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Thanks for confirming my prime concern -- namely, that a shell swap into a different vehicle isn't worth the added weight. I'm still curious about the later generation Geo shells, though, since the last time I saw a gen 1 Metro without rust was when my mother owned one new in '93.
It's not that I don't enjoy working on cars, I actually find it very rewarding when I'm able to do something myself. Pretty much ALL of the experience I've had with automobile repair has been over the last few years since I started delivering pizza. The rub is that with putting on upwards of 30k miles per year it's not really been worth it to buy a car that's anything but disposable (since resale is essentially nill and most "nicer" cars get rather poor MPG), and as such doing more than just the general maintenance work always seemed rather silly. I've never welded or done any machining before, but I love to do things myself and am very mechanically inclined (first year of an electromechaical tech degree completed, which is mostly drive systems, physics, and DC and logic) so putting the work into it isn't what's preventing me, it's not really knowing where to start or what should be done. I'm just lacking the automobile experience.
But this car I'm proud of. It was a task simply to find one, and then I managed to beat out about a dozen people who were going to come look at it after me today (hooray for having cash!). And it had only been listed for three hours. It's easier to find a CRX HF around here than a Metro XFi.
The car drives beautifully. Nothing that's important or safety-related (aside from the oil pan gasket and radiator as previously mentioned) is missing or damaged, it's just that I feel the pride of ownership -- not to mention the tips are affected by appearance of both yourself and your vehicle. I could theoretically replace the interior piece-by-piece from local junkyards, swap out the doors and hatch, get new locks, and learn to do or have someone else do the little remaining body work, but really a full shell swap just seems easier and would probably end up costing about the same if not less. More about wanting to do the work rather than NEEDING to do the work I guess.
Pics will have to wait. I just got home and the wife wants to spend time with me before I leave for two days. By the time I get back on Friday it'll be too dark, and then on Saturday I have a wedding to go to, and on Sunday it's a 12 hour work shift. I'll try to get them on Saturday though.
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