How did you get into DIY?

Do you have a spare garage space?

If so, go find a 70s-80s FIAT or MG or something similar. Running but rough interior/bad paint is perfect. CHEAP is important

Get a Haynes manual or Chilton guide and start working your way through it.

Alternatively, check your local junior colleges for auto tech classes and sign up for them.

I became a DIYer because I owned a series of craptastic junkers from the time I was 16 until I left college in my late 20s. I simply had no other choice

 

Agreed. I wouldn't touch the new-ish Audi either. Besides, we all need to keep one car running so we can get to the parts store!

I got into DIY because it was the only option open to me as a kid with $0 cash. My son, now 20 y/o, got into it when we bought an MGB for $250 and rebuilt it.

What would I recommend? Buy a cheap, old sports car and consider the cost to be training-money. If you sell the car you recoup some of the cost. If not, you are just paying for training - and then donate it somewhere.

So what car? I suggest that you buy an older Alfa Spyder or a Fiat 124. The 124 is a little rarer and starting to grow in value. An Alfa Spider can be found CHEAP and it offers two big benefits:

(1) It's metric so you don't have to buy THREE sets of tools.
(2) It's just new enough to mirror the technology found in older 308s.
(3) It's made out of the same parts as 50% of a Ferrari 308!

The next advantage is that you can buy a cheap Haynes manual for the car and understand just about every system on the car. Couldn't find a cheaper text book. Start with cleaning. End with testing (always diagnose BEFORE surgery), repairs and restoration.

THEN, buy your Ferrari and apply all those valuable skills to save you BIG money on Ferrari maintenance.

rick
PS: Recognize the difference between 'maintenance' and 'service'. Maintenance is what you do to minimize service.

 

Woah! Are you my long lost clone brother?!!!

rick / '79 308GTB / silver with blue leather

 

Get the right tools, to the research, ask questions until understand the answers, and then jump in. Like many, I became a DIYer because of lack of funds while in college. Purchased a 650 Triumph and promptly blew the sucker up. Since I could not afford to take it to a shop, nor could I afford to walk away from my "investment", I followed the advice I just previously stated.

Studies show that people are 3 times more afraid of failure than they desire success. Just get over the fear and jump in, the water's fine.

 

My background is similar to rolindsays & pad.

As a kid in the early '60s I could barely scrape up enough money to buy my first car, so had no choice but to repair it myself.

It was a '53 plymouth that had been sitting behind the dealer rusting for 3 or 4 years w/o an engine. The family car, a '49 Plymouth was totaled (no, I wasn't involved). Turns out that '49 flat head 6 was still used in '53, so I bought the '53 for something like $50 & paid another $200 for them to pull the engine out of the wreck & drop it into it.

Drove it for several years, & actually got it into pretty good shape. Finally traded it in on a '58 Chevvy BelAire which I drove & maintained until '67 when it was broadsided by someone who ran a stop sign.

Had spent the fall & winter before the '58 was trashed helping my college roommate rebuild his 3.8 L XKE enginen in out dorm room. So when I needed to replace the '58 he talked me into looking for a Jag. Found a '58 XK150 in fair shape for a few hundred more than I'd gotten from the ins. settlement on the Chevvy. That summer we rebuilt the engine & over the next year I restored the body & had it resprayed.

Once I started driving the Jag, I was hooked on high end sports cars & have had to do my own service in order to afford them.

Of course I too got my sons hooked as soon as they were old enough to turn a wrench and 'help daddy'...

I second rolindsey's advice about getting an older car & learning on it. Even if it' isn't an Alfa, there are a lot of interesting '70s & early '80s sports cars you can learn a lot from owning.

 

He helped me do it, but watched from a distance as I did the work. He did get under the car to grab the tranny and pull it out. But I did all the tedious wrench twisting.

When my son turned 20, my friend gave us a ’67 Mustang, with blown 289 (that I still have if anyone wants one!), some hot heads, a 302, two C4 trannies, and the original 200 cid 6-cyl. I told my son, you can have the car if, you rebuild the 6-cyl engine.

I watched from a distance and added advice when I thought appropriate and answered all of his questions. But he did the rest.

