Mk3 Cavalier Owners Club | Vauxhall Cavalier Dot Com

Hi everyone - my names Tim and I'm from Bournemouth on the south coast.
Obviously new to this forum but had 5 Cav's when I was younger and loved them from the very first one I brought lol. I've been thinking about finding another since my last one in 2011, and I'm finally doing some decent research into picking one up, so great find a site with so much info. Although now rare has hens teeth I'd love to get my hands on a Polar Sea Blue Diplomat like one of my previous but aint holding my breath! So would consider anything tbh even if it needed some work but ideally face lift, LS or above. So wondered if you guys can help with:

Best sources for one or is it just being patient and checking Facebook Market, eBay, and Gumtree every day (or every 5 minutes)?

Back to my old Diplomat; does anyone recognise the reg L262XNP? Love to hear if anyone knows it, what happened to it etc.... I sold it in 2001 and according to HPI (I used to work at a Vauxhall franchise so checked it regularly) it was still about for years after I sold it, but disappeared, assumed finally scrapped, about 3 years ago.

Thanks, Tim
1989 'G' 1.6 GL
1993 'L' 2.0i Diplomat
1994 'M' 2.0 16v CDX
1995 'M' 1.8 GLS
1990 'H' 1.6 L

Strangely that registration is not recognised on the direct.gov site.


As for places to buy a Cavalier...
Ebay or Gumtree, but be careful that you get a full honest sounding description before you buy.

Otherwise, try Cavaliercorner facebook group.
It is probably the biggest Cavalier specific group on facebook.

Hello & Welcome I hope you find a decent car soon.

Hi and welcome

Hi, welcome. The registration not being recognised on any of the government sites means it is sadly very likely to of been scrapped.

That is my thought too.

I have tested this theory myself.
Cars that I have a certificate of destruction for, tend to disappear off the .gov database.

Many of those that I simply part'ed or have no knowledge of their history, tend to exist but have a "tax due" date from 20 or 30 years ago.
These could simply be a barn find waiting to happen, or parked up, rotting away in someones drive or garden.

Anything taken off the road since approx. 1998 should show a SORN notice online.

Robsey wrote:That is my thought too.

I have tested this theory myself.
Cars that I have a certificate of destruction for, tend to disappear off the .gov database.

Many of those that I simply part'ed or have no knowledge of their history, tend to exist but have a "tax due" date from 20 or 30 years ago.
These could simply be a barn find waiting to happen, or parked up, rotting away in someones drive or garden.

Anything taken off the road since approx. 1998 should show a SORN notice online.

For the first few years sorn was never strictly inforced, quite a few cars I scrapped before about 2005 simply show that the tax is due from then.

Hi all.... thanks for the welcome.

Yeah all of a sudden it seemed to just disappear from the .gov sites, and I no longer had access to HPI anymore by then. Wish I could some how upload a pic of it.

Thanks for the FB suggestion; cant stand the site myself but will get back on it if needs must lol I've seen an ideal one on ebay atm but its in New Castle!

Cavaliercorner are a good bunch.
Very nice people.
I agree, FaceAche is full of loathsome people,
I don't use it much myself...
But as said, that group itself is a good bunch.

Welcome Tim. I'm in the Bournemouth area, don't drive any more but got boxes full of spare Cavalier parts that I've gathered over the years. If you're after any odd bits, give me a shout if you find a project that needs work. Enjoy the forum.

If you wish to up load a pic, by all means email any pictures to my forum email address, and I will upload them for you.
Feel free to advise of any wording, and I will make any edits to suit.

Car forum email is...
Robsey@hotmail.co.uk

As for your Diplomat. Sounds like it was very nice.
I have a 1994 Polar Sea Blue LSi hatch with C20NE engine and fan-blade alloys.
So almost a homage to your old car.

Or you can host pictures on Photobucket, PostImages, Flikr etc ...
And then link your pictures in your post text.

Cavalier342 wrote:Welcome Tim. I'm in the Bournemouth area, don't drive any more but got boxes full of spare Cavalier parts that I've gathered over the years. If you're after any odd bits, give me a shout if you find a project that needs work. Enjoy the forum.

