After you see an ad like this, how can you resist the Goggomobil? Goggo! Goggo! Every day, you look at your Goggo-free garage and sigh wistfully (but secretly feel relieved that it's impossible to find a Goggomobil project). But wait! What have we here? Yes, it's a genuine 1966 Goggomobil TS 250, available for under four grand! Now you can have your own tiny German two-stroker, and all you need to do is finish the "necessary COMPLETE RESTAURATION" the seller had planned to do when he or she bought it. Don't worry about hard-to-find parts, because the seller says "As far as I can tell it's COMPLETE - ALL the parts for completion seem to be there including a complete owners/shop manual in German." See, everything you need, though the disclaimers "as far as I can tell" and "seems to be there" might cause a tiny bit of trepidation in the hearts of our more suspicious readers. There's rust. The engine "turns freely" (possibly because all the rods are lying in a heap in the oil pan). How hard could it be? Thanks to UDMAN and Mad_Science for the tip!

Come on, a 250cc engine? That's hella small! You need more than 15 ponies moving your ride these days, and you also need a truck bed! Obviously, the El Camino is the cartruck for a discerning sophisticate such as yourself, but where's the hell? El Caminos are easy projects! But hold on there- what if you were to drop the drivetrain of a Buick Grand National into a G-body El Camino? No, wait- what if you were to graft the front bodywork and interior from a Grand National onto that El Camino, then add boost until the transmission begs for mercy? Why, then you'd have something much like this 1979 El Camino with 87 Turbo Buick Everything, that's what! In one of our all-time favorite pieces of car-ad description, the seller estimates that this project is 87% COMPLETE. Not 84%, mind you, or even 88%. The engine came out of an alleged 10-second Grand National, runs on race gas only, and has already fried the unnamed automatic transmission (which "NEEDS WORK"). Also unnamed is the "bulletproof" posi rearend, which we sure hope is at least a GM 12-bolt. The line "FUEL LINE busted and i took front bumper off to try to fit a front mount intercooler (was not sucsesfull)." is somewhat disconcerting, but no doubt you'll unravel that mystery and oh-so-many others with this project. Then you'll be King of the Hoons!

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The early 3 series cars are fun, no doubt, but what if your driving style mandates a pushrod V8 and associated sliding-backwards-out-of-a-cloud-of-smoke glory? You could work all manner of complicated turbocharging voodoo by simply opening your wallet and pouring its contents over the BMW four or six... or you could do what this crazy individual has done: Yes, folks, it's a 1983 BMW 3 Series with Chevrolet LS1 V8, and the Buy It Now is a ridiculous $4,500. Four and a half grand! It looks like a lot of the work wasn't done with Sawzall and hoseclamps, which could well mean that you'll just have the usual nightmarish somewhat troublesome details to work out with the swap. It might even handle acceptably, what with the engine set so far back. Thanks to Thunder for the tip!

Come on, everyone is dropping LS1s in just about any car you can think of- they'd be rolling their eyes down at the local engine-swap bar (what, you don't have an engine-swap bar in your neighborhood?) were you to rumble up in an LS1 3 Series. No, you need boost and plenty of it, with a Toyota 1JZGTE stuffed into a family station wagon! Say, this 1989 Volvo 740 wagon with twin-turbocharged 1JZGTE engine, for example. You can tell the time is right to make a persuasive sub-asking-price offer on this fine Swedo-Nippon machine, because the seller laments: "with a few recent problems I've been forced to abandon all projects and just get something that is not going to take up my bank roll." You see? It's an easy project, and you happened to come along at just the right time to snap it up! Don't worry about the wiring harness, which the seller- in a fit of un-Craigslist-like honesty- describes as "pretty ****ty," since you'll sort out the glitches in a matter of minutes. What could go wrong? Thanks to Mr4Runner for the tip!

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135 horsepower from a sub-2-liter engine was pretty good in 1978, and that's what the Saab 99 Turbo managed that year. In a car weighing just 2,600 pounds, 135 horses gave a power-to-weight pretty close to what you got from a '78 Corvette... at a price tag $500 higher than the top-of-the-line Chevy. Thanks to the magic of depreciation, however, it's possible to get a Saab 99 Turbo project for a fairly reasonable price nowadays. They're not so easy to find, what with the rust and breathtaking repair costs over the decades, but we've managed to find one for- you ready for this?- just 600 bucks! Yes, this '78 Saab 99 Turbo (go here if the ad disappears), which appears to be reasonably complete (if you count random parts in boxes), is available for just six Benjamins. The seller was going to put in a black interior and paint it metallic burgundy, and that plan must add value, right? It's got rust, including an 8" x 8" hole in the floor, the engine is out of the car and has a crack in "the manifold" (we're guessing exhaust). No problem! It's been sitting for years and the registration seems dodgy, but don't let that scare you away from the incredible Swedish potential of this Hell Project!

