What was your first project car?

What was your first project car?

Truthfully, putting a new transmission in my fathers old 1992 BMW 850Csi that I completely destroyed the first day he gave it to me, and fixing the whole rear of the car.

A Lada Niva, of all things :grinyes: . It was crap, but it was fun - it was an ex-works rally car, with full cage, harnesses, no keys (just toggle switches and push button starter), close-ratio gearbox and a straight through exhaust. Picked it up for next to nothing in barely running condition, then spent the next year playing and tinkering before it finally shat itself for good.

I think I spent most of my time on rewiring, rebuilding the front suspension and then tuning the carbs - twin Strombergs are a bitch to get right! When they were dialed in, the little Fiat 1600 engine it had would sing along quite nicely.

Would have been a 1987 Monte Carlo Ls, welded in a new pieces in the floor, new bottoms on the doors and repainted it(wasn't done by us). Over all it's a nice looking car.

94 integra ls..

My Neon. It's only my 3rd car in this lifetime, and it's been the one I have put the most work into as fas as personalizing it. Someday I wanna get a hold of and restore a '69 Dodge Dart GT.

first 'project' was an 86 rx7, but that was more of just prettying it up... first REAL PROJECT, is my mr2, which i am currently working on, i'm putting a 3sgte in my first gen car (and re-doing the interior, and lightening the car up... it's gonna be a street legal race car :naughty: ) all i can say is Varoooom!

All of my cars have been "project" cars - most usually, the project has been to keep them running (and stopping!)

It was my 1989 LeBaron GTC but since some retard saw fit to run into it is now a VERY run down 1990 GTC.

Hey! And my 100th Post too!

My first project car was in high school, Junior year, when a friend and I bought a beat up 67 Mustang with some rust, bad paint, not running, and two dented fenders...it cost us $800. I was driving an 85 Prelude, which was only 1 year old, so it was the reliable transporter so we could get around while building the beast.

My buddy's father had a hydraulics shop and a lift, as well as air tools...so we took over the shop on the weekends when he was off (and sometimes after school if he was out running errands), having to move the car in and out if the father came back and needed the shop.

We bought a 302 engine, through his father's connections at a car yard, and cleaned it up, put a 4-barrel holley setup on it, sanded and filled the body, cleaned, got a half-decent Maaco mid-level paint job, and a clean set of American mags from a dead Mustang at the yard, from which we also pilfered original Pony edition seats. Our total investment went around $1600...not including labor (and of course the freebie use of the shop we had). My buddy drove it for 4 months, then we sold it for $2800, which we thought was a killing at the time.

We went on to rebuild a Ranchero and another Mustang...but the dad sold the shop, I went off to college out of state, and that effectively ended my car project lifestyle. I still like to mod all my cars, but usually just find the parts I like and have local shops do the paint or installs. Someday, though, I'd love to do another project car...maybe something European from the late 60s...

Yugo 45 Handihatch- stripped iterior missing body panels- never finished :p


The Best I've done so far is the upkeep of the BMW 2002- the Alfa has been tweaked minorly by me though ('cept for the Chip- that was done profesionally) with good results

well the first thing i ever worked on was a 1963 ford 4 wheel drive pick-up, went through and redid the whole fuel syestem, but my grandfather helped with that, so i guess the first thing i ever did by my self was a 1957 chevy truck, red, this baby was so nice when i got done with it, i rebuilt the engine, rebuilt the brakes and cleaned up the engine compartment, put down some metal in the back in stead of wood, cleaned it up alot and rebuilt the trans in it, i hate electrical so i left it how it was wich was dumb todo after all the time and effort i put into it. dang though it sure was a pretty thing to see and drive