Challenge Supreme Court (Questions Answered Here!)

In reply to bigben:

That applies to all rules on a case-by-case basis. Basically, we don't want somebody's totally awesome $2005 Challenge car to not return simply because of a minor rules change, especially if it isn't some super loophole-y podium contender. Contact us in situations like this.

In reply to Dusterbd13:

Yep, printout of the picture/thread with a note will be fine. Just be prepared to be judged by a jury of your peers.

In reply to darkbuddha:

Yes, you may trade with yourself. Use a FMV calculation for each part, and if they have the same FMV, note that in your budget and say $0.

Yes, you may take advantage of people when trading or otherwise negotiating. A fair deal should leave both parties feeling screwed. The Challenge rewards fair deals, but really requires amazing deals to run at the front. Find those desperate people that want to trade a brand new nitrous kit for that used fuel pump. FMV is only for cases where you don't have a receipt, in all other situations you should be basing your budget on the actual money spent or received. If you do that fuel pump/nitrous kit trade, just list in your budget "Traded used fuel pump for nitrous kit even. $0 budget value. LOL NOOB"

The Challenge does not have residual values. Your budget is continuous from year to year, and all build books are archived at GRM World HQ, and we will print you a copy of your past budget upon reasonable request (not one hour before the event!) so you can continue a past year's build. If you build the car for $1000 total budget with $972 of trades and an engine that cost $490.92, then next year your budget will be a $1000 total budget with $972 of trades and an engine that cost $490.92.

In reply to darkbuddha:

Yes.

In reply to Tom Suddard:

Cool. Thanks guys.

And im fully prepared to be judged by a jury of my peers. But i honestly have nothing to hide, hence the build thread.

I've just been writing what sold to who, and for how much on printouts of my Craigslist part out ad. Hopefully, that'll be sufficient documentation of selloffs

Tom Suddard wrote: In reply to darkbuddha: Yes, you may trade with yourself. Use a FMV calculation for each part, and if they have the same FMV, note that in your budget and say $0.

Is that a bit different from the past? If the FMV part removed is worth more than the part swapped on, either via FMV of currently owned or actual price of something purchased, does that difference then hit the recoup?

Example: Challenge truck purchased at $500 comes w/ recently replaced set of shocks/struts. Score better shocks/struts for challenge purposes at the junkyard for $8 each. FMV of shocks/struts on vehicle works out to $20 each, but you're saving them for post challenge use. Sounds like you could then deduct the $48 from the budget (4x$12 diff), w/ it hitting the recoup limit.

In reply to bluej:

In that case, you would count $80 towards your recoup limit, because you've sold off $80 worth of stuff from your car, then bought $8 shocks from the junkyard.

Ah, right. But basically you're approving FMV removal of items from the vehicle w/out an actual trade or sale to another party?

Purchasing a former Challenge car to Re-Enter this year's Challenge...what's the starting budget?

Suppose I purchase a former Challenge car for $1000. The prior challenge budget was $1600. Is my startinge budget for the new effort $1000 with an allowed recoup of $500?

Or do I have to assume the prior builder's $1600 value and recoup previously used?

Conversely If I purchase a prior challenge car for $1950 and the former entrant built it for 1200$ what are implications for my starting points as far as starting points on budget and recoup?

Not trying any shenanigans. And this is soon it's a true arm's length transaction and not a straw purchase from a friend to play games.

In reply to Ovid_and_Flem:

Your starting point is what you paid. Makes no difference what the last guy spent.

replacement of failed parts

It used to be that if a part failed you could replace it without a budget hit. For example: piwer steering pump had been fine. But during testing starts making noise. Power steering pump had come with a parts car, so not a separate budget item. Is it fair to replace with a reman with no budget hit or not?

If I buy 2 cars for $400 as a package, and both will be built for the challenge, how do I account for each car's original purchase price? Is each car valued at the original package price, $400? If so, does that mean I could recoup up to $400 for each one? If not, would I split the purchase cost? At what ratio? 50-50?

Conversely, would the same logic apply if I only build one of them?

What if you sold last year's challenge truck for more than budget. The new owner wanted just a rolling chassis. I want to put the engine in this year's car. What is said budget hit. I got 1900 for truck and sold transmission for 400. I want to use the rear spoiler too.

stan_d wrote: What if you sold last year's challenge truck for more than budget. The new owner wanted just a rolling chassis. I want to put the engine in this year's car. What is said budget hit. I got 1900 for truck and sold transmission for 400. I want to use the rear spoiler too.

Was the engine accounted for separate from truck in previous years or did it come together?

bluej wrote: Ah, right. But basically you're approving FMV removal of items from the vehicle w/out an actual trade or sale to another party?

Seems fair to me as long as it is not abused.

If we have to assign FMV to junk we install on the car that is just laying around the garage likely left over from another project, then seems legitimate to me that we could deduct FMV for parts that we take off the challenge car and choose to save for another project instead of selling them. However, we need to be honest in the FMV that we assign to each, no downgrading the FMV of parts going on and inflating the FMV of parts coming off.

bigben wrote:

bluej wrote: Ah, right. But basically you're approving FMV removal of items from the vehicle w/out an actual trade or sale to another party?

