Ok i know this answer to well. What I want to know is what the drive it in / drive it out time frame the general car hobbiest to seasend shop owners will say. Lets say you have a stock 1950 merc that is a good driver and looks very good for its age to start off with. For body mods it will be chopped slanted pillar, shaved, frenched headlights, mouthed for kustom grill, trunk & hood corners rounded, frenched antena, flush skirted, stainless around windows, working vent windows and real spots. It will also have a new crate sbc and 700r trans, cooling system, new rear end, power steering, power brakes, tilt steering, 4 wheel disc brakes, ac, exaust, all new front & rear suspension, fuel tank, all new wiring, door & trunk poppers, power windows, power front seat. Also it needs the lower door rockers replaced and a few other minor patch panels done to the lower fenders, door hinges rebuilt and newer door latchs installed. Body work finished in a quailty solid color paint, chrome, gl*** with new t&r interior. This one is not a frame off build but will look like one with the under side nicely cleaned up. The reason for asking this question is I have had a few customers usally new to kustoms who think i should be able to build there cars in about 1/4 the time it realy takes me. This realy pisses me off as I pride myself on doing quailty work and getting it done fairly quick. After I get some hamber imput I will tell you how long this car took me to build and what the customer told me i should have taken. GB & Thanks, Rick Erickson of EXK
I work on my Ford as much as possible, without compromising family life (wife and 2 young kids). I would say that I Am able to put about 20-30 hours per month into it. Mine is ALMOST ready for paint and I think Im about 3 years into it. I can tell you that it has taken me easily 4 times as long as I had initially expected. You really can't appreciate what goes into building a custom without hands on experience.
Lots of unknowns. Do you do all the work or farm out upholstery, paint, etc? One man band or a crew? How many cars do you build at same time? This is a guess- start to finish turn key 12-18 months.
If this is a FULL TIME job in a well equiped shop, and the customer had $40,000 sitting on the table to start with, one year would sound about right to me. Then again I really don't know what the parts cost, or how bad the rot really was.
Someones been watching too much TV. They see these 1 week build shows and wonder why they can't have their car in less time. Tell em if it was that easy everybody would be doing it.
In our shop? A minimum of a year-prolly two- providing the customer pays his bills on time and doesnt change his mind 1000 times (which usually happens with a custom build).And $40K? That wouldnt cover half of the metal fab alone around here.And if course you never know whats underneath the paint, or what parts cant be found anymore and need to be made - etc etc etc Too many people watch Overhaulin and stuff like that and think they can be done in 7 days- they COULD- if you had an open checkbook and a staff working round the clock of about 50 people.....! Shows like that have helped and hurt the hobby cuz every dreamer out there thinks they can have a car now and has NO IDEA what it really entails to do. If I am entering into a large build for a client, Ill have an interview of sorts with them to make sure they 'get it' and then also show them something in the shop and tell them how long it took to do 'just that' (frenched in headlight, or something smaller) so they get the idea of what time takes to do a quality job. Things can be done quicker-ALWAYS but the work would most definately be hacked or have shortcuts- which I DON'T do. resqd37Zep is right- if it was that easy EVERYONE would be doing their own work.
12-18 months. I'd have them write down what they want, just talking to them and me writing it down doesn't seem to do it. And they'll still change things. And it'll make everything take longer....
As long as the customer is the type that pays on time, gets involved with the incidentals and searches, maintains consistancy and interest I'd estimate 1500 to 2000hrs. At least 1/4 of that time will be spent on driveline mods and structural fab and a minimum of 1/3 the time is priming and sanding, metal finish, fillers, rust protection, sound deadening, panel fit and painting of every component. I too would like to know if it's a solo act or a full on shop. Time on the calander, 2 guys, 7-10 months if you hit it hard and can keep up a decent pace, 1 guy you can double that because of life's general interuptions and a degree of sanity. Sometimes a solo act moves along real fast but I still say over a year for that much work to a truely finished car. Beware the "I don't want a showcar" mentality presented if that's the case. It translates into not having the finances and will place all the blame on the builder for obvious low-buck quality. I restore Cl***ic cars to concours standards. We get all kinds. Most know what it takes and have the will to go for it so I'm not trying to piss on your parade. Just an observation over the last 30yrs. In my prior position the company management would hit me and the crew with the 'overhaulin' mentality more often than most would think. Those TV projects take 90 days of preparation and a staff of 100+ people to pull it all off. The 7 days was after everything else was ready for the project. Most of those builds consumed well into 6 figures also. You;d think a $15M company would understand that but sadly, no. I left em over 2 years ago and now enjoy reality. Good luck with the project. I hope it pans out for ya.
