If you want to buy a cheap car you probably should look towards the superminis which because of their size and comparatively small engines, also come with reasonably low price tags. There are many to choose from on the UK market but one of the better ones is arguably the Ford Ka. If you're a young driver, this is the cheapest car for you to own either new or used as it's on average the cheapest car for a 17-18 year old new driver to insure. You could get a decent used Ford Ka for as little as 300 while a new model will cost you around 7,500. The Ford Ka is also said to be fun to drive as it's nimble but fairly firm. CO2 emissions are around 115g/km and the car is fairly frugal. But in addition to this the Ford Ka is also not very popular amongst car thieves. The reason for this is that they don't consider the Ford Ka as being desirable enough to steal. The most stolen cars according to the same website are the Toyota Yaris, the Volkswagen Touareg and the Volvo XC90. The big 4x4s are apparently often stolen to use for ram raiding somewhere else. Porsche 911 is another vehicle which is popular to steal both for its value and performance. But regardless of what type of car you do own, in order to minimize the risk of being targeted by car thieves there are some simple things you can do to deter criminals. Always tidy away all your valuables and keep the car keys somewhere safe in your home. Also when parking, turn your wheels towards the curb as this makes the car harder to tow away. Also cars which are personalised or very distinctive are less likely to get stolen because they are so recognisable. So perhaps spray-paint your car pink if you dare.
I completed the following project about a year ago, never had a chance to post this up, but recent questions by members PorscheCrazy and others reminded me. This DIY covers modification to my upper third brake light wiring to alter the LED from a single constant "on" steady state to a blinking light when brakes are applied. I actually got this idea from a member of a non-6Speedonline Porsche forum that is very popular. I had always thought that having a blinking third brake light would be a great safety enhancement, and more so for smaller sports cars. Anyways, I found a small company that produces a controller that when tapped-into your brake light wiring modify from steady to blinking. The company is Kahtec Technologies International. This US company produces several products all focused on safety modifications for brake lighting. Someone recently mentioned that there are other products out there -- I do not have any knowledge of them or experience.
I ordered on the Kahtec web site, and in a couple of days the small box arrived as advertised. The box contained a small wired black box with Red, Black, Blue wires, set of wire taps, and instruction sheet. The instructions are very clear, easy to read and I felt comfortable that tapping into my wiring would be reversible should I have to switch back. So I set off in search of the best location to grab the wires in my car ('14 C4S coupe). So, I recalled locating the wiring harness for the third brake light and antennae bump back when I was wiring my car for the back-up camera. I pulled the trim off, and right in front of me was the wiring bundle I needed! It was great not to have to dig and search for wires for once! Here's the bundle -- there are three wires. Black/Red, Brown/White, and a larger solid black cable. The cables run from the passenger side of the car up into a rubber grommet (upper right side of pic below), which leads into the trunklid area and up to the grill where the upper third brake light resides.
For reference - in the pic below, LEFT is the passenger-side rear corner under window, RIGHT is near the Sound Symposer opening under the center of the rear window. BRWN/WHT is ground (-). I need THAT wire for???). Get the Kahtec black box, and the three red plastic wire taps ready. NOTE: I've since modified the wires further. I don't like using the clamp wire taps, so I went back and replaced with soldered bullet disconnects. Much more reliable, easy to disconnect if necessary, and will maintain a much "cleaner" connection. Hold the BLK/RED wire, pull it into the red wire tap. Take the RED wire from the Kahtec black box and push it into the red wire clamp. Clamp down on the red tap until you hear it "snap" and use a pair of pliers to make sure you've pushed through both wires. Now take hold of the BLK/RED wire about an inch away from the tap you just installed, and push the wire into another red wire tap.
Take the BLUE wire from the Kahtec black box and push the end into the red wire tap. Clamp down to complete the splice connection. Take the third red tap, and holding the BRWN/WHT wire push it into the tap. Take the BLACK wire from the Kahtec box and push it into the red tap and clamp down. The last very important step? Make sure you follow the directions, and CUT the BLK/RED wire somewhere between the first and second red taps you just added in the steps above. Doing so now causes all power to run through the Kahtec black box to the upper third brake light. If you forget this last step, your brake light will continue to function as normal, without the blinking. If for some reason you didn't get the wiring correct, you can disconnect the taps and re-try. Try to leave as much wire length as possible in case you need to restore to original state without the module. If you take-on this project, please post your end results and experience here for all to share! As well as the removal and setting everything back to "stock".