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How Will The Classic and Collector Car Hobby Differ In 10 Years?

125 messages,  Last post on Jan 28, 2011 at 12:39 PM

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What is this discussion about? Classic Cars, Coupe, Convertible, Truck, Sedan, Wagon

Messages Page 10 of 13

#86 of 125 Re: The Future of the Hobby [Mr_Shiftright] by hpmctorque

Dec 23, 2007 (10:09 am)

Incredible memory, Shifty!

#87 of 125 Re: Well no, you wouldn't do that... [andre1969] by lemko

Dec 23, 2007 (10:18 am)

Replying to: andre1969 (Dec 21, 2007 7:26 pm)
I guess the coolest car in high school at that time was the new blue 1982 Trans Am some student I didn't know very well had. His father owned a furniture store and bought the car for his 16th birthday. There was another guy a few years older than me who had a 1967 Corvette. Don't know if was a big block. Of course I thought the coolest car was my then-girlfriend's white 1969 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham.

#88 of 125 Re: Well no, you wouldn't do that... [lemko] by Mr_Shiftright HOST

Dec 23, 2007 (10:20 am)

Replying to: lemko (Dec 23, 2007 10:18 am)
I just HAVE to see your high school yearbook picture--LOL!

#89 of 125 Re: The Future of the Hobby [qbrozen] by hudsonthedog

Dec 26, 2007 (9:55 am)

Replying to: qbrozen (Dec 22, 2007 8:30 pm)
The difference with the muscle car era and the cars of today is that the collectible cars of the 1960s/1970s were rare THEN. On the whole, the Hemi option or SCJ option wasn't ticked by many people...relative to the entire production of the associated vehicles. Chrysler's modern Hemi is relatively more popular today. A larger proportion of all Chrysler 300s have 5.7L engines today. Especially when Chrysler is producing somewhere around half a million such engines a year today.

#90 of 125 Re: The Future of the Hobby [hudsonthedog] by qbrozen

Dec 26, 2007 (1:22 pm)

Replying to: hudsonthedog (Dec 26, 2007 9:55 am)
yes, but you also had several variants back in the 60s and 70s and only the real rare ones pull the bucks today, correct? So while a 300C might not be a big deal, neither is a V8 Lemans, right? But what about an SRT8? That MIGHT be more akin to the expensive muscle cars we are referring to, wouldn't it?
 
And you also have to remember population numbers. OK, so maybe only a couple thousand special purple Y-motors big block 4-speeds were made in 1968, and those are now wanted by 20k people in today's population, thereby driving the price to $X. But then you have, let's say 10k SRT8s made in '05, but 30 years from now, you have 6k on the road and 60k people in the world's increased population who want it .... I don't know. Its way too many variables for us to have a definitive discussion about, I think.

#91 of 125 Re: The Future of the Hobby [qbrozen] by Mr_Shiftright HOST

Dec 26, 2007 (1:33 pm)

Replying to: qbrozen (Dec 26, 2007 1:22 pm)
We can predict supply but predicting demand is harder--and we need both predictions to make any kind of crystal-ball gazing.
 
But high supply would probably screw the pooch for future collectiblity. There are a few instances of high supply AND high demand, like the early Mustangs, but that causes a lot of hair-splitting and tends to disfavor low-optioned or 6 cylinder Mustangs or causes them to be modified to higher specs.
 
I'm expecting a much higher survival rate for modern cars for one thing, and so the nit-picking and hair-splitting is going to be pretty ferocious for cars in big supply. You can see this in the 94-96 Impalas, where a mere floor shift and console adds 30% or more to the price. Why? There are fewer of them and they look nicer.
 
Another hair=splitting decision that goes on in high supply cars is "purity". The earlier Mustangs are preferred to the 71-73, the 240Z Datsun preferred over the 260 and 280 and 300Z, and the early Vipers over the mid 90s cars.
 
All of the above are still quite plentiful cars.

