So what's it really worth? - C4 track car
08-07-2010, 04:35 PM
#1
Le Mans Master
Thread Starter
So what's it really worth? - C4 track car
In Sept of 2006, I bought my black 94 Corvette to convert into a track car for autocrossing and some lapping days. I had been to a few lapping days in my C5, and just didn't want to tear up a new Corvette like that. As they tend to do, this C4 project got out of hand and went way further (and deeper into my pockets) than I originally intended. Now I have more kids at home and less time away from work than I did in 2006. Guess which hobby went away. I spent two and a half years building the car. I raced it one time, and it performed perfect. That was March 2009, and I haven't raced it since. I still crank it at least once a month and take it around the blocks in my neighborhood. It fires right up every time and idles perfect.
I now would find a C5 or C6 that I can drive on the street much more useful. I know there is no chance of getting anywhere near even half of my money back on the race car, but I am weighing on if I should sell it complete or part it out. I don't doubt I would get more paring it out, but that is a whole new project itself. Please don't reply asking for parts off of it, as this is not a parts for sale thread.
Anyway, here is the info on the car:
1994 Corvette with LT1 and 6-speed.
Clear title in hand. Never wrecked.
All work was done by me.
Car has right at 100,000 miles on it when I got it. If I remember right, it was 95K, give or take a few miles. Car was stripped down basically to the body shell and frame and built back up from there.
Original LT1 shortblock was replaced with a new Golen 383. Original LT1 heads and intake were shipped off to Lloyd Elliot for an LE2 package (2.00/1.56 valve) port matched intake, and a LE2.2 cam. Although I have never had it on a dyno, 400+ RWHP is very realistic with this combo. I have the cam specs, but Lloyd asked me not to just give them out. Obviously, the buyer of the car or motor will get them.
Engine is loaded with performance parts, 1.6 full roller rockers, 58 mm TB, SVO injectors, Canton road race oil pan, high volume oil pump, etc. The factory wiring harness is gone. Painless harness installed. Custom ECM programming by Geoff at Thunder Racing. New GM Opti, but it is now just a position sensor, and Delteq Northstar coil pack was installed. The opti was not modified though, and can be used as a distributor again if you wanted to remove the coil pack for some reason. Also as a new GM water pump and new OEM motor mounts. Also has a custom A/C bypass pulley. ATI balancer.
ZF6 is all original, nothing wrong with it at all. Fresh GM syncromesh in it. A Fidanze lightweight flywheel was installed (very light), along with a centerforce clutch. New clutch master cylinder installed.
Dana 44 is all original. Fresh synthetic fluid installed. 6 new spicer u-joints installed. No problems here at all.
Every single suspension component was removed, cleaned, and rebuilt or replaced. I purchased a complete VB&P track kit. Every last bushing is new. All new Bilstein shocks. Both springs are new. Front spring has adjustable ride height, same way C5s do. Rear spring is adjustable rate. Rear height is still adjustable by spring bolts. New VB&P front ball joints (all 4). R&D Camber brace. VB&P sway bars, 30mm front & I think the rear is 24. I’ll have to look it up to be sure. New OEM quick turn ’89 Z51 rack and pinion was installed also.
Brakes are all new. Front are new OEM C5 Z06 calipers and OEM C5 Z06 rotors with custom adapter brackets. Rear are new OEM C4 (powdercoated red) modified by me to remove all of the e-brake components. Rear calipers are much simpler now. New GM C4 rear rotors. All stainless hoses. Bias spring in OEM master cylinder. New fluid of course, high dollar stuff, forget the brand. Hawk pads all around.
Exhaust consists of Exotic Muscle 1-3/4 long tubes with full 3” back. X-pipe. Magnaflow rear mufflers to satisfy the officials in our local auto-x group. They don’t allow open exhaust. No cats obviously. No AIR tubes on headers.
Interior consists of two matching Corbeau fiberglass seats (no sliders, fixed back). Dash is custom made by me. The aluminum front and plastic top combined weigh less than 6 pounds. Pro-Comp ultra-lite gauges (speedo / tach / water temp / oil temp / oil press / air-fuel meter). Speedometer doesn’t work as I never got around to figuring out how to hook it up properly. It’s mounted in place and ready to be wired in. All other gauges work properly. All are electronic, not mechanical) There are two painless fuse boxes mounted under the dash too. Master power cut-off switch on dash as well as push button start.