When you're talking about Turbo Malaise Hell, is there anything that can beat a carbureted draw-through turbo system? Why yes, there is: a draw-through turbocharging system that uses a computer Quadrajet! The computer Q-jet is fun enough when naturally aspirated, but bolt it to a hair-dried Pontiac 301 (an engine which itself is the essence of V8 Malaise) and the fun really begins. That's right, we're talking about the notorious Turbo Trans Am... and not just any Turbo Trans Am. We've found a genuine 1980 Indy 500 Pace Car Turbo Trans Am (go here if the ad disappears) for you! The price tag is a grand higher than the Saab's, but that's just because this car is more complete. Now, we're not musclecar purists around these parts, but there's really no choice with a Turbo Trans Am Indy Pace Car but to restore it to its full Malaise glory, 210 unreliable blown horses and all. Oh, sure, you could drop a modern fuel-injected turbocharged small-block Chevy in there and get reliability and power, but then you wouldn't be experiencing the full nostalgic impact of 1980. This one needs some work, no getting around that; first, there's rust (from the car "sitting for years back east"), and we're not talking about harmless surface rust. It doesn't run, but the seller seems to feel that it'll fire right up with the addition of a new distributor, and maybe he or she is right!

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When a car ad leads off with the statement "This is another car that I have exhumed from my graveyard," you know you're in for a real treat. Better install some good air-conditioning in your garage, because it'll get mighty hot in there once you drag this '76 Lancia Scorpion inside! You Yurpeans might know this car as the Montecarlo, but don't let the similarity fool you- the US version had 81 horsepower instead of 120, because Yurp decided it would be better to allow asthmatic children to die horrible hydrocarbon-enhanced deaths than to strangle car engines with emission control hardware during the Malaise Era. Naturally, that means you'll need to do something about the 1756cc engine currently in this car, but it's probably a boat anchor by now, anyway, as the car "has been sitting out in the weeds and weather for many years" and probably wasn't running when placed in its weedy home. We suggest installing a supercharged Toyota 4A-GZE out of an MR2, which should be a no-sweat swap... right? You know it! The seller claims it's a parts car, but we know you'll be able to bring it back to life in a couple of weekends.

So the Toledo 24 Hours of LeMons race is coming up and you still don't have a car? How about a Merkur XR4Ti, such as the one the confusingly-named Team Flying Hyundai drove in the Altamont race? Come on now, you might whine, nobody really sells an XR4Ti that cheap! Au contraire, my skeptical Midwestern wannabe-racer friend! Just take a look at this '89 Merkur XR4Ti, which has a price tag of just 600 bucks and actually runs! Well, to be honest, the statement "Runs and drives, but needs work" generally means "it makes noise when you turn the key," but that's better than a car that doesn't do anything. It's priced $100 over the 24 Hours of LeMons limit, but we suspect the price is negotiable (besides, if I can sell $280 worth of parts from a $100 Volvo, you should be able to squeeze a measly C-note out of a Merkur). Many, many problems bedevil the electrical accessories, but all you'll need to do is tear out everything a race car won't need and then pray that you can still get the engine computer to work. Thanks to SundaySunday for the tip!

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We'd sure love to have an NSX, but it's pretty tough to find an example that's really a low-cost-of-admission project, for the same reason it's tough to find cheap project Ferraris. But how about that sweet DOHC NSX V6 engine in a more affordable car? Like, say, this Legend with a '97 NSX engine (go here if the ad disappears), which 500 bucks plus a trip to the bustling desert metropolis of Bullhead City will make your very own nightmare pride and joy. Five hundred little dollars! That's a 290-horse C32B in there, friends... well, it had 290 horsepower when it left Honda's hands; we're guessing a few of the ponies may have fled by now. The transmission is bad, and the condition of the body suggests that the car may have been hooned to oblivion driven enthusiastically prior to the transmission failure, but: cheap! Oh yes, the statement "in rage of tranny going out the windshield with need replaced" seems to indicate that the owner of this car has had enough... but you won't feel that way when it's your punishment dream car!
Thanks, and a half-credit towards a PCH Tipster T-shirt, to EMPM Esq for the tip!

