expensive mistakes! internet hotrods

As many have said inspect if you can, I can't comment on buying from a builder but I have bought from an amateur restorer/builder before. Either make sure you are getting a great deal to cover these type of things (internet buy) or if you are paying a "market" price then make sure you talk to the guy and get pictures...and not just the surface gloss over pictures, the detailed ones showing the stuff you'd look at if you were there (like underside, common spots for cutting corners on painting, spagetti under the dash). I've sold stuff on eBay and I make sure to describe it like it is and take a ton of pictures and always of the bad areas and trust me some pictures have a way of making it look worse usually the underneath shots while others can make it look better. I once buffed out a cheap maaco paint job on 61 Galaxy and had to make it clear it was only a 10 footer since the pictures made it look almost show quality. But then again most of the stuff I've sold I owned and/or drove for some time so anything major on a driver was fixed. Internet sales have turned a good chunk of the market into a hype based mode and while Craigslist is great since it's free it's chock full of crap as well.

Little off topic story about eBay and the new type non-licensed used car / classic car dealers out there that love the internet. Had a 65 F100, stock 352 motor 4spd w/granny one repaint, rust free and I mean rust free never a work truck, solid driver just didn't like over 60mph. Oh and it had some 18" Boyds I hated but they came on it and had good tread so I lived with it. After a year or so I decided I wanted something else so up for sale it goes on CL. No real interest, drop price haggle with an idiot then almost sold to young kid but dad decides he needs a newer pickup...retard. Drop price later to right about what I paid and get a guy with a story about buying for his brother. We haggle, he offers what I paid and I take it. Had an odd feeling about him since he drove up in a Land Rover and reeked of Scottsdale. Anyway I have a local eBay search email I get just to see what's for sale in the area and a few weeks later boom my truck appears. Only difference is he cosmetically cleaned and spray shined the motor, painted valve covers, must have put fresh paint in the bed floor but that was it. Bed was nice but I did use it so it didn't look new but not rust or dents. A week later it's bid to almost 7k, double what he paid. He made it look better but didn't spend more than 2-300 and was looking to make a couple g's. Feel bad for the new owner...nice truck but not 7k nice unless you live in the rust belt and have money. Oh and his brother was Mr. eBay.

Moral of the story is beware if you can't see it and beware of someone selling a driver that hasn't driven it, be it local or internet. I've plowed through my share of old cars and late model used cars in my time and anything someone hasn't owned for close to a year+ or isn't registered and insured falls under the category of better get a good deal and gotta look it over good...sometimes twice. There are deals where it's a must buy or one look is enough but I've learned you see way more the second time around and may not be as loose with your money.

 

29Nash wrote: Are you people reading what you are writing?
Hotrods need to be built to standards where nobody is killed when they stumble?
Give me a break.
A perfectly built traditional roadster or another with poor welds, junk parts, and no cotter keys in the linkages, in a crash, will dole out equal amounts of trauma to the human body.

Nobody said hotrods need to get seatbelts and airbags. Safety is about preventing preventable crashes, not the measure of damage after an unpreventable crash. If you want to kill yourself, be my guest. If you crash into me because of your own mechanical incompetance, you'd better run if you're able, because if I catch you you're going to get banged up alot worse.

 

You might be correct is everyone had half a brain and behaved responsibly. We need legislation to protect us from EACH OTHER. One man's car is another man's weapon of mass destruction.

Under your theory, we may as well get rid of annual automobile inspections. You know very well that some assholes will drive around with baloney skin tires and kill somebody while exercising their freedom to do so.[/QUOTE]

I actually see both your points, but what about the states that have no anual inspection? In CA if it had a VIN# and you knew a cop who liked $$ you could get it plated. Worked for me every time.

 

Not so.

Click here: List of countries by traffic-related death rate - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

USA........... ..13.9 road fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants.
Australia.........7.8 road fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants.

USA...............9.0 road fatalities per 1 billion vehicle kilometers (621,371,192 miles).
Australia.........7.9 road fatalities per 1 billion vehicle kilometers (621,371,192 miles).

So much for living in a Gubmint bubble!

 

The annual inspections are a money-maker for the state. I moved from Massachusetts where they have two a year, to Tennessee where they have none. After living here for 15 years I still don't see any "Demolition Derby" atmosphere as one might be led to believe there is here.

 

Well...living in Switzerland makes it pretty hard to inspect the hot rods before you buy (when they're in the US...). I bought 3 - a 32 Brookville roadster and 2 originals - a 31 roadster and a 30 pick em up. I just had pics and my very subjective impression from 2-3 phone calls with each seller. I was lucky till now and got more than expected. The guy with the 32 even put a 4-piece hood in the container without telling me...

