Need West Coast Cali Help

Any suggestions or comments from Spyder owners may be of help to me?  Thanks

Pete

C'mon West Coasters.  Someone has to be close to this place who can help out Pete.  If I wasn't five hours away I'd do it; that and my Subaru knowledge is pretty limited.

Spyder owners need to step up here.  Speedster guys do this all the time for each other.

Well... hang on a minute here. Greg said he would let someone come and test drive it for you? If he'll let me take it out for an hour then I'll write a whole review.

...oh and Pete - you would have to become a Supporting Member. <insert grin here>

+ 1 on the supporting member request. I missed the fact he wasn't. Pony up Pete.

Pete

This looks like a very nice car.  The rear suspension has been modified to use coilovers, possibly by Vintage.  I like the coilovers better than the Beck torsion bar suspension.  I think with 195hp a 3.44 R&P would have been more appropriate.  Don't really like the old style Beck seats.  Carey has recently switched to the standard speedy seats in his Spyders.  Perfect colors.  This car new would approach $50k.  Think if you could get it for $35k it would be a good deal.  Let me know if you get it.  I would love to see it.  I'm always driving to NOVA and Charlottesville in my IM.  I grew up in Vienna and went to Madison HS.  Hope to add a spyder one day. 

BTW.  Are you sure you can pass VA inspection without windshield wipers??

Thanks guys. Agreed, last year I was a Supporting member, guess I need to do so again.

Phil,

It would not pass a VA inspection but I don't think I would need to do so since I would apply for a Special Construction Vehicle registration/Title. Greg at Vintage offered to go through his Arizona connection and get it retitled as a 1955 Porsche Spyder (currently it's a Cali SCV but it says on the title 2009) that way I could retitle it easy through the Special Constructed Vehicle process and since it will be titled as a 1955 no emissions would be required and I was planning on going the Vintage tags. To meet that requirement it just needs to be 25 years old.  So I was hoping to do that and therefore would not need an inspection.

How do all the others with this same windshield set up do it? Greg did say it could be test driven.  I'm worried about possible heat range conditions, start stop type driving especially in hot weather that it's okay.  My better half is against me getting it and especially without seeing it in person and test driving it. It would be a real risk on my part. That's why I thought I'd reach out to SOC folks who might live close enough to check it out all I could offer in return is a few cold beers at the next Carlisle gathering.   I may have to just give up on this one.

Thanks,

Pete 

Pete, I don't know how property taxation is applied in VA, but here in Connecticut I'm assessed, and payable to the town, personal property tax. My vehicles are calculated by Blue Book values.

My speedster replica was purchased from Oregon where the registration identified it as a 1958 Porsche Convertible...DMV didn't notice the big blocked letters reading "REPLICA" at the bottom of the certificate...so my personal property tax liability was based on a '58 Porsche convertible...a truly staggering amount!!

Trying to correct this identification mistake is nigh-high impossible...the paperwork disappears into a black hole at DMV headquarters in Hartford. My only alternative has been to acquire 'Vintage' plates which puts a reasonable lid on maximum taxes, but it also severely restricts its usage.   

Pete.  Personal property taxes in VA stink.  If it was registered as a 1955 Porsche assess value may be astronomical.  Think I would leave it a a special construction vehicle.

Question.  My car is registered as a special construction vehicle.  My car is smog legal in 50 states and also passes all inspections.  But are you saying that if my car is a SCV I DON'T have to go through VA state inspection??? That would be awesome.

Phil, You would not have to do VA inspection only if you run Antique tags. On my Beck Speedster I do the regular inspections but it has everything on it. 

BTW I'm still dealing with the crank pulley from the Carlisle trip. It's in the shop now and I have a guy who's going to try to mill a seal to go with a sand seal that we got. I have been running it locally with only a little oil leaking but at highway speeds it throws more oil gets on the exhaust etc. So even though I have AC compressor my only choice now is to run a sand seal pulley with a special milled seal and it may still leak. That loose crank pulley damaged the case inside. It's such a bummer as the motor only has about eight thousand miles on it. All for a loose bolt and the stupid AC pulley. I only ever used the AC once but it came with the car. The thing I'm trying are without taking the motor out or apart to fix the problem.   

Guys good points on the taxes for a Porsche. I have thought of that and worried the same. So perhaps the way it's titled in CA is the best way or have SCV/replica on as well with a 1950's date rather that a modern date if that's even possible. 

Thanks for you help guys I think I'm going to give up on it.  It's such a pain to have to worry about this stuff but again I guess that's all part of the madness.

Thanks,

Pete

I'm on the east coast as well, so can't go look at it. But I do have a few comments.

First of all, there aren't a whole lot of Spyder owners that are even on here, and the few that are live in the east, fyi.

This car is what is called a Veck. It was a Beck Spyder, but Greg at Vintage chops the rear frame off and adds his rear frame making it a Vintage from the firewall back. You can tell it is a Beck because of the two carriage bolts in the dash that hold the column, plus there are telltales up front as well, namely, the accordion gas filler boot and the black finish underhood.

The rear suspension is all Vintage, no torsion bar, fabricated trailing arms and coilover shocks. Nice looking Subaru install.

Anyone out west could check this out for you, mechanically they are almost identical. Speedster or Spyder owner, doesn't seem to matter to me.

Greg does very clean work.

Thanks Danny,

I spoke to you briefly at Carlisle, love your Spyder.  My buddy Syl told me you're one of the Spyder Gurus.

Pete 

Car price "Buy it now"  reduced to $36K.  Hmm.