5-point Corbeau harnesses are mounted to a Sparco harness bar.
The steering column is non-collapsible with a quick-release removable wheel. I threw this in one weekend as I needed to be able to move the car that week. I never got around to redoing this area and even ran my only auto-x with it like that. I would recommend replacing it with a collapsible column for safety. That is the only part on the car that I do not think is 100%. It works fine, but unlike the rest of the car, isn’t the best of the best available.
Battery is gel-cell rear mounted. It’s a small but powerful motorcycle battery and is very light for a battery. It has a custom aluminum mount and isn’t going anywhere.
Wheels are OEM GM Speeline C5 Z06 wheels with Kumho Ecsta V710 racing tires. (275/40/17 front and 315/35/18 rear)
Rear tail lights and rear brake lights both work (for night events). Clutch safety switch works. I modified the front bumper to add brake cooling ducts, and oil cooler duct, and a power steering cooling duct. The big cooler you see on the passenger side is for the power steering fluid, as C4s love to boil the PS fluid. The tiny OEM cooler was tossed. The bumper was also modded for ram air. The side fenders were replaced with 95-96 fenders and cut out to function as engine heat extractors.
As you can see, I have a lot of time and money in this car. I am not using it. It is time to cut my losses and move on.
What could I expect to get for it selling it complete and as is?
I now would find a C5 or C6 that I can drive on the street much more useful. I know there is no chance of getting anywhere near even half of my money back on the race car, but I am weighing on if I should sell it complete or part it out. I don't doubt I would get more paring it out, but that is a whole new project itself. Please don't reply asking for parts off of it, as this is not a parts for sale thread.
Anyway, here is the info on the car:
1994 Corvette with LT1 and 6-speed.
Clear title in hand. Never wrecked.
All work was done by me.
Car has right at 100,000 miles on it when I got it. If I remember right, it was 95K, give or take a few miles. Car was stripped down basically to the body shell and frame and built back up from there.
Original LT1 shortblock was replaced with a new Golen 383. Original LT1 heads and intake were shipped off to Lloyd Elliot for an LE2 package (2.00/1.56 valve) port matched intake, and a LE2.2 cam. Although I have never had it on a dyno, 400+ RWHP is very realistic with this combo. I have the cam specs, but Lloyd asked me not to just give them out. Obviously, the buyer of the car or motor will get them.
Engine is loaded with performance parts, 1.6 full roller rockers, 58 mm TB, SVO injectors, Canton road race oil pan, high volume oil pump, etc. The factory wiring harness is gone. Painless harness installed. Custom ECM programming by Geoff at Thunder Racing. New GM Opti, but it is now just a position sensor, and Delteq Northstar coil pack was installed. The opti was not modified though, and can be used as a distributor again if you wanted to remove the coil pack for some reason. Also as a new GM water pump and new OEM motor mounts. Also has a custom A/C bypass pulley. ATI balancer.
ZF6 is all original, nothing wrong with it at all. Fresh GM syncromesh in it. A Fidanze lightweight flywheel was installed (very light), along with a centerforce clutch. New clutch master cylinder installed.
Dana 44 is all original. Fresh synthetic fluid installed. 6 new spicer u-joints installed. No problems here at all.
Every single suspension component was removed, cleaned, and rebuilt or replaced. I purchased a complete VB&P track kit. Every last bushing is new. All new Bilstein shocks. Both springs are new. Front spring has adjustable ride height, same way C5s do. Rear spring is adjustable rate. Rear height is still adjustable by spring bolts. New VB&P front ball joints (all 4). R&D Camber brace. VB&P sway bars, 30mm front & I think the rear is 24. I’ll have to look it up to be sure. New OEM quick turn ’89 Z51 rack and pinion was installed also.
Brakes are all new. Front are new OEM C5 Z06 calipers and OEM C5 Z06 rotors with custom adapter brackets. Rear are new OEM C4 (powdercoated red) modified by me to remove all of the e-brake components. Rear calipers are much simpler now. New GM C4 rear rotors. All stainless hoses. Bias spring in OEM master cylinder. New fluid of course, high dollar stuff, forget the brand. Hawk pads all around.