#92 of 125 Re: The Future of the Hobby [qbrozen] by hudsonthedog

Dec 26, 2007 (3:02 pm)

Replying to: qbrozen (Dec 26, 2007 1:22 pm)
I agree with your analogy. The modern Hemis are too plentiful, but the SRT cars (Dodge SRT4, Dodge Charger/Magnum SRT8, Chrysler 300C SRT8, Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8) may fall into the "rare" category...perhaps rare and desireable enough to be collectible. Sr Shirtright's call on the later Vipers (SRT10) may be correct, which is why I earlier called out the 1992 Viper (no fixed side windows, no A/C, etc) as being different from the later Vipers. And the Chrysler Crossfire SRT6 MIGHT catch a backdoor collectible market because of the connection to the brief and ill-fated Chrysler/Mercedes-Benz tie-up.
 
I like truly rare cars, many of which are not collectible. Vehicles with unique body panels (not just added scoops or wings) and/or unique powertrains. Vehicles like the Ford Taurus SHO which had engines not shared with any other car/truck (and the especially unique 60-degree DOHC V8), Pontiac 6000 STE AWD (all-wheel drive system not shared with other A-bodies), 190hp Oldsmobile Calias (high-output Quad 4), Chrysler DOHC 2.2L fours (Maserati head or Lotus head), and Twin Dual Cam GM cars with 5-speed manuals.
 
With today's emissions regulations, it's very tough to build one of these vehicles. I wish GM had taken Oldsmobile or Chrysler had taken Plymouth out in a blaze of past glory with a unique powertrain setup. My dream was for a final run of Plymouth Breezes with 3.5L SOHC 250hp V6s (pipedream: mated to manual transaxles) and called it the GTX or "Road Runner" or Duster or Barracuda or some such name.

#93 of 125 Re: Well no, you wouldn't do that... [Mr_Shiftright] by grbeck

Dec 27, 2007 (12:32 pm)

Replying to: Mr_Shiftright (Dec 21, 2007 2:58 pm)
Mr. Shiftright: Again, I think you may be confusing true muscle cars with common 318 Road Runners or Chargers, etc. Not the same thing at all.
  
A 440 Charger R/T 4-speed is worth $70,000. A 318 Charger is worth maybe $12,000.
  
You and your friends got what you got because of supply and demand. Lots of 318s, just a handful of 440 4-speeds.
 
No, these were 440-equipped (and, in the case of one 1969 Road Runner, equipped with a 383 and floor-mounted four speed) Mopars from the late 1960s and early 1970s. We knew very well what was under the hood, and the distinctions between the high-performance engines and the "regular" V-8s.
 
They were available for a song - at least, judging by the people I knew who were driving them. Those people were not rich, nor were they collectors. I don't disagree that these cars are worth a lot today, but they weren't in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

#94 of 125 Re: Well no, you wouldn't do that... [grbeck] by andre1969

Dec 27, 2007 (12:41 pm)

Replying to: grbeck (Dec 27, 2007 12:32 pm)
No, these were 440-equipped (and, in the case of one 1969 Road Runner, equipped with a 383 and floor-mounted four speed) Mopars from the late 1960s and early 1970s. We knew very well what was under the hood, and the distinctions between the high-performance engines and the "regular" V-8s.

 
Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if, once the oil embargo set in, a slant six or 318 Satellite or Coronet might have been worth more than the 383, 440, and even the Hemi models! Nobody was thinking about performance by the mid 70's; it was all about fuel economy. The first and second oil embargos actually sent a lot of those old musclecars to an early grave, as people could hardly give them away, so they'd just scrap them.
 
I'd imagine that the Hemi might have been the hardest sale of all. Usually they were little more than street-legal racecars, with no air conditioning, stick shift transmissions, very little in the way of creature comforts. Not exactly a winning formula for a used car back then.

#95 of 125 Re: Well no, you wouldn't do that... [andre1969] by Mr_Shiftright HOST

Dec 27, 2007 (4:25 pm)

Replying to: andre1969 (Dec 27, 2007 12:41 pm)
That's not how I remember it at all
 
Any car with that much HP is never ever going to be ignored. I don't wish to arm wrestle in a friendly bar but I think some Hot Rod magazines from the 70s and 80s would prove the point.

Messages Page 10 of 13

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