Oh hi there! Well that's good to know! I'm off to Surrey tomorrow to look at one; so you may here from me soon lol

Robsey wrote:If you wish to up load a pic, by all means email any pictures to my forum email address, and I will upload them for you.
Feel free to advise of any wording, and I will make any edits to suit.

Car forum email is...
Robsey@hotmail.co.uk

As for your Diplomat. Sounds like it was very nice.
I have a 1994 Polar Sea Blue LSi hatch with C20NE engine and fan-blade alloys.
So almost a homage to your old car.

Or you can host pictures on Photobucket, PostImages, Flikr etc ...
And then link your pictures in your post text.

Thanks Robsey, I'll get a couple sent over soon. They're not the best quality as their pictures of actual pictures lol

Definitely, in my opinion, the best colour! An the 8V a better and willing engine I found over the 16v that I had in my CDX.

Good luck, hope your trip brings a result.

Here are Tims pictures.

Thanks Robsey - I would just like to point out that YEEESSSS I put the V6 badging on it. But that's sort of thing you do when your 20; right?? lol

Would you want me to email the pics of my 1990 L with 31'000 miles on it as well for a look?

You are more than welcome to, if you wish.

Just email or pm any pictures, instructions or wording, and I will do the rest.

As for the V6 badge...
I know a former member who did the opposite.
Kev fitted a V6 3.0 litre lump under the bonnet,
(This is the 2.5 going in before it was modified to 3.0...)



but then had a 1.4 badge on the boot.



You have to love the irony.

Mine is totally badgeless except for the griffins.

I would also recommend starting a work in progress thread, when you find a suitable project car.

1.4??? hahaha.... love that.

Yeah sure I'd like to do that. Might need a bit of help how to it.
Off in a bit to see a really low mileage 1.8 GLS shortly. Looks ok from the pics but fingers crossed when I'm rummaging about underneath with a torch! Does need a few bits doing though. Front bumper paint, new badges, new ariel, blah blah. Oh and a set of FanBlades adding naturally lol

It would be good to look at the MOT history, to see what is likely to be wrong with it, or how well it was cared for.

Here are the details of your other car...

1990 L with 31,000 miles on it

Interesting story with this one.

When I worked at a Vauxhall franchise this was given to our service dept by some old guy that had given up driving.





We bought it off Vauxhall as an ex demo from Network Q for him in 1991. 

Full service at our place and only 31'000 miles on it.



I bought it off the company for £400! 

Well, back after a 6 hour round trip.... took it there and then! A lot lot tidier than I was expecting.
Service history isn't great but its clearly been looked after; MOT history show only one corrosion issue back in 2009 and since then nothing but fuel, pipe, tyre, CV boot, the usual you'd expect. So came straight home in it!
Things need doing obviously, and there a pretty poor rear arch repair but nothing noticeable until you get right up close to it.
I was getting some really curious looks coming back down the M3 at 60mph lol
Ive got loads of pictures to upload some how, and would love to start a WIP thread if you can help?

Excellent, good to hear you've got a project. We all know what feeling. Start a thread in viewforum.php?f=21 section, you'll have to set up some sort of photo storage account somewhere for free to dump your photos to and copy the links to here.

Excellent news...

As for pictures, register with a picture hosting service.

They all work in a similar way.

I use postimages, who seem to have settled down again after a 'flakey' period just before Christmas.
I keep all my photos backed up on CD at full resolution for my personal future reference, and
I upload to Postimages at a resolution of 480 x 640, which is sharp enough to see a modestly good image whilst being low enough resolution to allow thread surfing to be quick and smooth.

Just message me if you need any assistance or editorial changes.

Here are links to -

The How 2 for Photobucket.

viewtopic.php?f=70&t=14778

The How 2 for Flikr.

viewtopic.php?f=70&t=16077

The How 2 for Postimages.

viewtopic.php?f=80&t=16827

Cheers guys for all your help. I'll crack on with it now.

PS; someone on Cavalier Corner (FB) replied about L262XNP! He brought it a few years ago. It got scrapped (boo hoo) but he saved the interior and its still currently in a GLS of his!
Funny old world

At least some of the car "lives on" in another body.