. And honestly, the the mud is in places that I didn't I don't even actually understand how they how they got the mud there is ridiculous. Yeah, but look, it's it's it's one of those things I always say to people as well, like if you if you get stressed out about you know things like that, then you've got the wrong car. Um I posted video showing a clip of two kids in the back of the dad B9 when I had it, and they're eating an ice cream in the back of it, and there's so many comments. How dare you let children eat ice creams in an Aston Martin? That's sacrilege. I think honestly, if I had a car that I wouldn't let my children eat in ice cream in, then it's not the right car for me. I shouldn't have that car. Yeah. Um Level cleans up really nice anyway.

Yeah, take us back to a trip to Langelsey then. So there's four of you in the back of the car, and you got music on? You got the radio playing? What would be on the radio?

Yeah, I can remember like early years memories of of music. Fleetwood Mac. Um Fleetwood Mac, I can remember playing quite a lot early years. Yeah. Um yeah, Queen as well. My dad used to listen to Queen quite a lot in the cars. Did your mum drive or was it just your dad? No, that's really interesting. So yeah, my mum never did. She did all of, I can remember doing all of her lessons. I can also remember my dad taking her out. So she must have been, you know, insured as a learner on the family car as well.

Yeah, yeah.

And um, I can remember it being really stressful, you know, while she was learning. And I think she did a few of her tests, but then failed.

Oh my dear.

I assume what happened was when they separated, I reckon it was around that time when you know she was probably just about to pass, but then they separated and then sort of life changed. So, yeah, still to this day, my my mum never actually passed a test and learned to drive, but she always she always sort of instilled that in me, like because I saw how much it capped her freedom and the things that she could do in life and everything as well. Um so yeah, yeah, it was so it was just yeah, it was just my dad.

Do you remember um yeah, neighbours with interesting cars or or kids at school?

Yeah, yeah, oh yeah. Okay, so neighbours, a big one for me, was my main family home. It's the second home that I lived in, and that was the main one that I got all my incredible memories of. There was a guy at the end of my road who had an S1 lotus Elise. Oh, lovely. So this would have been when they first came out. Yeah, and I can just remember every every day, you know, seeing that car, and it was just incredible, insane. I was just so fixated on it. Like it's just like what's that 97-98 sort of era we're talking?

Gotta be, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. That's it. And it was, yeah, green. I can just just remember just being really really fixated on it. Yeah. And um, that's no doubt why I was so obsessed with getting an elite myself. Um, and that's something I used to always say as well, actually. It's like I'm I'm not having children until I've had my elise. Okay. Obviously, you know, at least that's not a anyway family car, is it? Yeah. So I and I did I did do that. I did, I got um an S2 um Lotus Elise. It was a 111R that had been fully converted using all Lotus parts and everything to an SC, so supercharged S2. Uh, and yeah, that car was mega. But but yeah, I always remember that really important memory for me. And then you say people at school, the only like childhood friend that I remember who had a cool car was there was a friend who lived down the road from me, and it was his mum that had had a jag. Nice. This was this was really early, really, really early. This was uh I assume it must have been an XJ. Yeah, but the interesting thing about it was there was no seat belts in the back. Okay, and like my mum would have been horrified. I don't think if I ever told her, certainly did tell her when I was a child, she wouldn't have let me go out in it because my mum was like that. And I can remember being in the back of that, and his mum was just so so different to mine because she was driving in the front, cigarette in hand, and then me and my friend were in the back of it. Remember, it's in the summer, and we had like the windows down, we're just climbing, clambering around, you know, like leaning over the parcel shelf. And it because it was the summer, we both had our t-shirts off as well. And we're just like we went down to um South C C front and we're just walking around. My mum never even let me that was this is this this gives you an idea. Look, um, my mum never liked me to take my t-shirt off in in the summer and walk around because she was like, No, that's common. But when I was with this friend, I just felt like um there's absolutely no rules I could do with anything. It was incredible. But I remember the jag and it was just yeah, like incredibly cool, just floating around in this thing with you know, like cigarette smoke like blowing in our faces as we're like hanging out the windows and stuff. He had a scaffolding on the back of his house, I remember at the time, and we used to climb up the top of the scaffolding and eat cereal up there and stuff. And it was yeah, yeah, he was like my cool friend that literally just like there was just no rules whatsoever.