Exhaust consists of Exotic Muscle 1-3/4 long tubes with full 3” back. X-pipe. Magnaflow rear mufflers to satisfy the officials in our local auto-x group. They don’t allow open exhaust. No cats obviously. No AIR tubes on headers.
Interior consists of two matching Corbeau fiberglass seats (no sliders, fixed back). Dash is custom made by me. The aluminum front and plastic top combined weigh less than 6 pounds. Pro-Comp ultra-lite gauges (speedo / tach / water temp / oil temp / oil press / air-fuel meter). Speedometer doesn’t work as I never got around to figuring out how to hook it up properly. It’s mounted in place and ready to be wired in. All other gauges work properly. All are electronic, not mechanical) There are two painless fuse boxes mounted under the dash too. Master power cut-off switch on dash as well as push button start.
5-point Corbeau harnesses are mounted to a Sparco harness bar.
The steering column is non-collapsible with a quick-release removable wheel. I threw this in one weekend as I needed to be able to move the car that week. I never got around to redoing this area and even ran my only auto-x with it like that. I would recommend replacing it with a collapsible column for safety. That is the only part on the car that I do not think is 100%. It works fine, but unlike the rest of the car, isn’t the best of the best available.
Battery is gel-cell rear mounted. It’s a small but powerful motorcycle battery and is very light for a battery. It has a custom aluminum mount and isn’t going anywhere.
Wheels are OEM GM Speeline C5 Z06 wheels with Kumho Ecsta V710 racing tires. (275/40/17 front and 315/35/18 rear)
Rear tail lights and rear brake lights both work (for night events). Clutch safety switch works. I modified the front bumper to add brake cooling ducts, and oil cooler duct, and a power steering cooling duct. The big cooler you see on the passenger side is for the power steering fluid, as C4s love to boil the PS fluid. The tiny OEM cooler was tossed. The bumper was also modded for ram air. The side fenders were replaced with 95-96 fenders and cut out to function as engine heat extractors.
As you can see, I have a lot of time and money in this car. I am not using it. It is time to cut my losses and move on.
What could I expect to get for it selling it complete and as is?
08-07-2010, 09:58 PM
#7
Racer
Member Since: Jun 2008
Location: Janesville WI
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Well built car! It has a lot of what I intend to do on my project, done already. Goes to show your point on how it is better to buy a built car than build one. On the other hand the build is fun to.
I would say hold on to it until you have time to race again.
If not I think $10k would be fair.
I would say hold on to it until you have time to race again.
If not I think $10k would be fair.
08-08-2010, 09:27 AM
#8
Burning Brakes
Well built car! It has a lot of what I intend to do on my project, done already. Goes to show your point on how it is better to buy a built car than build one. On the other hand the build is fun to.
I would say hold on to it until you have time to race again.
If not I think $10k would be fair.
I would say hold on to it until you have time to race again.
If not I think $10k would be fair.
10-12K with the right buyer. Nice job on the build. That's a cheap way to spank a lot of C5Z's for somebody. 
08-08-2010, 06:32 PM
#9
Le Mans Master
Thread Starter
I would be happy with 12K, even though that's less than half of what I have in the car. I don't see me getting back into racing any time soon. If I do get back into it years from now, I'll do the smart thing and buy a car someone else already built.
As of now, I'm going to list the car for sale (12K) and list the motor for sale (3K). If the motor sells first, I'll be parting the car out. That won't really hurt my feeling to bad to part it out, as it has many parts that I will be able to use on my '72 resto-mod such as the rear end and some of the suspension and brakes.
As of now, I'm going to list the car for sale (12K) and list the motor for sale (3K). If the motor sells first, I'll be parting the car out. That won't really hurt my feeling to bad to part it out, as it has many parts that I will be able to use on my '72 resto-mod such as the rear end and some of the suspension and brakes.
08-08-2010, 09:28 PM
#10
Safety Car
Since I have my '85 track car I feel I can chime in here. I would take $10,000 for mine. That seems to be the magic number right now. You can generally expect to get .50 back on your dollar for a track car or race car. That's on a good day. On a bad day you'll get even less.
btw - Here's my newest column from Vintage Motorsport.
Richard Newton
FaceBook Page
btw - Here's my newest column from Vintage Motorsport.
Richard Newton
FaceBook Page
