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Hi Folks.
Looks like I have joined the ranks. It’s not in my grubby hands yet, but worked it out tonight and I’m on par to pick it up as soon as the weather permits (fair chances of rain off and on for the next several days here).I think I didn’t do too bad on the price. Not a steal but I won’t get hurt either. Basically the money will be worth the fun for sure I think.So what I’m getting is a ’78 Fiber Fab on a ’72 chassis. Bright red paint and tan interior/top. It’s in pretty decent shape – not immaculate but if a guy wanted to just drive it without touching it, it would still turn heads o’ plenty. There’s a little tweaking to do for the motor at best, but being a bug I’m hoping that even if the engine were to implode, the things used to be about the simplest things possible to work on or replace. I’ve not heard either way for at least 25 years but hopefully that’s still somewhat true these days. It seems to run OK with fair pep, it just doesn’t like to idle. I’ll fix that one way or another.I have to offer a thank you already to this forum. I’ve picked up a lot of good information just in the past couple days of pre-purchase research.More blabbering and pictures to come.Hi John.
I’m in Kansas City, not North Carolina. But now that you’ve made me point that out I have to ask myself why!! Visited NC a while back and I loved that area.Maybe I should just spell my location out instead of using the local abbreviation. I can see how I wasn’t very descriptive there.Thanks for the welcome.edit to add: Profile now reads Kansas City rather than “KC”vinito2015-05-07 23:39:27
Welcome Vinni to the forum there are a lot of good advice and a little bad :),
but were here to help.
TDREPLICA Map
http://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?webmap=7f9174ad614e43b680deba085b0abf48
vinito wrote:on par to pick it up as soon as the weather permits (fair chances of rain off and on for the next several days here).Sounds just like the weather I had for getting mine. I chose the first half good day I could and managed to tow the car 150 miles, missing a heavy rain shower on the way back by delaying departure from the city it was at and still encountered light sprinkles or drizzle when within 30 miles of home. Luckily it had the tonneau cover to keep interior dry.Would be great to know the price for comparison, but I won’t nag you for it! Mine was $5600 anyway so you’ll know that.Thx Vinnie lol my poor eyesight saw NC .. my bad..
anyway welcome aboard..for this exciting adventure in your MGTDrWelcom aboard Vinny!
First time I ever drove my TDr on public roads…it snowed. Seems rain and snow must be good luck for us here!Have had some great times in Kansas City, on both sides of State Line Road!Paul Mossberg
Former Owner of a 1981 Classic Roadsters Ltd. Duchess (VW)
2005 Intermeccanica RoadsterIf you own a TDr and are not in the Registry, please go to https://tdreplica.com/forums/topic/mg-td-replica-registry/ and register (you need to copy and paste the link)
Welcome aboard Vinny! I have a red and white FiberFab like yours and it sure is a lot of fun plus you are right, it does turn heads. I was just at the gas station a couple of hours ago and I had a group of guys gather around to ask questions and talk about their sports cars. You meet a lot of people with one of these things. Looking forward to seeing some pics. Enjoy it!
Vicenç - (bee sense)
Pembroke Pines, FL
1986 Aston - BCW Model 52 - "Montse II"(1983 FiberFab MiGi II - "Montse")
Well it didn’t work out. Everything was good to go other than me figuring out a bunch of little details for getting things legal. I’m on the state border and it was coming from Missouri to Kansas which complicates title transfer, plus her deceased husband’s name is on the title. So I would ask her questions, go and figure out what paper was needed to jump that hurdle, find another detail, more answers and hurdle jumps, etc.
