Reply With QuoteIf the car park at work is anything to go by I think we should be more worried by this new fad for 'metallic poo brown' rather than relatively inoffensive white!!
Whilst pondering a brand new Audi Q5 last year I went into the local dealer and the only one they had to show me was a white one. Car was nice enough but not for me but I mentioned in the conversation about the fad for white cars. Dealer said they sell 60-70% (at that time0 in white - his view was that after 20 years as a dealer he was more than happy to follow market demands but in 3 years time there was high potential or the P/X discussion to go south on the basis of it being a fad colour that may no longer be the 'in thing'.
Personally, for me, white is a big put off.
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks long into you.........
If the car park at work is anything to go by I think we should be more worried by this new fad for 'metallic poo brown' rather than relatively inoffensive white!!
Now that is a proper car! It would look good in any colour.Originally Posted by andy tims
No depreciation suffered on this old one of mine
Haha it is my car actually but no worries, each to their own! I didn't like it at first but it has grown on me and now I am quite a fan. It certainly has road presence and is a great handling car for something of its size.
Certain cars have to be white. I'm thinking of RS500's, E30 M3, RS Evo's and the various Porsche CS/RS and the like, cars which were homologated or destined for the track. Anything else looks either poverty spec or a fashion statement. The M3 posted above gets away with it as white has become the 'signature' colour for this model but why anyone else would consider a white car over black or silver is beyond me...
fine line between popular and common. surely its about what you like as your paying for it.
anyway this is my new car - it doesnt matter if you love it or loathe it, your not making the payments.
I had a white Vauxhall Cavalier once, and I had to keep the doors locked when driving in town to prevent people getting in the back thinking I was a Taxi!
drat beaten to it... was going to say only buy white car to match you white stilettos.
sorry but white car just screams ESSEX !
I've had white before and actually made a profit on it!
Plus I'm guilty of black wheels on my old lotus and current VX...
Last edited by pete-r; 1st February 2013 at 09:09.
One of the reasons why white is popular at the moment is that it is claimed that white cars are cheaper to run.
The reason being that white reflects sun light (if you have a black car you know how hot they can get in the summer) and therefore it uses less AC (and therefore power) to cool it down.
Its is also believed that metalics actually make the car heavier (Paint+clear coat) rather than just paint.
Finally as people have indicated solid colour cars are cheaper to buy than metalics, which makes them cheaper to run. Especially if you need it repainted at any time.
Andy
Whoever does not know how to hit the nail on the head should be asked not to hit it at all.
Friedrich Nietzsche
white care are awesome. i have a bmw m135i on order, i should have it late march, cant wait!!!!
white car=chav=white socks
White will be out of fashion by then........hopefully.
Where are those claims from Andy?
Sounds a load of old nonsense to me.
I'll stick with my silver Cayman S.....
When you look long into an abyss, the abyss looks long into you.........
You can't be serious.
Are you seriously saying that my Sapphire Black car is heavier than a "council estate" white car of the same model?
I've a feeling the trend won't last too long. Funny how it went so quickly from being the "cheap" option to a desirable one.
That said, I saw a white BMW e46 M3 a few years before white was in vogue, and thought it looked absolutely stunning.
I wouldn't rule out a white car myself if I got it for the right price, but it wouldn't be my first choice.
as a French foreign legion soldier said to me in Tomislavgrad when they where told to paint their vehicles white [and refused].
white is the colour of surrender.
Spot on Paul.
All Fords RS variants were mostly white in the mid 80's
i had 3 white cars. Mk1 RS Turbo, XR4i & XR 4x4. They were a devil to keep clean !
Now, I would not have a white car even if you gave me it.
I saw a Nissan Puke approaching Chelmsford in traffic the other day . It was the obligatory Essex white,
but the wheels were black with multi glow colour rims....nasty !
I predict that 4 yrs from now, the run of the mill cars painted trendy white will be worth much less than
their darker / metallic equivalents.
Cheers
Darren
Not the reality these days Andy.its all clear coat lacquer over the colour coat for reasons below.
water based colour coat used now are not durable as a top sealing coat.