And then I bought a blown 350 from an ass....in Switzerland. The engine was fucked up and I did not get my money back!

But you guys are absolutely right about inspecting the car and not just looking at the color and the upholstery.

 

im not sure if the law exist or not.(im sure it can be lawyered out).but one thing i do know being a PP (private pilot SEL)..the pilot is responsible for deeming the aircraft fit for flight..that goes for any air craft..and if you survive the crash..the FAA is there waithing to hang whats left of you.
thats why a good pilot will do an extensive pre-flight before he puts his ass behind the yoke.

 

you get what you pay for most of the time. Most being the key word... Some people just want to beat the crap out of you on the price. Hell i can find fault in just about any car. People never build a car as you would face it we all would do someting different than the other guy. Your not going to be happy with it unless you did it your self.... Ask what you can take what you get Befor I would pay 20k for a car you can bet your sweet ass I would look at it and if I didn't ,I would not bitch and cry about it. It's my own damn fault not the seller for not telling you everthing wrong with the car.... I hate it that there are people that screw other people out of their hard earned money but they have to live with it and answer in time..... My dad has always told me If you do good it come back 10 fold if you do bad it comes back 10 fold I don't need any bad luck in my life

 

To make such a claim you must know the number of accidents caused by technical problems that would have been caught by an inspection. Without that, you can make no claims regarding the significance of technical check on motor vehicle fatalities.

 

How is this possible, when 99.997% of all vehicle deaths in the US involve factory built cars and trucks.

How exactly do super strict regulations on home built cars prevent deaths in factory cars?

More likely, is that Australians simply do not drive as many miles per year per capita. Add to that the fact that Australia does not have anywhere near as many miles of road as the US does, nor do the country as a whole have the disdain for speed limits that we Americans do.

Add all that up, and you get a death rate that is much higher here than there.

I have a hard time believing that there are only 1,000 vehicular deaths each year in the entire country of Australia though. You say there are less than 1,000 deaths per year, and then you say we are three times more likely to die in a wreck than Australians are. That math don't jive.

In 2007 there were 41,059 vehicular deaths in the US. The population of the US is ~300,000,000. Of those, ~227,000,000 are over age 18 (you can drive at 16, but I couldn't find any statistics for nation wide population down to age 16) and could presumably drive. That makes your chance of death in a vehicular wreck 1:5,555 (one in five thousand five hundred and fifty five).

The newest numbers I could find for vehicular deaths in Australia was 2007, when there were 1,617 people killed. The population of Australia is ~22,047,000. Let's assume for now that the same percentage are over age 18 (75.7%), which gives us ~16,689,000 eligible drivers. Therefore the Australian chance of death in a vehicular wreck is 1:11,111 (one in eleven thousand one hundred and eleven), or ~1/2 that of the US.

This is easily and adequately explained by the difference in miles driven per year per capita. US drivers drive 16 times more miles per capital than Australian drivers, which makes US driver risk per mile traveled nearly 8 times lower than that of an Australian driver.

In other words, your stifling regulation has nothing whatever to do with your difference in the rate of vehicular death.

If they don't bother you, that's fine, and that's all that matters, I guess. You're the cat what's gotta live under them.

We here in the US however will not be adoption such regulation, as it is quite obviously a pointless surrender of freedom, and we guard what freedom we have left jealously.

 

Killing someone through negligent action is ALREADY illegal.

What more do you want?

The only way laws prevent things from happening, is to prohibit people from engaging in that action (IE remove a portion of someone's freedom).

I am for personal responsibility.

If you build a shit box and kill someone, you go to jail.
If you drive like a fool and kill someone, you go to jail.

If you build a shit box and/or drive like a fool and kill yourself, well then, that's instant karma, now isn't it?

If we as a society did not spend some much time trying insulate stupid people from the consequences of their stupid actions, we would not have so many habitually stupid people anymore.

They would either learn from the consequences, and not be stupid anymore, or die, and not be stupid anymore.

 

The great majority of wrecks the US are caused by driving at too high a speed for the conditions.

Equipment failure represents a very VERY small fraction of the overall death toll, which is exactly what my point was.

Inspections do not save lives. Inspections make the state sponsored inspection stations money, and that is all.

I think when people hear "inspection" they visualize like ten guys pouring over the car inspecting every device and geehaw for structural integrity and proper function. This is not what happens.

What really happens is one guy in dirty overalls makes sure the lights all work, the tires aren't entirely bald, the wheels don't fall off when kicked, and the steering actually turns the front wheels.

They check the VIN, write out the ticket, and stick the sticker on the windshield.

I have NEVER seen one take more than ten minutes to execute.

They are a joke, the only purpose of which is to extract money from the car owner.

