Whats A Good First Car???

[XR6_190]

EL would be a good place to start, have a good look around though, don't go for the first one you find, If you look enough you should find one, low klms (under 150,000) good condition for about $5000 They are a good safe and fairly reliable car. Thats your best bet if you want a ford.
Otherwise If you still want a big car, and something that will be invisible to the constabulary go for a TE,TF or TH Magna ('96 to '00). They are also big, safe and reliable but you could probably pick a good one up for about $3,500 or $4,000

[Powdered Toast Man]

Money will be the deciding factor but since you seemed to be pretty switched on and are thinking about saving now it probably won't be a problem.

If you have a very low budget then I would also recommend an EL but since most have done a lot of kays now reliability will be a problem. I'd say get a series 2 or 3 AU, nice cars, pretty cheap, reliable mechanicals and very servicable.

Or if you can scrape together the coin and really want a BA get one of those, but I think BA's are still yet to prove themselves in the long term reliability stakes.

I'm just thinking of the sort of kays most of these models will have travelled by the time you get your licence. Or if your very mechanically minded get something old school, but not being able to have a V8 defeats the purpose of old school IMO.

[Mark351]

The BAs are solid cars, and the AU utility is a good unit. Both thirsty on fuel though. If you can afford the extra perhaps try to get a dedicated LPG version.

[nommic]

In all honesty, something small and Japanese is an ideal first car.

But, since you're set on a Ford, go EF/EL. If you can, find one that has an AU headgasket. Or if you can up the budget a bit, some form of AU. Just be wary of dirt cheap AU's... ex-taxi and dodgily repaired AU's seem to be pretty common around here.

[FPV8U]

AU or BA, good safe cars, look good & go pretty well.

[tapeworm]

Well I saved hard for an EF Fairmont for my 1st car. The guy I bought it off was my boss at the time, a horse trainer, and only ever used it as a tow vehicle and for carting stuff off to races etc. It's been an awesome 1st car, super reliable, heaps of luxury, gets over 600k's for a tank of fuel, copped heaps of abuse without any drama for the first 2 years of driving, lol, it's safe and good looking. If you can afford one a BA Futura would be my pick, also you can't go wrong with a low km E series Falcon, especially if you maintain it well, it will go forever.

[Yellow_Festiva]

If you want small and BULLIT PROOF,

Get a Festiva.

Cheap for parts, basic yet efficient mechanicals, very good on fuel and easy to maintain.

[irlewy86]

PPPPffffffttttt,

Golden rules of a first car,

You have to be able to fix it yourself.
You have to be able to afford to wrap it around a tree and not give a damn.
You will run it into the ground.