Re: Go Getting My DMC

["dmcmike2002 <billsfanmd@xxxx>" <billsfanmd@xxxx>]

I will try and help a little with my experince....I was 19 once 
:-)...I am 39 with 3 kids and a great wife and a normal job. We are 
not wealthy or poor...I would say happily upper middle class...I 
remember walking out of the movie theatre in 1985 after watching Back 
to the Future knowing I HAD to have that car...17 years later it is 
now sitting happily in my garage...I have had the car for just over a 
year and everything people have written in this thread is true, 
especially David Teitelbaum.

The first car I bought after seeing the movie was.....not a Delorean 
:-( ...It was a 1988 silver Acura Integra. If you use your 
imagination and squint your eyes and turn your head sideways etc. I 
kind of felt it was as close to a Delorean I could get...The car gave 
me 130,000 mile swith virtually no repairs. I joked with someone once 
that if Honda made the Delorean there would be no need for a DML. I 
also remember calling someone in mid 1980s (I dont know who but it 
may have been Kapac) It was an older gentlemen and he sent me a few 
photocopies of Delorean information. He spent about 20 minutes on the 
phone with me and after hanging up he had me convinced not to buy one 
unless I had extra money and another car to drive everyday.

I am very fortunate to have a wife who understood my dream to own 
this car...Just over a year ago (after about 6 months of begging) she 
finally said go ahead :-) I looked for about 6 months and test drove 
2-3 of them.... I ended up buying one for about $12k and really felt 
like I got a great deal from an orignal owner who had all his work 
done at one of the vendors. 

I am not a mechanic and needed to rely on the skill of others to fix 
major problems. New distibutor, water pump, steering rack etc...When 
I bought this car I had no idea what to expect. There is such a 
mistique to looking at this car that you forget it needs to drive in 
traffic, at highway speeds and stop when you hit the brakes. These 
functions we take for granted and like David says the body can make 
the car look new. 

Had it not been for people like Michael Pack on the DML who donated 
about 100 hours of his time when I first bought the car getting it to 
be safe and reliable (and since we have become great friends). There 
is a learning curve to this car that you can only begin to climb 
until you have been towed twice, thrown a socket wrench into your 
garage door and laid there on the floor with tears in your eyes 
looking at fuel pouring out of a metal fitting that should never 
fail. There is a line in the movie "Armageddon" while sitting on top 
of the shuttle ready for launch where someone says "Do you know we 
are sitting on 2 million moving parts built by the lowest bidder." In 
many ways you can apply that to teh Delorean.

The bottom line with this car is money. Plain and simple. If you have 
the resources to fix any problem then buy it now. But I can tell you 
I had to put out $1500 to pass MD inspection, $1000 for a major 
tuneup, $1000 in cosmetic parts, and I have a wish list of about 
$5000 more in parts. Forget about the tools you will want to buy. We 
tell ourselves just owning the car is enough but then you see all the 
things on the car that could be a little better. I always put car 
repairs in 2 categories: what needs to be done to keep the car 
running and what you would like to be done to make the car look 
better. It is a constant battle between these 2 forces. People like 
David Teitlebaum, who has helped me personally, make owning this car 
a reality. I have also bugged John Hervey on the phone many times. 
Ther are so many things I want to buy from Rob Grady I could put his 
kids through college. So from a technical standpoint there is nothing 
that can happen to this car that can't be fixed, for the most part, 
the only question to ask is can you afford it?....

I wish you the best becasue I know how you feel...Take your time, 
join a local Delorean club, meet some owners. If you lived near MD I 
would love letting you see the car and answer any questions. I was 
able to get mine because the housing market in my neigborhood doubled 
and I was able to use a Home Equity loan to finance the whole 
car....The rest of my car is on Visa :-) And after having this car 
for a year I would not trade it for anything. A year ago I couldn't 
tell a sway bar from a connector rod and now my car is on jack stands 
in the garage and I am cleaning up the frame and replacing stabalizer 
bushings. I am climbing the learning curve with the help of people on 
the DML and living the dream.

Mike C
2109