Maybe you're hoping for something a little more sleeper-ish than a Legend, since everyone knows even the stock Legends are fairly quick machines. How about a Civic sedan stuffed with lots and lots of boost? You can probably count on the fingers of one hand the number of turbocharged Civics that look like plain-vanilla commuters, so imagine the fun you'd have smoking the front tires through all the gears in a fourth-gen Civic sedan (and nuking your third transaxle in a week, but you'll deal with that later). Now, the cheapest and easiest way to dive into Blown Civic Hell is to take on someone else's unfinished project, and we've found a real screamin' deal for you: this '90 Civic with turbocharged D15B VTEC engine (go here if the ad disappears) for only $1,500. Normally, we'd say the first thing you'd need to do with such a project is finish the running gear setup, but with this car we need to declare a 27-alarm emergency on the paint job, which appears to be a sort of Yakuza Police black-and-white deal. Once you're done making it look like Grandma's commuter econobox, you can do something about the fuel-delivery system; looks like the current owner installed a turbo kit without upgrading the fuel injectors... and has been driving it that way, which means the engine is getting fed a cutting-torch-lean fuel/air mix every time the turbo takes effect. Don't worry, though, because the seller has only "taken into boost 1 TIME YES IT WILL BOOST" What could go wrong?

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We had observed that many teams gave themselves a big advantage in the pits (both for parts to use on their own cars and for horse-trading leverage with other teams) by bringing parts cars to the last couple of LeMons races, and we were determined to do the same. As an added bonus, with a parts car you can pick and choose the best shocks, brake calipers, etc. to put on your racer. I figured I'd put up an ad and then offer the standard wrecking-yard 50 bucks to those who responded, but I hadn't banked on the desperation of those who are sick of staring at the immobile hulk of a dead Volvo day after day, month after month. Once my Craigslist ad went up, I had three responses within the same day, one of which came from the owner of an '85 242 Turbo that was in a back yard just a few miles from Black Metal V8olvo HQ. This car had been purchased a few years back by a guy who stripped it of all the turbo goodies and some other pieces, and he wanted it gone from his yard ASAP. The price: free! Needless to say, we had the trailer over there within 20 minutes of talking to the guy.


Yes, the Turbo 242s are highly sought-after cars, but this one was pretty well trashed. It did have three Draco rims, a usable battery, decent shocks, and thousands of little parts that would save us many schleps to the junkyard over the following months.


Doesn't look like there's anything of use in that thoroughly grody leather interior, but we grabbed the steering wheel and the clock for the race car...


... and the wiring harness proved to be incredibly useful when harvesting connectors, relays, and wire to use in the race car.


Don't weep over this 242T's fate, Volvo lovers- its shell shall live on in racing glory, for the Evil Genius himself will be gutting this car and turning it into a full-on (Volvo-powered) racer in the near future! Don't you love a happy ending?

This one is very close to being a true beater, but it's not quite there yet.


The '82 Turbo's engine produced a respectable-for-Malaise 180 horsepower, 20 more than the Camaro Z28's 305-cube V8. And this one has some snazzy pinstripes! Do you suppose the owner of a car with the license plate MO GIGI has anything in common with MO REES across town?


And T-tops, for that true Malaise sensation. Do the Datsun T-tops leak as badly as the GM ones?

Oh yeah, and if you liked the '82, the same seller also had this 9,092-mile '84 300ZX Turbo, which went for $28,000.

In spite of the snow on the ground, it wouldn't have been a bad day for top-down Saab driving- 60 degrees, sunny, and pleasant out that day!

Celicas with All-Trac AWD and turbocharging are a blast to drive, but they're quite rare- you'll need to drop close to ten grand for a nice one. But you're a barbarian with a wrench in your pocket, and you know you can save a bundle by starting with an All-Trac that needs a little bit of work. Say, this 1991 Celica All-Trac, for example; while we don't know the reserve price, it's only been bid up to $1,200 at the time of this writing. The seller says "the olny thing wrong with it is it needs a shift control cable, and the bolt for the front sway bar," so there ya go! A few body parts, a little elbow grease, and it'll be good as new!