Then she eventually got around to talking to some friend of hers who made her paranoid with misinformation. Namely, that if I can’t get the title transferred into my name (which wasn’t an issue by the time I researched and found answers to every necessary detail anyway) then she was liable for it and would have to give my money back and re-sell the car again, etc. I have heard this urban myth before and always suspected it was BS but I wasn’t 100% certain. So I checked around, even with my attorney, and verified that was not true but she was paranoid about it and closed to all further thinking. I relayed that I had reliable sources who explained that once I purchased the car with a legal title properly transferred according to the seller’s state’s requirements, then any risk that is not in her control and certainly not malicious intent on her part rests with me from that point on. Her title is legal and all paperwork was in order, so from her end it would have been a done deal and rid of the car this evening, but whatever.Incidentally, I even called the current owner of FiberFab to ask about getting the title transferred and he was extremely helpful. I had all the hurdles figured out and I am 100% certain I would have got the title transferred. It wouldn’t have happened tomorrow, but I wasn’t in a huge hurry anyway and even a couple weeks of jumping through hoops to get it done was no big deal to me.Of course she didn’t change her mind until after I had spent literally hours researching and making phone calls to figure out and verify that everything was in order plus getting the loan done. I was literally calling her with the news that I cash in hand, a ride over there this evening to pick it up and an answer to the very last minor question about proof of death of her husband when she was simultaneously calling me to say that the sale was cut off to me. She has decided that a Missouri buyer is the only route she will go now (even though the location of the buyer isn’t a fact that is necessarily disclosed to the seller). No big mystery that I am extremely frustrated and sour about the whole thing now.So I’m sorry to say that I am NOT joining the ranks and it’s probably not likely I will be. It was a bit of a whim and I just happened to see the listing. I probably won’t be actively searching one out to buy. Too bad. I was looking forward to the camaraderie that seems to be here as well as just driving the thing around.Thanks for the friendly responses though. Have fun with your own continued enjoyment of the buggies.Take care.Vinnie.vinito2015-05-08 20:06:44
Vinnie,
Hope you reconsider, and find another one, it is the cheapest fun you’ll ever have.BillBad Bill
Sorry to hear it Vinny, but if you stick around here a bit you’ll likely get line on another one before long. Hope you do.
As a Missouri attorney — formerly of the Kansas City area BTW — you and the lady (and your attorney, unless you simply misunderstood him/her) are all full of misinformation. Let’s start with the idea that it’s somehow more difficult to transfer title across state lines. Ridiculous. If that was the case, used car dealers across the U.S. would all be run out of business tomorrow. Assuming there is a valid title to a vehicle (any vehicle), it makes no difference what state the buyer or seller(s) are from. Period.
The only legal requirement is that the seller be **capable** of transferring ownership. That means that the legal owner has to sign the title. The title is all-important because the name(s) on the title determine who is the legal owner and therefore legally capable of transferring title. Here is where we lack sufficient information. There is a lot of talk in your post about the title, but I don’t see where you actually saw the title. Nobody — self included — can provide legal advice about a title that no one has actually seen. And why would you ask an attorney anyway? For pete’s sake, the attorney doesn’t give you a title. Why wouldn’t you just ask the Kansas DMV? They are the ones whose opinion actually counts, and they don’t even charge for their advice. Because if you’d asked the DMV, the first thing they’d ask is for a copy of the title, because nobody can answer the friggin’ question without a copy of the title!Frequently both the husband and wife have their names on the title. If so, all that would be necessary to transfer ownership to you would be for the wife to sign and to provide a certified copy of the husband’s death certificate. Sometimes, however, a title is in the name of the husband only. If so, and if there was no “transfer on death” (TOD) designation on the title to transfer ownership to the wife after the husband’s death — then either probate and a court order, or “refusal of letters” to the spouse would be required. THEN the Missouri Dept. of Revenue (Missouri’s DMV) would have to reissue the title in the wife’s name. Once the title would be in her name, obviously she could then transfer title to you. You would be under no obligation to wait for this to be accomplished, because it could take weeks or even months.If there was never any title issued because it was a kit car, then that is another