At least 60% of my brain activity is devoted to automotive projects. Restoring or modifying my car, researching cars for friends, or just looking at what is available for reasonable money. It is not unusual for me to focus my attention on a particular car, a MKII Toyota Supra for instance. I figure out what decent ones cost, what restoration would be required, and what modifications would be fun and unusual. I may never resto-mod a Supra, but I have a pretty good idea what it would take to accomplish the task. In the process of researching possibilities, I run across people that are actually doing the things I am thinking about. As luck would have it, people love to work on their cars, and more importantly, talk about what they are doing to their cars. There are many very talented craftsmen out there turning their ideas into reality. Porsches with LS7’s in them, Factory Five 818 or Stalker kit cars, VW Dune Buggies with turbo Subaru engines, old Volvo wagons with various engines, Miatas with Honda V6 power, even electric MR2’s. These are all cars I love and can be built by a person without any fabrication skills. Of course there are the totally custom builds that do not use any kind of standard parts (besides a car and an engine) like the Volvo Amazon with a BMW turbo engine and Skyline driveline, or a completely homemade off road buggy. With enough effort, almost anything is possible.
Therein lies a problem. Effort is a sparse commodity, it seems. Automotive forums are full of interesting projects that never come to fruition. About 75% of the projects I read about stall at that point when real work is required. It is easy, even fun to search for the car, get the parts, make the plans, but when the garage is full of metal and glass and plastic that could become a car, many people lose interest. It takes real, hard, tedious work to build or rebuild a car. It is much easier to just buy a new one. In this case, no work (other than the soul-crushing, mind-numbing work that you do every day) is required to turn greenbacks into transportation.
Sometimes it is simply that a project is too ambitious. Accomplishment would require more time, energy, or money than is available. In addition, the project is always a hobby. It is not the primary or even secondary form of transportation, so there is no sense of urgency to complete the project. Ever. In fact, it is easier to just get rid of this hot rod thing taking up space in the garage. Why would anybody want a hot rod anyway?
Because they are freakin’ cool. Don’t get into a position where the only practical end is to simply end the project. Be realistic. If you don’t have a garage, lift, welder, upholstery sewing machine, tubing bender, paint shop, parts cleaner, an unlimited budget, years of restoration experience, and three helpers, then you are just like me. I know not to get into a Jaguar restoration right now, which would require all the things I listed above. Instead, I modified my CR-V. It still has the same engine, radio, and interior installed in Japan all those years ago. I never planned to install a massive stereo, or cut the roof off, or swap in the driveline from an Evo, even though I have researched the feasibility of such changes. That would be too ambitious right now. Regardless, I love the car. It reminds me that I am an able human with ideas and the ability to express them. A mildly modified car in good shape is so much more enjoyable than that garage full of crap that will never be anything but an aggravation to your family, who want to roller skate in there.
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