Toyota, Toyota, Toyota... sure, they're well built and reliable and all that, but everyone's got one! That's why you're a Mitsubishi sort of masochist aficionado, so you can stand out from the crowd. Yes, from the Zero all the way up to this 1991 Galant VR-4, the triple-diamond logo has meant "quality" for decades. This car has the same 4G63 engine and powertrain used in the Talon/Eclipse, but the wrapper is total stealthy sleeper, and this example looks pretty clean in the photos. What fun you'll have with it... once you get it running right, of course. According to the seller: "NOW FOR THE BAD THIS CAR WILL NEED A NEW FUEL PUMP CAR DOES RUN AND DRIVE BUT ONCE U HIT BOOST IT CUTS OFF THE COMPUTER IS THROWING A FUEL PUMP CODE," which means you'll have some fuel-system woes, starting with the fuel pump and ending... well, that's why it's Project Car Hell!

Now that's a freakin' hood ornament! This car listed at $26,265 when new, which is about $75,588 in 2007 bucks. 75 grand! The funny part is that the owner came out while I was photographing his car and offered to sell it to me for $600, which means its value has depreciated about 99.2% since new. Hmmm... knock off $100 and it's 24 Hours of LeMons ready!


This car has the turbocharged version of the unkillable Mercedes 5-cylinder diesel engine... an engine that deserves mention as a Workhorse Engine of the Day, when we continue with that series.


This example is on the rough side, with lots of dents and dings, but it still runs well enough to be used on the owner's daily 50-miles-each-way commute.


The Malaise bumpers don't look so great, but otherwise this design has held up very well over the decades.

The Porsche 944 Turbo was a badass piece of machinery, no doubt about it. Rear-wheel-drive, as near perfect weight distribution as German engineering can devise, and horsepower ratings approaching the magical 100-per-liter threshold. Wouldn't it be great to find a nice clean one, in good running condition, for three grand? Yeah, it sure would be great... but for now the best we can offer at that price is this 1984 944 with a 1986 944 Turbo engine (go here if the ad disappears). Heck, did we forget to mention that the turbo engine is kinda not quite installed? There may be a few pesky details to deal with when it comes time to do the swap, but rest assured that the seller is offering a crazy-good deal here; in his or her words: "I have a situation that has come up that requires money, unfortunately the only thing I have to liquidate is my baby." Oh, and the engine is in a million billion tiny pieces, and the Porsche 944 was designed by The Evil One himself to frustrate attempts to perform even the most minor maintenance, so you might want to budget more than just a couple weekends for this project.

Porsches are great cars, of course, but they're so obvious. Your dentist probably has a couple, and lots of people do an automatic Porsche Driver = Putz calculation when they see one go by. But you've got $3500 just begging to be turned into a Hell Project and you want something fast and turbocharged... in fact, you want something with two turbochargers. Have we got your car or what? Step on over here, sonny, and slide behind the wheel of this 1991 Nissan 300ZX Twin Turbo (go here if the ad disappears)! Yes, yes, that is the engine you see on the ground in front of the car, but don't let that scare you. In the seller's words, "My mechanic pulled the engine out to replace both turbos. After he was done with turbos, he suddenly left everything behind and fled." This car is so hellish that it drove some poor mechanic out of town, but are you going to let that minor drawback stop you from taking it on as a project? The '91 300ZX Twin Turbo engine makes a mighty 300 horsepower... which is just the starting point for what you'll get once you make with the boost-enhancing upgrades.

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Many of you are probably thinking you'd go with a Mercedes-Benz turbodiesel for your bacon-grease-powered machine, and others would suggest a big ol' Detroit truck. Nuh-uh... those thangs ain't available in Hell! Besides, they're boring, and you're a trendsetting stylemaster- that's why you need this 1983 Peugeot 505 Turbodiesel! Now, before you go clutching your head in both hands and moaning about French cars and their totally undeserved rep for reliability problems and part-obtainment woes, just take a look at this car. See how nice it looks? Why, the interior looks great, and the body is straight (well, the parts we can see in the photos, anyway). Any car this well-preserved is probably in tip-top mechanical condition, and a diesel with 177,000 miles is just getting started! And man, just $1500? Sold! So, you rig up a heated tank in the back to keep the bacon grease liquid, add some big filters, and tell Big Oil to kiss your Peugeot-drivin' ass!

Have any Americans ever seen, or even heard of a turbodiesel Toyota Camry? No? Well there ya go- simply by peeling 1500 frogskins off your roll, you could have this 1985 Camry Turbodiesel, thus becoming the only person in your time zone to have one. And the mid-80s Camrys actually have some character, unlike the soporific appliances they became later, so you won't suffer from Camry Ennui as you roar past all the stranded dinosaur-juice machines with your tank full of hemp oil (and your head full of another hemp product). The good news about this car is that everything other than engine-related stuff is easy to find in the junkyard (and Toyota quality as well). The bad news is... well, where the hell you gonna find Toyota diesel engine parts? Yes, Europeans, you got plenty of 'em over there... but this car's in California! The seller says the timing belt needs replacing, the injector timing is bad, and the turbo might be bad (probable translation: engine is on its last legs). But hey, nobody needs to know about it if you go swap in a Mercedes turbodiesel engine, do they? That should be, oh, about a one-weekend project, right?

