Projects Have you ever bailed out on a project?

A few, in no particular order:
48 chevy coupe
39 ford 4 door
68 pontiac custom S
68 triumph Bonneville bobber
51 ford Tudor
Chappy

 

I picked up a fairly nice 48 Dodge 2 door sedan. I kept it around for a couple of years, but it just never grew on my like I thought it would. I sent it away for a small profit. I bought a 40 Chrysler 4 door, it ran and drove, needed minor floor work (which I could have done) and a few other things. Someone came by and wanted it a whole lot more then I did, so I bailed on it as well. There have been a few over the years that have fallen into the concept that I thought I would grow to like, but people showed up and wanted them more then me. I didn't buy them thinking I was going to make money on them, but for many, that was how it worked out.
After a few buys that I bailed on and actually made a little money on, I think I got to the place that if I saw something that I thought I might like, I went ahead and picked it up. If I fell in love, I would build it, if not I would send it down the road for a small profit and do it again with something else. About 15 years ago I ended up at a smaller place (very little storage) so I quit doing that, probably a good thing these days, this stuff isn't as easy to sell as it used to be. Gene

 

Ummmm...........uh...

 

Way to much money in the ‘glass chopped sedan delivery. Sold on the HAMB for pennies on the dollar. Buyer finished it and then sold it to a guy with a son in a wheelchair. While I lost my ass, it ended up with someone that made it a practical hot rod.

 

Years ago I bought a Standard '40 Tudor. I was used to building things with junkyard parts. It seems that every repro part was available for a '40. I priced out the pieces and chickened out. Now that I've done a car with lots of 1-400 parts, I wish that I had kept it.

 

I bailed on a 454 powered Lloyd project when the dealership I was working at in Az got sold and the new owner brought in a whole new crew and I had to move.
I have stubborn about giving up on projects ever since.

 

Hung up the white flag on the Nash in my avatar last fall, too goddamn big, and traded it for a econoline pickup, have bought and sold several bullit nose Stewdy projects over the years. Have come to believe it is a part of the hobby, everything I ever drug home was someone else’s abandoned project.

 

Yup, '50 Dodge 1/2 ton.
Bought it cause it yard drove was priced right and got caught up in the fever of "this could be a cool rod!"
Traded it and other things for a paint job for my '35 slantback that now lives in Australia.

 

Bought a 56 chevy wagon in high school, never registered it, realized I did not have the money/time it would take as I was working full time and going to school so I sold it for what I paid. Same with a t bucket project, though I still have the 4" drop 32 axle from it. Have a 39 Buick I might let go if the right
offer came in but I do not think that will happen, and am finally ready to start my 50 chevy pu. After that one who knows.

 

There are probably people standing in line waiting on you to let go of the dropped 32 axle. HRP

 

I would bail out on the 52 suburban build if I could. But it is my girlfriend Dani´s car. And she loves it... and she doesn´t have the $$ to get a better car. So I try to make it a reliable driver on the cheap.... I told her never to tell anyone that I built her car... I made the floor, body mounts most of the cowland firewall from scratch, because there was no way for her to buy the replacement panels in the US and pay for parts and shipping... So I made new inner a pillars, up to the roof... and there is still so much bondo and bad repairs on that truck that I´d rather sell it cheap than fixing it up ... She loves it and I love her, so I guess I just have to bite the bullet.Hahahaha

 

I see '59 Fords, nice paint and interior go for $10,000 less than what I have in mine. But I have a lot of upgrades those do not.

 

I really don't call it bailing out but I guess it was, I recently sold my '32 5 window coupe and I really enjoyed driving the car around town but I also like to take road trips and the original drive train wasn't going to work for me.

I crunched some numbers and with what I wanted to do with a new flathead , transmission and quick change rear axle I would be in way to deep and to be honest I just couldn't afford to build it the way I wanted. HRP

 

I have an issue or two that prohibit me from not finishing what I start. Id probably live longer if I learned to bail once in a while.

 

Well...come to think about it, there was this one ex-wife...

 

I still think you made a mistake letting go of that sweetheart of a Chevy II converible.

 

This site isn't about mistakes though is it? Nooooo! I make a lot of mistakes.

But like Sinatra sang "Regrets, I've had a few, but than again, too few to mention.
I did what I had to do, and saw it through without exemption..."

 

The only project I've given up on was a '57 Airstream trailer.

Do you have any idea how many god damned rivets are in those things?

 

Many

 

I bought a running '50 AD pickup while serving in the Navy at Alameda NAS. My intention was to drive the thing until I got out of the military...then make it bad-assed. My first long trip cost me $50 in oil that it was throwing onto the pavement, the shift linkage fell apart and the clutch started slipping. By the time I got it home I never wanted to see that piece again. Sold it to a local guy for half what I gave for it...he spent a few dollars on it and drove the crap out of it. Now, 40 years later...I want another '50 AD truck but now they want big dollars for a decent one.

 

Yes

 

I need to get out of my 58 plymouth one of these days, shes been sitting long enough

 

Back in the 70's, needed a pair of early ford spindles, found a guy with them but he would not split up
the axle from the spindles. I think I paid 100 for everything, but it might have been less.

 

I've bailed on several.

I gave a really solid 66 Corvair Coupe to a neighbor of mine that finished it into a really nice driver and eventually sold it for big dollars (relative to Corvair dollars). It was in my way as I was building stock cars at the time... that's a big money maker!

The hardest was a 66 big window short chevy truck, in pro street, big block mode. This was back in the early 90's, and I was buying my first home, and it made a nice down payment. It was the last of a long line of 60-66 trucks I owned and the nicest. I gave it away with all the hard work done. Made fantastic money when we sold the house 12 years later, so I guess it worked out fine

 

Yes, but only one since my teenage years. Normally when I spend money, I feel committed and have to finish.
But then came the Corvair convertible, in the family 30+ years, 80K miles, gift from my sister to my daughter, what could go wrong?
I spent more than the car was worth on day one. Now 3 years later, fresh paint, new brakes, suspension, stuck valves. It is now setting in my barn, waiting for hell to freeze over. I've spent in excess of 2k, needs more cash, interior, engine repair. At the end of the day, when it's done it's a 3k corvair that I would have 5k in.
So to the barn it went, taking up space there. 40 Chevy came into the shop and will be completed by spring, and I am enjoying the build. Very excited as paint in only weeks away, then I get the fun stuff, building a hi hp BBC and sticking it all together.

 

Corvairs are a labor of love!

I sold my last one 4 years ago. I miss it a little once in a while, then I get over it.

 

Have let a few go when the company moved us. Had two decent 62 biscaynes stashed in Lake County but had to let em go when we were moved. Then got a so-so 61 Vette in 89 for $5000--didn't run but was all there-started working on it and some guy just had to have it for more than 2X the money-gone!

 

I haven't given up on it, it's just been sitting in a storage unit 1200 miles away for the last 2 1/2 years.

Sent from my SM-G920V using The H.A.M.B. mobile app

 

I think everyone on this forum has a similar conclusion. Probably not with Corvairs and probably a lot farther underwater than 2k.

Oh, wait. Maybe I'm the only one it happens to.

 

On wife no. 3 and loving it! first 2 bailed out.