Seems fair to me as long as it is not abused. If we have to assign FMV to junk we install on the car that is just laying around the garage likely left over from another project, then seems legitimate to me that we could deduct FMV for parts that we take off the challenge car and choose to save for another project instead of selling them. However, we need to be honest in the FMV that we assign to each, no downgrading the FMV of parts going on and inflating the FMV of parts coming off.

FMV Part Swap/Removal Continued

I agree, and still haven't decided how I feel about the clarification and that's part of why I was asking for more info. IMHO, it should only be able to be used for actual swaps of parts, not simply removing something. For example, challenge cars don't need radios and as I currently read this ruling, one could pull whatever radio (carpet? rear seat? door liner? headliner?) came with a vehicle and make an effort at an FMV against the recoup/overall budget without actually selling the part.

What about parts cars/bundles?

I THINK requiring it to be an actual part swap from the challenge vehicle would fix the potential for shenanigans here.

Same logic could be applied to parts cars/bundles. Example: buy an engine w/ accessories you're putting in the challenge vehicle and want to swap in a different cheaper alternator you scored, but keep the original as a spare on the shelf, but you can't just deduct the original alternator FMV if you need a different one to make the swap work.

In reply to bluej:

I think you just blew open a rather large loophole.

Allowing recoup for parts removed without actually selling them is not new- it's been interpreted that way for several years.

However, I have not seen it applied to parts cars, or any part removed. By that interpretation, almost no Challenge car should ever show up without claiming the entire $1008.50 in recoup.

Just makes it a $3000 Challenge.

FMV OF PARTS REMOVED from CHALLENGE VEHICLE BUT NOT SOLD[w/b]

It seems to defeat the purpose and intent of the challenge. But who am I to question the rules?

ADDENDUM; pursuant to Robbie's excellent suggestion below that we deal with real problems and not hypothetical the $250 difference in my build budget that this rules interpretation will affect immediate decisions about what I can legally do to an engine rebuild.

In reply to SVreX:

I was not aware of the recoup without selling being an established thing. Neither would a first time builder, I think.

Also, whether I "blew open" a loophole doesn't change that it was there to begin with. What people have done in the past helps how GRM decides to treat it (I think), but getting a firm answer is the point of this thread, right?

I still see there being two loopholes that need clarification:

Can FMV for a removed part still be counted for recoup if it's not replaced by another?

and

Can the FMV of parts from a "bundle" or parts car be treated similarly?

I actually lean towards "must be a swap" and if that is decided that way, then I could go either way on that being applied to bundles/parts cars. If it doesn't have to be a swap, I'd think it shouldn't be able to be applied to bundles/parts cars, for the same reason you illustrated.

Since bundles of parts came up, and I never got a solid answer from the powers-that-be...

Are parts bought as part of an 'all you can carry for $XX' deal at a junkyard considered as being one collective purchase, or is it treated as a massive proportional discount?

To avoid overpowering people with bold text, here's examples of each method.

Collective purchase, or 'box of parts': I get 5 spoilers for the $80 'all you can carry' price, and then sell 4 of them at $20 apiece, making my budget (and effective) cost for the remaining spoiler that I use on the car $0.

For the proportional, I get the same 5 spoilers for $80, and then sell 4 for $20. However, since they've considered individual purchases at a (not much in this case, but I digress) discount even though in the 'real world' I've zeroed out the purchase, the remaining spoiler is still a $16 item in my budget since the most I can recoup from each spoiler is $80/5 = $16.

Each has its ups and its downs- I just want to know which I should be using since I've already grabbed a few parts from one of these and will be getting more from an upcoming one in July.

I know we can go on and on thinking up extenuating circumstances and eccentric cases, but there is a difference between "I have this (or plan to have this) issue with my build or budget currently" and "I could see someone might have this issue".

Since the first is more immediately relevant and Tom is just one guy, maybe we can mark the questions if they have immediate impact to someone's build so he can prioritize which to answer?

I think the remove and replace sounds in line with the spirit of the event. However, the remove the stereo just to get extra budget money sounds like we're starting down that slippery slope. Could be justifiable or it could be a budget shenanigan.

SVreX wrote: In reply to bluej: I think you just blew open a rather large loophole. Allowing recoup for parts removed without actually selling them is not new - it's been interpreted that way for several years. However, I have not seen it applied to parts cars, or any part removed. By that interpretation, almost no Challenge car should ever show up without claiming the entire $1008.50 in recoup. Just makes it a $3000 Challenge.

WOW! I may need to get out from under the rock I've been under more often. This will save me a bunch of hours selling stuff. And, I wanted to keep some of the parts on the car and the parts car to boot.

In reply to bigben, bluej, and SVreX: that exact situation ("can I remove parts and subtract their FMV without actually selling them?") was ruled NFG by David S. Wallens himself back in 2004.

I may or may not have been the person who asked the question. I don't recall ever seeing that ruling reversed, but I will admit to not paying close attention to challenge rules for the last 8 years or so.