He now works on C130’s.

 

And I'm selling mine. And it has an extra engine t'boot!



....sorry. I know that was shameless

 

I think becoming a DIY kind of guy starts with breaking all of your toys when you were young, and trying to fix them. Then, trying to figure out what makes mechanical things tick, disassembling motors, vcr's, computers, etc.

Eventually, after you have broken enough stuff, you graduate to helping your father fix his cars. You start with water pumps, oil changes, belts...

Eventually your dad gets into an accident, then you learn body work.

One day you buy a cheap car, which always breaks. You become an amateur mechanic.

As time passes, your tool collection swells. You father eventually gives you his. Now, you have a garage full of tools.

You still don't have everything. You graduate to an air compressor, and air tools. Ohh, don't forget the lift. You wonder how on god's earth you survived without these.

Also key, is to have a good "real" mechanic or 2 in the family. Because you will screw up . . . and the guy from the local shop isn't going to drop everything to run to your garage...

Then, comes the invention of the internet. Which makes working on cars that don't have a WSM and Haynes manual available, possible.

Now you buy a Ferrari (after 15 other cars), and use your skills...

Thats probably how most folks I know became do it yourselfers. Its a "path of life", not a destination...

Enjoy the drive .

 

Same as everybody else, lack of funds to repair cars as a student.......just kept going

You could try and find a Fiat X1/9, it'll teach you all about working on cramped mid engined cars......and all about rusty italian sports cars

 

Get a Toyota MR2. Mid-engined sports car ... and lots of information on website forums about the mechanical stuff. I'm learning how to put a new engine in my SW20 G Ltd model (yes that's the same car where the engine cooked itself on a run with the FOC in NZ and we weren't even speeding ).

I'm new at mechanical work, but have lots of friends that have worked on their MR2s.

 

A nieghbor of mine gave me an old Aston 6 cyl. engine when I was 10, took it apart and thought it was cool. Took me a few months to put it back together, hahaha. It had a hole in the no. 1 piston, never ran again and I of course had no reason for it to run, so I made it a 5 cylinder when I put it back together altho I do remember having some stuff left over but what the heck I was 10 and I didn't need it to work... I do better now LOL, Regards, Vern

 

One of the truths about DIY is the more you do, the more you find you are able to do. Start with the basics, the easy things, and go from there. Change the oil and filter. Air filter. Fuel filter. Spark plugs. Fuses. Clean the engine compartment and figure out where everything goes. Most important, pick up the service manuals for the car(s) you are working on and read as much as possible about whatever you are about to attempt. Don't forget to read the "general" instructions, as they often tell you about the basics you need to know that the specific instructions take for granted that you know. And don't be afraid to ask questions. The only stupid questions are the ones you DIDN'T ask before trying to do something new.

And don't pass up the chance to help other people work on their cars, especially if they have a lot of experience. Just watching, handing wrenches, holding things, can give you a wealth of information. The more you do, the more you'll be able to do. So get started. It's fun.

Last comment -- buy the absolute best tools you can afford. You buy good tools once. Cheap tools, you buy over and over again. Ask me how I learned that lesson.

 

Addendum: no matter the initial quality of the 10mm or 9/16 socket, it WILL be missing when you need it. There's always a particular tool you will end up buying over and over and over -- the tool varies per person. For my dad, it's a 9/16 open end wrench

 

How did you get into DIY?

My first car was a FIAT 850 Spyder.

 

Triumph Tr4

 

Nice! I rebuilt my first engine, from a Honda VF500F, in the kitchen of a shared house in college. I learned to paint in the basement.

As FasterIsBetter said, it's kind of a waterfall effect as you learn more and more. After 20 years of alternately fixing and breaking things, I'm certainly not a professional but the tasks I take on are now based on reward/effort rather than concern that I can do the task. I enjoy walking out to a well-stocked garage with a cup of coffee and a neat project at hand. There's an '86 Esprit in my garage right now that I'm buttoning back up after a rear main seal and clutch pilot bearing.