You still in contact with this person, or are they no?

I don't I don't look, he's he's yeah, someone that I went to school with. But like, I don't know, probably every like couple of years. If I like went out and bump into him, we would have like a catch-up and we talk about this sort of stuff and everything. But yeah, no, it's not someone I I still sort of see now, no. Yeah, it's quite funny, isn't it? What colour was the Jag? Do you remember?

I think it was like a burgundy type coloured one. Yeah, I think it must have been 70s, early 80s if it had no seat belts in the back.

Yeah, you know what? That was probably actually even earlier than the space wagon. So that's probably my first memory of being in the car. I'm just doing the maths in my head now because that was when I lived in my first house. And I don't think we got a space wagon until we moved into the second one. So yeah, that that would have been the earlier one. Okay. And yeah, that'll be it then. Yeah, we've we've achieved something today. I I'll never put so many things together there.

Do you recall any um teachers with interesting cars? Either interesting or just dreadful.

Oh, you know, I don't really. I think I think it's because I grew up in in South Sea in in Portsmouth. And Hampshire, that's where I grew up. And it's one of the most densely populated cities in Europe is Portsmouth. So if you live down in South Sea, like you just walk everywhere. Yeah. So I think a lot of people, like we, you know, we'd walk to school and stuff. That's why I've not really got any any memories of you know, like cars on the school run and things because people didn't really do it. I mean, I'm sure I'm sure there was some people, but you know, they'd have to park like a few roads over, and it it wasn't really yeah, every everybody I know is sort of like walked to school and things. So yeah, I don't I I don't really recall any teachers having a having a cool car. I feel like they probably all would have just walked in.

Do you think the Elise was the car that sort of lit the spark? Was that the first one that went? Or did you see something on TV or in a movie? Or yeah, okay.

So the Elise was probably looking back, that was when I realized from the earliest age that there was going to be something with me with cars. But what really sort of started all of the obsession where I just couldn't get cars out of my head was my grandparents bought me a PlayStation One. And so I can remember when Gran Turismo One, the original Gran Turismo, came out because we went and bought it that week. And then me and my older brother just absolutely got obsessed with that game. And you know, a couple of our closest friends as well were all just completely obsessed with Gran Turismo One. And then fast forward a few more years, so I was still too still too young to drive. But my brother was was driving, and well, he had his first, it was a Mark, was it a Mark III Fiesta? Okay, yeah, like 90s Fiesta. And so he'd done his like first year having that, and then he bought a Mark II MR2. Okay. I can't remember what it was, it might have been like 1300 quid or something like that. But he went to see it with a friend of his, and then he put a deposit on it. And then when he went to get it, he was like, I'm taking you, Ben, because you know how excited I was about it, because you know that was that was a car that was in Grand Turismo. We're getting a Japanese mid-engine rear-wheel drive, two-seater car. And so I went along with him as well. And I just I couldn't believe it. I remember every time I'd think about this this time, this day, like just straight away then, like the hair on the back of my neck goes on end because I can just really picture it. Just seeing this car and think, how can we get this? Like my brother's um, I don't know what he was, was he like 20, 21, something like that? And then sure enough, he bought it, got the key. I was on the passenger side, and we started driving home in this two-seat mid-engine rear-wheel drive car from Grangerisbo, and it felt like we were in a supercar. And I just kept looking at him and going, I can't believe this is real. I can't believe we've got this. I can't believe this is amazing. It felt like we just bought a Ferrari 355. That's what it felt like. Yeah, and that feeling of driving back in that car for the first time, that rush, like I I still get, I still get I still get that feeling now whenever I go and buy like a dream new to me car now and drive it back for the first time. Yeah, you know, that excited feeling, right? You find it like in your drive. This is mine, but it's just chasing that feeling, I'm sure, that I felt, you know, when I was like whatever, um 15, 16 or something like that. So that to me was really, yeah, it was my brother. It's my brother, and and um, because yeah, my daddy at that time, he was still just you know driving, driving whatever. Um, and it just I don't know, it felt it felt weird. It felt like the feeling of being in that car was like you're not like everybody else. So you've just hit like a cheat code, like you're playing a game and you've like where everyone else is just doing boring things in life, whereas like you've got this thing which is different, and and where we I got no other memories growing up, but never been in anything else like that. You know, I didn't have like a an uncle who had you know something. I didn't never spoke to that neighbor, and he he never offered to take me out on your lease or anything. Do you know what I mean? So um, yeah, that was the thing. So it's my brother, really, that that started it all, and then and then our friends as well. They they all started buying 90s Japanese cars as well because of Gran Turismo. And we were at that age where they were all at the the bottom of their depreciation curve as well.

