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When to walk away from a project?

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Maybe it's because I turned 50 at the end of last year. Beginning to appreciate the limits of time, so thinking about how and where I'm spending my time. Also trying to be good about asking the question "am I really going to do that work?" Self honesty can be tough sometimes. 🤪

Funny, I barely noticed turning 40. 50 seems to have made me ponder a few things.
 
I guess I'm not the one to answer that question. I have owned the Sprite since '95 but it honestly didn't become a real "project" until a couple of years ago. The Prefect, OTOH, has been a project since 1962. The "urgency" of the project has varied a number of times over the years. It has gone from a freebie to a daily driver to a project to "wait for a better time" to finally back to a proper project currently sharing in my time with the Sprite and helping my shop partners.
 
Well, you got in while I was typing Drew. Just remember, 50 is still a youngster. You have all the time in the world left. I am 82 and my oldest partner, the one restoring the MGB, will be 88 in a couple of months and still going strong.
 
mikephillips said:
I look at the Alpine out in the garage and realize that next summer it'll have been mine for 50 years. One thing I've learned, never tell a woamn you're still driving your high school car. For some reason they don't find that particularly impressive....
Click to expand...
My brother once said the perceived passing of time was like the needle on an LP record. The outer run seems to take forever to make a full rotation but the closer it gets to the center the faster that circle is completed. Just as with life and the passage of years. :censored:

My Elan S-3 has been with me fifty-one years. Six years less for the +2. Been through four MGB's in a bit more time than that.
 
Ready to retire? Turning 80? Still young enough to keep the vehicle as it doesn't require feeding yet? I have a ten yr Jag project with 5 left, a GT6 might take a yr and a half. A Disco that just needs starting, a Valiant that needs floorboards finished, upholster the seats and start. My boat needs carbs rebuilt and fuel drained and cleaned. My rv needs genset put back in and fridge started. Both drivers need oil changes. 2 yrs to 75, retired , no kids, but still puttering. If I walk away, I have assets left that are not taxable, but I will not abandon. That is the garage, not the house. Now find that 10mm, before dark!
 
The Cathedral De Notre Dame took over 180 years to complete.
 
Drew,

If it''l help you out,just ship it to me.
That'll solve your problem.

Just like the phone company slogan - "We're here to help".
 
I strongly believe that projects that works the mind keep you compos mentis. projects that work the mind and body are good for the mind and body. But the body can struggle a bit.
my dad loved to “tinker” with mending all sorts of things and still had his 1960’s British V8 classic sports car in the garage to the end ( mid 80’s but C got him).
Mum in her 90’s loves word games and still avidly reads the “big newspapers” more on the ball than I.
So don’t give up entirely just keep busy doing things you enjoy a little bit at a time.
I’ll be 60 this year and for some reason dreading it. But it’s just a number as I still spanner on my car and try to invent “trick bits or mods” to go faster and still do my sprints and hill climbs here in the uk.
Just enjoy whilst you can.
 
When I retired from university almost twenty years ago, I vowed to have nothing more to do with computer network management, and to continue my interest in Nature and history. Didn't want to spend my "golden years" slouched in a recliner, watching reruns of Gilligan's Island.

So I began volunteering as an "old airplane cleaner upper" at the New England Air Museum, and volunteering in historical agriculture, horticulture, and orchard care at Old Sturbridge Village. And to keep my hands (and brain?) occupied, I found myself an old MGB.

Now I'm director of the air museum research center, an interpreter of 19th century New England history, and have continued building up knowledge of "oily old iron".

Aviation, agriculture, autos - all from the past - have kept me active going into my mid 70s now, and hopefully for years ahead. cough cough

Never just retire away from something old. Retire *into* something new. It doesn't hurt to keep searching for something new, especially when the old gets boring.

Tom M.
 
Well I have an answer to my initial question: When to walk away from a project?

Now

After a few months of thinking it over, I've decided to move the Bugeye project along for a new owner to finish. Restoration work is just not my favorite thing, and this car still needs quite a lot of work.

The truth is that I really like driving the MGB, and I fit better. The Morris Minor provides some nice variety (drove it to work today in fact). So now it's time to find the Bugeye a new owner.
 
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