Convince my parents that Zeds aren't junk!

:rofl::rofl::rofl:
Do you get a free set of steak knifes with it

 

Well I got to say Arashi - I for one love the look of that design you've got happening there - looks a winner to me! But, you've changed quite dramatically the whole roof line of the Z32..... You'd have to chop the entire roof section off to achieve that look... that'd mean all new inner trims too - big, expensive job right there. Anyway, hats off to you for designing a hot looking car.

 

This^^:rofl:

Arashi, actual design and all aside; are you asking his dad to invest in your company? If so i'd love to see your business case/plan for that. Unless i misunderstand what you mean, you're planning to compete with the likes of Mansory, Brabus & AC Schnitzer....minus the performance mods? I love our Z32's but i don't think there's much money to be made flipping 20year old cars with only cosmetic mods. It'd be a helluva niche

 

I've had a range of cars and the Zed is definitely HARDER maintenance than other cars. Now, it hasnt had any major problems so far touch wood and the ones it HAS had are the same all cars I've had around that age have had - the difference lies in the difficulty of repair.

My old LX Torana cost me $800 from the wreckers and another $500 to get it up to roadworthy. I replaced the entire engine myself in a weekend when the original one with 1.2million km on the clock cracked the crank. The replacement engine cost me $50.

Replaced that with a carby N12 Pulsar. Aircon, 5 speed, power mirrors, pretty good performance for what it was, $500 WITH a roadworthy certificate and a new radiator. Lasted me 2 years until I tried to dodge a dog in the middle of a bush town at 3:00am and I dodge straight into a pole. Cashed in the rego and got $250 back as I'd just registered it, sold the wreck to the wreckers for $200. Replaced it with a VN Commodore that came with 12 months rego so I basically paid $50 for the Pulsar.

My VN Wagon cost me $4k from a car yard (A fair few years ago now though) and is about to get engine number 3 as the first one packed it in at 380k and the second one spat an oil seal in the pressure switch and dumped the oil as I was driving. It's going to need an extra set of hands to do the swap and the engine is $350 exchange.

My Zed cost me $5000, needed $500 of work to get roadworthy. That's with Bryan throwing in a whole bunch of freebies to help out and a lot of work on my behalf. Had to redo the muffler - my Torana's exhaust was $200 for the entire thing. My Zed just cost me $230 for 1 muffler + removing the resonators and welding in straight through pipes. If I was going for a rwc it would have cost me around $400 to do it properly. I have a small oil leak from the drivers side turbo which is a $200 job as well as a small power steering leak which is going to take me a few hours to fix compared to 30 mins in the wagon. I was lucky - my Zed had it's 100k service. If yours hasnt add another $1000 to the price of it.

While I LOVE my Zed I miss the economy of the Pulsar, the ease of repair and cost of repair of my Torana and the utility and cost of repair/parts availability of my Commodore.

The other one is fuel. I average around 1000km a week about 75% city, 25% highway.

N12 Pulsar - $60 of Petrol
LX Torana - $80 of Petrol
VN Wagon - $90 of Petrol
300ZX TT - $150 of Petrol

 

"....you are lucky at this time that I am 2-3 months away from from completing it....."

lol... that is what we heard some 3 years ago .... !!!!!

 

We did actually go looking around in all the wanneroo car yards yesterday, found this place called Marlyns Autos, they have a showroom with just Skylines basically. Got him to at least look at a nissan (although they were $25k GTRs and stuff...)

 

That was me! And it worked

 

Its all fine and dandy to want it now. But you need to factor in insurance , maintenance. Wait till your 4-5 years older, insurance is cheaper and you have a secure job to keep the girl going.


Just my advice and this is what I have done.

 

Edit

See what I've done here

 

Thanks and the roof line will just overlap the existing and create an illusion of a sharper angle.
http://i.imgur.com/7yhYz.jpg

Lastly for reliability issues one can just swap a newer Nissan v8 into the car and this only costs a few grand in the United States.

Now I'll have my own large CNC machine which will carve my 3D design easily.

 

lol;;;;; ".... Now I'll have my own large CNC machine which will carve my 3D design easily."

and for how long have we been hearing about this fantasy machine also ...... ????!!!!!

you claim to be 2-3 months away from completing it .. i call complete rubbish ... as it all has been for years.

 

Ill make a thread about it this week, it should be working soon.