Any Z owners besides Jeffie?

[invisibledemon]

me personally, i would never touch a salvage title.

you cant only pay attention to the body, like stated above, the suspension usually takes a good hit as well, and once the suspension is damaged, it will never drive 100% the same.

then, you have to think about the wiring, i have seen so many salvaged cars with completely fucked wiring. a buddy of mine had a 2003-ish s-10 that had a salvage title. his gauge cluster stopped working one day so i popped it out to check the wiring, all the wires, every one of them, were cut and replaced with speaker wire. he broke down at least once or twice a month because of a wire somewhere was loose and hit a ground, blowing fuses and killing the car.

it was a nightmare.

so, you have to pay attention to the paint quality and color. make sure the gaps between the doors/hood/hatch are all even. put that thing on an alignment rack and have them pay close attention to the suspension, the strut mounts, everything to ensure that they are within spec.


walk on eggshells here. and you have to go into the deal with the knowledge that this guy is full of shit. he'll say anything to make you feel better about buying the car. dont listen to him, expect the worst, and take it to more than one body shop.

 

[Jeef]

I would stay away. My buddy got into a bad accident, damage was almost enough to total, but his Jimmy was rebuilt. The thing never drove right after, including his 4wd. It isn't worth it.

 

[Capt. Orygun]

If anybody hear speaks Carfax I could use an interpreter lol

My first thought was "I paid $30 for this?" For all the advertising they do about how awesome it is they don't exactly come with it when you put your money down.

Notes:
3 owners, fleet vehicle sold to dealer, dealer sold to private party whom totaled it, dealer bought it and sold it the current owner.

No frame damage "detected"... I guess a dealer would be obligated to report it. Also it doesn't appear the current owner got screwed into buying it, we have lemon laws in Oregon.

thoughts?

 

[invisibledemon]

the fact that he has only had it for about a month really throws a red flag for me.

 

[Briansol]

Call your inuracnce company first. some places won't even insure a salvage or rebuilt car due to it simply not being as safe as it was new.

carfax is useless. i don't even buy them any more. I ran all my cars that i've wrecked/got hit in and NONE of them to this day show any accident report, and i had a police report on most, and went through insurance on all (ie, the sti vandalize, the m3 rear end).

I wouldn't pay more than $2k for a rebuilt car. period.

 

[jeffie7]

HID's are nice to have
I wouldn't buy a car without an LSD, it's too expensive and too much of a pita to add one afterwards
TCS again is nice to have, especially if you want to autox the car
Cruise control I don't care about, but some people do

My LSD took 1 hour and 2 guys. One for holding it one for bolting it up.

HIDs are nice but not a deal breaker.

TCS? come on man, I dont know a single friend with a Z that runs with it on. It's the first thing to go even more so when tracking a car, in fact most people remove their dash/gauge pod and disconnect the stupid light since it always stays on to remind them its off. It's there for one reason, to keep noobs from wrapping the car around a poll due to spinning it out. Learn to drive and there's no need for traction control, I get sideways in 1st 2nd and sometimes 3rd, I wouldnt want it any other way.

Cruse control is up to each person, I personally never use it on any of our cars. Even when driving 100+ miles trips. I sometimes turn it on then feel weird about it so I turn it back off.

As for the LSDs people upgrade the stock units pretty often and there's a handful of LSD pumpkins laying around ready to go. I believe I paid around $150-200? for a full working unit.

Granted I wouldnt want to install one using jack stands, if you have access to a lift, it's not bad at all. buy a used unit and pay a mech to install it for you and I bet you'd be in the $300-400 range total.

Again get on my350z.com and look up info for each year, also check out the local forums, you can look for cars for sale.

There's a lot of Zs out there, the cars are pretty cheap now. Just keep searching until you find the car you want.

 

[Capt. Orygun]

slept on it, not buying it

The whole idea was to buy it IF it was tip top and just had a bad history.

The fact that this guy is the first owner after the rebuild and is tapping out in a month is a pretty good sign something is amiss. I have enough money to buy one Z, not two, so I have to get this right the first time...

oh well, I wanted black anyways

 

[Cashizslick]

slept on it, not buying it

The whole idea was to buy it IF it was tip top and just had a bad history.

The fact that this guy is the first owner after the rebuild and is tapping out in a month is a pretty good sign something is amiss. I have enough money to buy one Z, not two, so I have to get this right the first time...

oh well, I wanted black anyways

You can still find a black one, with a clean title. Just keep looking around. How do you feel about ebay?

The last time I went car shopping, I couldnt find what I wanted locally. Ebay had it. Granted, I had to fly to Florida and drive up the entire east coast, but I got what I wanted.

Even if you dont want to go to such great lengths to find a black one, Im sure one will turn up eventually in your local area.

 

[Capt. Orygun]

I could if I needed to and I might, I bought my 240 in Texas and drove it to Oregon. I was living in Texas when I bought it but that didn't make the drive home any shorter. Plus I got to cruise the Vegas Strip in an S14 lol

 

[Capt. Orygun]

hot on the trail of a black 06!

 

[Capt. Orygun]

MINE bitches lol

 

[E_SolSi]

congrats

 

[Cashizslick]

See? I told you a salvage title wasnt worth settling for... unless this one also has one

 

[D16Civic]

Details?

 

[Capt. Orygun]

06 touring model, clean title.

power everything, heated leather, navi, bose, dropped 1.7 inches on aftermarket springs, etc

I paid maybe a couple hundred below the fair market value. It needs a camber kit and the life of the shocks long term is in question because of the springs. We negotiated with that understanding and I think we reached an equitable deal. I had my brother, who is an anal retentive Evo owner, test drive and inspect it for me and of course I ran the Carfax, it's on the up and up.

First order of business will be the camber kit, followed by a real set of coilovers by year's end. And nit noid stuff like putting the badges back on and painting the silver plastic piece on the door gloss back.

oh and it has NISMO CAI with the water bypass valve thingy.

 

[92stoccord]

And please ad taking off those queer headlight things.

 

[Capt. Orygun]

nope keeping the eyelids, the more black I can get the car the better. I am either buying black wheels or powder coating those, depending on weight (assuming I can powder coat them)

black on black on black, but I'll spare you the Knightrider leds lol

 

[92stoccord]

 

[95b16coupe]

bring it to golden gardens next weekend bitch.

 

[reckedracing]

my first order would be to re-install the factory springs back in it
if you want to fill in the wheel well get yourself a little bigger sidewall for a more comfy ride lol
scrap the rear coilover and camber kits
sell the CAI, for a stock one plus cash

i'm too old for this game

but nice buy man, glad you didnt get the salvage title one and found one you liked in black