So, old p38 4..6 died with head gasket problems again after 400 miles. I refuse to pay out to have them changed again, So it can be some one else's problem, quite likely the scrap yards.
So left with the thorny problem of what car to buy that can take my electric wheelchair? looked at all the newer stuff, and the mobility cars, if you want to pay them 3 grand down every three years, bugger that! so the only car that fits the bill, is the good old ranger. spent a month trying to get a good 322, failed, so bought a vogue4.6 on a 2000 plate and with a thor engine.
The difference between the thor and the gems in initial pick up is quite remarkable.
with the gems, you have to pick your moment, and floor it, with the thor, you have to regulate how much welly you give, in case you end up entering the car in front for a cup of tea!
Not sure what makes a vogue better than the rest though? Sure its got piping round the chairs, and the plastic wood on the console, but is there more to it?
It doesn't even come with a multi cd player, so having to strip the one out of the 'dead un' and install it into the 'live un'. Probably along with the boom box, as the original one in the car is shite to say the least!
Are there any other changes that make a 'vogue' worth the different tab?

Multi changer in the boot, left hand side bet you didn’t notice it !
If you’ve got the plastic tray liner you won’t see it without removing the tray, is the subs not good, most probably the cones have gone, you’ve heard mine !, plenty of omphhh

The wood on the vogue might look plastic but it's not. It's actual wood veneer under many layers of lacquer

When I swapped mine for some piano black trim, I found that every piece of wood trim had a sticker on it with the chassis and job number for an specialist trim place in Slough - which I'm not sure even exists now.

Vogue is just trim level, base, S (hardly any of those about), SE, HSE and Vogue. That's before you get into the various 'special editions'. So being the top spec, it should have had the top spec audio system too. Sounds like someone took the CD changer out but an upside is that being a 2000 it should have the separate amps in the doors and not the very expensive, prone to dying, DSP unit.

Well< looked for trhe ccd changer< found the hole but no hardware the cd player is a low budget kenwood
Having the system stripped out of my old one to replace the piece of shite in the new one<
as for trim level not that much different from base as far as i can tell< colour matched carpets and piping?
as for the wood< why would you put so much plastic on top of it< that you can no longer tell if its real wood or not? crazy to my mind>
But the thing starts and goes< and i am once again enjoying the life in a big old ranger again>

It isn't plastic... is lacquer. If it were exposed wood veneer, it would need a lot of maintenance and generally look crap - by now it would be probably ruined in most examples.

Base model wouldn't have sunroof, headlamp wash/wipe, front fogs, leather electric memory seats (base had cloth manual seats), dimming rear view mirror, climate control, trip computer, cruise control, a basic stereo with only 6 speakers (midrange and tweeter in the front doors and midrange only in the rear), no heated seats, no heated windscreen, no air con, no wood except for the strip above the glove box, etc. As trim levels rose, so did the bits fitted. The Vogue would have come with all of these, even the seats and carpet would be different to those on a mid range trim level with the coloured piping and deeper carpet, and the stereo would be the Alpine unit with 3 speakers in each front door, 2 in each rear and the sub in the back along with the CD multichanger. If the head unit is a Kenwood someone has removed the original system.

As for the wood, if it wasn't lacquered you'd be looking at cleaning and wax polishing it at every service interval just to keep it looking something like decent.

Sloth wrote:

It isn't plastic... is lacquer. If it were exposed wood veneer, it would need a lot of maintenance and generally look crap - by now it would be probably ruined in most examples.

A mate of mine had a Volvo V70 that a natural, un-lacquered finish to the wood trim. I thought it looked fantastic and he never had to do anything to it to keep it looking good.

While on the subject, if you need to drill through deeply lacquered wood it pays to be careful, the lacquer can crack.

Varnish = lacquer?

Lpgc wrote:

Varnish = lacquer?

Close but subtly different, see https://www.doityourself.com/stry/what-is-the-difference-between-varnish-and-lacquer

Varnish = lacquer,, same meat different gravy, both do the same job, if applied through spraying, hard to tell the difference, I’ll let you know how drilling it goes, I’m moving my lpg switch as I’ve wired in an aux socket to radio, should keep the kids quiet now they can connect there phone to it,,