The Stories
I’m one of those people that always wants to hear the bad news first, the glass is always half empty, that kind of thing. So the challenges always come first.
I don’t mind a car having stories if the origin, severity, and aftermath are verifiable in some way based on paperwork or by simple inspection. I got a huge discount on the Diablo (14%) that way because I did my homework and discovered the “accident” was a $6k stoplight bump. They’re cars, subject to real world stuff.
On the other hand, there have been cars I inquired about during this search where the dealer had no idea why the report indicated a car had an “accident history”, I steer clear of those situations as it’s pretty clear either they are trying to hide something, or too lazy to do their own homework . The pretty exterior of a GT can hide some ugliness below as Rich Brooks told me once about looking at repaired salvage cars. This car has seen a few track days, which doesn’t bother me like it would a Ferrari.
The former owner told me the car had a previous minor incident before his ownership, so when I pulled the CarFax there was a blemish that referenced some damage (not an accident, which in the history reporting world is an important distinction). So you know just from that designation that no other cars were involved, no police report, no tow truck.
I was told the car had a parking lot low speed bump with some obstruction. The splitter and the bottom lip of the bumper were cracked (both replaced). The very bottom of the radiator (which hadn’t been replaced – it was still working 10 years later) was pushed up slightly in one spot about ¼” right in the center indicating to my mechanic that it ran over some debris, the corner of a curb or possibly bumped a stud sticking up from a concrete parking bumper (the pushed up spot is pretty narrow) since the car sits 1” lower than stock. So clearly a minor event I was OK with since a flimsy radiator had just surface damage, not requiring immediate replacement.
The other story makes a case for why we should always have these cars on tenders and NOT jump them from other vehicles. When the former owner went to purchase the car, it had not run for months so the battery was dead…..the seller jumped it, and promptly blew out several gauges along with the odometer display. So the car has a full set of Speedhut gauges, which I am told was the solution of choice around 2012, before you could buy re-designed Auto Meter originals. The car went without an odometer display for almost 6 years (but the true mileage could be read from the OBD2 port so the CarFax always listed true mileage). The display was finally replaced in 2018, but required a control box (pollack (sp?) box the owner bought from Shelby) and a trip to the dealer to activate it. So then the odometer started over, true miles are today about 28,500 give or take.
This won’t be an issue titling the car in Texas (anything over 10 years old can claim exempt from odometer reading with some details), but will turn into a reporting challenge the first time the odometer reading is less than before. I’ve already started a dialogue with CarFax how to handle it in the paperwork when that does happen.
