Friday, January 1, 2010

Happy New Year from BeaterBlog, what are your resolutions?

Its a new year. Time to look back at the past year and make half-hearted resolutions about the next 12 months. Perhaps you're actually going to find that bell-housing or weld in those floor pans on your lawn ornament. I resolve not to buy any more project cars.

Not that 6 cars (plus a motorcycle and a team owned LeMons car) is too many. In my defense, only one of them is not currently running and I sold two cars in 2009. Its just that at some point, it becomes too many mouths to feed. When purchased its easy not to think about all the space, time, money, and effort required to transform a $200 craigslist find into a running automobile. Nonetheless, I pledge to put all of my dream garage projects on hold for another 52 weeks. I will not buy donor vehicles to complete my veggie-oil diesel Lincoln Mk VII, 4.5L stroker AMC spirit, or VW powered Maserati Merak no matter how inexpensive or rust free. I don't expect this resolution to be easy to keep given the temptations only a few mouse clicks away but I haven't broken it yet.

Posted by David Houser

1 comments:

  1. My 2010 beater resolutions are as follows:

    1. Spend at least 50% less time on Craigslist. Not knowing future projects exist prevents their purchase. See #5 for backup plan.

    2. Get the Javelin running. It's been off the road and on my books for 12 years now. Long enough.

    3. Get a car hoist. With all of the auctions these days, they are finally within my fiscal grasp. Memories of replacing doing the auto to manual conversion of my Studebaker on my back in a sandy cowlot has forever scarred me.

    4. Get a real truck. This is America, not Sudan. Stop trying to convince myself that a Nissan Hardbody can tow or haul anything.

    5. Get some land for future project storage. Scrap prices are on the way back up and some stuff can't wait to be rescued.

    6. Learn to do bodywork well enough to where I wouldn't want to hire it done.

    7. Fix the rust on the Simca. If I don't, it will cave in by summer.

    8. Restock my tools sets, or more appropriately: Be better about caring for equipment and not losing 10, 12, 14, and 17mm sockets and wrenches.

    9. Move some off-site garage operations such as wiring and interior work to the basement of the house, allowing my to spend at least 45 mins per day on stuff that would otherwise take hours. This time can be be merged with the 45 mins that I currently spend drinking beer and watching Cops.

    10. Focus, focus, focus! The Javelin, Nissan, and Simca projects, Falcon importation, parts washer, waste oil heater, welder, workbench, kegerator, etc. can not all be done at the exact same time. Working diligently on one project per day but alternating projects will ensure that the shop gets cleaner and the cars either get or stay running.

    Good luck to all in the new year! It's going to be a tall order.

    10.
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