Martin doesn't quite know the value of Miatas, wrecked or not. People love these 10ae things. I think it's a bad car to swap tubs into, much better to shine up and sell for profit. I bet you can easily make $1k out of this.

If it doesn't sell you have a 3.9 torsen, 6spd, and vvt engine, and bilsteins to make back what you've put into it.

 

I'm not gonna tell you "I told you so". I'm not that mean

Good luck dude. I really do hope you end up with profit that will get your MSM back on the road or a clean tub that you can use.

Sounds like you have some really cool people helping you out, so either way this should result in win.

Next time be way more careful when bidding on cars at the auction. Double salvage = no bueno.

 

Curly, that's not a 2nd CAT, purely a small baffle for the exhaust.

Don't be tempted to remove it for a straight pipe, you'd be shocked at how much noise that tiny little thing kills.

 

yes, seroiusly, do not remove any cats or resonators from the NB exhaust ever. the sound will make people want to die

 

Yeah I wasn't going to. There's ~2" of pipe sliding in and out, it'll be marked and welded when I remove everything for the diff swap

 

Hmm, why not just re-shell into this car? Am I missing something here, it seems like you have a decent shell here and the MSM bumpers would swap right on.

It just seems like a lot of work to get this thing going and flip it for $1k profit and still not have a miata you can drive.

 

Re-shelling will be a crapton of work that I'd rather not do unless the new shell is totally worth it. From the sound of it, this shell isn't worth it. Both cars are not far from drivable status, so my current plan is to make both of them drive, THEN decide what to do. Priority is getting the blue one driving though.

Ordered spark plug wires last night. going to ask around our body shop to see if they know of a really good welder.

 

10AE is not a vvt motor.

 

Yeah, but why buy the car then? I guess I'm missing the point, lol. It looks good enough to re-shell into to me, it's HARD to find a car with perfect paint (ask vlad), so just repaint that one. Assuming there is no structual damage under the skin, i'd run with that shell and keep this project moving instead of diving into another project (flipping this car, THEN trying to get your other one going too).

 

Cause $1k or even $500 profit pays for the control arms for the MSM. and until it sells he gets a miata to drive instead of a Jetta or what ever econo box he's in currently. Makes sense to me.

You're right Richard, not sure why I thought this was a VVT. Must be the cam sensor.

 

Edit to add: I bought the car because I knew that even if the shell wasn't clean enough to swap, it's clean enough to sell and make a profit, even if it's a minimal profit. I plan to do the rest of the work to get it roadworthy myself -- don't want to take advantage of Curly's generosity with his time and space.

EXACTLY.

I will ONLY re-shell if it's a minty shell. My shell is in really nice shape other than, well, the smashed bits. So there's really no reason to re-shell when my rollbar is installed, my hardtop matches, and the MSM is a great looking car. It's not blue, and that's kindof a bummer. But I'm done chasing perfect cars, and at this point I'm interested in minimal cost and effort to accomplish what I want: a sick Miata to drive.

 

holy crap you guys are about to learn a very valuable lesson about making money:
the car will nickle and dime you, waste a ton of your time, and for what, $500?
I guess if you have absolutely nothing better to do......

Sorry I"m really not trying to be a negative nelly here, cause I like both of you gayz, but I just don't see this strategy as a good one. Write down every single expense for this car. Write down approx hours spent. Then when you sell it we'll do some simple division and see if I'm wrong.

 

$500 will be a disappointment...

Current plan: Fix the diff. Drive the car. If all is well, polish and sell.

 

This was pretty much my thought. The only way I could see the car as a good investment, is if you were to build it up over time. Get it running first, swap bumpers down the road and paint it, swap drivetrain stuffs eventually, and generally make it a project. The shell is solid enough to do that.

However fixing it to turn a profit.. good luck getting more than the $ you invest into it, let alone the time. Even if you turn 1k profit, look at the time you spent on it. This is all time being wasted on a car you want to get rid of anyways, instead of working towards fixing/reshelling your current heap.

NO offense either guys, I'm srs. I just think swapping parts over to the 10ae and parting the rest might be the best idea at this point. You will be working on a car you are going to KEEP, you should fetch decent coin for the drive-train parts, etc.

It just sounds like you are undertaking something that will be a huge time sink instead of working on your current huge time sink.

 

This very well may happen. Like you, I haven't even seen the car in person!

This... this is something I do ALL OF THE TIME. So that's probably true.

 

You should build a house while you're at it.

ILU

 

We've actually been talking about buying a house towards the end of the summer...





This is what my plate looks like right now:



And I'm attempting to add this to it:

 

Haha, cool. As long as you realize that I do this all the time too, and I've just recently become more conscious of it. I'm now working on more of a ONE THING AT A TIME scale, ranging from most to least important.


I'm just happy i have a running turbo miata to enjoy right now. it might be ugly, falling apart, and blows the occasional smoke cloud - but it's fast, very enjoyable, and still more fun than anything i've ever driven in the meantime.

 

If it took a front hit they might have bent the hood back instead of replacing it. They tried to do that to me on my RX8 when I hit the front, but I ended up making them replace the hood as they couldn't get the thing right.

 

Ed do you want me to drop the diff? It'll literally take me ~1hr. I've been itching to work on something that's not mine. Then you can cart it off to be fixed in the next week or so when you drop by Thursday.