Track Car - Convert, or start from scratch?

[Icemaster]

I'm on the fence as to whether to convert the targa to a track rat, or preserve it, (maybe sell it) and buy a roller to build from the ground up.

What's the pro's/con's either way that you all can think of or have experienced?

[Joe Bob]

Always cheaper to buy someone else's project.....

[JohnJL]

Always.

I love Targa's, I own one. But they have drawbacks to track duty, mostly with flex.

[r_towle]

buy versus build...
OR
Start with a hardtop.

Rich

[drl911]

I have spent the last 7 years slowly converting a near perfect '86 Carrera into a light weight, loud, no frills track car. I love everything it has become, but in many ways I feel guilty "raping" it when I could have had the same results starting with a much lesser example.

Dan

[Icemaster]

The fact that I'd be converting a targa to a track car hasn't been lost on me...I'm leaning more towards starting with a clean slate.

[na2ub]

I would say it depends on how pretty your targa is. If it is still in nice shape, sell it and buy a coupe that is beat up. If it is already ailing, cosmetically, just convert it and call it a day. I wouln't worry about the targa thing, unless you plan to get competitive. Even then, a full cage will take care of most of that.

[winders]

Originally Posted by Icemaster

I'm on the fence as to whether to convert the targa to a track rat, or preserve it, (maybe sell it) and buy a roller to build from the ground up.

What's the pro's/con's either way that you all can think of or have experienced?

Icemaster,

Forget the Targa unless you are going to build a roofless race car.

I am in the process of have a race car built. I contemplated buying someone else's race car and decided against it.

The main advantage to building a car from scratch is that you get to pick and choose every aspect of the project. You aren't stuck with someone else's decisions and compromises. The main disadvantages are cost and time. If you build it from scratch, it is going to cost up to twice as much and possibly more. It will take a lot of time to get the car done too.

If you decide to have a race car built from scratch, make sure you get an estimate on the cost and time of the project. Then count on it costing at least 33% more and taking 33% to 50% longer to finish.

I don't have my car yet. It should be done by August 1st. Before I started this project, if I knew what I know now about how much it will actually cost and how long it will take to finish, I would probably tell you that I would buy someone else's car. However, I do suspect that once I get my race car from the builder, I will be very happy I took the route I did.

It's a tough call...

Scott

[Joe Bob]

A Targa is easeir to put a cage in...you could always put a fg top on it. BTW, I have one for sale, a top that is.....

[Icemaster]

Saw that Mike....that and the roll bar install is actually part of what started me thinking.

The fact that I'd be trying to convert a targa isn't lost on me, but the fact that I'd be ripping and replacing as opposed to building ground up is what really has me leaning towards finding a roller. I like the idea of starting with a clean slate. This would be something that I build up myself, so if it takes too long I've got no one but myself to blame.

[JeremyD]

I had a pretty good track cabriolet - and got to the point that I wanted a more serious hard top. Unless you cage it -

[winders]

Originally Posted by Joe Bob

A Targa is easeir to put a cage in...you could always put a fg top on it. BTW, I have one for sale, a top that is.....

I guess. But it would probably be better for simplicity to just cut a hole in the roof of a coupe to make the cage easier to weld properly and then cover the hole with a FRP or carbon fiber panel.

Scott

[KTL]

Your signature is depressing...........

I have a very nice '87 coupe that I contemplated making into my own competition car. I had progressed it from a garage queen to the point where it was somewhat gutted, typical fiberglass replacement pieces, set up solidly for track days, and went pretty fast for a street car. I decided it was time to go W2W racing now or never. But I couldn't bear to do the permanent modifications a race car requires. And I ran the numbers to see what it'd cost for me to build what I wanted- yikes. So I bought someone else's project that they dumped way too much money into.......

Buying someone else's car does have it's advantages financially. But you still have to make sure you take notice of how it's built and be sure you're satisfied with it. My car is fairly well put together, but there are some things I would have liked to be done differently. Most notably the safety cage. Knowing what I know now, I would have not been content buying a car that had retained the sunroof, which lowers the cage halo in the car. Sure I can gut the sunroof, but raising the cage for more headroom is tough, even with plinth boxes. Point being is to make sure some basic but important details are there to make the car a well-executed build.

As far as a Targa goes, i'd look for a coupe. Reason being is even the coupes benefit in stiffness from a cage being tied into the roof pillars. Open top cars need even more bars & pickup points to help with stiffness. Ripping and replacing is not that much work. It's always easier to dismantle something than it is to put it back together!

Honestly the best way to go about it is to buy someone else's unfinished/stillborn project. That's where the real gains are made- from a buyer standpoint. People with finished products have the proof that its done and works, even so far as to demonstrate it's a "winning" car, and they want a good dollar for their efforts.

[175K911]

I had an '83 Targa back in 83-86. As I slowly modified it with 22/29 torsion bars, Bilstein Sports, big sway bars, 40IDA, SSI's, I discovered how darn flexible a Targa can be. Back in late '85 I remember going up through the esses at Watkin's Glen, about 6500 rpm in 4th transitioning from left to right over the bridge, looking up at the top of the vent window where it meets the top of the windshield pillar and seeing the gap opening and closing as the chassis flexed. At 120 mph in a turn!! And that was long before the current super sticky R-comp tires which would have made it flex even more I suspect. I went home and ordered a new '86 coupe that Monday!

To make a Targa into a track car really requires a cage if you're going to make any suspension mods at all. Otherwise it's like an old sled- Flexible Flyer.

[giovanni86]

track = coupe

sell you targa or keep it if you have enough money

[Icemaster]

Karma....

1989 Blk/Tan Sunroof Coupe (3.2 Carrera) $19000 OBO sorted and ready for road/track

Anyone wanna buy an 85 targa with some nice mods?

[KTL]

That's a good car. I know it personally. Go git it.

[175K911]

What Kevin said. Souk's a good guy.

In fact I'll see the car Thursday next week when I'm at Souk's picking up another track 911 for a friend.

[JeremyD]

I'd buy a car from Souk in about a minute. In fact - I'd be on that car like a cat on a junebug