some of us hang onto the factual machines ..simply because they aren;t there today. a carbed geo, an old beetle, an 80s subaru...
I forget sometimes, and wonder. Why doesn;t everybody have a mig welder? visegrips, piles of sheet steel for the special stubborn new england pulverized spots..of course not OE, that would be too feminine.
I figured it out today: it is the car inspectors. They kill the will of owners.
if it is older than 6 months you may have a grumpy grandpa with an inspection license tearing apart your hypermiled masterpiece. I took a 1987 in today, it wasn't bad, excpet for one disagreement. The law allows this, you can even negate all the way to the state police inspection station. I do have a local guy who targets my machine. Very old school, like chevy ford battle, how dare I bring an original 23 year scoob beaten to life ... it outlasted his life.
Anybody else have this strange problem? what about hho/alternative fuel people and state inspectors? or oh no, the custom turbo on a little engine.. I bet there is some uneasy stories...as if you had to defend your car from a nutcase. Knowing it is not only text book, it exceeds oe 90% of the vehicle, the last 10% meeting it or fixing original non-repairables. Sometimes it just looks like the model it started off as
I am lucky to find a garage that understood welding. It is these other ridiculous things that need to stop. Targetted for a tire on an awd with cups on the inside. No way. never seen that before. I ponder being an inspector, staying dynamical with many years of knowledge is the only way. rock heads need not apply with state law books only. they aren't dynamical enough.