aklim

Surely you can. Liking and falling in love are 2 different things. I like the car for $X. Beyond that, I'll pass if it isn't worth it. I'm not in love with it and have to have it at any price.

hcbph

NS_Carguy

Good attitude and plan. Best thing I can suggest is educate yourself on the cars, get your $$ together and be ready to jump if the right one comes up. In addition to fall and storing a toy, watch for divorce selling, one coming out of storage that might be 'just right'. Some don't want to deal with any issues and either don't know how to fix it themselves or have the money to take it somewhere. If it's something you can handle it may be worth a look. Another place is car auctions, some dealers will sell off vehicles they took in trade that don't "match" their image (like a 30 yr old Vette at a dealer that sells Ferrari's, lambo's etc - that was mine). It showed up in a car auction over a thousand miles away and I had less than a day to decide. I've had good luck with dealer car auctions, bought 3 vehicles that way so far.

I'm sure you'll find your 'right' Vette when you least expect it. Good luck.

midlifecrisis1979

I just saying that there will always be negatives to any purchase. I sometimes regretted the purchase of my 87. She had problems with vats, u joints, leaky top, slow windows, sticky locks, leaky ac, injectors, alternator, master cylinder, headlight motors, relays, and she had been wreck on the front buy the guy I bought her from. The wreck never affected her cause there was no frame damage and she was fitted with a new nose and hood, and this was either before car fax and records or they did it off the record cause it doesn't show up, was just aggravating cause I to keep the car polished so you could notice a difference in the paint. I sometimes thought I would have been better off if I had bought a different one but now I wouldn't have it any other way. I saw the guy I got it from a few years back, he was amazed that I still have my vette, he wondered if I would sell it back to him, I smiled and said no way.

BrandensBeast

This

73n95

To your initial question, what are killers of an 80's C4; If the body/paint is bad you will have to spend mega bucks on a paint job. You can do a quickie Maaco job that will last a couple years and that may be OK. You can do a Plastidip or such for a couple of hundred if you can live with it but it you really want a nice car paint jobs are expensive. Trannies and engines are not that bad but you won't find a transmission for a hundred bucks. Overall condition is very important. If its been neglected, repaired with duct tape and coat hangers run!!! Neglicence will be a killer if you want to keep it. In so many ways let your first impression be your guide. If its sitting on flat tires, covered in bird dung, the hinges creak and the hood won't close clean; move on. I can't believe how many nice 80's C4's are out there is exceptional shape. Be patient and let us know what you find.

VikingTrad3r

OP, your goal of a cheap c4 that is daily driveable while fixing/restoring is totally possible.

im on my third "cheap vette".

my rules are:

1. nothing wrong with bottom end apparent when i inspect it
2. nothing wrong with trans when i inspect it (knowing it could happen at anytime)
3. no paint issues that a can of duplicolor perfect match + clear cant fix.

u can buy a 1k car and turn it into a 5k car with about 1.5k of used parts and your own time.

87 z52 black, 105k miles, paid 3k, daily drive it, looks awesome, had to do heatercore, rear passenger ujoints, dizz cap.

85 z51 red, 40k miles, paid 4k, daily drove, replaced almost every seal and did head gaskets. had to put a wrecking yard trans in, which cost me 225$, worked great. sold for 8k.

86 base w/sport seats, black, 136k mikes, manual gearbox, paid $600, just bought $400 worth of wrecking yard parts, refinishing interior, daily driveable but its winter here.


OP, are u in canada?

aklim

I don't know about that. $1000 is a "push, pull or drag" item. Most likely drag. If you take a perfectly good car like mine, remove the trans, engine and rear end and I figure on replacing the carpets and the seat materials, I'd give more than that. No way you are sticking a decent trans, rear end and motor in my car for $1500.

FAUEE

You might be able to find a Crossfire someone is throwing away for that.

But agree, unless there's just a plethora of wrecked L98s around where you live, and you have the time, skills, tools, and space to pull engines and transmissions and do the swaps yourself, you're not going to make that happen for $2500 between car and parts.

He even said all of his cars were $3k or more. And one of them needed a head gasket and a transmission which if you couldn't do it on your own would cost you probably $4k minimum.

aklim

Or you simply hitched it to the back of your truck and drove away like you stole it, which you did.

Engines are one thing but can you simply swap transmissions? IIRC, the tailhousing and hence the output shaft is different so you are rebuilding, at that point if you are changing the output shaft.

