Finally getting some warmer weather on Jersey Shore

Hi Guys. It was 65 degrees yesterday at the Jersey Shore & I was finally able to take a nice thrilling ride in my Spyder due to the warmer weather. It's about time we get some warmer weather on the east coast, isn't it?

Here are some pictures taken yesterday at my house from my LG camera phone:

Yeah, it was a fine weekend here as well so I went for a drive...Let's see...The valve covers leaked onto the headers, both rear axle stubs leaked into the brake drums, the shifter on my Craftsman lawn tractor works better than this piece of crap Jamar shifter, and the ride and handling characteristics of the car are noting short of diabolical.

If this is the typical "spyder experience" then I'll probably have this piece of crap on e-Bay come late spring...I don't need this kind of heartache.

I'm sorry to hear that about your almost new 2003 Beck, Terry. Had you've purchased a Vintage instead, you probably wouldn't have all these problems. My car started up 1st shot yesterday and all in all drove & performed just great.

What??? Watch your lingo, pal. I just said I was sorry to hear that you had a not so good experience with your Spyder this weekend. Maybe it was the fact that you hadn't used your Spyder in quite a while and just underwent a few "beginning of the season" problems.

Exactly the kind of low brow gloating I have come to expect from you --Censored--.

Terry

John, the fact that you have not had these problems probably means the previous owner did. Most of these cars need one if not more things tweaked.

Mike

John,
Just curious as to how many and of what manufacturer of Spyder you owned prior to getting your Vintage Spyder? Just curious as to what you base your various comparisons and opinions of the superiority of the Vintage Spyder over various other Spyders on.
Thanks,
Jim

Joe - Jake has the car now, but you know, I was actually relieved to see the thing on the rollback and going out of my sight...My first thought was, "Too bad it isn't going to a new owner."

I'm trying to keep an open mind but right now that's very difficult to do...More than anything, I feel like I'm getting the car right before I sell it, so that the next guy doesn't have to go through this crap. I suppose I had too high a set of expectations for what was supposed to be a new, turnkey car.

I wish I had found this forum before I bought the car...Not long after I made the purchase, I began to read all the crap the guys here go through just to drive the things and wondered where the fun is...I'm a fair mechanic, but I don't enjoy it and owning a car that requires carrying a toolkit, cell phone, and the phone number of the local wrecker service every time I drive it isn't particularly attractive either.

If I had known then what I've learned from this forum, I would have quickly deleted all Spyder related bookmarks from my favorites list and gone out in the back yard and burned $50 bills...The experience would have been the same and I could stop any time I wanted.

Sorry, to piss off at you...You, Bruce, Mike and others have been very supportive and helpful...Right now I'm just disgusted.

Jim, the Vintage Spyder I have is the first Spyder I own. Frankly I like both Vintage & Beck Spyders and do not Superior the Vintage over any other make except for a few opinions I have heard from both Classic Showcase & RM Auto Auctions favoring the Vintage because of its safer tubular chassis and their rarety over the many more produced Beck Spyders. But both Vintage & Beck share many other components such as engines, shift boxes, ect,ect.. Another comment from Classic Showcase was that Vintage pays more attention to detail & fit n finish when building their Spyders and spends more time in trying to make every car perfect; their main reason for purchasing/ordering from Vintage Spyders and then re-selling them for a large profit.

This helped in leading me to purchase a Vintage but honestly I believe that both Vintage and Beck Spyders are awesome motorcars. They look and are built very similar. They are a great hobby, fun to drive, and most people think they're real restored vintage Porsches!

Just curious John, if you don't mind me asking, what did you pay for your car and how many miles does it have?

I doubt that the so called "rarity" of the Vintage you refer to John is a desire of the owner of Vintage. I bet they would like to be putting a few more out than the current production rate. Give it time and they will have as many out as Beck does now. Beck has been doing it for some time and he has found a formula which seems to work for putting them out. Back when I bought mine he wasn't producing that many per year either.

