After reading the cheapest roadster post it got me thinking. SamIyam and others made some good points. I thought this info deserved to be kept out of that post. What I did is took a two week billing cycle for a customers car from this winter at our shop. In this 2 weeks, the rolling chassis was brought in to us to run the plumbing, install the motor (SBC Crate mill) and run belts, hoses etc. We aslo installed a set of Econo rear shocks. In the breakdown I have listed labor costs, we will pull them out after the total. Nothing on this car was high dollar, tubing was mild steel, brass fittings, plain aftermarket AC and Alt brackets powdercoated locally 'cause it was quicker and cheaper than ordering them coated. Alternator and AC compressor were not polished. Almost all of the small parts were from our local Carquest and I DID NOT mark them up to full boat retail!The only really big ticket item was the Strange rear axles for the 9". The cost of these is not much different than what us cheapskates would spend on some Vintage intake and a set of Finned aluminum valve covers! Feel free to add to this data, the list is not complete, we only had the car for a short while and the owner ended up doing the rest. Unless you actually have put a dead car on the road, you have no clue how much the little shit addds up to! I know, my 54 took a fair amount of coin for these same "incidentals" The list. CHassis Engineering Shock Mts 14.99 Valve cover Breather 6.95 Rear End hsg Vent 12.99 Magnum Brake hose kit Front 64.95 Spark plug looms 59.99 Fuel Pump 28.99 Harmonic Balencer Bolt 9.99 PCV Valve 4.99 Fuel Pump Push Rod 18.99 Reman Starter 89.99 Starter Bolts 6.99 Oil Filter 4.99 Fuel pump plate 9.99 Labor 30 hours 1350 Hose clamps/misc tubing 14.99 5 Qts Oil 9.95 80-90 Diff oil 3.99 Heater hose nipples 15.98 Brake line 9.70 Bills Alt Brkt 75.00 Bills AC Brkt 75.00 Powdercoating 25.00 Plain Al Pulley 55.00 Plain Al Crank Pully 55.00 Alternator 95.00 (I could have sold him a polished one for $20 less!) Plain AC Compressor 199.99 Vbelt 15.99 Vbelt15.99 Flywheel cover 29.95 Misc Hardware 5.00 Gas shocks pr. 59.98 Fittings 3.99 Fittings 3.99 Radiator cap 8.99 Rad hose 18.99 Rad hose lower 18.99 Fan spacer 12.95 Tstat housing 9.95 Strange Axles 395.00 Brake line 9.95 break line 9.95 fitting 9.95 Local sales tax 185.18 Shipping on ordered parts 55.29 Total 3271.48 Subtract the labor and it is 1921.48 in small parts. This list is by far not complete. You could save dollars in some of these area and spend more in others. There were reasons for the choices made on brackets and other parts.
..and your just figuring this out??? what about all the sandpaper,cutoff wheels primmer,thinner to clean the guns,new nuts &bolts you NEVER count,all the time your compressor runs, all the time,gas&shipping spent chasing parts, all the lil parts you get from the junk yard you forget to add in... ...i LOVE it...hhaahaha
And if you're buying all your stuff at swapmeets it's important to include the, at least, 25% you spent on items you didn't end up using. If you attach dollar signs to building a car yourself you should stop right now and consider your motivation. If you only focus on cheap you end up with something no one else will want. If you say, "I'm not in it for the money", you're temporarily fooling yourself. Just my two cents. dug
dude i just spent $37 at the hardware store buying hole saws and a pilot drill. no one ever seems to count that shit.
My point exactly. Guys want to make it sound like they built their cars for next to nothing. What's a good welder cost these days? I've a shop full of stuff I didn't use on my cars. Will I use it on the next one? Who's to say there will be a next one. It's ALL great fun though. I just hope my kids get what this shit is worth when I'm dead and burned.
geez Tman, doncha know some wives and girlfriends might read this! they ain't supposed to know the real cost! and we just don't ask how much they spent at the mall...
Tman: if i told my wife how much i dumped into my modified , she would have a stroke. it really ads up in a hurry, even with free parts.
Hey Bill--If your wife would have a stroke at the Modified`s cost,what would she say about the poor old `42 Merc Convert!!
Uhh, sorry guys hahahha, As I was getting ready this morning I was thinking of this list and remembered there was another invoice I forgot to add to this for around $300+, you get the idea. Jeem, as for nuts and bolts I sometimes wonder if it would be better to invest a couple hundred in a small asortment for the garage? What really adds up is the Grade 8 hardware! Several bucks a bolt for the long ones!
