What to do with my TR?

Park it until later. Or, sell it to me cheap in January

I LOVE that color, btw. Can't say I've ever seen a green one before

 

Sorry to hear that. The green is extremely unique & looks great. I hope it doesn't get parted out!

 

Way too low! I'd say $25K min, and with the recent price runup should be more like $30K -- JMO.

 

If you have the time and space and stress equity, part it out. If you are interested in selling it at the aformentioned price as is in need of repair, contact me. I am not a dealer. Just a potential owner.

If you have any attachment to the vehicle and would like to see it kept in one piece, contact me.

Thanks

 

sorry to hear that, a DIY job out of the question?

you could farm out the trans work to a expert after removing the motor and save $$.

other than that park it for awhile you may begin to miss it and make a decision then

 

Dave - I'm sorry to hear of the troubles with your TR , it is gorgeous and very unique in that color! Maybe you could contact TRutlands or RICAMBIAMERICA and see if they have (or can track down) a 512 TR tranny. That would be the thing to do, if you want to keep the TR.
Parting it out is always an option. So is parking it in the Bronx .... (Just make sure it is fully insured!)
Make some calls for parts, labor, etc.. and run the numbers. Then ask yourself if the TR puts that big of a smile on your face versus the $$$ it costs. Best of luck with whatever you decide!!

 

Absolutely - now's the time to do that 512TR gearbox upgrade and solve the problem for the long term.

I don't know. It's a gorgeous car, but over 50K miles, and 'resale green' doesn't help in the market. I'd say $20K would move the car very fast, $25K also seems reasonable.

But I'm sure it's rare and I hope someone buys it and does the repair/upgrade to keep it on the road.

 

Sorry...we all dread that happening.

The question you have to ask yourself is: "Is this a financial decision for me, or an emotional one?"

The reality is, you are DEEPLY in the financial hole. You are guessing it may be 15,000$ to fix, but, reading other depressing threads on this subject, I bet its more. Then figure in the hassles, time, aggravation, and possible unlimited bills.

List it as is on EBAY. I bet you can get more than 30,000$ for it. Someone will buy it, figuring a trans can't be more than a couple of grand. You see cars on ebay that have been in roll-overs sell in the 20-30's.

Either way, it suks. Say the car is worth 45,000$ in nice shape. Subtract 15,000 for your last service. You now have a 30,000 equity in your car. If you fix it, and spend 20,000$...you have 10,000$ equity in your car. I don't know if my convaluted though process here makes sense.

Either way, in the past year, you will have almost the entire value of the car, wasted on repairs. If you fix the car, and sell it, you net 10,000$. If you sell as is, you will get more.

This is why no one wants a testarossa with 50,000 miles on it. That seems to be when the expensive parts go. Sure, a garage queen may leak, have bad seals, etc. But the trans doesn't go at 5000 miles...

I feel your pain, and wish you luck.

 

This is a Deja Vu on a car I have a thread going on (a red 87 in Chicago area).

It is a big question!

Could you perhaps buy an engine & gearbox and just do a transplant?

 

i'll buy it as is. and like my_adidas, i would keep it together. i love TRs--i have one already, but a second wouldn't hurt!

aside from personal gain, if i were in your shoes i would decide how much i like the car. a couple of years ago, my dad and i did $12k worth of work on our beloved 914, now worth all of 5K. we did it because it is my dad's car from new and i will keep it forever. if you want the car, go ahead and fix it. it will suck financially, as bo said, you won't have much equity left. if you don't want it that bad, sell it as is. no need to go through the hassle of fixing and surprise problems. as someone said, you'll get more selling as is. but, one thing...DON'T PART IT OUT!!! >:/

john

 

JohnG is making sense to me...look at it this way: Say it costs $25,000 for the car as is, + maybe $30,000 to put the mechanicals back into fresh overhaul state. What else can you buy for $55,000 that will give you this quality of a collector or hobby car? Heck, you could even use it as a daily driver for 3 or 4 years for this kind of money. Anyway, the picture is showing me too nice a car to give away or just part out. Maybe I missed it, but are you planning any engine work if you do choose to fix it up?

Changing subject, do the experienced owners have a comment on how common a broken transmission is on cars with over 50 thousand miles? (providing of course that the car was not used for drift events, 1/8 mile drags, etc...)

I am just a little disconcerted at how similar this story is to my '87 candidate...although in it's case it is reported to be first gear itself rather than the transfer shaft.

Good luck with this one, James

James

 

I see both sides here. Yes I am biased becasue I am a prospective buyer. But the market is still shaky on these cars and we are talking about some potentially serious coin for repairs.

