build diary

June 27, 2006: More thoughts on Car and Driver.
I've been thumbing through the article over and over again. There's been a big goofy smile on my face since I got it. Of course I'm happy! I remember being worried that Larry didn't understand my car on his brief time behind the wheel but when you read the article, it's obvious he did.

For those wondering about the price, that is the cost of the car as it sat in Texas at full retail and including a purchase price for the engine. My own costs were less. For example, the pedal assembly quoted at $350 included the pedals, master cylinders, residual pressure valves - and actually only cost $287 at retail instead of $350. When I think about it, I have no idea where I came up with the $350 number. It must have made sense at the time. I also assigned a cost to random parts that were sitting around my garage. I did not include the cost for parts I did not use, such as my original tie rods or fuel tank. It's tough coming up with an accounting for a project like this but I think the cost shown in the article is fair. I've said many times that it would cost about $7500 to duplicate my car with a few changes. Those changes get rid of expensive items such as the high-performance engine (listed as $1500 for C&D, because that's what I paid for it), the ECU (listed at $1400 or so) and paint (I paid $385 for the beautiful Lotus Chrome Orange). I've added a cost spreadsheet to my site to show how it all broke down for C&D.

I must admit I've never been called a "crafty ringer" before though.

entry 1254 of 1439
<< | random | >>
back to entry listing