I completely agree, Tim. What you find here is rare and I have never been on any other forum that even comes close to this one in terms of friendliness and support.
My plan for the car is to fix it, no matter how long it takes. I was going to get a donor vehicle, but I haven't been able to come up with the money, so I'll probably just start building it little by little. I haven't had a chance to measure the chassis and see all the parts I need, but it's going to have to be done on a part by part basis.
Uh...
Saw this thread not until now - glad, BigBlue, you are ok and no other was hurt. But I feel with you and I am so sorry for this, a nightmare of everybody, who drives his dream...
I love this communities concern, readiness to help and friendly solidarity to each other. I do not have experienced that before in other web communities, this is unique and within a short time this 7173-community became my absolute favourite! Wow!
Do you have conceived a plan meanwhile?
Cheers,
Tim
So BB did you decide to shop for a new body and transfer your best parts? Only because it looks tweeked. Or did you get a chassis opinion. And what did the insurance company say? I am very interested to hear that!
I had a perfect donor car lined up... it even had the aprons and radiator support separated and ready to be welded in. But I couldn't come up with the funds, so I'm going to have to pass up on that deal. What I've decided is to just start accumulating the parts I need once I've made an assessment of the damage. I got caught up figuring out the situation with my new daily driver and wasn't able to measure the chassis this past weekend. I did, however, pass by my parents' house (where the car is currently parked thanks to their gigantic yard) and had a good 5 minutes to look around at the damage and check the crumpled mess, and what I found was interesting.
The sheetmetal up front was crushed as far as fender, radiator support, apron, valance, bumper, etc. But the frame rail is still intact. It's probably tweaked a bit, but at least it's not bent out of shape. So beside the radiator support and apron, everything else is just outer sheetmetal. The car doesn't look twisted when seen in plain sight, so I'll take that as a plus. The control arm is bent, but I have to take a good look and see how bad it is. Oh, and the radiator is shot. Yup, I'll definitely need one of those.
Rear sheetmetal damage seems to only affect the rear quarter, taillight panel, bumper, etc. but the frame rail seems to be ok. I'll take that as another good sign. Still have lots of metal to replace, but the less deep the damage is, the better I feel.
This weekend I'll finally be able to measure everything and get an idea of what I'll be needing. So I'm still crossing my fingers and staying positive that the car isn't too badly tweaked.
As far as insurance goes, I don't get anything. I have a basic PIP policy that only covers bodily injury, since that's all I was able to afford. It bit me in the ***, unfortunately, but it was either that, or let the car rot in the driveway. You know how they say... you win some, you lose some.