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This is the "after" photograph of team mechanic Walter's Saab, which was cannibalized for numerous parts for the race cars during the race. His daily driver car, which he had intended to drive home after the race. Did these guys deserve to win it all or what? All right, enough from me- let's hear the tale of Team Saabs Gone Wild, in the words of LTDScott and teammate Alex:

The Saabs gone wild team fielded three cars, all 80's Saab 900 turbos. Two of the three cars were trailered in, but the third was street legal (passed smog and all!) and drove up from L.A. under its own power. It was loud, hot and windy at 80mph, and power steering fluid was leaking onto the exhaust, but it made no complaints otherwise.
When we arrived on Friday afternoon, we realized we had no tools, as our team mechanics were several hours behind us. So unfortunately we weren't able to get the cars out on the track immediately (silly things like glass and lights had to be removed, and we had no tools). The other cars had no gas in the tank. Man, we were off to a great start. Finally around 5pm the rest of the crew arrived, and work began in earnest.
3 cars meant thrice the amount of work, which turned out to be pretty devastating when it came right down to it. Trying to motivate a dozen people is not easy. Tires needed to be changed, gas runs made, final prep work, tech inspections, stickers applied, etc etc etc. It's like having triplets.
Somehow we managed to get everything done in time to turn some practice laps. The Altamont folks were kind enough to extend practice until 8:30pm, which allowed us to get all three cars up to speed for a few minutes. It was determined that lower air temps and familiarity with the course significantly improved lap times. With an open course we could run low 52 second laps consistently, versus our best 56.5 in July. All of the cars ran well, even the last minute one.
The time flew by and soon enough they were kicking us out. We vowed to return with more gas cans and a few more spare parts in the morning.

