SOLD 2004 Honda S2000, Grand Prix White on Tan, 53k miles

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 9:37 am

Back when the first owner of Mike's car bought his, a *lot* of Porsche sales of cars like THAT one went like this:

Buyer: Hey, I just came into money and I want to buy a Porsche {Turbo/GT3/GT2}
Salesman: Okay, great, we can put your name on a list and should be able to have you one of those in a year or two.
Buyer: You're shitting me, right?
Salesman: Nope, there's a waiting list for that, sir, and there has been for years.
Buyer: Well, what can I have *now*?
Salesman: Let me show you this red 911 we just got in...

When I went looking for my 996 Turbo (the yellow 2002 one that I brought to the night series that one time), that was the story. I already had my M3 convertible, so I wasn't dying for anything, so I didn't even get on the list. But a few months later my salesman called and said he had a buyer back out and that I could have his spot in line for a car that was ready to be built. Could order it however I wanted. Went in, looked at the option price list, got almost no options, and ordered the car.

--Donnie

BretLuter · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 1:51 pm

MikeWhitney wrote:

Couple of things I have noticed driving an arrest-me-red-originally-$80k-sports car:

I need to correct this. It's an arrest-me-red-originally-$90k-sports car

Seriously? I mean it's a great car, but who in their right mind spends that kind of money on a car? I know, I know, a rich prick (which I am sure I look like now). Kendra and I decided that whenever someone comments about how nice it is, my reply will be "well I was going to buy a new Camry, but they are too expensive".

Sadly I didn't get a window sticker with the car, but this appears to be the option list and MSRP as best I can tell:

67900 Base MSRP
1490 Savanna Beige
2790 18" wheels BBS Sport Design
1239 Stability control
3240 Advanced Technic Litronic, Bose, CD Changer, washers
2100 Comfort package Dual power seats, driver seat memory
3250 Full leather
175 Wheel caps
1750 Flared rocker panels
2400 Sport exhaust
395 Supple leather
415 Heated seats
340 Rear wiper
115 Floor mats
1520 3-Spoke Str Whl-Dark Wood/Leather
875 Dk Maple Burr/Al Shift Knob/Brake Handle

89994 Total

"$2400 for a sport exhaust? Sure, that sounds like a good deal"

Thank god for rich people buying cars like these so normal plebs like myself get to enjoy them after 10 years.

Yeah, this is sooo true. I drive a ~$45k BMW 528i wagon, err "touring", that I paid $2500 for. Sure, it needed some attention but the guy I bought it from told me he was tired of high maintenance costs, like paying $800 for brake pads at the dealership (!!!). I guess that's why one of the rear pads was metal-to-metal when I bought the car- I spent about $125 for 2 new rotors and new brake pads, and it took me about 30 minutes start to finish to get them installed.

JamesShort · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 2:21 pm

The maintenance costs on luxury cars aren't usually *that* much more than a Honda/Toyota etc, its just that the shops/dealers know they can charge more. I have to say that I'm quite impressed with the online BMW parts suppliers that I've found: Pelican, Turner MS, FCP Groton etc. That parts aren't that expensive and I've already read the E46 Bentley manual and it's not really a hard car to work on. So I echo Bret in that people complain about maintenance costs on luxury cars, but it's just part of the game....gotta pay to play or do it yourself (I prefer the latter).

DickRasmussen · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 3:46 pm

MikeWhitney wrote:

Thank god for rich people buying cars like these so normal plebs like myself get to enjoy them after 10 years.

Mike, You are NOT normal in regard to anything related to cars and the ability/energy/facilities to work on them. :lol:

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 3:52 pm

Mike, any story on how those wheels got bent in the first place?

--Donnie

Chuck Branscomb · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 3:54 pm

JamesShort wrote:

The maintenance costs on luxury cars aren't usually *that* much more than a Honda/Toyota etc, its just that the shops/dealers know they can charge more. I have to say that I'm quite impressed with the online BMW parts suppliers that I've found: Pelican, Turner MS, FCP Groton etc. That parts aren't that expensive and I've already read the E46 Bentley manual and it's not really a hard car to work on. So I echo Bret in that people complain about maintenance costs on luxury cars, but it's just part of the game....gotta pay to play or do it yourself (I prefer the latter).

Use http://www.realoem.com via Firefox with Greasemonkey and the Gm script: http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/111782 -- integrates direct clicks to pricing. I use http://www.getbmwparts.com a lot for orders -- they show you the real MSRP along with their price (which is typically 20-25% off MSRP). Quick shipping too.

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

Donnie Barnes wrote:

Mike, any story on how those wheels got bent in the first place?

--Donnie

Just appears to be normal urban (Miami) driving, probably construction zones. Nothing else on the car is abused. I bent 2 wheels on the WRX once just from blasting through a construction zone and smacking a cut-joint at too fast a speed once.

I think every used car I have ever bought with <50 aspect ratio wheels has had some degree of bendage ... this was just bad enough on one wheel that I could feel it. Turns out it was about 0.100 out of round -- 0.015 or less is considered "straight" and 0.030 or more is considered "bent". Apparently used car places won't bother fixing a wheel unless it's > 0.030. Anything less than that is never obvious. All 4 wheels are less than 0.015 now.

If everyone stuck a dial gauge on their low-pro wheels and tires, I bet many of you would be surprised at how not-round your wheels are

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

JamesShort wrote:

The maintenance costs on luxury cars aren't usually *that* much more than a Honda/Toyota etc, its just that the shops/dealers know they can charge more. I have to say that I'm quite impressed with the online BMW parts suppliers that I've found: Pelican, Turner MS, FCP Groton etc. That parts aren't that expensive and I've already read the E46 Bentley manual and it's not really a hard car to work on. So I echo Bret in that people complain about maintenance costs on luxury cars, but it's just part of the game....gotta pay to play or do it yourself (I prefer the latter).