Parting it out and returning it to fresh condition also have the less tanglible "fish or cut bait" factor.

I had a 2002 Viper. After having the motor rebuilt, frame rewelded (factory defect) lot's of $500 here, $1000 there consumables, I sold that car more from just getting away from it. I loved that car. But I reached a point I was done writing checks for it.
I hate to see it parted out. I considered that with my Viper. Considering the hood alone is well over $12,000.
I removed the supercharger and sold the car at a loss.

It's both an emotional and financial decision.
I hope I never am confronted with selling a Ferrari. That seems several orders of magnitude tougher than selling a Viper.

He does still ahve the 355, right?

 

Anyone know how many testarossa's actually have trans problems? What percentage are we talking about? 10% 50% All of them?

If you are on FCHAT long enough, you really start to think that these cars are ticking timebombs, but a lot of this is just sampling bias.

Any thoughts from the mechanics?

 

Call GT Car Parts for a used trans. 623-780-2200

 

All cars break its a fact, Porsches, Vettes whatever, when it happens to a Ferrari its just so much more expensive to repair them.

 

Thanks!

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Your testarossa is a rare unit for they colour and is a dream car, i recomend to you to make the reparatios and keep the car in perfect condition to ride and enjoy it. testarossa is a car who never loks like old because is a classic/modern design, everybody turn the head to see it. keep your testa or make it the reparations and sell it, with patience is possible to sell it for 60.000 or more dollars. regards.

 

Well, at least our ranges meet -- and I'd agree that at $20K there'd be a frenzy -- would love to see it on eBay at No Reserve (just can't imagine that someone like TRutlands would let somebody else get it for only $20K).

I wouldn't stress out over it -- the people who have trouble are the guys with the low mile garage queens who wrinkle a fender or hood and then have so much equity in the car that they are forced to pay $10K for the replacement parts and do the fix.

 

Early TRs 85-86 and maybe some 87's had some updates that should be done when the motors are out but most of the people working on them now are not even aware of them. The syncro blocks for example are very inexpensive but the labor to replace them is a killer. If those break it can seem like the end of the world unless you know about it and know the symptoms. I have been working on those gearboxes since the BB's were still new cars and with a few exceptions breaking those gear boxes required some effort. We were aware of their weaknesses since the BB's and I have always been in a work environment that warned our customer base about that and have had very little trouble. One of the failures that happens to them is progressive and gives very noticable symptoms before anything bad happens but in all the years I have been working on these cars I am still amazed how many owners will live with bad symptoms in the hope they will go away by themselves. Believe me it never gets cheaper the longer you go. That particular problem was addressed by the factory in an update but it was an unsuccessful fix. It can be fixed but requires different measures. Most of the blown up gear boxes I have fixed were a new customer that never had the chance to be given warning from us about the do's and don'ts of them.

The statement made here about not abusing the gear box when it happened is typical (no offense intended). Drive train failures happen generally in 1 of 2 ways. Either a catastrophic stress event that cannot help but break something or something in its history (singular or a series of events) that weakened parts so that the failure happened "just driving down the road".

I have one of these cars and have little concern about it's transmission. Not because it can't break but because it is late enough to have many of the problems addressed and also because I know it's limitations and drive within them. It also had 1k miles on it when we got it so it's history is of little concern. I can almost guarantee it will never be cracked open during my lifetime.

 

David,

SO SORRY to hear about the TR tranny troubles. That sucks man. I've seen your car and it is gorgeous... As for what you should do, I don't think I'm in a position to advise (indeed I think few are). At the end of the day, it's such a personal decision that is based on a cost/benefit balancing that factors in the intangible attachment you have for the car. I know I'm only stating the obvious here... sorry.

Whatever you do, best of luck. I hope you're able to keep the car.

Best,
J.

 

Sorry to read this sad story.

Most of the time when I read this kinda things the owner reacts furious about this and that, italian trash bla bla.

You look to me like a real Ferrari lover the way you mention things.
You car is a work of art, I know that you will repair it and drive the car a few more years. The milage doesn's mean anything, come on it's got many years to go.

Take care.

 

Green is unique and beautiful. I hope you repair and keep the car, considering how much mechanical investments you have made in it, the trans job will provide you with a well sorted car with no issues.

 

Hi,sorry to hear that...
Please don't sell it to Tillman,but to me....
I have myself a red TR,but this green one is magnificent.
Speedman
PS IMO,you'll miss the car if you sell it...