Amen is right, seems every time someone had that at***ude it bit me in the a--. Even lost a law suite over one of those, the judge ruled that I was a "professional" and should of known the guy wouldn't be happy with the job that HE asked for and had to give him his money back! After that there was no more negotion on quality v/s price, as soon as they start to ****er price I send them away, will not work for them. Same thing with time restraints, if they have a "must meet" deadline I'll p*** on the job, life's too short to kill yourself on deadlines that in reality seem to be impossible to meet. My clients do want to meet time frames and we do try to get something done for a show but it's not a do or die situation, they understand if we don't make it there is always another show. Funny thing is even after changing policy and running off customers looking for a "deal" or having deadlines I still have more work availible then I have the time for, get paid well and on time and haven't delt with a "jerk" in years. Might be too late with the customer your refering to with the Merc but you gotta be upfront with your customers. At all cost never set a time frame yourself, it is so easy to think I can do this in a week and things come up and it takes 2.
Any good shop is capable of doing high quality work, fast and at a cheap price. The problem is that you only get to pick two of the three and that will affect the time to do the work. This is true with almost any project and type of work being performed. If you have a plan that is completely laid out and no changes are made during execution you can probably come up with a reasonable estimate of the time it will take to get the project done. This is rarely done so the time get longer and the cost increased as the project proceeds. Proper planning will take a lot of time but it is worth it in the long run. Experience and the talent pool that you have to draw from greatly influences the projects time frame, cost and quality.
Capable of doing quality work, fast and cheap ? YES. Being able to actually turn some kind of profit doing so? Not always. Not saying you should charge thru the nose- but peole are paying YOU becuase you are the expert- that (at least to me) is worth more than a 'cheap price'.People need to be paid what they are worth and you should never settle for less than that if you are a shop. Respect the knowledge, Id use the term 'reasonable' for what is expected. And even then its still the clients perception. Ive had clients complain about $20K to do a complete resto (which I wouldnt do again -ever) and then some who didnt bat an eye over a resto/frame off custom that was over $100K. Its all how you present it and what the clients expectations are. Both need to be on the same page and that requires constant communication. And you always need to account for delays in parts, payment and **** that comes up. Ive had a car sit for 2 months because their parts were backordered and only one place sell them and I couldnt make 'em.
I'd have to agree with one of these replys, there are far too many variables in between. But if you can build a nice quality car, by yourself, in two years..I think your doing great. I take forever nowadays, I have a full time job, building cars after that, and basically try to make time for my family, but theres only 24 hours in a day.. it's hard.
A little off topic here, but have you noticed those shows are always doing muscle-car type stuff? I know restoring a car is hard work, but building a kustom is a lot more. A kustom isn't built with new off the shelf "original" re-pop parts (most of the time). It's alot of cutting, welding, grinding, mud work, sanding, sanding, sanding........most of the time with parts that are super hard to find, out of production and in need of restoring just to put them on a car. I think one of those shows would have a hard time pulling off a kustom build in the time frame they portray. I think the one exception would be the '52-'54 Ford one of the shows built not too long ago. Not really a traditional style sled, but close. As far as EXK's question, I would think it would take about a year and a half......depending on some of the mentioned variables. I know of a few shops with leadsled projects sitting in them, and a few of those cars have been in there for YEARS! I was building a leadsled style kustom truck up until about a year ago. Nothing as radical as the Merc mentioned here. I worked on it probably 20 hours a week, as work, family, and other BS stuff life threw at me allowed. I had easily close to 1200 hours in it just in kustom bodywork and mods. That doesn't count all the mechanical, air suspension work and other stuff needed to keep it on the road. Also, at the time, it was my daily which made it harder to do the work on. I couldn't have it down for long because I needed it to get around. Like resqd37Zep mentioned here....If building a kustom was easy, everybody would be doing it. I think this is the reason the *** rod movement is so big. That movement is totally composed of building something "old" quickly. It is alot of hard work, but it lacks the skill, time and attention to detail needed to put something on the road that is not only kool (and hopefully safe), but cosmetically pleasant to the eye..........E
<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=6 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD cl***=alt2 style="BORDER-RIGHT: 1px inset; BORDER-TOP: 1px inset; BORDER-LEFT: 1px inset; BORDER-BOTTOM: 1px inset">Originally Posted by theHIGHLANDER . Beware the "I don't want a showcar" mentality presented if that's the case. It translates into not having the finances and will place all the blame on the builder for obvious low-buck quality. </TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE> I worked at a restoration shop for 14 years, and never understood how you could do that. Leave some of the dents, don't fit doors, hoods etc? First show that 50% "restoration" hit would showcase the work the shop did and you would think turn away someone with the funds to do a 100% finished project.
