Anyone missing a '71 Grabber Lime M-code project car? More VIN fraud?

[cudak888]

http://miami.craigslist.org/mdc/cto/4592598793.html

Went to see it in person; the bubba who ran the lot acted as if showing the inside of the trunk was too much for him. "You going to buy it or not?" was the first coherent thing he uttered.

Arsehole sellers aside, underneath the very slapdash black paint job (cracking all over from Bondo) is a Grabber Lime car, with the Grabber Lime paint clearly visible at the edge of every bit of window trim and immediately below the fender visual line at the A-pillars.

Floorboards are completely rotted and needed full replacement; the pulled-up section of carpet indicated that this is being "solved" with lots and lots of Dynamat to bridge the gaps. Strangely enough, the quarters are originals and not patched with skins or Spectra lower ends.

Nevertheless, I started to smell hijinks when I noted the following:

• Dash VIN is 1F05M120*** (I don't remember the whole VIN; sorry); in short, a 351C 4V car. Black interior, facilitating a dashboard swap (just saying).
  
• Every single panel - hacked hood included - showed clear (in some cases, blatant) evidence of Grabber Lime paint, EXCEPT the driver's door, which was from a Bright Red car (hard to miss - the jamb window rubber wasn't installed), and the data plate had been heavily sprayed over with paint. If the rest wasn't that bad, why that door only?
  
• Deluxe interior...with recovered seats done to match standard seats. Interior swapping?
  
• This is the biggie: Seller refused to open the hood due to rainwater sitting all over it, but it didn't matter. I looked down the Sawzall-cut hood and found myself staring straight at the top of the left cylinder head, with a "2" cast proudly in the corner. Really? M-code car converted to 2V?
  

Now - I realize that at least a few folks out there must have gone through the effort of putting 2V heads, 2V headers, and a 2V-port-compatible Edelbrock intake on a M or Q code just for a boost in low-end - but this built-in-a-barn car (rear window trim fits so bad that it is silicone-glued onto the car and sits a quarter inch off the body line - not even in the window channel) wouldn't strike me to have been built by someone smart enough to know that. That, and we have the kooky door.

Something tells me that the shock towers and engine block tell a very different story to that dashboard.

-Kurt

 

[71_resurrection]

That thing is hideous and needs a new owner that will take care of it, too bad someone out there is gonna probably pay that almost 10k price and hate themselves later for it. At least it's so performance driven that it doesn't need shock tower braces anymore... Oh and what's up with the 80's conversion van center console?

 

[cudak888]

Oh and what's up with the 80's conversion van center console?

Just part of the package...like the amp with corroded terminals and subwoofers in water-damaged boxes - all half installed in the trunk. Someone should wipe off the "Mach 1" vinyl stickers and write "Ghetto Machine" on the sides in 1980's fashion. That would be most suiting to it, given its current appearance.

I still think VIN fishiness may be a possibility with this one though. An ex-1F05H?

-Kurt

 

[mweeps]

Why butcher that beautiful hood to add a bug catcher?

 

[cudak888]

Why butcher that beautiful hood to add a bug catcher?

Believe me - "butchered" is not the word. It still had rough edges and burrs on it.

-Kurt

 

[Kit Sullivan]

Why such continual vitriol for those selling less-than-perfect, or even questionable cars?

That car might make someone happy just the way it is, or someone else may treasure it as a project.

You can't blame the guy ( or any other seller) for asking a high price...that is the essence of the collector car market.

If you like and want this car, make an offer you think is reasonable and affordable to you. He will either accept or not.

If you don't like the car....for whatever reason...who cares what he's asking for it?

With all classic Mustangs dwindling in numbers every year, basket-case cars are being reconsidered as project cars more and more often.

That car will eventually be sold for exactly what it is worth...to the new owner.

 

[OMS]

Why such continual vitriol for those selling less-than-perfect, or even questionable cars?

That car might make someone happy just the way it is, or someone else may treasure it as a project.

You can't blame the guy ( or any other seller) for asking a high price...that is the essence of the collector car market.

If you like and want this car, make an offer you think is reasonable and affordable to you. He will either accept or not.

If you don't like the car....for whatever reason...who cares what he's asking for it?

With all classic Mustangs dwindling in numbers every year, basket-case cars are being reconsidered as project cars more and more often.

That car will eventually be sold for exactly what it is worth...to the new owner.

PLUS 1

 

[cudak888]

That car might make someone happy just the way it is' date=' or someone else may treasure it as a project...[/quote']
I don't mind the car and he has the right to his asking price. For that matter, if I had the funds and no other projects, I would possibly consider it myself - the VIN was the first thing I went to look at, and my heart did race a bit when I saw the "M." Don't get me wrong - for the right person, this is a good car to start with, and the original quarters are impressively solid. The amount of sheet metal work needed here is less than the work that was (or is) needed on either of the two cars I own.

