I'm sure plenty of people on here have found themselves starting a project build with all good intentions only to regret it several months/years/thousands of pounds later with nothing but a half built car gathering cobwebs or rusting away under a tarp on their driveway. I was just wondering if anybody on here has ever handed over their project build to a garage for completion and if so where/who did you entrust to do the work, how far off completion was the car when it was handed over, what work needed to be done and how much did it cost etc etc. In the last few months I've managed to finish rebuilding my new engine and gearbox and re-install it in the car. However time is short and I can only commit a few hours a day to plumbing it all back in and getting it up an running (something it hasn't done since 2012 after encountering an issue with its original engine). I'd really like to get it up an running this Summer. Appreciating fully that all builds are different and it's very much a case of 'How long is a piece of string' but I'm just trying to work out how others went about finding a reliable garage to do the work and if it was done on an hourly rate or whether an approximate monetary figure/approximate timescale was agreed before work commenced.
Just chip away at it a little at a time mate. Don't rush it to make this summer as there's always next. I was 200 miles away from my car for 2 years having to make extra trips back to work on it. Sending it to a garage now might not get it completed by the summer anyways. Due to the fact that if they are a reputable company you'll probably be in a very long queue.
Last year I bought a stage 2+ kit for my Fiesta and the seller recommended his friends garage to do the work. Cams, full intake, full exhaust, reflash and maintenance. All was done withing days and for a very fair, under the table hourly rate. Would I let them do it again? Nope. I enjoy doing it myself now. Sure sometimes I can't make the time to finish something but I am commited to doing it myself or not at all. Keep in mind that everything is easier once the car is running and driving. All the modifications are one piece out, fiddling, new piece in later on.
I've been chipping away at it off and on for several years now but I've slowly lost interest in the feckin' thing if I'm completely honest. After all the time, effort and money that's gone into it I just want to be able to jump in and rag the shit out of the bloody heap now.
Its a real dilemma, but I agree with both arguments. I have been building my Soarer V8 thunder saloon for 4 years and I am tired and have no time. However finding good garages is hard. With time however I have built up a core of three including a mobile welder / fabricator. One other is a well known engine builder on D/W who I still haven't used and the other is an expensive local race team who work on everything from tin top fiestas to historic F1 . The latter are expensive but great at problem solving for instance when we wanted to use wisefab rear suspension and realised a soarer is TOTALLY different from a Supra ! I collected a shiney new subfame with 6 pots , LSD and wisefab but the bill was nearly £8k...yes £8k ( inc parts ). You have to balance that against your own time and value I guess. What it has done for me is got me over that mid build blip where I was tempted to rush and use bolt on parts , where really what I have now is a proper job, that I would have rushed. Jerrfies makes a good point in that sometimes place swill be so busy that it may take as long. Also as I found , in motorsport, you can get bumped for regular customers ! Stick at it
I have some input here and will start off by saying that you need to choose carefully. I have heard so many horror story's over the years of projects far exceeding a sustainable budget or never reaching the required standard or 100% completion as the garage struggles with the engineering aspect that these cars require. When building custom cars you should be looking for good engineers and not mechanics. Assess their ability to do the elements that you wish to farm out, talk to current or former customers or look at previous examples of work carried out. Do avoid using the typical "we can do everything" these places are rare to find. The old saying applies here "jack of all trades - bla bla bla". The very best Garages specialise in a particular area and sub contact the bits they are not so good out to trusted partners if they are project managing, save yourself some bucks and do this yourself. You also need to avoid the general high street garages as these are usually just good for bolting stuff on, most mechanically minded people can do this for free...Unless this is the service your looking for? Agree on an hourly rate to start with, based on the whole project time scale, tight deadlines attract larger quotes. Dem da rules. Agree on deliverables and milestones so that you can monitor progress, this does not mean that you have to go and inspect every otherday. Just lay down your criteria, have a budget and be clear of your expectations. We would love to help but we are booked up until after Mid-September. Its obvious stuff I have written but I could not glide past this thread without gobbin off...
One of the big issues is someone taking their half finished project to a garage only for them to find out it's horrendously bodged together. So on top of them installing the final parts they then have to go round and fix all the obviously dangerous or poorly done stuff.
This is so recognizable. For the first time in my life I'm building an sr86 including swapping in sr20, welded cage, modifying interior to fit, paint engine bay, paint cage, complete new wiring loom etc all in my own garage at home. Only things I outsourced are bending and welding the cage and building the engine with fresh parts. The above is going on for more than 4 years now as in the meantime a lot has happened for example my father in law passed away and I myself became a father. On top of this work is also busy so I have/had limited time to work on the car. And sometimes I just didn't have the motivation to work on the car when I had some spare time. I have a couple of good mates but none of them are really into cars so that didn't help either. At the moment I'm at 85% so finally getting there but the last part is the hardest. As it always is...There were a lot of times especially the last couple of months were I thought about selling the car or getting it to a shop to get everything sorted but after I slept on it a night I realized I got this far and I want to finish it myself. If I would sell it or have someone else finish it I would regret it. Anyway what I'm trying to say is that you're building the car for yourself. Why not give yourself a bit more time and finish the work you've done so far so are sure it will be as you want it?
