Car History

arcsine · 10-24-2002, 01:07 PM

Fellow readers,

I was re-reading the service records that came with the car last night and decide I would plot out the date and mileage. I am not sure what I was hoping to see, but I think it is neat (well, it is my car). What you see are the years and mileage each owner had the car. I bought it at the far right with 106,000 miles.

The general trend is that the car gets driven more in the first half of the period of ownership and mileage that tapers off as time passes. Each of the first four owners demosntrate that trend. Makes you wonder if it is a factor or boredom with the car or that with mileage comes repairs, so if they drive less they will have less repairs.

The hidden nugget of goodness for me is that an "R&R" (rings, bearings, valve guides, springs, chains) was done on the engine over 4 years ago but just 10,000 miles. I have never heard of the shop (European Autowerkes in Fall City) so if anyone has any info about the quality of their work I would love to hear it. Lastly, I think it is amazing that the 1st and 2nd gear synchros were noted to be iffy in 1994 (at 77,000 miles) and they still work. They ARE iffy but with patience and touch they work.

Thanks for indulging me.

Porsche911NYC · Porsche911NYC's Garage

Now, simply calculate the respective r-squared's and standard deviations, regress against a known determinant, oh, and don't forget about the slope. Partial differentials won't be necessary as there is no such thing as diminishing marginal utility associated with Porsche ownership; perhaps it's due to the inelasticy of demand.

Nice job.

GoodMojo · 10-24-2002, 01:31 PM

For some reason this post reminds me of a movie called the Red Violin. It would be interesting to see a similar thing based on an early p-car...

island911 · 10-24-2002, 01:39 PM

Interesting; you can see each owner has tapering use before selling. . .except #3. Looks like he found it too expensive.

Doug E · 10-24-2002, 05:53 PM

Nice graph.

I did something similar with mine but not quite as colorful. I even when so far as to try and track down the previous 3 owners to see if they happened to have any additional information or records but nothing ever materialized.

speedemon666 · 10-24-2002, 11:37 PM

How did you create this graph? What program did you used?

arcsine · 10-25-2002, 08:08 AM

SD666,

I used three to punch this out.

First I built an Excel spreadsheet with the data (including stuff not shown on the graph). Then I exported the graph to Macromedia Freehand where I could manipulate the data trace (cut it up to create the individual onwers sections) and put in lables here and there. Lastly, I created a JPEG that I tweaked in Photoshop to make it an appropriate size to post.

It is actually a simple process that sounds imposing.