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Re: Big Healey

To: GNH.Wbst207V@xerox.com, CraigR3454@aol.com, british-cars@autox.team.net
Subject: Re: Big Healey
From: "TeriAnn Wakeman" <twakeman@apple.com>
Date: Tue, 25 Oct 94 11:06:44 -0700
In message <"24-Oct-94 16:50:28".*.George_N_Haynes.wbst207v@Xerox.com>  writes:
> CraigR says, "I have come across a 1957 Big Healey for $400: would 
> it be worth it to buy it and do a total restoration on the car. I really 
> don't know that much about the Big Healeys so any advice would be 
> helpful."
> 
> Since you asked, FORGET THE ENTIRE IDEA!!  Unless a 1957 Big Healey 
> is a car you lust for and would keep forever, it's simply too much time 
> and money to restore a big Healey, especially for someone else!
>    
> I bought a second MGA a few years ago - didn't need another MGA, 
> but it was cheap - thought I could "restore" it for $6K and sell it for 
> $10K.  What a Dummy!
> The bill for the car exceeded $10K and I was lucky to find a buyer 
> a year later for $12K.  I lost two years of time I might have spent on 
> my own cars and lost money, if my time is considered.  It was a painful 
> lesson and one I would not someone to repeat... at least not without a 
> warning!  
> 
> George Haynes
> Dove Grey 1956 MGA
> Blue 1964 Spitfire ... slowly being reassembled
> BRG 1965 TR4A... the next 100% restoration 


George,

Your are right of course,  but my first reaction was to tell him not to bother 
and by the way whats the address & phone number of the seller.  It takes an 
incredible amount of time to rebuild a car and costs scads more that you can 
concieve of up front.  I keep telling myself I've learned my lesson with my once
& future TR3.  I just hope I don't come across a cheap maybe rebuildable big 
Healey when I have money for one (My current cars are doing their best to make 
sure I will not have too much money though).

To get into a rebuild project you have to have the following:

1. A NEED and a love for the car, along with the knowledge that you will never 
want to sell it.  

and/or

2, You enjoy spending time working on cars as a way to relax and be at peace 
with yourself & the world.  The costs of rebuilding a car doesn't mater as long 
as your are having fun.

Plus

3. Patience and a desire to do it right so you can be proud of it.

4. You can devote 8 or more hours/week on the project without other parts of 
your life or relationships going to pot.

5. You can scrape together at least a couple of hundred dollars a month for 
years to donate to the project without other parts of your life or relationships
going to pot.

6. Your not the type to look at a big  pile of broken warn parts, loaded with 
rust that used to be an assembled car & give up.  Other call you stubborn, you 
like to call yourself tenacious.

7. Sanity does not run in your family, or at least managed to bypass you.

If like me, #2 doesn't fit, you will only get sucked into one rebuild... unless 
in a weak moment a car you NEED comes by at a price you can not resist.  I'm 
trying to stay away from those.

You can always come across disassembled project cars because at least one of the
other factors was missing and someone decided they could not face working on it 
any longer.

You can always come across rotting  project candadates owned by people  who only
fit in #7.  They assume that the value is always going up as the car rusts into 
the dirt and plan to ether sell it for a killing or restore it one of these 
days, soon after Gadot shows up.



TeriAnn Wakeman        Large format photographers look at the world
twakeman@apple.com     upside down and backwards     
LINK: TWAKEMAN              
408-974-2344                         TR3A - TS75519L, 
                       MGBGT - GHD4U149572G, Land Rover 109 - 164000561



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