 

Mike51merc;

Seatbelts? Airbags? Where in my statement did you get that? Or the idea that I want people to kill themselves. I get from your statement that you have high regard for YOUR BUILD, but have something against mine? Sounds like you presume a lot.

If you missed the point, that well-built hot rods can kill just as quickly as the crappy built, and people with nanny syndrome that want new legislation to prevent the crappy ones from being built, you need to review my comment before quoting it and throwing red herrings into the salmon soup.

 

CAVEAT EMPTOR,, HRP [/QUOTE]


I learned that phrase from watching "The Brady Bunch" as a kid...Greg bought a real piece of crap '57 Chevy convertible

Good times, good times...[/QUOTE]

Gregs' car was a '56 ragtop. Sure wish I had it!

 

Looked at buying a built but unfinished 49 pontiac off of ebay. Had the guy send me pictures and documentation including title which I needed to cross back over the border. During the email exchange the guy offers for me to come have a look and if I don't like it I could just drive away. I agree to the sale and send down $500. Prior to leaving to go get it (12 hour drive) I print off the emails to bring them with me. The car wasn't bad but it certaintly wasn't up to the hype. The "fresh" 350/350 blew smoke on start up and the tranny was very sloppy. Brakes pulled hard. We eventually measured the wheelbase and found one side was longer by almost 2 inches. The rear had a loud gear whine. At that point we start comparing the photos to the car and they aren't matching. The owner claims he's done work since the pictures. I decided not to invest unless the price dropped $5,000. The guy had a fit and started ranting that we had a legally binding agreement. After a brief arguement about misrepresentation vs. an ebay agreement I pull out the copy of the emails. The guy decides he'll honor the drive away agreement but not refund the $500. I'm willing to accept that as a penalty for me being stupid. Before we leave my brother checks out the title and notices it doesn't match the car. Now we're threratening to call the police. Ultimately The owner backs down and give me my $500 back.

We stay in town for the night and decide to go see a bit of a cruise scene happening down the street. We run into the same guy. He has a much nicer unfinished 49 Pontiac then the one we looked at. Long story short, this was the car that was actually for sale and he was trying to sell me a different car. Both were in primer, both built in a similar fashion. One of the guys at the cruise commented the nicer car was a customer's car. We again threatened to call the police but ended up walking away after the guy gives us another $300 for our gas and time.

 

a well built hot rod is a lot less likely to kill someone else, because there's a good chance the steering works all the time, the brakes work all the time, it's been put together by someone who knows what they are doing, or isn't afraid to admit they don't and has someone help who does, are you saying the piece of shit tacked together,bald tires, useless suspension, junk brakes rat rod isn't a lot more likely to kill someone? I call bs on that, I've seen some on the road that I can't figure out how they stay together at all. Anyone who really cares about their car is going to take the time to build it right. the problem is our useless leaders and the public ,can't tell the difference between craftsmanship and junk.

 

Claims made without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. Saying something with a strong conviction is no evidence.

Here in Germany the inspections are quite thorough. They take a few hours to complete and are compulsory every two years. The cost is about 100USD. Every system is checked and measured, including a dynometer to check the brakes.

Moreover, there are too many confounding factors to correlate road safety based on fatalities per country to the efficacy of technical inspections.

 

And of course, we end with the universal statistical co-out: "There's just too much data to make any sense of it, we'd best just give up and do what they say!"

Sorry man, but you European folk are simply a breed apart.

You and I are never gonna see eye to eye on this, so we'd better'd just agree to disagree, lest one of us start digging trenches.

 

I know what you guys mean about misrepresentation. I've never bougt a vehicle sight unseen but the temptation is sometimes there.. Then I think how the local pawnshop guy operates & it turns me right off. I see some of the cars this guy puts on eBay,,& from what I see in person, compared to how he takes his photos & the bullshit stories & descriptions he puts on eBay..... it makes me puke.. A real scumbag outfit..

he's got a 63 Galaxie boxtop 3904spd. on there now.. he just had a quicky black paintjob done to it & it's a bondo wagon,wavy. he took pictures late in the day so you can just see the reflections on the horizontal surfaces,, you can't see the lower portions of the car.. & now his latest scheme / talltale (the last 3 or 4 cars on eBay) is that he's selling it for for a widow to settle an estate. It must be his way of getting himself off the hook.. BEWARE!!

 

Damn, you're paranoid. This has nothing to do with your car (or mine). You scoffed that people were implying that HotRods need to be accident proof.

I disagree. I say that poorly built HotRods will definitely kill more quickly than well built ones. It's just a matter of time and numbers.

Just because you didn't get hit by a bus while jaywalking doesn't mean it's as safe as the crosswalk.