Back in 1960's - 70's and early 80's, acrylic type nitro cellulose paints were often used and the colour of the top coat was solid and was easy to apply and air dry but needed polishing.
Then 2pack isocyanate came along. This was clear coat over base colour & used extensively in the 1980's-1990's that most manufacturers adopted as it was baked and produced a good finish without polishing.
The best paint to use imho for refinishing any car. The downsides were its airborne emissions and life threatening toxicity.
For this reason, water based paint was developed in the 1990's. based on the tonnage of paint and tthe emissions foot print, all mass production vehicles were painted with water based paint.
This was not a roaring success for the painters or the robots and many warranty issues came up.
Timings of application etc had to be perfect or adhesion (lack of) and brittling of the paint occurred.
Even now, a big play is made of low emissions and climate friendly water based paint....Don't believe a word of it. The clear coat lacquer sealing the paint is still 2 pack based isocyanate nasty shit !
Cheers
darren
My car is white! I can't claim to be part of any fad though, as my Fiesta is 17 years old and admittedly starting to go brown around the rear wheel arches...
What a silly thing to say....go stand in the corner!
The truth is that the car that re-started the move back into White as a viable colour choice was the Mk 5 Golf GTi in 2004.....and yet 9 years later (so a "4 year fad? I don't think so....) there are a number of cars that White is the right colour to go for and suits it very well. However there a number of brands that just don't seem to work in the colour or the range is fragmented between those that do and don't work in white.
I remember when I ordered my new car in 2006, the car that started the white resurgence. The 911 GT3. I was at Geneva that year and it was the only white car on show, now everything is white!
Carrera White was the launch colour for the GT3 997.1 whereas Guards Red was for the GT3 997.2.......and as I said before the mk V GTi in 2004 was the car that paved the way for White making a viable comeback.
All the taxis in my home town of Dudley have to be white!
OK,but i am just going by the majority of the sort of people i see driving white cars.
My mother has decided to ditch the lease car through work and buy something to replace her white polo which goes back next month.... She's gone for a Hyundai i20...in white lol purely down to she doesn't care what colour it is and wasn't paying the 500 quid for metallic on a car that costs 9k!
The whole race car body in white thing is also a bit of a myth really as all the white cars you see have always been painted. I remember when my race car body shell came back from Surface Processing Ltd it was a dull metal colour and after treating with etch primer an even duller grey. One of the reasons we chose Maritime Blue was because it supposedly is very heavy with pigment and thus doesn't take as much to cover the car. I have no idea if that is true but it does look great. White I guess would be equally effective over a dull grey base but I can't believe it makes much difference. Personally I specifically didn't want white as its just so incredibly boring to see yet another white competition/track car.
I am fairly sure this white car fashion victim trend started with west coast rappers several years back.
IMO white works now as cars have moved back to designes with more lines and angles. It worked in the mid-80's for the same reason, then it stopped working as cars moved to softer, more curved designs. Now lines and angles are back and it works again.
That's why there are still cars that don't look good in white, those more slab-sided, softer designed cars. I don't think it's right to say white is a fad, as that would imply it's simply the colour people like, rather than the overall design in that colour. It all has to work together.
Personal experience from round my way is the whiter the car, the oranger the driver
he,he,hePersonal experience from round my way is the whiter the car, the oranger the driver
White is - and as far as I know always has been - the most popular colour here in Australia. Probably something to do with all the sun. If you are playing 'Count car colours' on long drives with the kids, white always wins. White also will protect your resale value here, not damage it.
I also seem to remember reading somewhere that white is the most popular car worldwide.
I have a black car.
Yep, white is the new silver apparently! Personally I think It looks ace on the right car with darker wheels and windows - normally porkers..
As andy has already posted..
What on earth has white got to do with essex ?
Do you lot actually believe the bullshit portrayal of Essex people on the tv ? I've seen more girls in white shoes in Newcastle than anywhere else ( and that was recently ).
Last edited by K80; 12th February 2013 at 16:19.
Has it touched a nerve?
