i have drove this car for over a week. it is doing great so far. i got it to be a parts car but turned out to be much better than that. i figured that if i am going to keep driving it i should clean it to the best i can for what it is. i got the interior done for now. i can't believe how much better it looks. the big problem i am having now is talking my wife into letting me keep it. it was originally a project to attempt to make a little money on but decided i want to keep it for my daily driver. she has a good point, if i am going to drive a car to keep my truck nice i should get one that gets better mileage to cover the extra insurance of another car. we will see what happens.

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That is a really nice interior! What does the outside look like? Good luck on the wife.

 

WOW It does not look like the same car that you brought home just a few weeks ago. Keep it!!!!!

 

here is a better comparison, before and after.

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and a before on the body, i won't be able to do much with the paint. maybe touch up some areas. the paint on the hood, top, and trunk lid is gone.

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Loooks great!!!! Are you looking for the spoiler tips? Hard to find if your are able to get them at all. Also, how did you clear the straps on the seat belts? I am having a hard time getting mine clean. Are you going to replace any weatherstripping?

 

If you want to bring back the paint, shoot me a PM. If you don't have a good body/paint guy you trust, there's one near me I've worked with for 20 years now. AWESOME guys and every friday night they are down at the local drag strip. If you were willing to do the grunt work on removing the trim and reinstalling it, I bet you could get the paint fixed for about a grand, maybe less. That car looks nice and straight. Excellent score, and great job on the clean up! They might even have sources to get some of the replacement pieces like those wing tips, but not 100% sure on that. They have come up with some really weird odds & ends parts for me over the years when my sources were all tapped out.

 

Have you priced out materials lately? I had a car painted at cost 18 months ago. Paint was pearl so it did raise the price a little. Needed a little bit of body work and it was $1200 than and it was a great deal.

If you pay less than a grand to get a car painted you wont be happy, unless the person painting it is pretty much just charging for materials, heat and electricity.

That two tone on the HO is a bit of a nuisance. That will raise the price. If you buy stripes its around $300. There is also the added time and cost to paint the front air dam and also the bumpers.

I am not trying to scare anybody. I am trying to say that i find it unlikely it can be done for $1000 when i believe there is $600-$700 worth of materials.

I am in the middle of doing my Hurst Olds so i can speak from experience.

 

You're probably dead on then. I haven't painted a whole car in a few years now, and I know that the cost has gone up a bit. I do know my body guys treat me very well, as I work at the local college, and I send them a lot of business from kids that are here from out of town that need a good referral. They are always happy with this place, as am I. Last car I had painted, and got REALLY detailed with cost me $800, but that was about 7 years ago. They have done a few odds & ends jobs for me since then, but nothing huge in the interim. I was more thinking that since the one side looks about perfect (or at least pretty good in the pictures shown) that doing the rest of it to match wouldn't be too ridiculous. At least get the drivers side and doghouse/roof back in shape. If the rest is decent, make the rest match it. These guys have always been dead on with matching any paint I've needed too. I guess I'm fortunate to be working with local guys I've known since high school. They also like special "fun" projects and make sure to do them as nicely as possible, as the "word-of-mouth" advertising is worth WAY more than anything else. When I have the "Jazz Blue" GTI out and about, I almost always get asked who did the paint & body work. They did all the prep & paint. I assembled it afterwards. That helps greatly in keeping the cost down too.

Thanks for the input. Good to hear a current perspective on the situation, as I may be looking at another whole repaint on a new incoming acquisition...

-Jeff

 

i don't plan to get anything for it other than tires if i am going to keep it. the weatherstripping is not that bad but the top does leak a little when i washed it. i need to see where it is leaking. i didn't clean the seat belts yet. they look a little better in the pictures than they are. mine have more wear than dirty.

 

i cleaned the outside the best i could. the paint is just to far gone. i wet sanded the rough sun rotted paint on the hood and smoothed it out a little. it don't look great but does look better than it did. hit some spots with spray paint and this is all the better it is going to look without really doing a ton of work. i need to get some tires for it. these are really square and not very safe.

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I have driven a lot worse as daily drivers. Have fun with it!

 

That's a plenty nice lookin daily driver!

Just remind your wife that the car is actually worth a little more now that you have cleaned it all up. Also remind her that the car will pretty much hold its value and you will be able to sell it off for what you have in to it be it tomorrow or a year or two down the road so its basically a free car to drive for a while.

 

my thoughts exactly. if the engine quit in another cheap daily driver it wouldn't be worth anything. if this engine quit and i wasn't going to fix it, the car would still be worth as much as i have in it just in parts.

 

I've ran a few cheap boats, cars and motorcycles past my wife this way. As long as one can "claim" it makes financial sense, you can usually keep the little lady happy.

 

The last beater that went through my hands was a 96 Audi A6. Gave $600 for it, put in one ignition switch and an oil change for about $100. Drove it for 2 years til the engine started making a valvetrain noise. sold it in 3 hours flat on CL for $500. Drove it for almost 2 years. Not a pretty car, but made great financial sense.

Wish I had found the one you did. It's a much cooler DD than the german tank was.

-Jeff

 

The first thing to tell the wife is that you need to put several thousand miles on it to help when selling it. One week will not prove that it is a reliable car, 3000 miles and an oil change will.
As for the tires, you can either drive on them for "free" as they have to come off before selling. Nobody is going to be happy buying a car with 4 square tires.
Conversely, you could buy the new tires and put several thousand miles on them to get some value back.
Either way, as others have stated, you are going to do no worse than break even on the car, so all the miles are "free".
Congrats on saving the car and congrats to the car for rewarding you for your efforts!