Car Hunting, Pt. 2

(continued from Pt. I)

Once I realized that I wasn't going to have much luck finding most of the cars on my initial list in decent shape for my somewhat-limited budget, I started focusing the search on Miatas and BMW E30-chassis 325i and 325is coupes. Per my original requirements, they're both cheap to initially purchase and to operate. Parts and insurance don't cost much, they're both easy to work on, have strong enthusiast bases and neither are gas hogs. And, having been built in the late-80-early-90s, both are equipped with some modern safety features.

Also, since this was to be a fun toy/hobby car, a manual transmission was a requirement. Sorry, no slushboxes - I already own two vehicles so equipped. And while I had initially hoped to find decent '94-'97 1.8l Miatas in my range, I discovered that my budget was about $2k short.

Off to crazedlist.org, a website that allows the user to search multiple Craigslist pages at once, while using the same search criteria. Being in a population-dense location, I searched the San Diego, Orange County, Imperial County, Inland Empire and Los Angeles pages all at the same time. Here are some pics from the ads that popped up:
Feeling frustrated at the questionably-modded and/or clapped-out nature of most of the cars (as well as the obligatory horrible Craigslist photos), I then decided to reach out to a colleague at Mazda USA. Turns out, one of his friends was trying to unload a 1990 Miata.
He had planned on turning it into a Spec Miata racer, but lost his storage space before completing the job. The owner replaced the soft top with a hard top and had installed the full Spec Miata suspension, among other goodies:

mmm... Bilstein/Eibach combo

The good news is that it was within my budget, included a lot of spare parts AND was still usable as a daily driver in it's current state.

However, I was afraid that this particular car would be a bit too extreme for Allison's tastes - and it turns out that the seller was not available to show me the car, located about an hour away, on the weekend that worked best for me. But exchanging emails with the seller ignited some long-dormant Miata fever in my brain. I had always liked the classic "NA" Miata and had started searching for one, just for kicks, close to six years ago when living in Wisconsin.

Turning back to Craigslist once more, I noticed a clean, relatively low-mileage, original-looking '91 Miata that had just been listed for sale here in Carlsbad. While it was a bit higher in price than my original goal - as well as red (my least favorite of the four original, standard Miata colors), I figured it'd be good to see it and drive it anyway - at least to further my knowledge of how these cars look and perform. To be continued...

Down On The Street

As found in Rancho Santa Fe on a sleepy Sunday morning, one of my all-time favorite Bavarian beauties.
The BMW Z8 was produced between 1999-2003. I have no idea what year this one is, but I do know that I'd gladly kick the Miata out of the garage in order to accommodate this ravishing roadster.
Styled by Henrik Fisker and meant to evoke the classic BMW 507, the car sold in relatively-low numbers. The $128k price tag probably didn't help sales.
Still, it's a beautiful, rare car and will likely become more desirable in time.

Car Hunting, Pt. I

Being a renter out here in California means that I have a lot more free time on my hands than I did in Wisconsin - which is good and bad. The good: it’s quite nice not having to run to Home Depot or Menards on a Saturday afternoon to drop $50 or more on mulch/paint/appliances/gardening tools/etc. and then spend the time working on the task at hand. The bad: I kind of miss doing those little projects and home improvement in general. And with the housing market still unsettled and Carlsbad prices still high, buying just didn’t seem right. So, with a bit of free time and extra cash, finding a fun project car gave became a fun project to work on.

Starting with my list of ten cars I’ll own before I am dead, I started trying to figure out what would be available within my modest budget. That obviously eliminated acquiring a decent example of a 911.

My criteria:

* Affordable to purchase in decent condition. I didn’t want a non-running/unsafe car that I’d have to sink money into in order to get it road-worthy.

* Affordable to run. Inexpensive and readily-available replacement parts, cheap to insure, easy on gas. I did not want to have a nice car that needed, say, a $1,000 part that is now only available from a remote German warehouse, nor did I want anything that’d become a financial weight around my neck.

* A foreign make. Japanese, German, Swedish, heck, even French. Aside from Jeep Wranglers, Cherokees and Grand Wagoneers, most American car models just never did anything for me.

* Readily available locally. I entertained the idea of expanding my search nationwide, but spending, say, 50% of the car’s purchase price on shipping it back to this corner of the country just didn’t seem to make much sense - I’d rather put that money back into the car. Nor did trusting buying a car based on photos and a seller whom I may have only met via email and/or phone.

* Safety. Well, at least *some* semblance of modern safety features. Sorry rear-engined/air-cooled VWs. I want a little bit of crumple zone.

So, with that all in mind, I went back to the list and searched all of the Southern California Craigslists using Crazedlist.org. for:

BMW E30 325i/325is
BMW 2002 (not on my original list, but it should be)
Mazda MX-5 Miata (“NA” platform)
Mazda RX-7 (“FC” platform)
Mercedes-Benz SL (R107 platform)
SAAB 99 Turbo
SAAB 900 Turbo or SPG (first generation)
Toyota Land Cruiser (FJ40)
Toyota Land Cruiser (FJ60)
Toyota MR2
Volkswagen GTI/Jetta GLI (“A2” platform)
Volkswagen Scirocco II
Volkswagen Corrado
Volvo Amazon
Volvo P1800
and, just for kicks, a Citroën DS

The Land Cruisers were quickly eliminated from the list, as all FJ40s within my price range were basket cases and the FJ60s were rough at best. In fact, about the only decent Land Cruisers were FJ80s with over 200k miles on the clock. They’re great, classic, dependable SUVs, but I don’t need another vehicle in my fleet that gets gas mileage in the mid-teens. Aside from late-model Volvos, the Swedes never seemed to have made an impact, sales-wise in SoCal. No surprise, since they’re known as great winter cars combined with the lack of seasons in this region. A few somewhat-promising GTIs came up, but most had very high mileage and/or were located a couple of hours away from Carlsbad. I even found one Citroën DS, but it was in need of a complete restoration and (thankfully for my wallet), located up in Burbank. The Mercedes SLs in my range would have given my wallet a severe cashectomy. After a few weeks of searching, it became clear that I was going to have the best of luck finding a BMW E30 or Miata that met my criteria.

To be continued...

Good Morning Little Red Car

The fourteenth car I've owned, new to the fleet as of last night. Details to follow...

My Next VW Van

And it's only $100...

Another Thousand Down

I'm still spending plenty of time on two wheels, the totals for 2011 so far:

My First Three Bikes

Found some old pix at my parent's house last week...

1975 Roadmaster (made in Olney, IL)

1977 Rampar R-10 (later run over by a neighbor lady and replaced with an '81 model)

1981 Raleigh Rapide + tube socks

Yeah, surprisingly no Schwinns. All of my friends had Schwinns, I wanted something different, so we drove to the larger twin cities of Champaign/Urbana, IL and bought the Raleighs from Durst Cycle.