If I may be permitted a little pat on the back, my personal crowning acheivement if DIY-dom can be seen on this web page.
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Mine was a 1954 Hillman Minx with a '56 Hillman Husky engine in it. Didn't run. Bought it for $1. Towed it home with my dad's car. This was 1967. Mice had eaten the wiring harness, not that there was much of a wiring harness in those cars, and it needed a new starter motor and ignition switch. A few bucks for parts, some borrowed tools and a little common sense and help from a friend, I had a running car that lasted me until I went off to college, and then sold it for $75. I've been working on my cars ever since.

 

Wow! Mine was too! A 1968 I believe. It had paper-thin disk rotors on the front from steel-on-steel braking for years! What a piece of trash. Wish I had one now...

 

I slightly disagree. Buy at least mid-level tools, don't buy the stuff in the auto store dollar bin, but if you are new to DIY don't go get the Griot's Garage complete FACOM set either. Craftsman works fine for nearly everything, Snap on and the like are more expensive and not really any better. My rule is to buy the mid level stuff and if it wears out I replace it with the good stuff that costs more. If I use it so infrequently that it never wears out or fails to perform well then the money is better spent elsewhere. That's why I have some very very nice combo wrenches in 13mm, 14mm, etc, but the 22mm is hardware store stuff. Plus someday you'll want to modify (destroy/ruin) some tool for a special project - grind notches in a socket, weld a bar on a wrench, use a screwdriver as a punch or cheisel, use a hammer on something improperly - and that's way easier on something that didn't cost top dollar.

I started just like everyone else. I bought a '75 Honda Civic in high school that was a POS but was a lot of fun. I kept me busy with both essential and elected projects. Funny that a 10 year old car was such a pile of crap. Cars are so much better built today, I think.

 

13mm sockets for me... Ever once in awhile, I'll find 2 or 3 of them burried somewhere in the garage!

And by then, I'll have another one to add to the collection!

Why is that?

PS: I buy Craftsman whenever I can. Can't beat the 100% return policy. They'll still replace a 50yr old ratchet with no questions asked!

 

My first car was a Karmann Ghia with a burnt valve. While my parents were on vacation, I rented a tranny jack. Armed with the idiots guide to VW repair, I pulled the engine, pulled the heads, and had a valve job done. It ran great afterward. I later swapped this car for a Bugeye Sprite (which I still have), that also had a burnt valve.

I also have had various British cars, Alfas and FIATs. An X1/9 is a good car to practice on if you one plans to have a 308 in the future. I have a soft spot for Alfas, though. They are mini-exotics, and parts are easy to get and relatively cheap.

-steve

 

I agree in general. Also, buy 6 point sockets & wrenches, not 12 point. They're stronger & fit better, thus less likely to round off fastners. Get a complete 1/4" set, and a 3/8" set. 1/4" tools used to be called 'engine sets' for a reason. For most jobs 1/2" drive is over-kill until you get into really heavy work.

If it's something I know I'm only going to use once in a blue moon, I generally go looking for it at Harbor Freight or Northern Tool.

Also get HF impact sockets there as they're as good as anybodys at half the price. Altho, I used Craftsman 6pt sockets as impact sockets for 30 years and only broke 1 when I used my big 1/2" drive impact wrench on a 10mm 3/8" drive socket. However, the drive holes got beaten up pretty badly.

A couple of years ago my son got me a set of Craftsman 1/2" drive impact sockets. I've only used a couple of them. However, I use my HF 3/8" a lot.

If you're just starting out, I'd get a set of HF 3/8" impact sockets & not bother with std ones. Just wipe them down with WD40 occasionally & they'll never rust. Same for 1/2" drive.

Another exception: I've got a set of Snap-On torque wrenches. One case where I think upper mid-grade is worth the $.

As to commonly missplaced tools:
10mm combo wrench & 10mm deep 3/8" or 1/4" drive sockets, darn near every project one or the other will go astray. Most show up months later where someone helpfully miss-filed them, or else when I do a major clean-up & move things around.

13mm 3/8" deep sockets. About every 3rd project.

 

That has not been my experience. I broke every single impact socket I actually used out of the 1/2" HF kit I bought a few years ago. One with just an 18" breaker bar and my spindly little arms. Maybe they're better now or it's just luck of the draw.