According to You: The most fun you’ve had with cars on a budget
Last week, we asked members of the Hagerty Community about the most fun they’ve had with cars on a budget. Some of the answers might not surprise you, but I have a feeling at least one of the responses below might be something you’ve never considered before. So have a look, and tell us what we might have missed.
Gambler 500
Hagerty Community member @Eric participated in the Gambler 500, which is one of the most affordable ways to get out there and have fun. Especially with others, as I suspect Eric’s story below isn’t unique:
“I did the Gambler 500 for actually $500, at the peak of the used car market recently. My friends and I found a ’95 Honda Passport for $500 that had no brakes, a bent tie rod, a cracked valve cover that literally spit oil, and many other smaller problems. We fixed it up with exclusively junkyard parts (total parts cost under $400, so we spent the last hundred of our parts budget on stickers and paint) and got some used (nearly dead) 35″ tires for free, cut the fenders to make them fit, and ran the Gambler in it!
One of my crew’s daily driver broke down and he’s been dailying our Gambler car ever since, which is a testament to how well we fixed it up for so little money. This is a great way to spend a season’s weekends with your friends.”
Random adventures in a field
While @TG reminds us that “local back roads in one of my toys” is a great way to get a thrill for cheap, @Wayne has an entertaining story to go with this notion:
“I once found and bought a Volvo P544 from a field. I was able to get engine unseized without pulling the head off. Then one day when on a date, we drove some rough trails around Hamilton, Ontario. Someone must have reported the “joy-riders” to the police, and we subsequently met them on the way out.
They said, ‘Oh, you’ve got a girlfriend with you’ and didn’t say anything else. Luckily we drove off (on the road), and my now-wife never lets me forget this run-in with the police (who are real fun-loving people too).”
The 24 Hours of Lemons
I have spent a fair bit of time talking about The 24 Hours of Lemons, but @Steve has a fantastic first-hand account of the Lemons experience in a particularly affordable example of the genre:
“For me it’s racing at Thunderhill in the 24 Hours of Lemons series in a 4-door 1963 Plymouth Valiant. The Valiant was sporting a stock slant 6 and push-button A904 automatic. And trust me, duking it out in a bunch of hoopties on a racetrack while shifting with your left hand is insane fun.”
Exotic Car rentals
Renting an exotic definitely checks off a lot of affordable boxes for our question, at least compared to buying leasing one of these for a longer period of time. So @Darwin sets up a great reason to rent an exotic instead of a boring family sedan or SUV from the airport.
“I had a reservation for an exotic car in Las Vegas, which I was planning to drive to Zion National Park with a best friend. The rental outlet couldn’t come through with the Aston-Martin that I had requested so I was given a new 911 for a significant discount. We drove to Zion (very quickly) and then the next day received record, unexpected snowfall once we were deep in the park. Was a harrowing, yet exciting drive getting out. Lots of fun, lots of memories, for a fraction of the price of the Aston.”
Any rental car?
But, by the same extension, isn’t any rental vehicle a cheap way to have fun? Or as @TG put it:
“I went from Denver to Montrose in a company rental. It’s cheaper and I generally arrive sooner than the flight!”
Ice Racing
Provided you live in the right location, racing on ice is an affordable and thrilling way to enjoy a vehicle. Here’s what @Mike experienced in a very interesting vehicle:
“Participating in an “icecross” (autocross on a snow/ice-covered course laid out on a kinda plowed out dirt field), upstate New York in the dead of winter. I was driving my $50, pulled-out-of-the-junkyard Renault 4CV, which actually has amazing traction (31-69% weight distribution front to back) even on regular tires. Glad I was wearing a helmet…the course was so rough the helmet smashed the dome light on the driver’s side. The car was pretty rusty so I wasn’t sure it would hold together, but it did. No trophy, but a lot of fun sliding around and cornering on the snowbanks.”
Autocross
Regional autocross events near you are not hard to find in most parts of the country, and @Tim is proof positive of this being both approachable and affordable:
“Autocross your daily. Our local club charges only $35 per day. And while it’s not budget, my next suggestion is definitely high value per dollar: get your friends together and race with The 24 Hours of Lemons.”
