Smiling All The Way To The Bank?

[Nikyboi]

I dont like people who lick the marmite pot!!

[Clairey Fairy]

Obviously: " " doesnt signify taking the mick anymore then

Sorry Kam and Mitch and Chris for offending you.

[Linz]

I am not averse to having a go at things, but have an boyfriend who loves tinkering with cars and is pretty good at it - so in all honesty I have never really done much 'personally' to my car other than regularly clean it, change wheels, clean/adjust coilovers etc. But whenever he is doing things to it I am there handing him the tools, greasing bits, handing them back, and generally helping.

When I (we) did my car this summer Byron did as much as he could himself - breaks, BMC, modified sub frames on the porsche seats, wiring for seats and boot solenoid, changing steering wheel, stripping car for painting, putting it all back together etc - and I helped by making rolls/tea etc, putting stuff in boxes, tidying up, and polishing the wheels.

But when you look at my car, you can't necessarily see the all the hours and late nights we put in - you see the paint and the leather ... which we paid someone else to do. We chose the colour, all of the body mods, the leather, the style of the stitching, but weren't confident enough in our facilities or abilities to get a decent finish so paid someone else to do it.

I doesn't matter to me either way whether people do it themselves or pay someone else to do. When you stand and look at the car in the show field, and have no prior knowledge of the car, how do you know if they did it themselves or paid someone loads of £££ to do it.

If you like the car, you like it - you don't like it, fair enough! Yes, I agree that someone you does it themself, in most cases, does maybe deserve a bit more respect for having a go, but someone who doesn't do it themself does not deserve any less respect for not doing it themself.

[IDGM]

I am not averse to having a go at things, but have an boyfriend who loves tinkering with cars and is pretty good at it - so in all honesty I have never really done much 'personally' to my car other than regularly clean it, change wheels, clean/adjust coilovers etc. But whenever he is doing things to it I am there handing him the tools, greasing bits, handing them back, and generally helping.

When I (we) did my car this summer Byron did as much as he could himself - breaks, BMC, modified sub frames on the porsche seats, wiring for seats and boot solenoid, changing steering wheel, stripping car for painting, putting it all back together etc - and I helped by making rolls/tea etc, putting stuff in boxes, tidying up, and polishing the wheels.

But when you look at my car, you can't necessarily see the all the hours and late nights we put in - you see the paint and the leather ... which we paid someone else to do. We chose the colour, all of the body mods, the leather, the style of the stitching, but weren't confident enough in our facilities or abilities to get a decent finish so paid someone else to do it.

I doesn't matter to me either way whether people do it themselves or pay someone else to do. When you stand and look at the car in the show field, and have no prior knowledge of the car, how do you know if they did it themselves or paid someone loads of £££ to do it.

If you like the car, you like it - you don't like it, fair enough! Yes, I agree that someone you does it themself, in most cases, does maybe deserve a bit more respect for having a go, but someone who doesn't do it themself does not deserve any less respect for not doing it themself.

Well said. I see your car is in Golf+ this month. I haven't read the mag, but I'm sure that where appropriate, you have acknowledged those who have helped and provided paid services along the way, just as many feature car owners do.

In all my 25+ years of reading Street Machine, Custom Car, Hot Rod, pre-nudies Fast Car, Volks World, CCC and laterly the water cooled VW mags I have never read a feature where the owner is soley responsible for all the work on the car.

[chris260]

I think if you want to have the best of the best then you have to go elsewhere for some things. For me i like to have a go at all of the mechanical stuff but that's more due to the fact that if something goes wrong i've got the ability to fix it myself rather than having to pay extortionate labour prices! However if i was getting paint or a retrim i'd not even consider doing them myself.

[lunalupi]

what i cant live with is the carting your car off and not seeing it for 7 months then collecting it with everything done, no idea of the process's or how things have been done

Exactly what I think - nothing wrong with paying someone else to do work on your car if you don't have the time/knowledge/space to do it yourself, so long as you know what's being done to it. So like Linz who decided on the colour, the interior, but paid someone else to do that because she couldn't do it herself. But still chose what was going to be done, and also did the simple jobs herself/with boyfriend.

[Mr ColinG]

As much as possible I try to do what I can myself, however I realise there are limits to my abilities and where appropriate I will get someone elses help.I do all the mucky bits and all the ideas are out of my head, similer to Linz I got a company to do the retrim and paint. Whats the point in investing all the time and effort and expense to let the whole thing down at the last hurdle, poor paint will stick out from a mile away.What I dont like is someone buying someone elses completed project and taking all the glory, Carl Taylors mk5 and Greigs mk4 spring to mind, Steve Simon Sweetland probably did it the right way, broke his car up, took balls mind 

Edited December 16, 2008 by Bluloop

[treblet]

As much as possible I try to do what I can myself, however I realise there are limits to my abilities and where appropriate I will get someone elses help.

I do all the mucky bits and all the ideas are out of my head, similer to Linz I got a company to do the retrim and paint. Whats the point in investing all the time and effort and expense to let the whole thing down at the last hurdle, poor paint will stick out from a mile away.

What I dont like is someone buying someone elses completed project and taking all the glory, Carl Taylors mk5 and Greigs mk4 spring to mind, Steve Sweetland probably did it the right way, broke his car up, took balls mind

I agree with that completely Colin, even I would leave paint and retrimming to a pro but everything else i'll give a bash myself

As for buying completed cars and doing nothing to them once you have bought it, I totally disagree with that, Steve Sweetland's decision to break his car is very VERY wise, think of the money he'll get back as people will buy parts knowing that they came from his car.

It also means that no one else is driving around in his car. Imagine how gutted you'd be if you'd spent the money he did on that only to sell it and either see it sold on for more than you sold it for or worse smashed up in a heap because someone got a bit over enthusiastic with their driving!!

[Clairey Fairy]

Steve Sweetland's decision to break his car is very VERY wise, think of the money he'll get back as people will buy parts knowing that they came from his car.

It also means that no one else is driving around in his car. Imagine how gutted you'd be if you'd spent the money he did on that only to sell it and either see it sold on for more than you sold it for or worse smashed up in a heap because someone got a bit over enthusiastic with their driving!!

Id love to drive around in that car and wouldn't feel a tiny bit bad

[andyp]

With mr sweetlands car, the owner would have a very hard time to put his/her own mark on it without completely stripping it down and starting from scratch again.

[treblet]

With mr sweetlands car, the owner would have a very hard time to put his/her own mark on it without completely stripping it down and starting from scratch again.

Agreed!

[Mitchell]

Obviously: " " doesnt signify taking the mick anymore then

Sorry Kam and Mitch and Chris for offending you.

have i missed something?

[Philplop]

I'd have no problem buying a ready done car. I half plan on doing it with my next car, with all the expensive work done. Then I can change wheels and the like as I please, but won't be starting from scratch.

I wouldn't take credit for it though. Just saw a RR thread on Edition of Pete McGinley's cream TT roadster, people were asking questions about it and he answered them without ever mentioning that it was exactly the same as he bought it. Just seems silly to try to pass it off as his own.