OK I've realised that Ron's £250 is a tad wide of the mark !!!

However I am often surprised at how enterprising / lucky some people on here are:

So here goes:

Who has come closest to the mythical cost for a completed car ?

What do you estimate will be the final cost if you are in the process of building ?

Disregard labour etc, just the cost of actually getting on the road.

I'm hoping for C£4000 but I'm prepared to be dissapointed.

Mark Allanson, over to you Sir.

Mick

Lets see....

excluding tools:

70+150+40+100+20+50+40+40+50+10=570 i think up to a near rolling chassis. not much more to spend to get it rolling.

I have budgeted for £4K and so far have spent £2500.

Spent about £900 so far, the only major purchases to go are seats (£300), Aluminium sheet (£100?), paint (£FREE!!), Rear lamps (£60), interior vinyl (£30?)

I expect to finish for about £1600 plus SVA and registration fees

We are not worthy!!!

Regards Mick

I am not wealthy!!!

Regards Mark

I recon about 5k and 800 hrs when finished.


atb

steve

If you did everything yourself it could be 5000hrs and £800 when finished.

think I've spent around £800 but recon that will go ballistic once the missus relenquishes her grip on the cheque book.

Whats a cheque book?
Never marry a bookeeper
Shug.

I remember reading it in the mists of time. Mine was about £1500 as a finished item about 3 years ago. Took a year from start to finish.

yours, Pete.

I'm intentionally not keep any count of how much I spend. Frankly, I don't want to know. At the moment tools probably account for well over a grand, probably closer to 2 grand after this weekend (lovely HF DC tig).

Kingr

Lucky Sod!!

£1200

Cheers

Chris

Well, I was reckoning on about £2500, using original steel wheels etc.

I've now been told by her indoors that I can spend up to £3800 on an RPI 3.9 V8

BUT it's going to cost me a conservatory, a kitchen and and extension on top of the garage.

So my 2500 is now looking more like 40k

Cheap at half the price!

ATB

Simon

just tell her

look, im building the car, i dont care what you think. just shut up and get me my slippers and a beer.

It works.

You will get as much time as you like in the garage to complete the build as you want!


Its just that you will be eating and sleeping in there too

atb

steve

Steve,

I will benefit as well - my garage will be three feet wider. Not much, but when you consider I've got the Locost (and all bits and pieces) and two bikes in there (one resto project) three feet will make quite a difference!!

As for the beer - sorry stopped drinking when I was 21, and you wouldn't want to wear slippers in our house, carpet grippers might get you!

Oh yeah, she wants some of them too.

Can I polish the concrete floor instead?

Gotta be nice - she threatened to divorce me yesterday as it is!!

We were at a MODEL Aeroplane show and a chap turned up in a stunt plane (FULL SIZE) - which she argued was a model. Needless to say a certain amount of wee taking ensued!!

Still loves me though

ATB

Simon

three feet is a huge improvement on a single garage. I cant even permanently fix my rear wings until the car has been finished cos it takes up too much work space.

I was in japan 15 years ago and the host really did call his wife over to get and pour us two beers.

I think 'wife management' is part of the building process.


atb

steve

I mentioned to the wife yesterday that if women hadn't been given the driving licenses or jobs, the roads would be half emtpy, salaries would be doubled and house prices would be halved.

Lead ballons

ATB

Simon

Some of you will be introuble if/when your wives read this lol

Back to the subject anyway

Mine has cost me.... not a lot so far.

All metal, tubes and sheets.... have cost nothing
Escort £50
Carbs £90
2.0L XE £90
Wheels & Tyres £100
Nose cone and wings £100
Brakes £20
Track Rod Ends/balljoints £40ish
Paint, welding consumables ... no idea

Not much more to do really

We've built 2 for less than 3k, second one finished, save for a bit of paint SVA soon!

Well, I'm now well aware of what a lucky git I am : I've go no one but myself to justify the cost to (not difficult - Kingr "I think we should get this really cool tool/part/whatever, it's totally unnecessary, but really trick/light/handy whadayathing?" Kingr "Yup, that's a masterpiece, it's almost like I though of it myself, you go buy it.". And, better still, the use of a double garage (woooohooo), locost permanently one side, empty space when I want it on the other (Kingr puts his feet on the desk, leans back, and wears an expression that is more than a little bit smug). The only real downer is my salary, but hey, it's a load better than it was a few months ago, and in a fortnights time, it'll be better still.

Kingr

life of a sucessful international coke smuggler eh, i dont know... we dont all have it that easy!

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mix
OK I've realised that Ron's £250 is a tad wide of the mark !!!

---

or "build your own sportscar for £250" if you go photocopy your mates book instead of buying it.

Wish i knew someone with the books before i bought them !

[Edited on 2/10/03 by Ben_Copeland]

Bem, how did you get an XE for £90?

From a mate

It was running, but needed a new waterpump 90k miles

didn't matter on condition cos i was going to rebuild it whatever! But it was a goodun anyway ! plus coscast head

Bugger! Er.. I mean well done fella! That was Low-cost!!

If you find another one at that money, give me a shout!

Know a breakers that does them for £150 i think ?!?!?

Think Ned knows the details !

My budget is £2500 (achievable I think) and my time estimate is 15 months (03/2003 to 06/2004) which may not be achievable.

I subscribe to the theory that it takes 3000-4000 units of either time or money. I hope that will be £2500 + 500 hours but it could well be £3000 + 1000 hours by the time I get there...

Simon, I didn't realise that you were such a smooth talker with the ladies
By the way(Simon) you are right that my website is behind the times. I have been making progress but it is not so visible (seam welding and grinding etc) and hence not worth reporting on its own. I am going to see a V8 engine tomorrow though which I hope to purchase and perhaps get at the weekend. That would be worth reporting!! I'll email you in the next week or so to update you.

Cheers,
Craig.

I'm afraid i think that engines already spoken for! though they did have another one with a hole in the block, but a coscast head...

Ned.

Craig,

Look forward to hearing about engine. Hope it's a good'un

Agree with your comments about the welding, spend hours and hours at it and only a few less holes to show for it.

ATB

Simon

Simon,
Went to see the engine earlier this evening and managed to get it running. It hadn't been run in a year or so so it had no fuel in the carbs and the pump had siezed up. I primed the carbs with some high-tech gravity fuel feed techniques (ie Fairy Liquid bottle and plastic tube) and off she went. The exhaust is totally gone so it was very very noisy and difficult to hear if it was running correctly but it's close enough for me to make me part with £175. For that I get anything I want from the donor car except for the gearbox so I can get all the wiring and hydraulics, pedal box, accelerator and choke cables etc etc. Seems like a decent deal to me.

The car was a ruin due to rot but the engine looks quite clean and with no signs of goo inside the oil cap. The oil on the dipstick was black but not "really" black if you know what I mean. It didn't look bad at all in fact. It's just a shame that the exhaust was stuffed or I could have spent more time getting it running properly. As it was I was in danger of upsetting the neighbours...

So I'm helping to extract it next weekend which gives me a few days to finalise my engine bay welding and grinding. Then I can start building stuff around the engine.

Cheers,
Craig.

ps. Sorry to be off-topic, won't happen again...

Top stuff !