Yeah, yeah.

And then my brother went on, he had that for a few years, and then he bought a Supra after that as well. Cool. Um, it was white Japanese import, it was only a naturally aspirated auto, but like it was insane. It was like somebody now buying like a Konig's egg or something. That's what it felt like to us at the time. And um, yeah, so it's really like my brother Jordan, my older brother, he was he was like my car inspiration hero, and he always sort of took me along to to share in those special moments and stuff as well, you know.

I think Grand Turismo has really got a fair bit to answer for, hasn't it? For lots of people, really.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's it. Obviously, like the following gangs like Grand Turismo 2 was incredible because they had even more um even more cars in it and everything. Because there's there wasn't actually that many cars when you look back in the first one.

Yeah, it's more of a sort of a Euro influence, wasn't there, in the second version from memory. Yeah, I seem to remember like Porsche's. Well, no, it wasn't Porsche, was it? I think I had the rights to that, but yeah, I remember some M3s being on there, that sort of thing.

And yes, yeah, yeah, that's it. You had like T VRs on as well. That they were a nightmare to drive, weren't they? They just spun out, yeah. Yeah, yeah, really hard to handle them. And yeah, it was odd gratuitism, but my brother, he always bought the Supra and then you know, modified that up to a thousand horsepower, and then I always bought a GTO twin turbo in the game, and then that was what I sort of modified up, and that's why later, yeah, in in my early 20s, I ended up getting a 3000 GT. Okay. Did it live up to the uh live up to the legend? How was it? Well what the 3000 GT? Yeah, look, it's mega. It was it was it was incredible, felt so fast. Um, what was that like yeah, like 2023, maybe when I had that? Um incredibly fast. But I ended up buying a Mark II MR2 as well later on when I could. Uh I was gonna ask. So I got a I got a Rev 4 Mark II MR2, so it's black on black, T-bar roof, nice, and it was just mega. And so I went from that to the 3000 GT, and I actually kind of missed my MR2 because it just felt a bit smaller, a bit like a bit more, you know, nimble. But in terms of speed, yeah, like the 3000 GT was incredible, you know, twin turbo manual. Yeah, but yeah, it was just it was great because we were just buying all these cars for pennies, you know, when we just had like weekend jobs and things, like the prices of of all the most desirable stuff now is is crazy, isn't it?

Yeah, definitely. Um, I'm glad, yeah, you've done the kind of the the Elise and the MR2 as well. I did wonder whether you went back to that and sort of relived it. Yeah. And yeah, Gran Turismo was massive for me. I remember we ended up, we didn't even have a PlayStation, I don't think. I think we hired one and Gran Turismo from like the video shop up the road when they first came out. Oh, okay, yeah, yeah. And yeah, me and my brother played that for a while.

That was a wrench giving that back at the end of the weekend.

Yeah, and we sat yeah, sat there kind of in our dining room with um yeah, this sort of old telly and um played that. And then the 3000 GT, I went to my prom in a 3000 GT, a red one.

Oh, wicked.

Yeah, yeah. The guy who had that, um, he had that and a lotus elise. Um, not an elise and a and a LAN, like the the two-seater convertible, which was like really sort of sharp-nosed. Yeah. He had one of those, but I went with someone else, and yeah, we ended up going in the 3000 GT. So um did you did you have to squeeze in the back? I think I sat in the front. I think this other guy went in the back. I think, but I can't I can't remember now. Yeah, that was cool. That was cool, nice car. Yeah, I've got no desire to buy one, but I've always fancied at least to be fair. I remember when they came out kind of seeing them in auto car like the sort of spy shots and things. And I used to get auto car and cut the pictures out and all the rest. So um, yeah, that was yeah, really cool.