And from what I gather from talking to a bunch of people that own/work on these cars -- aside from the "big ones" (IMS, RMS, clutch, cats), there is very little on these cars that systematically wears out like on a BMW. No cooling systems to replace at 80k, no control arm bushings that are shot at 40k, no RTABs that disintegrate at 100k. No dangerous inner tierods at 120k. I talked to one guy who tracks a 170k mile 911 with original suspension, shocks, and control arms.

I've been over every inch of the car and all I have found that might need attention is one slightly loose swaybar link. Thankfully the small handful of "big stuff" has already been addressed, mostly under warranty.

Knock on wood. I do expect and welcome something to go bad so I can get my hands dirty, it's odd that I want to take it apart. I've already read up on how hard it is to drop the engine (it's not bad at all, was designed for it).

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 4:40 pm

MikeWhitney wrote:

If everyone stuck a dial gauge on their low-pro wheels and tires, I bet many of you would be surprised at how not-round your wheels are

Oh, okay. Didn't realize we were talking about stuff *that* tiny. Makes sense.

As for reliability, yes, it is very good on these cars. The quality of the engineering is on another level from most things.

--Donnie

Richard Casto · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 7:06 pm

MikeWhitney wrote:

Knock on wood. I do expect and welcome something to go bad so I can get my hands dirty, it's odd that I want to take it apart. I've already read up on how hard it is to drop the engine (it's not bad at all, was designed for it).

It sounds like you are already well read regarding the IMS issue. If you haven't seen this yet, you might want to read up on it...

http://www.flat6innovations.com/ims-guardian-home

It is a magnetic chip detection system that tries to detect IMS failure in advance. Jake Raby is the guy behind this. He is a bit of an ass, but he knows what he is doing. He is the main guy behind the aftermarket IMS solutions. The "guardian" system is kind of pricy. I don't know how much oil analysis costs, but I wonder if you just did that on a regular basis it might come out cheaper than his system. If it was me, the first time you have to pull the engine out (for any reason), I would update to one of his IMS solutions.

Richard

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

Richard Casto wrote:

MikeWhitney wrote:

Knock on wood. I do expect and welcome something to go bad so I can get my hands dirty, it's odd that I want to take it apart. I've already read up on how hard it is to drop the engine (it's not bad at all, was designed for it).

It sounds like you are already well read regarding the IMS issue. If you haven't seen this yet, you might want to read up on it...

http://www.flat6innovations.com/ims-guardian-home

It is a magnetic chip detection system that tries to detect IMS failure in advance. Jake Raby is the guy behind this. He is a bit of an ass, but he knows what he is doing. He is the main guy behind the aftermarket IMS solutions. The "guardian" system is kind of pricy. I don't know how much oil analysis costs, but I wonder if you just did that on a regular basis it might come out cheaper than his system. If it was me, the first time you have to pull the engine out (for any reason), I would update to one of his IMS solutions.

Richard

It's already had the ceramic IMS bearing from LN Engineering done to it about 10k miles ago, preventatively. So I am officially not worrying about it, unless of course I hear the rattle...

Donnie Barnes · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 8:39 pm

LOL, Jake is definitely strong-headed and outspoken, but I wouldn't go *quite* so far as to call him an ass. Pretty good engineer, though. His shop definitely leaves a little bit to be desired in terms of looks, but it gets the job done I guess. I'd definitely trust him to build a reliable powerplant for me, though.

FWIW, the Pinzgauer that I owned for a couple years was his personal vehicle that he used to engineer his own fuel injection kit for. Sold 20 of those kits and that was it. Mine was pretty rock solid. Crazy bastard was daily driving the Pinz for over a year, too! I'm not sure which would be worse, the lack of AC (he's in Georgia), lack of heat, or the fact that a Pinz tops out at about 57MPH.

Jake is not an electrical engineer, however. Long story short, he's lacking somewhat in that department, which I found via the Pinzgauer and subsequent discussions with him on the topic. He knows internal combustion, particularly air cooled stuff, and now pretty much anything horizontally opposed.

--Donnie

clinehall · **Posted:** Tue Oct 09, 2012 9:33 pm

MikeWhitney wrote:

Knock on wood. .

Guess that ugly ass steerling wheel is good for something. :twisted:

Richard Casto · **Posted:** Wed Oct 10, 2012 9:09 am

Donnie Barnes wrote:

LOL, Jake is definitely strong-headed and outspoken, but I wouldn't go *quite* so far as to call him an ass.

Well maybe I should have said "can be" instead of "is".

I have never dealt with him personally, but from what I can see his personality traits don't fit well with how he does things (or has done things in the past). I know that he has (may still) offer one on one tech support for a fee and this can result in him privately and publicly berating customers that don't live up to his expectations. Usually this is when they don't follow is directions, or maybe he just doesn't think they are smart or experienced enough to be doing what they are attempting to do. I have no doubt someone else with better people skills could get the same message across without the amount of abuse he can heap out. I suspect you just have to stay away from his buttons (which are probably many). But, he knows what he is doing. He is well known in the 914 community for his work on the Type IV engines and also the IMS work he and Charles Navarro (LN Engineering) have done for the 97-08 engines. I have no problem recommending him to people, but I do warn them!

Richard

MikeWhitney · **Joined:** Wed Aug 20, 2003 9:15 pm **Posts:** 4724

Really? 3 cars in one month? What the hell is wrong with me?

Here I go again...

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SOLD 2004 Honda S2000, Grand Prix White on Tan, 53k miles

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