No I just hate complete bollocks
i dont expect it was ment to offend
Agreed and the amount of it on this site lately is depressing. Really depressing.
Cool....
dunno if it is common practice in the UK, but here in Italy many cars are sold as Zero KM "second hand" by the dealers.
dealers buy cars at the end of year to make up to budget figures and get their bonuses, so they buy colous that are most easily resellable.
grey was one, but it was metallic, so it would be more expensive.
come the resession... white is the solution to save a few bucks.
So, if you look up zero km cars from dealers, which are the ones being sold at the best price, they are all white.
so people basically, since they are strapped for cash, can only afford to buy white.
then the rich people, seeing all these white cars around think white is really popular and they too buy white cars.
It's a bit of a nasty circle.
HOWEVER, eventually the demand for white paint will make its price go up, it is infact super rich in its white compound, some kind of aluminate thinghy mineral, so then once it will be as costly as metal paint that will be it.
and we'll go back to grey
Only absolute flash bellends buy white cars. I pick mine up on Saturday.
I had this come in I think white suits it :)
The heat myth has been tested, and not quite busted. The cabin of a white car does not stay significantly cooler than a dark one under strong sunlight, although there may be great differences in the body panel surface temperature. The perception is, of course, greater than the reality:
http://www.tom-morrow-land.com/tests/cartemp/index.htm
Some attribute the spread of white cars amongst cooler climes to the "Apple effect". However, white cars look crap in most Northern European cities, because of the dull light and level of grime/diesel fume. So whatever shavings you save as a result of the a/c running not quite so hard are wiped out by the need to wash it three times as often.
Popularity in Australia, Texas, the Middle East etc is partly because of the heat perception, but also because white paint can't really fade. Also, it's cheaper. I remember once when UK car dealers in the UK used to charge extra for gloss black paint, and as for Audi's colour range before they joined the white bandwagon...
...but what do I know; I don't even like watches!
Because it matches their teeth ? And with the girls, also matches those false fingernails they wear.
While the 'Apple effect' is partially to blame, I think we can also blame the popularity of 'Big Fat Gypsy Weddings'. Anyone noticed how the cars on that show are always white (and not just the wedding cars).
I think its 'cause it matches their caravans.
2 things:The heat myth has been tested, and not quite busted. The cabin of a white car does not stay significantly cooler than a dark one under strong sunlight, although there may be great differences in the body panel surface temperature. The perception is, of course, greater than the reality:
http://www.tom-morrow-land.com/tests/cartemp/index.htm
Some attribute the spread of white cars amongst cooler climes to the "Apple effect". However, white cars look crap in most Northern European cities, because of the dull light and level of grime/diesel fume. So whatever shavings you save as a result of the a/c running not quite so hard are wiped out by the need to wash it three times as often.
Popularity in Australia, Texas, the Middle East etc is partly because of the heat perception, but also because white paint can't really fade. Also, it's cheaper. I remember once when UK car dealers in the UK used to charge extra for gloss black paint, and as for Audi's colour range before they joined the white bandwagon...
1. I think those temperature differences are significant.
2. I have had to clean my black and dark colour cars a lot more often than white cars - for those most part, even when fairly dirty white cars look cleaner.
It's just a matter of time...
Had 1 white car- 1973 MG Midget, OEW.
Would like one of these in white:
Otherwise, prefer darker colours: for a big luxury car, dark blue with cream interior.
Currently have a W211 E class estate in silver, and an E30 325i cab in black.
No objection to white for modern stuff, but not my cup of tea.
A MKII RS2000 was my dream car as a youngster. I currently have the latest Focus RS in white. If a car has a motorsport look about it, IMO, it looks best in white.
I got one when I was about 20, loved it. Didn't have the skills to drive it like I did, and ended up crashing it. The amount it cost then vs. now is about £800 a year increase, would have been a great investment!
White is the new black.
They hold their value fairly well at the mo - I had a BMW M3 Special edition in white with black and white leather interior - kept it for 18 months front the point of buying it as a demonstrator and lost only 3k.
£167 per month depreciation on a nearly new M3 sounds like you bought a complete bargain rather than anything to do with its colour!
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