Terry, I know exactly how you feel - I have put mine under a cover for years (literaly) because I got tired of f-ing with it. After going back through all systems again last year and reworking them I think I am now starting to have fun driving it. The only reason I am still with it is that I have relatively little invested (remember, I bought a complete kit in 1989 for $6145), so I figure it can sit. I think we buy these things with high expectations and emotion. When reality sets in - the mechanical requirements and/or the delay in delivery - all work to put a damper on the positives.

Something else has already caught my eye though and it could go in the back corner again.

On a different topic, how are Audi sales doing and what, if any, exciting things have they got coming out?

Regards,
Mike

Terry, I know how you feel. I plunked down a good buck for my used Beck only to take most of it appart for repair. I too was ready to sell it this spring. But with the help of the guys at my shop where I work and a few late nights going over the car I decided to keep it. I have driven it four times this year when the temperature was not below freezing. Looks like most of the problems are fixed.

This was a vehicle I thought would be great fun. But the first few drives were disappointing...bad suspension...sticking throttle...poor gear engagement and my cloths smelling like exhaust fumes everytime after my drive.

Once you get it all sorted out you will enjoy it. I would hang in there. Everytime I finish building a car there are always a few gremlins that pop up.

I would agree with John on the resale. I have been offer 10g's over my last year buy price. It is incredible how much a crooked piece of fiberglass is worth when it is presented in a desirable shape. (they are just glorified mid-engine dune buggies, right?)

Hey John: Wasn't the weather awesome this weekend? I drove my car everywhere. Its the first time this year I could drive it without wearing a wool hat. My scalp felt a little tingly from all that sun exposure. It's raining here in Toronto today. Hopefuly it will melt the rest of the snow and wash the salt off the roads.

SpyderMike, my Vintage Spyder was built in 2002 by Vintage Spyders, Inc. and sold to Classic Showcase. Classic Showcase then auctioned the car out through RM Auto auctions at the Amelia Island Classic Auto Show down in Florida last March of 2003. A classic car collector up in Rochester, NY won the auction and paid $37,500 for it. At the time he didn't realize he had paid too much for it. In early December of 2003, he put the car on ebay and he didn't recieve any bids that were close to what he had paid and based on a few other similar Spyders that were selling on ebay, he realized that he had paid too much. He re-listed the car with a reserve price of $28,500. My highest bid on the car was $25,000 and I was outbid by some others. A few weeks later, he e-mailed for 2nd chance offers due to the fact that the winner didn't go through with the sale. I ended up taking a trip to Rochester, NY to see the car and fell in love with it as soon as I saw it. The seller was very nice and was willing to sell the car before the end of the year for tax purposes. I offered him $25,000 immediately and he wanted a few grand more but said he would think about it. A few days later, he called me and stated that if I paid him before the end of the year, the car was mine for $25,000. I agreed and I bought the car for $25,000.

SpyderMike, my Spyder had 355 miles when I bought it a few months ago and now it has 368. The Spyder is virtually brand new, and I believe I got lucky in the fact that the seller wanted to sell the car before the end of the year for his own reasons and gave me a break, and I did not have to wait a long time to order one.

PS: Audi sales have been a bit slow for the past few months but have finally started to pick up since I got back from California. We should have a pretty busy March, hopefully.
The new A8L is doing very well despite its $75,000 price tag.
The A4 Cabriolets are also very hot.
An all new re-designed A6 will be arriving this coming fall.

Cheers,
JF

Thanks John for the reply. That's what I mean about ebay - some people are paying too much (re: $37k). It is interesting that your car has been transported more than it has been driven! That is one way to keep it in pristine condition! I bet you can''t wait until summer.

tell me you put more than 13 miles on it in CA!

Heiko said it when he likened these things to dune buggies. Albeit they are nicer to stare at!