Bit of a game changer, wasn't it, at the time? It was very um sort of out on its own, I suppose you could say, in terms of what it did, what it looked like.

Honestly, they're incredible cars. In terms of just having a weekend car, if you've got a garage and you've got the you know, 15 to 20,000 pounds and you're wondering what to get for a weekend car, two seater, honestly, a lotus at least, is always the answer, in my opinion. I I do hope to at some point in the future, before my children get too big to fit in the back, I want to buy an Avora because they're they're mega cars as well. Um they're they're incredible. It's just a problem that they're just not they're just not depreciating. Yeah. And I and I don't think they will. So even you know, like the bottom of the market for like a launch year Avora, a natural aspirated one, it's still sort of looking at like 25 grand, which is um uh just a bit frustrating, but they're mega in terms of dad cars, in my opinion.

With regards to dad cars, what's on your hit list? What would you like to take the kids out in? G given the option, someone phones you up tomorrow and says, I've got a garage full of stuff. What do you want to uh test? Yeah. Um and is it just new is it just new stuff, or do you go back and do old as well?

Yeah, no, I I do I do older stuff as well. So the the inconvenient truth though, right, is so the bread and butter, the things that I that I'm most interested in and I most like to review are exciting cars that you could use today as a semi-daily with your young children. So the inconvenient truth there is something that you never think about before you have children, but you need to think about safety as well. So in terms of you know, proper class, well like 90s cars, 90s cars are significantly you know more vulnerable structurally than cars from like the mid-nouhties onwards, yeah. Because around like the early, I think it's like 2001, was it that NCAP came in, or it's around there anyway, but around the early noughties, basically, NCAP suddenly came in and highlighted which cars were safe and which ones weren't. You know, and there were set of models that are up for sale, which structurally were terrible, and then suddenly everybody actually, you know, some people heard, oh yeah, so-and-so was in one of those old Alpha Romeos and it crumpled like a tin can, you know, and oh, but down the road's got a Volvo and it hit into a tree, and everyone walked away and uh was smiling, you know. But NCAT basically highlighted in no uncertain terms, here we go. So that's something else that for a lot of a lot of cars I've got to think about as well. You know, if if it's a car that I'm reviewing and I'm saying to people, look, if this is on your bucket list, you've got the money, you can comfortably afford to buy one of these. Look, I've shown you, you can get child seats in the back, the boots big enough for what you need. This car's sensational. You know, I can't I can't say all of that if it's like a late 90s car, and then I also know that from research online that actually structurally they're very unsound as well. Like I've got to I've got a duty, haven't I, to tell everybody that as well. So yeah, cars that I look at, like the sweet spot for me is mid to late noughties, because I think that's the glory time for you know peak internal combustion engine, in my opinion. You know, that's when they were slapping crazy large capacity engines into everyday saloons in the states. Yeah, yeah. You had like the C6 RS6 with the with the V10 Lamborghini Galado engine in it, and you've got like the E60 V10 M5 as well. That that's a car which is on my hit list. I've still not driven a V10 M5. I really want touring or a saloon. They did both, didn't they? I think. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they didn't make the the tourings in very high numbers, so there's a lot more saloons out there. I think um Chris Harris has got one, hasn't he? I think Chris Harris has got one, yeah. And he's like uh he's paints the interior and everything, and he's spent an absolute fortune on it. Yeah, but that's like that's peak for me. Like that that's an example of like a peak dad car for me because it's of the right age where that will be a lot safer than a BMW from the late 90s. But then it's also got a legendary V10 engine that we will never see again, you know, in in just like a you know, normal saloon or estate. So that's an example of like what I think is like a peak dad car for us right now. Somebody's got the money, they can comfortably afford it. And uh yeah, yeah, that's it that's a that's an example, yeah. Definitely what so for for me to buy as well, I'd love to, I'd love to get a later on this year, hopefully, like a V8 estate to have alongside my um I've got a Maserati Gran Turismo S, which is the world's only six-seat Maserati Gran Turismo, because it's got it's got a four across uh multiback in the back, which is in um matching leather as well. So it all looks like it's it's supposed to be like that from factory, which is which is crazy. But I think a a V8 estate or V10 um estate car sat alongside that for me, I just think would be like the perfect little lineup. Maybe an RS6, maybe, or uh yeah. Well so so here's the thing. So yeah, if you if you want an E60 touring, so V10 M5 touring, it's gonna cost you like 35 grand, something like that. It's like double the price of a saloon, which is why I think the C6 RS6, the V10 is like a better bang for buck purchase, because you can get one of those for around 15,000 pounds. Yeah, very risky purchase though, because both of these cars, they highly likely that you'll get thrown like a massive bill where you've got to take the engine out. Yeah, could easily throw you like a 5,000 pound bill, and that's that's part of the reason why they're cheap as well, isn't it?

