A Grand Monday: Vauxhall Omega Elite Estate

The Vauxhall Omega was one of the best estate cars of the late 1990s and early 2000s, but it’s getting difficult to find a good one now.
Often used as company cars before passing into the hands of those who needed a big estate car for work duties, the life of an Omega was often one of ritual abuse.
Nice survivors, then, are rare things - and hot MV6 aside, the cream of the crop is the Elite. Equipped with full leather, climate control and a whole host of other goodies, the Elite was a dish best served in V6 form, and that’s what we have here. It’d not the range-topping 3.2, but Vauxhall’s 2.6-litre six was still more than capable of giving you a kick up the bum if you floored it.
Couple that to decent ride comfort and a chassis that is incredibly agile for such a big and bulky estate and you soon learn why the Omega has always had a bit of a cult following.
So what of this example, discovered in this week’s small ads? It’s a fairly late one, of 2001 vintage, and aside from a wonky window switch it appears to be in terrific order for £900.
Captain-Cretin on 25 July 2019
I drove a few of these back in the day, from the basic 2.0 through to a police spec MV6 gun car; the V6's were really good fun to drive; surprisingly so for such a big car, but even the standard 2 litre was an OK cruiser.The gun car speedo was calibrated in 1mph steps to 140 or 160 MPH (it was a long time ago), although I never drove one MUCH beyond motorway speed limits.
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