People who have heavily worked cars, has all the money, time and effort been worth it? Are you happy with what you can do to a datsun, or have you accepted the inherent design issues and left things alone?

Can a 25+ year old car with 300,000 miles be better than a new car.

I feel like I've gotten to a point where I think i have something better for me than a new car. If it had a good cage it'd be safe as a new car ( with out all the mess of airbags. )

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I dont know about better, but it can be faster.

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That's the general inention.

Old cars are much lighter, and we can work on them without a scantool and thousands of dollars of software.

Better than a new car....defintely not as comfortable or convenient, but more fun to drive and more exiciting - old car winds generally.

To be short, No it has not be worth it.

Value is proportional to the lifespan of the car. My 1200 should last another 50 years. If petrol lasts that long.

Value is defined by sum positive output of the investment. Cars will continue to produce good experiences if they are maintained and not crashed or abused.

I'm very happy with the value of the experience I've had with my Dattos.

Chris

hell yes just think wen u look at it u no u have made it and that no one else has the same and makes u so happy wen u drive em

I dont like having to fork out $$$ for anything...however if your going to do it on a race car...Id much rather spend alot less on a Datsun and for it to go as fast and be as safe as a larger car say a commodore (similar to a Chev family car) and spend triple the price. Thats the way it works....
so 20k for a fast datsun translates to maybe 60-80k on an as- fast commodore.

I see that all replies are about performance.
What about show and shine quality.

If you go and look at my website you will see I have spend alot of money on my Datsun but not for speed but rather cleanliness and show and shine quality.
I am VERY happy so far.

I have printed on a color printer a good quality A3 size picture of my Datsun that I took when I had it parked on the dyno.
Visitors and people in our office are starting to annoy me because all of them want to know about the datsun on the wall.

Not even to mention about when we drive with the Datto over weekends.
When it is nice and clean and polished up (like it is currently) it turns heads.
I also got strangers when parking the car at the mall or shops come and ask about the car.
Even when I took the car just for the exhaust a complete stranger came to me and shook my hand congratulating me on a job well done with the car.

It was definately worthit all the money I have spend.
Just spend on the right stuff.

If you consider your car a hobby and enjoy working on it then the money will always be worth it.

You learn something, you get pleasure from results and in the end it is still worth something!

I like to compare my car habit to my girlfriends clothes habit. We both have about the same amount of disposable income to play with, I choose to spend it on cars, she chooses to spend it on clothes. Once bought, clothes are worth nothing where as you still get some sort of return on your car. From this point of view it's not a bad hobby.

I build my cars for my own pleasure
I don't build them for resale as none are or will be for sale
So every cent I spend on them is for the love of it and I wouldn't have it any other way
They are all dear to me and worth the investment in both time and money