You think that's bad? Hell, you should see what I go through, every week, in diapers. ... and I don't even have any kids. JOE
I have a big fat file full of receipts - I even find receipts out in thew garage that didn't make it to the file - I'll never add that shit up - it is what it is but I don't need to know what it is that's why it's a hobby I am also glad to see I am not the only guy that buys things they don't use or change the what you end up with - I have lots of extra parts
That is a really good point! Now that my car is almost done, I finally added up my receipts last weekend. Initial investment for the car: $3400 Money Ive put in to it so far: $3600 This is over a 2-year period and I havent really been keeping track of it, so it kind of surprised me.
I just posted what we put the car together for on the other thread. I didn't include much of what you are talking about here. I have spent a ton of money buy little tools we take for granted. The little parts and stuff will definitely add up, but I think many underestimate and don't appreciate the value of the tools required to put together these cars. I'm fortunate that I have family who has all of this stuff AND is willing to let me us it. If I had to buy all of the tools necesary to build my car it'd be 10K car easy. Much of the little stuff (ie hardware) were scangenged on my car. there was alot of time spent digging thru buckets of bolts and nut, cleaning and brushing, but I think as a hobbiest this is were the pleasure and savings comes in. Rather than just running out and buying a new part if an old one will due and it just take time to clean it up, then it is just time and not money. There are the parts that truely require new hardware for safety sake, for those you just have to bight the bullet.
I usually look at it from two perspectives. If I am going to keep the vehicle or if I am going to sell it. If I am keeping the project I usually spare no expense .This helps with the projects I am paying attention to cost on because I will have alot of the expendables or tools already. It makes it was easier not to have to run to the store every night and I can stay focused on buying stuff from ebay or classified boards. Swapmeets are great but usually only happen once in a great moon and there are some things that you just cant get from a swapmeet.If you really want to nickel and dime a car to know how much you really have in it , you can drive yourself crazy. I tried to keep track on how much it cost me to paint stuff a couple times and it can be a real pain in the ass between tape, cleaners, mixing cups, ect. With expendables it is best to buy in bulk (preferably from the flea market of some sort of discount place)to help keep costs down and remember your time is valuable also
I think tracking down all the expenses and whatnot just plain takes all the fun outta building the car! Yeah it costs a lot, big deal. If you want to do any hobby, it's gonna cost you somehow or someway. It'll drive you crazy to keep thinking about all the little things. Just have fun with it! Wouldn't the whole "cost of tools" thing be scratched out if you do more than one car...? You weld on the car, but you may also use it to fix some backyard furniture and then later, use it again to weld on another car....then your buddy comes by for some welding, etc. That wrench set also helps you with your housework or maintenance on your....ugh mean your "wifes" daily car. I'm not tryin to be all negative, just kinda lookin through the reality glass, yeah it's gonna cost (whether it's time or money) and if you don't wanna pay, don't play.
I think it's important to figure in all the replacement parts used on a car the first few years too, if you don't just put it together cheap and sell it and let the next guy pay for the actually useable new radiator after paying for three differen $40 rpairs on the old one and water and fuel pumps that don't leak and engine overhaul after finding out that he's spending more time replacing used engines than he is driving and tire's that don't blow and almost send the car over in a ditch. and an acceptilble by the highway patrol exhaust system after the fix it tickets can't get fixed by his uncle the lawyer any more. All that rebuilding and repairing and "tweaking" if you want to call it that is part of "building" the car too since it is what the "high priced" cars did in the first place. I added up all the reciepts for my blue truck when I first got it running in '93 and it came to around $5600.00. Since then it's got another engine, because the crank went south on the used SBC 400, a radiator recore becasue I got tired of pulling it to repair the ancient '48 chevy truck, leaky core, reupholstered in (free) leather and gone thru a set of expensive Goodyear Eagle tires and got a store-bought front end alignment and is going a long long time on a set of cheap Pep Boys tires. If you go to the swao meet and buy "stuff" regularly and just put it in the gearage in the "possibles" pile then it isn't "Free" 5 years later when you pull it out to use on a project. it's either valued at the current swap meet prices or it's valued at what you paid for it plus the mortgage or monthly value of the ammount of space it occupied while in storage waiting for that day. For instance, I just made out like a bandit paying $2000 for my El Camino that the previous owner paid $75 a month for 16 years keeping in storage, for what, me? That's $14,400.00 he paid. Thank you! If you have been renting a project-specific garage to build in you have to add in that rent to the cost of the car!
The Jalopy Journal
