Griff "sorting" - £ballpark figure?

[mr2aw11]

In 1992, when I was but a poor impoverished uni student in Newcastle, whilst walking to a friend's halls near St James' Park, I fell in love: trundling past me at probably 10mph or so came a 4.3 Griff, vibrating the pavement and making the most awesome noise. I've wanted one ever since, but never quite had the means...

Any way, to cut a long story short, New Year sees a new job for mr2aw11, and the purchase of my dream car will become a reality in the first few months of 2007. Budget will be somewhere between £12k and £15k.

Ideally I'd like a sorted 4.3 (A1 chassis, Nitrons/suspension already done, heater fan upgraded, and a plethora of other "enhancements", but I'll probably be paying for some expert advice (James Agger, Rob Ingleby?).

Any way, to the point of my post (at last) - assuming I get a pretty much "stock" car (albeint in the best possible condition for, say, £12k), what are the (rough) costs for the improvements (suspension, fans, any other "essential" mods you may think of)?

Cheers in advance

[mongoose]

Nitrons-£950+vat,Poly bushes-£1k(if your having them supplied and fitted).If the cooling fans need up upgrading from the old type to the later 500 ones,these are a little more than £100 each from memory.I personally dont believe you need other cooling mods.If it hsn't had a good waxoyl lately,then budget for this as well(mine costs £115)

Edited by mongoose on Monday 11th December 12:38

[Phil Dicky]

Don't forget the extra fuel cost as you won't be able to resist driving it...

[antonyj]

Heater fan upgraded?

[Guillotine]

look for a car with all the mods...there's plenty and they'll have been looked after.
it doesn't add much to the value.

andy
tvrmonster

[Griffter]

I've spent £5000 on sorting mine ('92 4.3). Although a little tatty when I bought it, it was mechanically sound (as three years ownership has proven). Major expense includes a Rollcentre rollbar (£1000 installed), a hood (£500) and a respray at mate's rates. Nearly half the cost of 'sorting' a Griff is the plethora of little things - electrical fittings, hoses, clips, bits of this, bobs of that, glue, gunk, sealant, sikaflex, waxoyl, paint etc which are essential to fix every flaw and really make the thing 100% right. If you do these things yourself you save on labour of course. If you pay someone else, apart from the risk of the job not being done to your satisfaction, you'll spend a lot on labour. Even at the money asked for 4.3s in the present climate I don't think I could get one as sorted (IMHO) as mine for this side of £18k. A lot more if I paid someone else to do the labourious little things. Go in with your eyes open and enjoy it.

[barreti]

I think you'll be surprised at the variable quality of cars available.
I saw a few really tatty examples being sold for good money. Once you start to look around the good one will really jump out at you.

Make sure the chassis is in good nick and anything else such as nitrons etc you should view as a bonus with your budget of £12k
There are 2 schools of thought, buy one with it all done or buy one and do it all or get it done. I suppose it depends on how long you can hold out to find your perfect car.

As for costs, these are off the top of my head so will be ballpark ...
Hood is around £750 to have done
Carpets would be £500 ish
Wheels come up for sale but are expensive (around £750) so if you want originality make sure they are good too.
Front end respray is around £700 if its badly stonechipped.
Dash reveneer around £300
Exhaust manifolds are rare so expensive. Replace with Stainless for around £800
Fans shouldn't need upgrading if the cooling system is in good order. You'd be better looking for issues with the rad than upgrading the fans.

Good luck and happy hunting

[mr2aw11]

Cheers for the resposes folks - much appreciated.

Grifter - I've been lurking on the Tiv forums since before I was a full PH member, so I'm aware of the potential problems of RV8 ownership, and also heartened that the knowledge base appears very high.

Barreti, looked at your profile, looks like you've done an awful lot of work to get your 4.3 in it's current condition - looks impressive. I may be tempted to look at early cars towards the upper end of my budget with the majority of the "sorting" already done, as Guillotine says, the market value probably doesn't come close to the actual costs incurred by doing all the mods to a stock car. I'm not specifically looking for power hikes etc, but suspension and reliability "fixes" would be nice.

Hope to post in the first few months of the New Year with details of my purchase, but may post more specific questions before I take the plunge.

Cheers folks