Advice on what to do with the MOAB (long post)
 

As you guys may know, I bought the MOAB-supercharged 1995 NA that GIGAPUNK listed here a few weeks ago. Actually, he sold it to oldgreyfrog, who decided that he didn't want to spend the time parting it out (his original plan). Oldgreyfrog tossed in a nice condition OEM soft-top, kept the hard top and 6UL's, and resold the car to me.

Unfortunately, since OGF had the car less than 30 days, he never registered the car in his own name. We signed a bill of sale and he signed (what we thought was) the second reassignment section on the NY title. When I took the bill of sale and title to my tax collector, they pointed out that the section normally labeled "Second Reassignment" on the back of the NY title actually specified that it was only for licensed dealers. As OGF is not a licensed dealer, they would not process the title transfer, even though I had a valid title that had been signed over to me, as well as a signed and dated bill of sale.

Now I'm debating what to do with the car. Here are the options I've been considering.

1. Apply for a bonded title with the car in its current condition. Cost would be $125-195 for the title bond, with the only caveat being that the car has to pass inspection before the title will be processed. At first I thought this was just the normal annual $5 window sticker inspection (brake lights, turn signals, horn, but no emissions or anything like that), but upon further reading I discovered that it has to be inspected by a Mississippi Highway Patrolman. Unfortunately, I cannot find out what exactly the inspection entails, only that it's the same inspection they do for kit cars. The car is 95% of the way there, I suspect. The brakes, tires, and seat belts are fine, but the tune is terrible (idle bounces between 2-3k constantly, smooth but overly rich in boost, and stumbles off throttle), there's a short in the dash harness (no power to gauges) and the speedo cable is broken (no speedo or odometer). I'm concerned one or several of these things would get the car red-flagged.

2. Remove supercharger belt, swap in stock injectors, plug in stock ECU, and then apply for a bonded title. This would allow me to quickly take care of the idle/tune issues, and leave just the dash harness/gauges/speedo cable to take care of, which would hopefully be pretty straight forward. After getting the title, I could reconnect the supercharger, injectors, and AEM ECU and work on the tune in my own sweet time.

3. Part out the pricey aftermarket stuff, build the car back to mostly stock, apply for bonded title, and then sell car. This would be best financial decision I suppose -- between the MOAB system, the AEM, the injectors/fuel rail, the suspension, the Torsen, the ACT clutch, and various other bits, I'm betting there's $4-5k in parts. I'd probably need to spend $500 or more on stock parts to get the car back to decent running condition, at which point I could probably sell it for $3500-4000 if I clean it up.

4. Part out the entire car, aftermarket and stock parts alike. There would be the possibility of selling the shell and drivetrain together for someone that wants spare parts or is starting a track-only build, or I could try to sell everything but the shell (and I guess either sell that or scrap it for it's weight in metal). I'm not sure how fast all the various stock parts would sell, however, nor if I want to turn this into a 6 month hassle of pulling parts and shipping them out. I'd also hate to get stuck with a partially parted-out car.

Poll is posted above. Vote, comment, tell me I'm a dumbass, or give me other options.

Well do you want the car or not?
If you want the car and its very torquey and awesome daily driver setup I'd do option 2
If you don't want it (seems like everyone keeps pawning off the car so it might be more fuxxorzed than appears in the advertisement) then do option 4.

My .02

qft. I'm voting option 2, I don't think the inspection will be as thorough as you'd think but idk.

The only advice I can offer is that this sounds very similar to what happens when you purchase a car from out of state and then apply for a transfer of title in Florida. They send a Sherrif's deputy or FHP officer over to look at the car. All they do there is visually inspect the VINs and run a check to ensure that the car isn't stolen or otherwise suspect.

I've never registered a kit car, but from what I've read, the purpose of that inspection is similar- they pull the numbers on all of the major components (engine, transmission, etc) and do a similar check for reports of stolen vehicles.

Assuming your car isn't stolen, I don't think this will be a problem for you.

can you just have gigapunk request a new title ? in florida it costs $75, then have him send it to you signed as an open title.

that way your out $75 plus tax tag title fees, with no inspection.

I'd need GIGAPUNK to play ball for that to work.

worth a shot, no reason not to help you.

Already tried, no dice.

Unless he changes his mind, the four options above appear to be what I'm stuck with.

douche move, other then that i would make it pass inspection and get a title no matter what you do.

I agree.

He's got no legal obligation to help me out. Can't do anything about it if he doesn't want to get involved.

Has anyone ever applied for a title bond? How much does it affect the car's resale value (I realize we're talking about a 15 year old Miata, but still). As bad as a salvage title?

Again, option 1 should not be that big of a deal. Assuming that the MHP inspection is in any way similar to the FHP / CHP inspections, all they're going to do is look at the VINs, make sure they all match, key the number into a computer, and verify that the car has not been reported as stolen. You won't even have to start the engine. (When FHP "inspected" my '71 SuperBeetle, the engine was sitting on the floor of the garage.)

You might as well try option 1 or 2.

Apparently (at least with the place I checked out) you don't pay for the title bond until after it's been approved, so there's no risk of paying out and being denied. But I think the inspection takes place after the title bond is already granted.

Maybe I'll try to call the MS DMV on Monday morning and see if I can get a better description of what the inspection entails.

Figures that I'd get passed around from one office to another for 20 minutes with nobody able to tell me what the inspection actually entails. I hate dealing with government bureaucracy.

BWAAAHAHAHA....government kicks my ass. After calling this particular office several times yesterday afternoon and getting a voice mailbox every time, I called again this morning...and the number has been disconnected. Bastards.

lol calling the DMV........I haven't heard of a single person around here that ACTUALLY got anything done by calling them.

Its a tarp

FML.

So I've been jumping through the bureaucratic hoops to get a bonded title. Final step was supposed to be this morning, with an inspection by a HP officer to check the VIN on the car and make sure it's not on any stolen vehicle lists. I've started the car periodically, letting it idle for a while, revving it occasionally once warmed up, etc., but I haven't really driven it around at all since (1) it's not registered, and (2) I have no license plate, and (3) I live less than a mile from my town's police station.

So I have an appointment this morning to take it to the HP center for the inspection at 9:30. I figured I'd open the store at 8, then leave at 9. I get in, start it, it stumbles a few times, the idle gets stronger, so I back out of the driveway and head down the street. Clutch in at the stop sign, clutch back out, it dies. I think, "Weird, maybe I had it in 3rd." Start it, let it idle for few seconds, clutch back out, it dies. Third try, same thing. Don't know why it feels like it doesn't have enough power to pull away from a stop, but after restarting it 4 times in 5 minutes after the car has been mostly sitting for several weeks, now the battery is weakening.

Run back to the house, get my wife to help me push it back into the driveway, hop into the Sentra and drive to work. I'm about to call the HP office and explain I can't make the appointment.

I'm about this close to just ripping parts off of it and turning it into a long-term part-out.