Stalled project. How to not let this happen.

You're basically describing my need to sell my E30 as soon as I can, while it still has some value close to the price I paid for it (too much). I've basically lost all interest in the car and it's constantly in the way. Stuffing it into my back yard and putting a cover on it won't do it any good.

I'm not sure this is the comment you want ot hear, but that's the situation with one of my projects.

My 1800ES I've accepted will be a very long term project. I've readjusted my GT6 goals to keep the car more or less stock. Maybe installing a rebuilt engine and transmission sometime in the future, but with no set time frame. The truck will be a learning tool. I'm far too deep into it financially to back out now. Plus, it's amazing how having a working stereo again will make me hate driving the thing less, but it would be nice to get the body work done. My main project-issue right now is maintaining everything. I'm actually at the point where I'm considering paying somebody to do the timing belt on the TDI. Not because I can't, but I just fear the car will be laid up in my garage for weeks on end... while I pour money into tank of the truck driving 100+ miles every day...

In reply to ls1fiero:

I've learned first hand that the only way to keep a project moving is to literally touch it every week, no matter how small the job. A few days ago I took 10 minutes to put 2 lightbulbs in the Javelin. Not a big deal, but it was still forward progress. Just try and do something every week.

Also, take the kid(s) with you. I taught my 9 month old how to change a tire last week!

SilverFleet wrote: The first thing my neighbor said to me when he saw the Trans Am pull up is that I better not make noise after 9pm.

Dude, talk about getting off on the wrong foot. I would have been tempted to be antagonistic toward them at that point, looking up noise regulations and being noisy "to the letter of the law." But that's not a good way to foster neighborly relations..

I like to take a day of work, on a random weekday, when my wife and kids are off doing something else....and just have all day to bust out projects on the car (and house).

Then again, I'm way too OCD to let a car just sit there with no work. 2 years on a disc brake conversion would drive me to suicide. I think I did my disc brake conversion on the e30 in one day :)

One day a week for 4 hours. 8years and counting but the Bugeye is pretty much going to be done come spring. I break everything down into task and when I go in the garage my plan is to finish that task. I will have researched how to do it and mentally gone through the whole thing before I ever go in the shop.

I was thinking about this today. I had a challenge car that I had all put together. Engine swap done and out on the autocross course. I put it in the garage and pulled it apart to make it pretty. At that stage it became apparent that since my wife was due with our second child two weeks after the challenge, it wasn't going to happen. There was no way to finish the car while taking care of my very pregnant wife and our one year old the way I wanted to. Something had to give and I picked the car.
The child that caused this scheduling conflict is nine now and the car sits exactly like it did the day I decided to take some time off and be a good dad. We might end up finishing it together.

I get up two hours before I need to and crack out my projects then. I can never get anything done at night, and this works as long as I can get to sleep on schedule!

When I have time, I dont have money for parts. When I have money for parts, I dont have time. The age old problem...

You could always try my (very stupid) plan. Even if you dont have time, when you have money, buy the parts. At least when the time comes there will be parts waiting. Then every few months figure out what the car and all those parts are worth to you (not worth, worth to YOU) and list it for sale at that unreasonable price. the lack of interest and/or lowball offers are sometimes enough to motivate you to press on, or worst case scenario someone pays what it's worth to you.

The Wartburg has been for sale for about a year on that theory....it's not going anywhere.

Thanks to everybody for posting here.....there are some good ideas how I can get back into the garage.

Is it bad that I envy you all who have these unfinished projects? That I want a dilapidated sports car taking up space in my garage?

I do not want to waste one minute of daddy/baby time. I can't work quietly while baby is sleeping. This has been my impass. The CRX HAS to get done. The Challenge car I couldn't really care less about, but too many people have put too much time into it to let it go.

logdog wrote: When I have time, I dont have money for parts. When I have money for parts, I dont have time. The age old problem...

yup... it's even led to me selling my first real project (the mr2) :(...

the s10 project problem is pretty much the same thing... right now i've got some cash so I'm buying what I need... I'm trying to do a little but won't really have time untill late nov to really spend out there... I'm trying to get some minor work done in the mean time... we'll see how that goes... but at least on the plus side i've been super psyched and researching, studying, thinking about the work I need to do.

Terrific subject. And relevant to my interests since my turbo e30 build just fired up for the first time a few weeks ago after being off the road for 2 years. I honestly felt anxious about starting it because I got used to it not being done, I was almost not sure what to do with myself if it actually fired up.

I always run into a phase in a project, sometimes more than one, where there is often relatively little left to do but it ends up taking forever. Part of it is because none of it interesting - such as after finishing all of the mechanical work on an engine swap, only having wiring and some plumbing to do. Another part of it is that I'm maniacally task oriented and usually none of these tedious things can reasonably be finished the same day after I start them. So I know for a fact that I won't be "accomplishing" anything today. It's false but there's no convincing my brain.

The only cure I've found is to just go. I don't want to hear about having no time. Everyone has a half hour they can dig up. Get up early and do it before work, do it right when you get home, or just before bed, it's not impossible. One of my other hobbies is powerlifting. After a full day of work, having to look forward to mustering the focus to put 700 lbs on my back when all I want to do is eat, watch TV and go to sleep, is daunting. I know that the second I try to come up with an excuse to delay going, I will succeed and it will usually end up into a perpetual delay. The only way it really ever works is to get home, change, grab the gym bag and go.

I find it's the same with the car. If I want to come up with an excuse, it's easy. But if I stop thinking and simply start acting (change, walk into the garage, turn the music on, pick up tools...), things just happen.

