Mercy! Mercy! That Dang Nabed PERCY!

Fixing up that Classic

Fixing up that Classic

There are some cars that are destined to become classics. Ask a kid, automotively inclined, and they will be able to tell you what those cars are likely to be. In my father’s day it was a coupe, in mine a 57 Chevy, then it was a muscle car and now who knows?

The reason I mention this is that if you choose a 5 year old vehicle instead of buying new you might as well choose one that has the potential for becoming a classic. The reasoning is that if you pay in the 2K range for it and keep it fixed up and maintained it will hold its value instead of losing half the first year.

There is another option for the semi-affluent and that is buying a leased or factory executive car. The savings on these 1 or 2 year old vehicles often approaches 30 percent.

If you don’t know anything about a car take it to a garage and get the mechanic to do some diagnostics before you buy it. Check to see if it makes white smoke when it starts, have them do a compression check, inspect the drive train to include the tie rods. Then see if you can’t find the service record to see if it has required a lot of maintenance and what the problems were.

If you do these things you will find a good used car and most of your focus will be on clean up and rust and finish work. Taking a course at the Tech College on Auto Body Repair is a big plus and will pay for itself many times over.

There are those who buy cars in this range, fix them up and resell them…That requires more expertise than the average person has, but is definitely doable. If you become unemployed using the time to get some practical education is not a bad idea.

There are many ways to deal with rust. Yesterday I said that the first step is to clean up the rusted area and assess the damage. If it is pitted and deep with pin holes and wafer thin it needs to be cut out. Cut out the square or rectangular area that needs removing and replace it with new metal. Many auto body shops today use an automotive type epoxy to apply the patch. Most purists insist on butt welding a patch panel. If you can’t weld that limit’s the home do it yourselfer to gluing. You cut a patch from the same gauge sheet metal which is about a third larger and glue it behind the area removed. One way to hold it securely is with rivets. To use a rivet drill a hole and squeeze one in with an applicator. This will leave an intention in the repaired area that you can fill by gluing a second piece to fill the repaired opening. Bondo around the patch and sand smooth. Voila. Why people drive these rusted beaters around when they could fix them up with a little ambition makes me scratch my head and wonder. Maybe that couch is just a bit too comfortable.