At a very minimum if the TC is not full of debris from the toasted trans and it is a simple clutch pack rebuild.

VikingTrad3r

i paid $650 for my 86. drove it home. interior was really gross but not that bad. engine runs great but valve covers leaking oil. the scissor strut was faulty, it reversed and shoved itself into the headlight.

there are multiple examples of people who have come across these awesome deals on the forum. its a matter of waiting for the right opportunity and seizing it.

yeah they are not out there every day but ....we already know that.



The c4's are in a very unique phase. Many are worth10-12k, these are low mileage and in showroom condition.

Then they range all the way down to mine, $650, where it runs fine, needs all fluids changed, a serious cleaning in and out, and has cig but burns in the cup holder lol.


OP here is my thread on rebuilding/restoring my interior for this $650 vette. Just to give you an idea of what u might expect.
https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums/c4-tech-performance/3935134-rebuilding-repairing-1986-doors-2.html

even shows the bucket of prts i bought and the invoice for it.


I would have paid up to $2500 for it. I actually went to look at it with $3500 in my pocket.

If a person wants a cheap fun car that you can tinker and repair while you drive it, tough to beat the c4.

midlifecrisis1979

so what's the general consensus of the deal breaker? Is the most expensive part of a c4 the paint job?

VikingTrad3r

you are right here. the cheapest c4 ive seen around me was a crossfire that a guy bought as a parts car. he paid $1400 for it. he said it. arely made it onto his trailer.

im not saying the $650 deal is an everyday occurrance.

but the OP stated he was in that 3-5k range and there LOADS of good quality c4's that are driveable while you are restoring them.

you dddoooooo need the space. kinda goes without saying though.

if you want to pay somebody to fix your c4 it will end up costing more than buying a low mileage showroom car first off.

aklim

​​​​​​
Bent frame and/or fiberglass cracks all over for me

VikingTrad3r

i hadnt even considered that sort of damage but yeah lol. parts car.

after ^^^those, for me, its paint/bodywork. so tedious. headgasket is easy, just turning a wrench. as posted though, gotta have comfortable and safe place to do thework.

FAUEE

Frame damage, salvage title, flood damage are deal breakers for me.

Beyond that, a severely destroyed engine or transmission, where a full rebuild is necessary is a deal breaker for me, it's just not worth the hassle even though I can do most anything on the car.

You certainly can make the paint job the most expensive part if you wanted to, but the reality is that you can get an "ok" paint job for not that much money. People (and paint shops) get caught up in "it's a Corvette, it's a show car, it's special" stuff and want to do over the top extravagant paint jobs. A basic paint job on a C4 shouldn't be appreciably more than on any other car. And frankly, with the rise of effective DIY paintjobs going on right now like plastidip, you can get a really decent driver quality paintjob for under a grand. Or, wrap it, and then it will last for several years and again, under a grand. WAY under if you DIY.

What your deal breakers should be depends on your skill set and level. Some guys look at a car with a blown engine and see it as a perfect chance to swap in a 5.3 out of a work van. Others see it as a car not worth the time. By that same token, the guy who will swap an engine might look at a car with neglected paint and pass, where another guy can paint it in his garage.

If you have no skills, your deal breaker should be anything you're not comfortable paying to have fixed at $100 an hour + parts or whatever shop rates are nowdays.

QCVette

A lot of talk about cheap C4's, but how about a different approach to cheap?

To me cheap doesn't just mean initial purchase price. I was looking for the total cost of ownership.

I bought two C4's to be cheap but yet fun cars for my daily drivers. ('88 A4 and a '94 6M) I was looking for a daily driver that I was going to keep for a couple years. My goal was to find something that was not the cheapest purchase price, but still a low price for the car. On both cars I found what I thought were good deals that were maybe $1k or $2k below what most comparable cars were going for so when I sell it there wouldn't be a great depreciation.

Both were pretty nice cars that drove well and looked pretty good, but they needed some things. For example, the antennas didn't work, I could see that there had been some bodywork done, the interiors were aging and the seats were hard and had some wear, both needed mufflers, etc.

On both cars I did not try to restore them to show condition and I lived with a few things, but I drove them each for about 2.5 years and 45k miles. Other than normal maintenance, I only spent a few hundred on repairs/upgrades. That was hard for me since I like to fix up cars, but my goal on these was to keep the costs down and daily drive them without restoring them.

