I'm in a too small for me 2 bed apartment with a 1 car garage.
They call it a garage, but really it's just a glorifide storage unit. You can fit a vehicle or other stuff. I went with other stuff.

During one of my occasional browsings of facebook marketplace looking for a new to me daily driver, prefrably something in the '80s Chevy square body range, I happened to come across a 1980 K-10 flair side. NICE...

Now, I'm in Wisconsin. Most everything you find around here in the square body Chevy 4x4 flavor is eather a pristine, restored type thing for way too much money, or a rotted out pile of junk, also for way too much money. As in $10k plus for a rotted out pile of junk.

So anyway, here's this K-10 listed for $8995. Hmmm.... actually looks in pretty good shape overall. Definately not perfict, but no where near as bad as most I find.

The price was a bit higher than I was really wanting to spend, but after a few days of back and forth I said heck with it. Called my sis for a ride and drove the 1.5 hours to take a better look at it.

I know pictures lie so I was expecting it to be not quite as nice as it looked in the pictures. And I was actually mildly surprised when we got there as it actually was not in that bad of shape compaired to most everything else I find.

Here's where the fun kicks in.

I was going there with the thoughts of a nice new daily driver. I assumed I would need to do some tweaking here and there, but nothing that would keep me from driving it home.


Yeah no sadly.

Crawled underneith and was met with a lot of leaking oil from the engine and trans and transfer case. To the point where I couldn't even tell where most of it was even comming from. It was just plain wet, and caked with gunk from the front of the enging all the way to the back of the trasfer case. That right there was a no go for even driving it home, much less daily.

Then on to the body....
It was actually not too bad overall, but what was bad was stuff that would definately need to be fixed before daily driving. Things like the drivers window not opening and passenger window barely opening half way. Holes drilled straight through the cab for running wires... with no grommets.... so bad wiring. Pin holes in the roof from what looked like a dent pulling type of thing, with said holes straight through to the inside, I could see daylight. Passenger side rocker was wood... yes wood... no idea how they did that.

Along with several other things along those lines as well.... so yeah it needed some work, which I figured it would, just not that much straight out.

I passed on it, sadly.

The part about me being happy about not having a proper garage...
Even tho I was looking for a new daily driver and didn't really want to spend that much to start with, had I had a proper garage, I would have actually bought it on the spot. It needed work, but no where near as much as most anything else I find.

Maybe a couple months of "basic" repairs, mainly dealing with the oil leaks, and it would have been a really good base for future restoration. Not that I need a project, or can really afford one eather for that matter, and I still would have had to find a new daily driver on top of it.

So yeah, the rare occasion I'm happy... sort of... that I don't have a proper garage right now lol

My experience - with tractors and motorcycles - is that it's a "pay now, or pay later" proposition.

You tell yourself you're "saving money" by doing the work yourself but if you keep good track of all your expenses, that's rarely true.

Unless you really like doing the work yourself and have the time, I find you're much better off to pay the extra money and let someone else eat the time and hassle. Plus, at least in my experience, it's rare indeed to sell something for what you've actually got invested in it.

Listing a "restored" tractor for $10,000 and actually getting it are two vastly different things.

Having lived in Wisconsin for nearly 20 years, I am familiar with the types of project vehicles you're describing. I avoid the temptation. My last few used cars have come from far out of state. I will go the extra mile, literally, to buy a car in LA or the south and drive it home, which I have done on my last three used car purchases.

About all I can say, JR, is if a square-body Chevy truck is what you’re looking for, then you need to expand your search outside of the Rust Belt.

quote:

Originally posted by PHPaul:
My experience - with tractors and motorcycles - is that it's a "pay now, or pay later" proposition.

You tell yourself you're "saving money" by doing the work yourself but if you keep good track of all your expenses, that's rarely true.

Unless you really like doing the work yourself and have the time, I find you're much better off to pay the extra money and let someone else eat the time and hassle. Plus, at least in my experience, it's rare indeed to sell something for what you've actually got invested in it.

I found the same was true of airplanes. You end up in a similar place, with a similar amount of money tied up in it, you just get to work on it for the first six months instead of flying it. No thanks. Been there, done that, bought the t shirt. Not going back.

I grew up with mostly junk. We farmed with junk. When I got my license I drove junk. Everything had to be worked on before you could use it.
Did I learn a lot? Yes. I was now deep in farm equipment, diesel engines, transmissions, etc. before I was licensed to drive. I am also grateful for that education.
However, I buy mostly new stuff now. I do have an old 2003 Buick that I drive to work.
But stuff to play with (motorcycles) or work with (tractors) I’m buying new.
Tinkering on them lost its charm a long time ago.

A 45 year old anything is rarely ever good for a daily driver. That’s more for when you have a solid daily driver and you enjoy working on old stuff as a hobby. They typically require more hours of constant repair than you get in hours of driving.