 

Coolhand. You sure hit it on the head! "Amen" to exactly what you said.

 

You missed, or ignored, the premise of my post; I scofffed at people that have the nanny syndrome; NEW LAWS WILL NOT MAKE A HOTROD ANY SAFER.

 

What I do is have a "game plain" of what I want to build and then try and stay as close to that as possible with the money I have. Some times I have to use a part I have or can afford rather than the one I want because I can't spend that much money. All the while I keep in mind that some one is going to see this and they will know I built it so I try and do as good a job as I can.

 

29Nash wrote: You missed, or ignored, the premise of my post; I scofffed at people that have the nanny syndrome; NEW LAWS WILL NOT MAKE A HOTROD ANY SAFER.

Alright, you believe what you wanna believe. That's fine.
I believe that laws pertaining to motor vehicle equipment and condition actually save lives. Your "personal responsibility" rants are meaningless without laws to guide what "responsible" means, and yes, it changes over time and the ages.

Cars used to be built without safety glass and turn signals until the "Nanny State" required them. Would you like to go back to those days? New laws made cars safer.

Face it, there are more ignorant people than informed ones and that's a fact. Without equipment/inspection laws most drivers would be clueless about the condition of their brakes and their tires, the two most important automotive safety features, not to mention the finer points of vehicle construction.

You argue for "personal responsibility" and claim there are enough prohibitions on bad conduct already, but a lawsuit or jail sentence won't raise the dead or heal the wounded.



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I had a deal I couldnt pass up. thru a friend of a friend heard about a 64 chevy convertable. I called the guy and he sent me pictures, looked great. I had a friend of mine coming thru the area of the car and said he would pick it up on his way home for gas money. great deal, I sent the money got the title and a week later the car arrived. the one thing the guy forgot to tell me was the pictures he sent were 13 years old and the building it was in had fallen in on the car. I lucked out when the guy who had bought the car new [a stock broker with lots of coins]contacted me about buying the car and later had me restore it for him. who do I blame for the deal, you a readin his writin nuff said

 

If you build it yourself from the ground up, you are less likely to complain about what the builder does.............

 

Well this topic is a spin on this old post:

http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=395851

I could read a few back how the 'save me' thinking started on this thing. Gov't inspections? Safety laws? Some will never get it. It's always about liability on that small part of this discussion. States that assume some degree of liability will have inspections. Want more info on that score? Educate yourself on it. It's easy. Quality? Pride? Rare these days. As rare as common sense. As far as saying a well built car is no safer than a shitbox build, whatever keeps your head on the pillow at night I guess. I've seen too many ignorant drag racing failures from lack of skill or lack of pride in workmanship. No excuse for bad work, EVER.

 

if the laws continue to prevent every scratch in an accident soon the entire car hobby will be outlawed. then will it be safe enough for you? the attitude of lawmakers is we must protect the idiots amoung us at the expense of everyone else.

 

Around here most guys are so tight with the money they wouldn't buy an $1100 gold coin if you stood there offering to sell it to them for $50. That's why I put the cars on eBay. Even then it makes little sense to me, I see comparable cars sell no problem, ours just kind of stagnate there with no bids.


I got burned, kind of, only once. Bought a local Rambler when I found it on eBay because it looked good. I had even seen the car a couple of different times before that. But had never been under it. I get it loaded on a trailer and the unibody rails are shot.

But I paid less than scrap for it, in fact after I sold the set of plates off it I have less than $100 in it, so no big deal. The car is fixable, I came up with a plan to do it, I just don't love a Rambler enough to do all that work to save it.


But I also ended up on the other side of the coin. Sold a '55 Chevy for a friend. Could never get him to load it on the rollback for a really good look underneath, but those always seem to rot just ahead of the rear axle, and it was solid there. Doors opened and closed okay, I could see some cobbed pans in it, etc. So we sold it for $1500 or so. Guy flat tows it home and it just falls apart, one of the rockers fell off, turns out there are no floors left from the toeboard to the rear axle hump, and the frame had rot behind the rear axle. Now he did come and look at it himself, too, but the same deal, it never left the ground. I felt bad about it, but as he told me, the stuff I described I was right about, it was the parts I couldn't see myself that turned out to be junk. Plus I'm sure as it sat here it was better - just the vibration from a trip like that will shake everything loose that's going to fall off and you find out just how bad a car really is. I had one car I brought home that the entire quarter panel fell off on the truck someplace and we didn't even know it came off - and that was just a 35 mile ride out of the junkyard it had sat in since 1959 or so.

So I always tell people to come look at a car themselves, I'd rather not sell and be honest than sell to someone and have to say "sorry, but you should have looked at it in person, I didn't know that was bad either".