When I sold them I nearly got my purchase price back. (about $200 less on the '88 and $300 less on the '94) So for me these were about the two cheapest cars I have ever had. They cost me almost nothing for the 5 years and 90k miles I had them. (and they made my 100 mile per day commute a lot more fun)

Just a different way of looking at low cost Corvettes.

Good luck.

midlifecrisis1979

that plastidip looks pretty cool I just wonder how it holds up over time, some of the things I am reading says it can be hard to get off but if it will last for a while that can be a really cool option for changing colors every once in a while. I see the main website for the product, then I see some rattle cans but wonder if there are any other suppliers that are out there that guys have used on here? either way it wouldn't hurt my c4 cause the paint is long gone on it. I been to the paint shop that dose some of the bodywork and paint for buyavette in Atlanta, my father in law is friends with some of those guys. they usually got like 3-5 midyears in the shop at a time in bodywork and paint. that's kinda mind boggling that the got like a million dollars worth of cars going at all times. I fantasized about having those guys spray my c4 until he told me that a good job would be around 5-7k. I am sure their work is worth every penny because vettes is mostly what they do and they gotta be experts on it at this point, but there's a lotta difference in spending 7k on a 150,000 dollar c2 and spending 7k on a 1500 dollar c4

VikingTrad3r

i concurr with qc vette. *if* a person finds a smokeshow of a deal great. but that is rare, and thats OK because there are copius amounts of quality boned c4's that offer you an ultra low or even zero cost of ownership *if* you carry out work yourself and if you buy one that is structurally sound and doesnt need paint work.

works out great for a guy/gal who thinks of wrenching as yoga.

NS_Carguy

Thanks that is usefull info .
I am in Nova Scotia . if you are in the US I would be slightly north and east of maine . Rust central

corvetteBlack

As a relatively new C4 owner I'd say budget at least 2-3k extra to bring your car to excellent or at least very reliable daily driver status. You'll need that extra 2-3k to deal with general maintenance as well as other common or rare problems that you may encounter.

Personally I'd say the sweet spot for the C4 is the 89 6 speed manual transmission, before the Optisparks where introduced, but then again I might be biased because mine's an 89' C4 and I prefer that body style and below to the 91's and above. I'm not a fan of overdrive transmissions or automatics.

If you're buying a daily driver which needs minimum investment I'd say expect to buy one for at least 7k unless you get lucky.

Deal breakers are:
*Clunky gear shifting, gears won't engage or they grind a lot. (To an extent all high mileage old cars will have a degree of clunky shifting on manual transmissions so it's difficult to determine what to count as clunky shifting but replacing a transmission is a messed up job because you can only get refurbs or swap your old transmission in most cases, it's hard to find a completely new transmission sometimes and you're looking at around 3k for the parts only)
*Seat adjusters that are not operational
*Flickering dashboard display, there are companies that fix and refurb dashbord displays so this might not be a big deal.
*Bad weather stripping, if you have a lot of rain where you live.
*Worn interior (Very expensive to fix, fixing worn interior is basically a restoration job nomatter how you look at it, you don't want a worn and tatty Vette)
*Body work (fixing fibre glass body work is very difficult and a niche job, it's expensive)
*Worn or old tires, depending on the tire size, a full set of 4 can cost you $1600 for the really reliable and good brands, or around $1000 for the mid range but also reliable brands.
*Dodgey seat belts
*A car that fails smog
*Anything that can leave you stranded or put your safety at risk.

Anything else would be a relatively cheap fix, e.g. replacing alternator, battery, fluids, hoses, fuel and brake lines, brake discs and pads, maybe some seals/gaskets etc (listen to the engine for clues). My rule of thumb is to replace ALL these smaller things whenever I buy a new car, because they are the ones that usually cause problems and if you take care of the little things then the bigger things won't happen.

Things to look out for that might not be deal breakers:
*Leaks in the engine bay.
*Leaks under the car.
*Work shocks (if you have FX3 option and are looking for a set of new Bilsteins then you're gonna have to spend a few hundred to over a thousand. It's usually only the front shocks that are worn though. If your car already came with Bilsteins you could buy a cheap but known and reliable set of shocks and then send the Bilsteins for regas and refurb and then re-fit the Bilsteins) This will leave you with two sets of shocks but only do this if you're in it for the long run.

The leaks might turn out to be small fixes but they might also cost a lot to fix. Find a local Corvette mechanic who works on a lot of the older Corvettes, visit them to discuss C4's, they will probably know someone who is selling or they might even sell C4's as a side hussle.