Hard-Copy Journal for 7 July, 2013

Michael called me and picked me up to look at another Opel to use as a parts car.  Registered on Craigslist for $400.  One complete car and almost every part from a second car.  Here’s the story:

The guy had bought two Opels in 1995 with the goal to restore one of them.  One of the cars had the roof cut off of it to turn it into a convertible, but the previous owners did a bad job of it.  The guy took that car and chopped it into six pieces, removed all of the relevant and salvable parts and stored those parts next to the Opel that still had a roof.  This Opel (with the roof) has some nasty rear quarter panel damage.  He had kept the rear panel of the roofless Opel, but had never placed it on the keeper.  This rear panel still has the trim piece so that’ll offset some of the cost.  All in all, it would give us two replacements of all parts.  Two engines, two drive shafts, two transmissions (one of which I’m commandeering for Tollsten, my own Opel), two front ends, two rear ends, and all glass, lights, wiring harnesses and a bunch of other stuff.

When we started talking price the seller informed us that he already had an offer of $500, and if we could offer him $600 we could take it, which I feel is kind of bull-shitty.  Michael gave a call to his wife for the final go-ahead and then we made a counter-offer of $550.  He accepted, we borrowed a truck, grabbed the trailer and started to haul it home.  As we were loading the car onto the trailer, come people on the road saw us and offered us $1000 for just the car.  It was very tempting, but in the end Mike didn’t like the feel of these people and decided to keep everything.  I agree that it was better to keep the car.  It’s good piece of mind.

We finally unloaded the car at Michael’s lace and I went home.  We still need to inventory everything we have and find out if there is still anything we need.  I know we still want brakes from a BMW, but I think we have everything we need not pertaining to brakes/suspension.

We also looked into getting a fuel cell, but they’re hella expensive, so we’ll use the OEM fuel tank (of which we have one from the parts car, and one in a shop somewhere in Roseville) for now.

Also, sometime between the last journal entry and this one, Michael cleaned out the carburetor that came with Project Phoenix, installed it, and ran the car.  That carb works fine from what Michael tells me so that’s good.  I wish I had an exact date of that piece of news, but it’s not the end of the world.

The next couple of times I go out to Michael’s to work on cars won’t be dealing with Project Phoenix.  We need to strip one of Michael’s trucks, and the Opel so they can be sold on Craigslist.  He wants to clear out some of the cars in his back field.

COSTS SO FAR:
=========================
LeMons Budgeted Items:
     Previous
               $364
     Today
          None.  Will include items
          parts car when installed
               $0
     Total Expenses
               $364
     Budget Remaining
               $136
=========================
Off Budget Items:
     Previous
               $0
     Today 
          None
               $0
     Total Expenses
               $0
=========================
     Misc. Items
     Previous
               $1,240
     Today
          Parts car and
          additional parts
               $550
     Total Expenses
               $1,790
=========================
     Grand Total Expense:
                $2,154