Who's prepping for the $2010 Challenge?

jdwmotorsports said: if I bought a set of racing seats but only use the driver seat at the challenge can I count half the purchase price toward the budget?

I'm not so sure about that. I thought you had to sell off the other seat to do that. Just playing devil's advocate here but I could buy a good engine and a blown up engine in a package deal for $100 but only use the good one. Would that make the good engine a $50 budget hit when the bad engine is worthless?

hrdlydangerous wrote: I'm not so sure about that. I thought you had to sell off the other seat to do that. Just playing devil's advocate here but I could buy a good engine and a blown up engine in a package deal for $100 but only use the good one. Would that make the good engine a $50 budget hit when the bad engine is worthless?

I'd probably heavily value the good vs the bad and sell the bad as recoup.

Or... split receipts ahead of time....

<-- wishes he had done that and "properly" broken down a purchase, as it is I have to spend almost half my recoup in selling parts to get the diff in a big package of stuff :P

The sucker vette guys bought 2 tank exhaust fans, used only one and budgeted only one.

If it's a problem of condition, I can always provide pictures (see link in signature) showing that they are in like condition. If I had thought of it a month ago when I bought them I would have gotten two receipts.

I want to use the car for occasional street use so I want both seats then but don't need both at the challenge.

Actually, that is an interesting question.

If I buy 100 of anything, doesn't that mean I get a bulk discount? So if I divide the purchase price by 100, the individual price is not representative of the value of the single item.

You are correct that the sucker Vette (and perhaps others) did this, but I think the recoup rule fits the scenario better.

If I buy 99 brand new built racing engines, I'll bet I can get the seller to give me one for free.

I'm just saying...

Doesn't matter to me either way, but I'm pretty sure you'd get a "no" based on the rules/interpretation. It's been discussed before. I will say, though, that I've always put stuff like zip-ties in the budget individually. Then again, I'm not buying 8 million packages of zipties on a crate to bring the price per zip-tie from $.02 to $.01.

Similarly, If I buy a $1000 parts-car, and only use the seat from the parts car in the Challenge car, I can't stick it in at FMV, but if I buy the $1000 parts-car, yank the seat, and re-sell the parts car for $1000, the seat's free in the budget. Get it?

I know it all seems like silly semantics, but dems duh rules, at least the way I read 'em. If I get the big trophy, the last thing I want is somebody calling me a cheatin' ass bastard for leaving something out of the budget.

I think the rule has been applied as partial price when duplicates are bought. I think the method to test to your personal application of the rule is: would it really be reasonable to get separate receipts? Basically, If someone was selling two identical seats they would probably not blink about giving you two receipts. OTOH if they were selling you a whole car, they would probably think you were crazy if you asked for a separate receipt for the driver seat.

Interesting.

poopshovel wrote: .... If I get the big trophy, the last thing I want is somebody calling me a cheatin' ass bastard for leaving something out of the budget.

It wouldn't be the first time the winner played a little loose with "creative accounting".

Uh oh!

In truth a lot of the budgeting is in the honesty of the person competing. Is it not.

When I bought the seats I had to convince the guy that I really did want the receipt written for what I paid him. He said, "you know everyone else is lying on their budgets"

After you have been buying stuff cheap for awhile you get a pretty good sense of what deals are possible. Overall Id say the top competitors are the most honest. Creative with rule interpretation sometimes, but they spell out exactly what they did and why they think its legal.

MrJoshua wrote: After you have been buying stuff cheap for awhile you get a pretty good sense of what deals are possible.

This is my second challenge build that I'm currently working on. I'm starting to think that in order to build a winning car you almost have to buy all parts that come your way that are a good deal and then use what is needed when it comes time to build the car.

minimac wrote:

poopshovel wrote: .... If I get the big trophy, the last thing I want is somebody calling me a cheatin' ass bastard for leaving something out of the budget.

It wouldn't be the first time the winner played a little loose with "creative accounting".

Care to expand? If you're going to call somebody a cheatin' ass bastard, call 'em a cheatin' ass bastard.

In reply to poopshovel: Are you being called out?

jwdmotorsports wrote: In reply to poopshovel: Are you being called out?

Uh, we've never gotten the big trophy.

The only example I can think of is the sucker Corvette team. In one of the articles about the car, it clearly states that they built the car at the shop at Proctor Gamble (I think) after hours, when the rules state that anything built using a for-profit shop must be billed accordingly, or something to that effect.

That being said, I still don't really think they are cheatin' ass bastards.

poopshovel wrote:

jwdmotorsports wrote: In reply to poopshovel: Are you being called out?

Uh, we've never gotten the big trophy.

Back to back runner up? Trying to remember.

That being said, I still don't really think they are cheatin' ass bastards.

You're a cheatin' ass bastard.

jwdmotorsports wrote:

poopshovel wrote:

jwdmotorsports wrote: In reply to poopshovel: Are you being called out?

Uh, we've never gotten the big trophy.

Back to back runner up? Trying to remember.

Always a bride's made. Just call us team-mini-mini-me. Fortunately, I'm pretty sure we didn't whine about losing because "the winner must've cheated."

jwdmotorsports wrote:

MrJoshua wrote: After you have been buying stuff cheap for awhile you get a pretty good sense of what deals are possible.

This is my second challenge build that I'm currently working on. I'm starting to think that in order to build a winning car you almost have to buy all parts that come your way that are a good deal and then use what is needed when it comes time to build the car.

Welcome to my world, after awhile it gets really hard to walk through the garage.

jwdmotorsports wrote:

MrJoshua wrote: After you have been buying stuff cheap for awhile you get a pretty good sense of what deals are possible.

This is my second challenge build that I'm currently working on. I'm starting to think that in order to build a winning car you almost have to buy all parts that come your way that are a good deal and then use what is needed when it comes time to build the car.

Thats what I've done. You can always sell the rest for a profit later.

Got any spare TII diffs you want to sell?

jwdmotorsports wrote: This is my second challenge build that I'm currently working on. I'm starting to think that in order to build a winning car you almost have to buy all parts that come your way that are a good deal and then use what is needed when it comes time to build the car.

We realized that after last year's car. This year we scrambled to get our plan lined up and have an itemized build list of what we need as soon as possible after the '09 Challenge, so we have as long as possible to find good deals. Most of the stuff we've bought we plan on using, although we've changed our mind on a few things and are just holding on to them in case we change our minds again. Worked out pretty well so far.

The way we do things, we don't have longer than a year to build a car, we have to keep them moving in and out so all the members cycling through the program get the same experience (i.e. build a new car and prepare last year's car). You guys working on your '11 and '12 cars have it easy.

In regards to the shop discussion, I think that may be why (if enough competitors show up) there may be a university class in the future. We are probably better furnished than the average home garage, but nowhere near as supplied as a professional shop. Just based on the nature of our existence, we can't work in personal garages. We don't even have any, the majority of us live in dorms or apartments, and we wouldn't be allowed to keep the school's car (official owner, you know) in a personal garage. It's just a different situation, and we try to keep things as straight-up as we can. Except on the internet. If anyone is in the College Station area and wants to see our operation, they're more than welcome to, just hit me up. We may be moving into our very own shop (old gas station-thing) soon.