Do you get involved with the tools? Are you mechanically minded or not?

No, no, I've never even changed a set of brake pads on a car, which is really embarrassing. I can I can do almost anything on a house, that's what I did before. So I am quite hands-on.

Yeah, yeah.

So, what I've done recently, I I think I alluded to it earlier on with the L405. I've I've started to do some stuff though, and make videos. So the L405 Range Rover, all of them with panoramic sunroofs, all the L405s, and the sports as well. The drain tray is made of steel, and the way that it connects to the roof drain hoses that corrodes and then detaches, and that happened to ours. Yeah, and so our car flooded, and so all under the carpet just flooded in water, all the modules underneath all got flooded. So I have started to now like I took all the headliner down and I redrilled the holes and put new connectors in, I sorted all that out, and I took all the interior out and got all the water out and um got these modules fixed and then put it all back together and stuff. So I'm starting to get involved a bit now and I would like to learn. Yeah, so that'll be the plan going forward. But I don't know, I can't see me becoming like somebody who's doing like engine swaps and and things like that, you know. I think there'll be a limit. Yeah. Um, if it's donkey work, like you know, sorting out a leak and um taking interior apart and everything, I'm I'm quite happy to give that a go.

Yeah, yeah.

Sounds similar to myself, that does, Ben. I've I can confess I've never changed a set of brake pads either. So you're not alone on that one.

Yeah, it does it, it does feel a bit embarrassing though to say, you know, when um when you're sort of like a creator in the automotive space and stuff. Because it feels like everybody else is literally dropping engines and things. But I am quite enjoying making making these videos though, because I can just hold my hands up and be like, Look, I'm an idiot, I don't actually know what I'm doing. So that takes a bit of pressure off as well. So if I do something really stupid, I've already said that I'm an idiot, so you know, feel free to comment because it helps engagement. But yeah.

On the flip side, there's not many mechanics who edit their own videos, so having edited the podcast for kind of years, like many people would just be presented with that and be like, I don't know what to do. So yeah, we're all wired for different things, aren't we?

Yeah, that's it. And I've I I just think, yeah, I think there's a limit, right? Because like I'm a one-man band, obviously, with it all. That's the only reason that it's it's viable. You know, if I had to pay a videographer, that's it. Like, literally, I would I'd that would take all the money that I earn from the video, or but I might not even earn as much as to pay the videographer. But but yeah, there's limits, right? So I could get involved in that sort of thing, but I still take these cars to specialists to get serviced and to get like but I like to video all that sort of thing as well, because I'll video like the whole process and you know how to look after cars properly. Yeah, because you do need to as well, because yeah, when you're younger, it might be fun if your car develops you know massive problem and you're stranded on the side of the motorway. It's a cool story to talk about with your mates down the pub or something. But you guys could imagine, right, if you had your two kids in the back of the car and you're on a flipping smart motorway or something and and something goes wrong. Um, it's a thing of nightmares, isn't it? So that's why you've got to look after these cars as well. My obsession with big engines, they're wonderful, but you got really have got to look after them to do like preventative maintenance and things.

Yeah, cool. Thank you very much for joining us, Ben. It's been really good fun and uh nice to hear your story. And um nice that you ticked off a few of those cars from the early memories as well. You've got to go and buy a space wagon now, haven't you?