Race Day #1
Since we got most of the prep work done the day before, there wasn't a whole lot to do in the morning but finish decorating the cars and install radios and cameras.
Our team cars had a Viking theme. The centerpiece was none other than Valkyrie, riding into battle on her trusty steed— the black #3 car, which was a veteran of the July race (we came in 13th). We also ran a Viking ship with shields (black #4) and a silver Viking horned helmet (#2). We got a few appreciative smiles, although nothing quite like the Maximus guys. They did end up with the People's Choice award for their car and togas.
The field was packed at the start. In a perfect world, 80 cars on a 1 mile track means approximately 50 feet between you and the next car. In reality, it meant was trying to stay out of trouble with the dozen cars swarmed around you. Some of the larger cars took advantage of the traffic to go barreling into turns like a shark diving into a school of minnows. Team Do Or Die (the hearse) was one of them.
They basically didn't care who was around and just went for the shortest possible line through the turns. They took out several cars this way. We were one of them. The driver in our silver #2 car said he could see the guy's hands in the rear view mirror and he didn't even try to make the turn. The hearse hit him so hard he was spun completely around. The impact trashed the rear axle. This was less than one hour after the start. This car went into the pits and received a donor axle, placing it out of the top running.
Thus began the cannibalization of the mechanic's car. One of our team sponsors - Walter Wong - is a top notch Saab mechanic in L.A. He and two of his techs drove up to the race in a Saab 900 that he had recently purchased and intented to resell for profit. When the axle on #2 got bent, most of the team figured the car was done. But not Walter. He had a never say die attitude, so he and his guys swapped the rear axle from his own car to get #2 back in the race.
All of us who ran in July quickly realized that the level of competition had been taken up a few notches. Drivers were taking chances in complete disregard for their own or others' safety. I believe Jay did his best to penalize the biggest offenders, but there's only one of him and 80 of us. We later found out that Jay gave the Do or Die Team quite the tongue lashing and made them park in their pits for a while to cool down.
We did not escape punishment either. The second yellow of the race came without warning and caught one of our guys unaware. He continued at race speed and passed 6 cars before slowing down. He was black flagged and had open mustard bottles attached to the hood. We made sure to obey yellows after that.
Our next casualty was the Valkyrie (black #3). We were running great until a blow from one of the many BMW's in the field broke the passenger side half shaft. We were in 6th place. The mechanics grabbed a half shaft from their street car and got it back to running condition, but it effectively ended that car's bid at a top finish. Not 30 minutes later, one of the drivers spun in the gravel on one of the infield turns and narrowly missed being in a head on collision. When he restarted the car he was blinded by the sun and couldn't see the giant mud pit just off the course, and drove right into it, getting himself thoroughly stuck.
After being pulled out of the muck, it was finally my turn behind the wheel at around sundown. Once I hopped in the car, I immediately experieced a horrible vibration from the front end while going around the banked part of the course. It felt like one of the CV joints was going to let go, but I decided to just ride it out. That is, until I hit the brakes to make the sharp left hander before the starter's podium and found I had none. Luckily I found this out before starting into the fast banked part of the oval and entering the chicane - that would have sucked. So I limped it into the pits and discovered that the mud caked up inside the passenger front wheel had split one the brake line and leaked out all of the fluid, in addition to causing the vibration. A 20 minute pit stop fixed the brake problem (again stealing parts from the mechanic's car) and netted me a new set of tires - I forgot what it was like to not just constantly understeer around the fastest parts of the track!
A short while later, I spun out and stalled the car... that's when I broke the ignition switch trying to restart it, and had to sit and watch cars fly past me while sitting in a precarious position in the chicane until I got a push from one the service trucks and was able to bump start the car.
While all this was going on, the silver car (#2) had been steadily turning laps. The only concern was wisps of white smoke during shifts. It was still making good power under boost and the car felt tight. This, however, was a warning that the head gasket was ready to let go. We didn't have any stop leak and the car was running on straight water, so the mechanics decided to let it die. We had a spare engine after all.
An hour later the gasket gave up. There was only steam left in the coolant reservoir by the time it made it back to the pits. It was 6pm, just 3 1/2 hours after the start. We sent two teams out to auto parts stores to find a cherry picker and an assortment of necessesities. By 11pm the non-turbo engine from the mechanic's car was a running engine in #2, thanks to an amazing host of mechanics and pit crew.
Somewhere in all of this, the #4 car had been running great until an unknown electrical issue killed the engine after a hard hit on the left front corner (where the ignition box resides). After several hours, one of the mechanics correctly diagnosed the issue, but in the process fried the starter. Oops. We would have to wait for a parts store to open in the morning to fix it.
The end of the first day left the #3 car in 47th position. #4 and #2 were 67th and 73rd, respectively. It was a disheartening midpoint given our expectations, but at least we hadn't gone home yet. There was still life in this team.

Race Day #2
We started early by getting both the #2 and #4 cars up and running. They rejoined the field at the start of racing for day 2, determined to claw their way back through the diminished field. Just 50 cars returned to kick off the second leg of this endurance race.
The drivers of the #2 car realized quickly that they would not be turning fast laps. The engine the mechanics had put in was a non-turbo, making a good 50 HP less than its turbo'ed brethren. To make matters more interesting, the throttle cable would stick occasionally, sending the engine to bounce off the rev limiter. Admitting that the car would not be competitive, we decided to just keep it out there for laps. Our enterprising mechanics grabbed the bent rear axle and welded it on as a front bumper for the rest of the race. They took turns hassling the hearse.
I took another turn behind the wheel of the #3 car, and my stint was uneventful with the exception of making a Miata the meat in an Integra/Saab sandwich during an unavoidable multi-car pileup in the chicane. There was only minor damage to my car, but I later learned the incident killed the radiator on the Miata. D'oh.
Meanwhile, the #4 car was looking good. All of the drivers were able to turn decent laps and they were quickly making up time. Then, around 3 hours from the end of the race, the transmission quit.
#2 obligingly pushed the #4 car back to the pits, where it was determined that the transmission was completely shot. Having used up the spare engine and tranny from the mechanics' car, this was the nail in the coffin for #4. It would not finish the race and ended in 57th place. #2 finished in a dismal 72nd place. #3 bravely pushed on to finish 25th.
Fittingly, our team won the "Most Heroic Fix" award - a broken connecting rod trophy. We gave the trophy to Walter the mechanic, because he and his guys deserved it. He stripped his street car of all usable parts and left it for the recyclers to take.
Well, a disappointing finish for us, but good fun was had by all.

Before you check out our gallery, be sure to check out the 100+ excellent LeMons photos provided by Team Saabs Gone Wild here, then take a look at LTDScott's personal collection here.