Track Days
I am a big fan of HPDEs put on by local enthusiast organizations, as they are pretty cheap for all the track time and professional instruction you receive. But @TG takes it a step further, suggesting a “track day in an Indy (style) car” would be the most bang for the buck. Hard to argue with that!
Off-road Parks
As I mentioned last week with my suggestion for rallycross events, @Dean rightly reminds us all that these events are often held in offroad parks that are open for more than just competitive rallycross.
“I’ve taken a 1947 Willys CJ2A at the new Holly Oaks Off Road Park. Sure it only has 60 horsepower, but there’s that 40:1 gear reduction drivetrain. If you want to go sometime, you let me know.”
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Back in the early ‘80’s most of my friend that had really nice “survivor“ muscle cars bought winter beaters to save them for nice sunny day cruising. I had a ‘68 Cadillac Coupe’ DeVille I bought from a piano tuner for $400 (which was quite a sum in 1980 dollars) and went off road on gas pipelines in the woods of northern NJ. Never once did I get hopelessly stuck, but I did manage to constantly shed the exhaust system. Prep was just lowering the power antenna, removing the fender skirts & wheel covers & having good all-season or snow tires all around.
One of my buddies had a ‘70 Buick Electra 225 & another had a ‘68 Lincoln Continental. We would climb up a large mountain and see all these Jeep guys at the top & they would ask us how we got up there. We’d say “our luxury sedans, of course!”
Come on Hagerty, do you REALLY want to encourage people wrecking what might be decent collector cars?might
Yes, I’m referring to the Gambler 500 and the Lemons race….and demo derbies everywhere.
All they are is wealthy people to show that they are wealthy enough to destroy cars that many could like to put to good use, all in the name of getting a good bar story.
Not very responsible.
The Lemons event is a particular disgrace, by disrespecting a car for some cheap laughs. c
Sorry, that these out of fashion cars may not be the 911 that these trust fund babies got for not dropping out of the ivy league, but to many, they meant a great deal, these humble cars were all they could afford and they gave years of faithful service.g
The car hobby has enough enemies, do we really want to give the opponents more ammunition to use against us?
Oh, pooh!!
I was just about to suggest Demolition Derbies as a cheap source of (short-term) automotive fun. I don’t know any DD drivers who are wealthy — often they’re tow-truck drivers or mechanics with access to plenty of cheap discarded or worn-out cars that’re headed to the crusher anyway. It seems to me a fun way to end the car’s life. Maybe not “dignified,” but that’s sort of up to the car. I still have high respect for the ’53 Chevy wagon that survived a long DD bout with its rear frame broken and bent back on itself so the rear universal joint was running at almost 90 degrees. And that was 60 years ago!
As a partaker, I would be interested in hearing the data behind “wealthy people.” Lemons came out of the idea of bringing those high-faluting hobbiest races in SCCA down to us plebes. After having my leg duck taped to an SCCA guy’s leg, I can tell you that at least of one of them SCCA guys lacks a sense of humor. Converesly, it truly does take a wealthy person to take a LeMons salvage title car to the Concours status you’re looking for. After all, it has to be $500 after the good bits are sold off. Mine was $6, although yes I got a good deal because Edmunds thought that it was worth $50.
Back in the late 60’s early 70’s we would go driving in snowstorms in our Vdub beetles in rural sections of Bucks County PA. We usually had a group of about half a dozen cars. The lead car would pick a cornfield to drive into. The person that went the furthest was the winner. When the cars got stock we would pick them up by the front bumper and turn them around in their tracks and drive back out to the road. Bumper hitching was fun also but very dangerous.
Many years ago, Grass Roots Motorsports was loaned several then-new VW Scirocco’s to play with for a weekend. I was invited to drive not only one of those but also a well-cared for Camaro IROC Z. I was faster through an official SCCA Pro Solo course in the Chevy by a few hundreds than the VW. My cost? Zero dollars and no sense of worry about breakage! I’ll never forget the day!
If you can drive it enjoy it. It doesn’t matter how.