So uh honestly, if anybody out there knows of somebody who's got a Mitsubishi spacewagon, Mark One, I would love to drive one. Yeah, I don't think there's any left. I think they've all dissolved and they're not special enough for anybody to care enough about keeping it. But I would love so much to drive one of those. Um, so yeah, if this ever gets out to somebody, please reach out to me. I would love to, I'd love to drive one. I'll see if I can find one.

Haggerty's Festival of the Unexceptional.

There's got to be a row of them. Yeah, well, I I don't know. I I do occasionally on Car and Classic, I just type in Space Wagon just to see if one pops up. Because if one came up and it was like, you know, a thousand pounds or something, it's the sort of thing that I would just on a whim just think I'm gonna just go and buy that. Yeah, definitely. But it's been wonderful, guys. I really appreciate you inviting me on. Um, it's funny, one of the one of the things people always refer to my channel as dad's cars. Yeah, so loads of times, you know, I've had people sort of saying dad's cars, so it might be quite helpful for for both of us, me being on here now, because there might be some sort of keywords thing of people hugging dad's car or something like that, then it might sort of have a bit of cross-pollination for us. So, um, so yeah, that's cool. We appreciate it.

No problem at all. Thanks, Ben. Yeah, hopefully we'll bump into you again at some events coming up. Yeah, awesome. Thanks, guys. Take care, see ya. So, yeah, thanks very much to Ben for joining us.

Yeah, that was good, wasn't it? That was a bit different in terms of uh parent cars and what you ferry your kids around in.

Yeah, definitely. Um, obviously, yeah, from his point of view, I think it was Mitsubishi's spacewagon, wasn't it, which kind of started it off. And I think I alluded to yeah, my um my godparents had one, so yeah. I have had a little bit of a look around and there are none for sale.

All extinct.

They are all disappeared, even in Japan and kind of overseas by the looks of things.

So really interesting.

Someone must have one in their garage somewhere.

There's got to be some Jeff out there somewhere who's got a whole field full of um yeah.

My uncle was called Jeff, so that's really of all the names. Um, so yeah, that was that was good. And yeah, I think the idea of just discussing and demonstrating that even if you have got a family or a larger family, you can still sort of enjoy cars and he's kind of championing that and uh a little bit of a to hell with it attitude almost like absolutely, yeah.

I guess it's kind of the opposite of the direction I've taken myself, and that I have sacrificed more a car that's not necessarily more led to ferrying children around into going for something that is. Um, but he's he's saying no to that.

You you have had the mayor of London against you as well, but True, true. But yeah, he is kind of yeah, he's got the Maserati, he's got a Range Rover, I think. That's true. It's obviously kind of a far more sensible choice. But yeah, he's currently shopping for uh another sports car and exactly not to. So yeah, if he could make the maths work and get it past the other half, then um fair play. That's wonderful news and makes for good content. Yeah. So yeah, if you're looking for a YouTube fix, then do go and look up dad cars because um yeah, Ben's having a lot of fun over there.

Absolutely. Yeah, it's refreshing as well, isn't it, to see someone involving their kids in in that sort of thing as well. Yeah.

And chatting to him when I was up at the NEC actually, like he'd got a big scale electrics set up on the stand and they've got sort of colouring and all this other stuff which is specifically geared up for children so that people can go to those shows with their family and with their kids. Yeah, because otherwise, yeah, it's very much kind of lugging around carrier bags of brochures or whatever you might be given. And the kids can't sit in the cars, there's nothing really for them to do.

No, it's like I said on the episode, just going to a local car show usually results in me only taking the kids if there's an ice cream at the end of it or at the beginning.

So there's not really much to do, you're right. Yeah, you hurry around kind of almost feeling guilty that you want to spend an hour looking at the cars. So yeah, I think the more sort of shows and events that sort of take a leaf out of that book really and consider that if we can make this more accessible to other people and families and actually the hobby and the industry surrounding it can grow because yeah, all of a sudden it's not just something that dad does when he has a rare day off on his own. Yeah, yeah, it it can be a viable day out for everyone, like there is something in it for mum and the kids and all the rest. So definitely. Yeah, yeah. Thanks very much to Ben. Enjoyed that one and um yeah, thank you very much, John. Thanks, mate. Cool. Okay, we'll wrap this one up and roll the credits.

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