Very glad to see he pulled the trigger on one....It looks like he found a stellar candidate and he is smart enough to know that there is some work to be done before putting it in use. I'm sure that will make a perfect D when DMCCA is finished with it. Looking forward to seeing it when it's done.
I wonder if he will go with the Stage III in the future....I have had my doubts about the cost vs. performance, but I haven't ruled it out for my car either.
I wonder if he will go with the Stage III in the future....I have had my doubts about the cost vs. performance, but I haven't ruled it out for my car either.
I doubt it - the guy makes a living driving some pretty speedy cars, I believe his motivation here is very nice driver-level car. He has talked about this car a couple times on his "Smoking Tire" podcasts (NSFW, BTW).
Dave S
DMC Midwest - retired but helping
Greenville SC
I wouldn't jump on him too bad. I'm sure we all made some misquotes when we first got our cars. For me what stood out telling me it wasn't an '81 was the combo of the hood and the exhaust tips. I'm sure he noticed it wasn't an '81 when he was holding the temporary registration in his hand. Too bad about the damage in transit. I also think his reference to DMC was more of DMC is the place to get your car worked on. I hope that he got a great deal on the car because a 3-4 month resto won't be cheap. Then again, if I had the cash I would probably be driving my D already instead of taking to super slow and scenic route.
-James . . . "Life without knowledge is death in disguise." ~ H.P.G.
He mentioned on one of the podcasts about it that he was looking for an 81 but when this one came along (super low mile, original owner, California-kept car) he went for it. Also knowing what that means in terms of restoration.
Dave S
DMC Midwest - retired but helping
Greenville SC
I wonder if he will go with the Stage III in the future....I have had my doubts about the cost vs. performance, but I haven't ruled it out for my car either.
It's kind of weird how no one here on DMC Talk has taken the Stage III plunge, and there's not really any videos on youtube of the cars, either. I'm guessing there hasn't been a great take rate for the Stage III cars?
Originally Posted by Michael
Without knowing anything about the car, I'm going to say a 2k mile car that's sat for 28 years will have a resto bill of around 12k.
Since he admitted in the video to purchasing a Stage II upgrade, $12k is probably a conservative estimate. I've never known anyone who has sent their car off to one of the vendors and walked away with a tab that low for that matter... and none have taken the Stage II/Spec II plunge to bolster their tabs, either. My guess is this resto will be around $20k, possibly more.
I don't think the Stage III makes economical sense. For the price you pay, it just doesn't seem to add up for what you get. Also, at the risk of starting an argument, it still uses the original fuel delivery system. Why?