We never saw too many Renault Fuegos in the US of A, but they were head-on competition for the likes of the Manta and Capri over in Europe (with body design by Rober Opron, the same guy who did the Citroën SM), and the Fuego Turbo was a hot little front-driver. "That's all well and good," you say, nervously fingering the piggybank containing your project car budget, "but I can't afford one!" Well, our bankroll-challenged friend, you can certainly afford this '82 Fuego Turbo, with a self-proclaimed "motivated seller" starting the negotiations with a humble $750 asking price. Less than $750 for such a car? Sacre bleu! Now, there's a small dose of reality in this dream, because the seller forgot to mention whether or not it runs. He or she also neglected to describe such things as the condition of, well, anything. We're sure that's just because the tears dripping on the keyboard rendered it inoperable- to give up one's Fuego Turbo? The pain! Looks like it needs a catalytic converter to pass smog (that's assuming that a new cat will fix, say, six burned valves) and, naturally, it's a bill-of-sale-only car (i.e., you will become very, very familiar with the personnel at your local DMV as you attempt to deal with the title paperwork). We figure one weekend of wrenching, tops, and you'll be tearing up the roads in your Fuego.

If one turbocharger is good, two must be better, right? And then what if you prefer rear-wheel-drive hoonage to front-drive torque-steer madness? Or you feel that your driving style is more Italian than French? If you answered "yes" to any or all of these questions, yet your trembling fingers are still clutching the $750 you counted out for the Fuego, have we got the project car for you! Yes, by God, it's a genuine twin-turbocharged Maserati for the same price as the Fuego Turbo! This one is a bit rougher than the Fuego, we admit, but the seller gives you more description in the listing. Sure, none of it is meaningful description, but you get more of it. But hey, the car "does 0 to 60 in what feels like ludicrous speed." Not only that, but "IT'S LIKE RIDING THE TEACUPS IN DISNEYLAND!" Apparently that means you spin around and around until a 7-year-old pukes a foaming gutload of Sugar Smacks and Mr. Pibb down your shirt when you drive it, but so what? Twin turbochargers, baby! When new, this engine belted out 185 Italian horses, and (once you penetrate the miasma of problems surrounding the clutch and/or transmission) you gotta figure at least some of them still reach the back wheels now. A few twirls of the ol' wrenches, maybe an afternoon of bodywork, and it'll be good as new. You won't even break a sweat with this slam-dunk beginner's project!

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- Sui-Slide doors
- Articulated hatch
- 3,165 pounds
- 40/60 weight bias
- Twin turbo 395ci LS engine, prox. 925 wheel hp
- HRE 597R wheels, 18x10, 19x12, 275/35ZR18, 345/30ZR19 Michelin Pilots
- Mendeola sequential transaxle
- Viper-ized suspension
- Baer 6S 14-inch rotors w/6-piston calipers
- Cobra Misano seats
- Hot Rod Air HVAC
- Audio system delete

After seeing VintageRacer's 510 in action, we've been keeping our eyes open for good deals on the old Datsuns. Of course, these days forced induction is all the rage, so it's tempting to turbo-ize your vintage Bluebird... but why do all that complicated turbo plumbing yourself when you can buy someone else's hopeless ambitious project 510? Say, this '72 510 with a VG30ET V6 ripped out of a late-80s 300ZX Turbo? And we do mean ripped; judging from the seller's description of the wiring ("a lot of the wires don't do anything"), it sounds like the swapper simply hooked up the hoist to the engine and yanked it right out without bothering to disconnect anything. Another warning sign: whenever you see the phrase "nothing a little welding can't take care of" in a listing, you know the car is a one-way ticket to Hell! The reserve on this auction is only $1700 ("just like last time"), which means that the Fun Per Dollar Quotient on this car has the potential to be even better than its power-to-weight ratio... if you can make it work, that is.

We all know that turbocharging the piss out of an RX-7 is a quick route to a batshit power-to-weight ratio, maybe even better than what you'd get with a VG30ET-powered 510, and this 1991 RX-7convertible with Turbo II engine swap for the chump-change price of just six hundred clams... well, you figure there's gotta be a catch somewhere. Fortunately, the warning signs are clear: First, you get the seller's statement, "I never finished the project because the engine needs a rebuild." Wait, he installed an engine he knew to be bad? Second, it has a new engine computer, which probably means every component that ever moved electrons would likely make a Mazda engineer weep if he could see its current hacked-together state; a junkyard computer swap is often believed to solve problems caused by a hopeless tangle of modified wiring. Third, the seller didn't bother to take the fast-food trash out of the car before shooting the obligatory camera-phone photographs. And, finally, he'll trade it for rims. Five lugs, please. Yet still, picture yourself in full Hoon Mode in this thing after you get it running and jack up the boost- the convertible top makes it that much easier to videotape your adventures!