Another thing to consider is that it's perfectly natural for interests to wane without actually disappearing. The most important thing at this time is to realize the latter. Just because you've lost interest in a hobby, doesn't indicate that it's time to sell everything off and get out of it because you will regret it, horribly. One day, the interest will return like getting hit by a train and you will be left thinking "what the hell did I do...".

So if it's a boring period in a project, grind it out. A bit of time, regularly, without thinking - just go and do stuff. If you're losing interest, put it away and DON'T TOUCH IT. You'll want to get back to it in time.

Paul_VR6 wrote: I get up two hours before I need to and crack out my projects then. I can never get anything done at night, and this works as long as I can get to sleep on schedule!

This works for me as well.

My wife almost always hates when I go out to the garage, so getting even one night a week has caused conflict in the past.

She's not a morning person... and I leave for work before she wakes up anyways. So, if I wake up early, I can get work done without causing any drama, and having the stop time deadline (I have to get in the shower at a set time) means staying focused and doing what I can up till quittin' time, even if it's just an extra hour.

From my experience one of the key elements to a project is having a space to leave it and work on it when available. In other words, if you have to pack everything up every time you quit you spend more time packing and unpacking your tools than actually getting work done. A dedicated work space is essential for good (quicker) progress.

These projects happen through sheer force of will.

When I was actually home, I found the best thing for me was stop watching TV. Seriously. If you have a DVR record cool stuff for bad weather, but honestly, don't even turn the thing on. Come home, grab a bite, change and hit the garage. Even if I don't do a thing but moves tools around, it is still more satisfying than sacrificing an hour to the idiot box. Which is easy to do even when you aren't trying.

I had a CRX a few years back like this. I re-committed myself to the project and instead of sitting on message forums talking about it, I went in the garage and built it, a 1/2 hour at a time with a few weekends thrown in. 6 mos. later it was done. This was at my first autoX with it,

keep at it, you can do it.

I agree that one of the toughest things is knowing that you won't be able to complete a task if you only have short periods of time to work on the car. When I was in college and I worked on my car, I would have an entire uninterrupted weekend and could knock out huge projects. Now I work 60-70 hrs a week at odd times so any time that I'm not working and my wife is home I need to spend time with her or our relationship will suffer. We moved a few months ago and that really set me back because everything was packed up. Recently I started to try to grind through a few small projects and I'm feeling much better about the whole thing. You just have to realign your expectations, i.e. "I will drill a hole and mount a gauge in it" instead of "install boost, water temp, oil pressure gauges".

There are certainly a lot of mental roadblocks to working on a car like this. I never realized how difficult it would be once I didn't have the luxurious free time of college.

Duke wrote: Hell, I have a complete, ran-when-parked, unburied car I haven't even driven in 6 years...

I have one I haven't driven in 8 years, and another one that I haven't raced in 6. I'll use them for something someday.

One bit of motivation is if the project is also your DD and you need it the next day (or on Monday morning) things seem to get done.

I don't do this any more but it is amazing what you can get done if you have to.

[Edit] I was thinking about this more and I seemed to do this almost exclusively with my RX7's Single handedly projects included.

A couple motor swaps. I had this down to about 7 hours depending on what I needed to do with the accessories.

I swapped in an entire T-2 drive train. Trans, The entire rear end including the dif shocks a arms hubs etc. I found that dropping the entire rear sub frame with the suspension made this really simple. I also swapped out the front struts, A arms hubs brakes etc. I basically did a complete drive line and a 5 lug conversion in my 86 in a weekend.

Another weekend I did a Complete interior swap (all except the dash)

Pulled a motor in my 74 impala on a saturday morning with the intent of going to the junk yard and picking up a new / used one. I got there and they had sold it (I was pissed as it was a 50K 4 bolt 350 for cheep. Went home tore apart the motor I had and measured everything up. I also had several SBC in pieces so I took what I wanted / needed and by 4:00 I had a parts list I called several suppliers and managed to get all the bearings gaskets, cam and some other parts I needed. I then put the motor together on the stand and it was completed by 11:00 that night. Plugged it in the next morning and had it fired up by noon. The afternoon was spent meeting up some wiring and plumbing. I ended up spending a lot less than the yard motor and because I had pulled the "best" parts from my SBC collection I had a great motor. That thing lasted 4 years and was sold with the car. It was then put in a friends 80 Z28 and as far as I know lasted another 10 years before he sold it that with the motor to some on in NY.

Looking back on these thrashes I think I was nuts.

[/Edit]

I have been "working on the 924ssc project for years now. I was all set to dive in with the swap to MS and install the supercharger and that was the week that the head gasket in my mustang decided to die. I have been tinkering fixing that for about a month (nights weekends) I am hoping that it will be done today but I am a realist and winter is coming so the 924ssc project most likely will be put on hold until next spring.

I find it helps to have just one project and take small attainable steps. I know I have too many projects and not enough time/money so what I end up with is alot of yard art and dreams. I do still enjoy looking at them once in awhile I even turn a wrench. I really need to do something on my cars.

Been there, done that, etc., but I found a way to cope. Read this:

http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/tech-tips/24/

Jack

poopshovel wrote: I do not want to waste one minute of daddy/baby time. I can't work quietly while baby is sleeping. This has been my impass. The CRX HAS to get done. The Challenge car I couldn't really care less about, but too many people have put too much time into it to let it go.

babies can sleep through anything. gotta follow the andy nelson plan: when i have 30 minutes, i do a 30 minute job.