Barring the price and my suspicions, I might have recommended this as a good project car - but the mismatch between the VIN, the driver's door swap on an otherwise solid car, paint purposely layered ultra-thick over the data tag, and the unexplained 2V heads on a car with rough craftsmanship bearing an M-code VIN - coupled with a dealer who acted like a cocky criminal - ranked this Mustang encounter as one of the worst I'd ever experienced. Perhaps you had to be there to experience the car and the seller first-hand. "Shady" is the best word to describe it; I left after only examining half of the car, realizing that the seller was essentially not welcoming anyone who wasn't ready to fork over the money within 60 seconds of visual examination.

I may have been harsh in my statements above, but I strongly believe that suspicious cars and sellers should not be shoved under the rug by those in the know for someone else to get burned. That's why it took the FBI to oust the Unique Performance chopshop*, when U.P.'s dealings should have been discovered a lot earlier.

Perhaps it's uniquely a South Florida/Dade County thing, as every single Mustang deal seems to be like this around here. Very few nice people seem to be associated with these cars down here, with exception to our South Florida-based forum members. It's not your average country bumpkin fools or otherwise reasonable people who are simply misinformed by Barrett-Jackson that have these things down here - it seems as if everyone who has a project car for sale was recently let out on parole - including the repair shop/junk lot where I bought the bits off that rusty '72 for $500. I later found out that the owner of the shop is one of the better-known slumlords of the area.

Ironically enough, the nicest local '71-73 owner I've ever met - outside of forum members - is an ex-gang member who swore off a life of crime and violence after taking a bullet and having been beat nearly to death. A real human being who knows the consequences and horrors that lie on the other side of the tracks.

It's not like that for all genres of cars down here, as the '70s Lincolns (of which I had two - down to one now) attracted their own group too, but the worst I'd meet or find were twenty-something wannabee-gangsta types who almost always turn out to be good kids too. The closest they'd ever got to a criminal act was to think about putting 22" rims on an old classic. You'll occasionally find a stuffy, snobbish original owner who enjoys sticking their finger in your face about how they "like the color of theirs better than yours" when you both wind up at the gas station with old Lincolns, but these curmudgeons are rapidly becoming a minority.

Thankfully, the rest of these '70s Lincoln owners are people who own them because they like the car; much like many Cubans here in Miami who own and restore GM products from the 1950s. They don't own it to prove anything or to flaunt it as 4-wheeled proof that they have no need for Viagra. They just love owning and driving the car for what it is.

Yet, just working on Soylent or Eleanor in the driveway seems to invite every egomaniac, jerk, addict, and underworld type to show up out of nowhere - in a neighborhood that's been overrun with Prius-driving preppies, which begs some question as to where these weirdos emerge from.

If I may be quite frank, the Mustang hobby from my local end isn't going that well. I love the cars and enjoy every minute of restoring them, but the people that they attract are souring the mere image of our cars in my mind.

-Kurt

*While U.P. screwed over multiple people rather than your average side-street car sales lot doing VIN swaps, I view the unethical behavior of a person who does ten VIN swaps with the same severity as someone who does one.

 

[midlife]

But it is a Crank Fone special!

 

[cudak888]

But it is a Crank Fone special!

[video=youtube]


-Kurt

 

[Mikes73]

The car looks like it has been passed around alot.

 

[Mike429cj]

Friendly advice on project cars, parts cars, and in general any car you are thinking about buying. Inspect and record VIN# and check the title before making offer. Your local law enforcement officer will be happy to run the VIN through NCIC to make sure it is not stolen.

If you buy a stolen car...the last thing you will see of the car is the back end of the car as it is being towed by a police authorized wrecker. You will never see your money again!

 

[cudak888]

Friendly advice on project cars, parts cars, and in general any car you are thinking about buying. Inspect and record VIN# and check the title before making offer. Your local law enforcement officer will be happy to run the VIN through NCIC to make sure it is not stolen.

And even that isn't enough. Our cars can change VINs - on the surface - in under 10 minutes by simply swapping dashboards.

More intrepid thieves may swap the dash and either peel the door data tag off the door or swap the whole door and use rust as an excuse for the swap.

In either case, no amount of VIN searching is going to help you, because you will be running the wrong VIN through the database. You may hold clear title to the VIN of a 1971, '72, or '73 Mustang, but if your VIN was swapped, that title will isn't to the car you bought. It's to the dashboard of a car that you don't have and will likely never see.

Only the partial VIN on the shock towers will tell you for sure. This video shows exactly what you'll find:

[video=youtube]

Trivia: The origins of the stunt Eleanor from Gone in 60 Seconds may never be known, as the front clip on that car was replaced up to the rear aprons, resulting in a swap of shock towers. This removed the only VIN permanently affixed to the unibody.

An alternate method - which is by no means foolproof, but could smoke out a VIN swap - is to order a $15 standard Marti report for the dash VIN, provided you can ascertain the factory color of the car.

For instance: If the Marti for the black car in this thread comes back as Code "I," Bright Lime Green, there is a good (but not absolute) chance that the VIN is correct. However, if it comes back as any other color, you can be certain that the VIN was swapped, as the car wears its original Bright Lime conspicuously.

-Kurt