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Everyone knows about the screamin' turbo Buicks of the mid-80s, with the GNX reigning supreme. But Buick sold force-fed V6 A/G-bodies well before the GNX did a big smoky burnout on our hearts, and this '79 Turbo Regal is the proof! For an entry fee of just $1500, you could enter a world in which your Buick can always go faster, just by adding more boost! The cool thing about this car is that a non-turbo hood is all that stands between it and utter Malaise Era sleeperosity... but, of course, there are a few minor obstacles in your path. First of all, the car has been stored for 13 years, so it will be an extravaganza of brittle brake hoses, bad transmission seals, and varnish in the fuel system. And, while the oxidized body is fine for a sleeper, the interior looks like an unpleasant place to spend any time. Then there's the matter of the engine; while it does run, you'll need to make a ton of upgrades to get any real power out of it, starting with a bigger turbocharger and continuing with a potlatch of $100 bills that will seem to keep burning forever.

The thing about the Regal is that a lot of folks are wise to the whole turbo Buick deal, undercutting the Sleeper Effect. If you want to really humiliate drivers of fast-n-flashy cars, you can't beat the turbocharged Mopar minivan. This 12-second Caravan Woody ought to make that point perfectly clear. The problem is that they're hard to find, but we've spotted this '89 Turbo Caravan for the same price as the Regal. Not only that, it's got a 5-speed! Imagine the fun of banging through the gears in a ludicrously overpowered Caravan, spinning the front tires for 50 feet on every shift... and probably torque-steering into a telephone pole, but so what? Of course, for this price you can't just expect everything to be perfect, and the sound of the 2.5's rod a-knockin' means the van won't be rockin' right away. Its ugliness shines right through in the blurry photos (what is it with the inability of Craigslist sellers to take a good photograph?), but that won't matter for a sleeper project. Then there's a no-doubt-long list of problems the seller doesn't mention... but just keep thinking about those full-boost shifts as you bust your knuckles on this thing for week after week!

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We like turbocharging, of course, and everyone knows we like Corvairs. Since it goes without saying that the Funk Factor of the VW Type 2 is quite high, combining a turbocharged Corvair engine with a '71 VW Bus... well, how can you resist? And hey, the seller only wants 950 clams for it! OK, killjoys, skip to the part in the description that says it hasn't run since George Herbert Walker Bush was president, and don't forget to wring your hands over the spark plug that got blown out of the cylinder head. The rest of us will overlook those quibbles, as well as the rust-through around the windshield and go straight to the good stuff: '65 Corvair Corsa turbocharged engine, with limited-slip diff, and a whole bunch of spare parts.

Some of you may be hesitant to get a Type 2, what with the whole patchouli-scented hippie stigma and all. And that's fine, because you'd probably be happier screaming down the road in your high-revving Cosworth Vega anyway! For the earth-shatteringly low, low price of... well, the seller doesn't say, you could get a '72 Cosworth Vega plus a '76 Vega GT! The seller isn't so strong in the written-language department, so we're a little puzzled by the intended meaning of "have kit for 76 from summit." But no matter- not when you could have a two-for-one Vega deal for a no-doubt-cheap trade. Sure, the Vega made ZAZ build quality look rock-solid, and we can't even tell if these cars even have engines, but that's why we call it Project Car Hell, right? Just keep saying the magic word "Cosworth" to yourself and you'll be fine. Thanks to Brandon for the tip!

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Best Use of a Burgundy Interior [kdmperformance.com]

Related:
Feel the Turbo Activated to Serve You Forever [Internal]

Hindsight being 20/20 and all, we get some knee-slappin' belly laughs when we hear the words "1980 Turbo Trans Am" spoken, since we all know it was, well, kinda terrible. But still, look at the optimism in this ad! The confidence! Why, even the Black Gold 280ZX guy was probably envious of the blown Screamin' Chicken back in 1980. – Murilee Martin\

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Never Mind The Horsepower: Special Edition Esprit Firebirds [internal]

Remember zero to 50 acceleration times, back when 60 was a forbidden speed? Well, the awesome '81 280ZX Turbo could do zero to 50 in 5.1 awesome seconds. Did we mention awesome? Bonus points for cheezy sound effects and use of a Hired Voice who sounds almost as macho as his Japanese counter