Hey thanks for all your imput so far. I been building customs for 35 years mostly building them and selling them for a profit for the first 25 years. Also did some gravy jobs for friends and some sub contract work for a few big name builders mostly chop's & frame and suspension work, stainless steel, paint job. About 10 years ago alot of people were asking me to build them turnk key cars. I realy did not want to so I would give them a real big price and a long time frame. Well a few took the hook and now we turn out about 3 turn key kustoms a year and we also do the gray jobs also. We have a total of 6 skilled workers including me. We work about 50hr a week except I work more. In the last 10 years I have had only 1 other customer seriously complaine abot the time it was taking to build his his car so right in the middel of the build I tood him his money and car was not welcome in my shop and to take it somewhere else. Now I have this young and rich new customer who thinks I can wave a magic wand and have his car done. This car started out as a chop only and I got it done 1 week earlier than planed. So he asked me how much it will cost to have it finished and the time frame. I told him the price and time is real hard to give a real number to but i can give you a deacent estament. So i gave him a rough total $$$$ amount and a time frame of 8 months. Of co**** later on he add the flush fender skirts, custom grill and mouth, spot lights and all new suspension with 4 wheel disc brakes. Also this car was in nice looking paint so we did not plan for any rust repair as he told us it was repainted about 10 years ago by a quailty paint shop. Yesterday was exactly 8 mounts to the day he brought the car in and he was pissed off I did not have his car finished as promised. We do have it very close and I told him it should be turn key ready for pick up in about 4 weeks. He told me I have only 1 week to get it finished and he wished he had taken his car to a more repuable shop. He then tood me he had been asking around on the time factor and most shops quoted they could have done this job in 6 mounts or less. Oh his payments have been about 2 to 3 week late on the adverage. So far I have not seen anyone here on the hamb claim they could do this job in 6 months or less. Thanks, Rick
I always felt if you can't appreciate the time it takes to build a one off piece of rolling art (and this is an art form) you're not capable of appreciating the car itself. Good luck with this guy Rick.
Well, I can tell you what my buddy's car cost at a well known high end shop here in LA. He got a hookup by the owner when he'd just opened the shop, kinda a back of the bus price, around 10k for a chop and shaved handles, flipped '50 ford rear window, primer. That took 8 months, but he could have gotten it done quicker if he'd paid full retail. The owner, the coolest guy ever, said he wouldn't take a job like that again, because the real profit is in buildling brooksville roadsters and such, and he's booked up doing those. I can't say I blame him one bit. 6 months or less? Like they say on COPS, I was born at night, but I wasn't born last night. That's a get-it-in-the-shop-and-blown-apart-time frame. Then they'll drop the bomb and start pushing completion dates. Sounds like maybe he's just new to building a car like this, and needs to be educated as to how long things take? He comes off as a bit of a lout, but maybe its just cuz he's scared he's being taken for a ride? If I were young, waiting 8 months probably would seem like forever, especially when you're dying to drive your car, and maybe getting some ribbing from family and friends like 'where's your car dude?!? All that money and no car?!?' Hopefully he comes around, but it might take getting burned by a few other shops before he figures out you guys did him right. Good luck man.
Rick, I own a Merc that is being worked on right now in a "custom" shop. If I were your customer I would be totally amazed that you could do all that work and have my car finished in 8 months. I would expect it to take at 12 months minimum. I have visted your website and from what I see you are an expert at building KUSTOM Mercs. Your customer is way off base.
I am not a professional in this industry but I do have some friends who have shops and also have had some friends who have had some high end cars built and think that an 8 month goal would have been aggressive. I had a friend who had his (not HAMB friendly) car in the body shop for 15 months for a high end paint and body work. My other friend who has a shop that does both maintenance and restoration of corvettes runs into the same thing with customers. I do think that it is hard for the average person to understand just how much work is involved with a full build if they have never tried anything like that themselves. Some several good points have also been brought up, one being the fact that if a payment is late work stops. I manage large construction projects and that is how we work also (if an owner is late or in default on payment we stop work, I came close to shutting down a $160 mil project). In reality I think the best way to address this issue is to get the guy involved a little. I am sure he is spending a good bit of money and probably has no idea where it is actually going. If he gets a little involved, known’s the status sees what is going on he will begin to understand the timeframe and in the end appreciate you allowing him to be involved. That way in the end everyone is happy and no one is getting bad mouthed…
First off I want to say the Fooses are good people and Chip's dad is someone I highly respect as another builder. But there tv show is Nothing but a show that makes them big $$$$$$$ and I am happy for them. What most of us builders donot like is the 1 week BS build time the general public is led to belive was done in. I personaly know of 2 builds in the past 3 years that were mostly done in a shop other than seen on tv for over 2 months and then went to a body shop for about 1 month other than seen on tv.
Thats the truth of it. My good friends Frank DeRosa Sr & Jr worked with Darrel Starbird on Jessie James' Monster Garage. All the Kustom work was completed on time and the camaras shut down. Car is then sent out to paint and interior and if I remember right that car sat around for another couple on months before they found someone capable of doing the padded Carson top. Then the camaras come back on for the final episode. Viewer only see's the one week of work but has no idea of whats going on when the camara's are off. You can't rush perfection.
0a good friend of mine once said "It's gona take longer than you thought and cost more than you expected "
This translates to, I really do want a showcar but I don't plan on spending what it costs to get one. If they don't want a showcar, I tell them to go to Maaco. All of my customers (and I don't think any of them would think otherwise) get what they pay for. End of story. As long as his bills ae paid, show him the door. If he takes his car and splits, you're out from under it. Chances are he's bluffing to try and get something for nothing, maybe he thinks you'll knock some off the top. Either way, it ain't right.
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