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aeronca65t
Great Pumpkin
Offline
Here's my lastest purchase...a sad little, round-wheel arch (RWA) Midget.
I bought it locally, via Craigslist, for $250. It runs (decent), has a title, has low mileage and the engine looks completely unmolested.
The owner has had it stored in his garage for a few years in the hopes of restoring it. He and his wife are a couple in their mid-30s (I'd guess) and his first car was a Midget. He had hoped that this car would rekindle that experience.
But they just had their first child and, unfortunately, the child is handicapped. The wife explained to me that they really have no time for a car project at this point. They both seem like loving parents and I'm sure that the child will be well-cared for.....but I do feel bad taking this car away from them. When I saw the ad and realized it was *very* local, I called and agreed to pay them the $250 sight-unseen. Now I'm glad I didn't try to weezle them down a few bucks (which I would normally do).
Anyway, the car will donate it's engine to my race car. I am switching to the 1275 engine for next season so I can legally run the car in the VRG vintage events (they let me run this year with the 1500, but said that "it would be nice" if I could switch to the approved motor). This is fine with me. Even if I continued to run the EMRA enduro series, I'd have switched the racer to a 1275 at some point.
In the pictures, the car looks dreadful, and there is some lower edge rust on the doors and rear fender. But the main tub is real solid. The sills are excellent and if they were re-done, it was a good job (unlike my last parts car). Since I have so much spare stuff around (including the 1500 race motor), this might be a good car to build into "rat-rod" for the street. I don't really need another car, so there's no real sense to keeping it....but I probably will anyway.
Part of this is because I hate to chop up another person's "dreams". Also, these cars are getting harder and harder to find.....ten years from now, I'll hate myself for chopping up a car like this.
I am already re-doing the race car (including a Mazda rear axle swap), building the Ford Escort (for regular EMRA racing) and constructing my Sprite-based Austin Seven Replica Special, so maybe I should hold off (I also need to get back to work on the plane). Anyway, I will keep this latest car as a rolling chassis for now and figure out what to do with it later.
I bought it locally, via Craigslist, for $250. It runs (decent), has a title, has low mileage and the engine looks completely unmolested.
The owner has had it stored in his garage for a few years in the hopes of restoring it. He and his wife are a couple in their mid-30s (I'd guess) and his first car was a Midget. He had hoped that this car would rekindle that experience.
But they just had their first child and, unfortunately, the child is handicapped. The wife explained to me that they really have no time for a car project at this point. They both seem like loving parents and I'm sure that the child will be well-cared for.....but I do feel bad taking this car away from them. When I saw the ad and realized it was *very* local, I called and agreed to pay them the $250 sight-unseen. Now I'm glad I didn't try to weezle them down a few bucks (which I would normally do).
Anyway, the car will donate it's engine to my race car. I am switching to the 1275 engine for next season so I can legally run the car in the VRG vintage events (they let me run this year with the 1500, but said that "it would be nice" if I could switch to the approved motor). This is fine with me. Even if I continued to run the EMRA enduro series, I'd have switched the racer to a 1275 at some point.
In the pictures, the car looks dreadful, and there is some lower edge rust on the doors and rear fender. But the main tub is real solid. The sills are excellent and if they were re-done, it was a good job (unlike my last parts car). Since I have so much spare stuff around (including the 1500 race motor), this might be a good car to build into "rat-rod" for the street. I don't really need another car, so there's no real sense to keeping it....but I probably will anyway.
Part of this is because I hate to chop up another person's "dreams". Also, these cars are getting harder and harder to find.....ten years from now, I'll hate myself for chopping up a car like this.
I am already re-doing the race car (including a Mazda rear axle swap), building the Ford Escort (for regular EMRA racing) and constructing my Sprite-based Austin Seven Replica Special, so maybe I should hold off (I also need to get back to work on the plane). Anyway, I will keep this latest car as a rolling chassis for now and figure out what to do with it later.