Mike

John, adjust your clutch

Hey Mike, I made a small typing mistake regarding mileage: When the car was transported to me in late Dec, it had 305 miles on it(not 355). I put about 40- 50 miles on it out in California. When I came back from So California, it had about 355 miles. This past Sunday I put on another 13 miles. I love the car, its great. The only difficult part is shifting into 1st gear sometimes. It seems that I have to stop completely before I can shift into 1st and its difficult to start out in second when making a slow turn unless you continually keep foot on accelerator. Once the car gets going though, its very precise in shifts, very fast, and it sounds awesome.

John--turn the wing thingey on the end of the clutch cable a turn or two (tighten it) and it will fix your problem, I think. It did mine. v

Unfortunately, I don't think John has a "wing thingy", Vicki. He has a Vintage which has a hydraulic clutch arrangement. Make sure the adj. nut on the slave cyl. is properly adjusted. On mine it is a nylock.

John, look at you transmission, on the right side you'll find a hydraulic slave, probably chrome or blue. It's horizontal and attaches to the trans. at the rear and the clutch fork arm towards the bell housing. Grab the fork and pull it towards the rear of the car, it pivots and has a large return spring. Adjust via the 1/2 across the flats nut until you have about 1/8 to a 1/4 inch of freeplay.

I believe I outlined this procedure under Vicki's "Hard to Shift" topic in this forum

Terry

Joe - Things are looking up. After Jake took a test drive, he stated that my car was "not right." So, I contacted the builder of the car and to his credit, he contacted Jake and they've worked out a deal so that I am out of the cost loop (For now at least). I'm keeping an open mind (Harder to do the older I get) and will see how it all plays out. Thanks for the kind words.

Terry, Jake KNOWS what he is doing, you are in excellent hands.

reminds me of a David Soul hit -

don't give up on me baby...

DanP--oops! I should stay out of the technical discussions. It just seemed so magical--turn a piece under the car and it gets fixed. v

Vicki, stay, you're fun!!!!

Don't apologize, Vicki, you have a Beck which has a cable, you were merely relating your experiences. John's car is different, so now we all know what to do with whatever car we have. Isn't that why we're all here?

Thanks Larry--I am also mildly masochistic (see thread pertaining to leaky cars). v

Actually Vicki, now that I think about it, being mildly masochistic may be a personality requirement for owning one of these cars. Being delusional may also help.

Thanks guys for the advice. When I'm down at the shore this weekend, I will try to put your suggestions to work, although I'm not a technical person and know nothing about tuning up clutches & transmissions. If I still experience the same issues and cannot figure it out myself, I'll wait till the warmer weather and drive my Spyder up the Garden State Parkway from South Jersey to Paul Miller Porsche/Audi(in North Jersey,where I work) and have our techs take a look at it.

or have it transported 8>)

What do you mean, Mike???

John, I was relating to my other post where yI discuss that your car has been on the transporter more than on the road (Vintage -> Amelia Island -> New Jersey -> California -> New Jersey)...you can trasport it to the mechanic and keep the wheels clean!

All in jest John, all in jest!

Regards,
Mike

Oh..you missed one, actually it was: Vintage(Cal)->Amelia Island, FL->Rochester, NY->Harvey Cedars, NJ->Culver City, CA->Harvey Cedars, NJ.

are you sure the odomoeter was connected the whole time?!

It better have been connected, Mike.

Don't forget to watch the season premier of "The Sopranos" on Sunday on HBO. They filmed alot last summer all over North Jersey and a little down at the Jersey Shore in Mantoloking. My cousin owns an Italian restaurant/deli "Italianissimo" in West Caldwell and you will see it on an upcoming episode.

I'm bummed - I am going to my vacation home in Oregon - no TV. I will try to tape it.

Mike

Terry's car definately has some issues with the suspension. I have driven it a few miles and can say its the worst handling car I have ever driven!

I feel confident that a ride height change and an alignment will do it a million wonders. The car sits way too low at the present. I have never seen a 550 that was this low, the suspension is non existant..

Once I get the suspension worked out I'm gonna cure that hesitation, the cough and the scrubbing of the fan inside the shroud!

If it can be made right, Brent and I can make it right!