whole can of worms, as Doug’s Garage can attest as that is his situation here in Nevada.You said, “if I can’t get the title transferred into my name … then she was liable for it and would have to give my money back and re-sell the car again, etc. I have heard this urban myth before and always suspected it was BS but I wasn’t 100% certain.” Urban myth??? Are you kidding? When you buy a car, the seller has to give you clean title right then and there, no waiting. IF the seller can’t convey clean title to the car, it’s only common sense that he/she would owe you a refund and that you’d have to return the car and the title. Frequently you’d expect people to work together voluntarily to resolve the issue, but that would be entirely up to you, because the law would not require you to wait for the seller to get his/her ducks in a row — you would definitely have a right to a refund, exactly as the lady said. I’m going to assume that you and your attorney simply didn’t understand each other about this, because I’d hate to think that a fellow attorney would make such a baaaad blunder.When I bought my TDR, the seller gave me a copy of the title that indicated that it was in his deceased father’s name, but there was an unnotarized signature on the back that he said was his father’s. Well, sorry, sir, NO, you may not just fill in my name and give me that title, that’s not acceptable because how do I know that is your father’s signature or that you have the right to sell the car for him? He said that the Utah DMV would accept it … okay, I said, that’s your risk … you just fill in your own name as transferee and let Utah DMV issue you a new title in your own name. He did that and got a new title issued in his name, then signed it over to me. Perfectly clean paperwork. Simple. The State of Utah says he’s the owner, I’m not party to any fraud, and it avoids any other potential heirs of the father trying to come forward and get the car back.BOTTOM LINE: ALWAYS INSIST ON GETTING A COPY OF THE TITLE AND TAKE IT TO YOUR LOCAL DMV TO SEE WHAT THE REAL EXPERTS WILL REQUIRE TO TRANSFER TITLE!johnsimion2015-05-08 22:34:47
I can see why you went there but I didn’t go on about all the details I had to figure out because it’s a long, boring list (because I didn’t know for sure already – somebody who did would have found it much easier no doubt). Also, describing the complete drama would just be me venting as the saga is closed now anyway.
So just FYI. Yes I did look at the title myself and the way it was named was : Deceased husband name, wife’s name then TOD to a trust in both his and her name. So since not both are deceased the trust isn’t involved yet and in this case Kansas simply requires a photocopy of his death certificate (and his SS# can be blacked out for identity protection reasons). Incidentally I know this now from calling DMV (one of a few calls to them). Since I did see the title with my own eyes and even take a photo of it (which helped in my efforts), plus verified that the chassis VIN did match the one stamped on the car (also with my own eyes) I was reasonably certain that the title was clean and transfer to my name would be possible. What the lady should have done before putting it up for sale is get a new title & take the deceased name off of it beforehand which would have made any sale a little easier.Resist the temptation to assume my attorney would give bad advice. It only seems like there are gaps in data because it would be verbose and boring for me to relay all the details here, so my fault not his. My mentioning this step was only me trying to illustrate how broad I was trying to cast the net to cover all the bases as best I can. The DMV and Highway Patrol communiques were more fruitful than the attorney as you probably already know. But I got nuggets of good info from most all the avenues I waded into, including the attorney.As I imagine you already know, title transfer from any state into Kansas requires a title inspection from the Highway Patrol before proceeding to the DMV. True to form, the two agencies don’t necessarily know what the other does or expects and this makes the process more difficult for anything outside the ordinary. There were a series of calls from one to the other, me just relaying what the other agency said. You’d think since they both do this all day, every day of their career that they would be so well-versed in the process that one or the other or both would know what’s going on. All the DMV would say is “you need to get a title inspection”. Well that’s easy for a 2009 Ford pickup that’s all stock. The Highway Patrol basically told me that I would NOT pass the inspection with this car. No mention of Certificate of Origin for the kit or anything else I now know are all you need for things to go forward. So is it just laziness or assumption of buyer stupidity or narcissism or something else which makes them say things like that? I’ll never know.Believe me I wanted to know with strong-as-possible certainty that I wouldn’t be hit with too many surprises and certainly no big ones. I am the type that will try to think of any possible way a thing can go wrong and make sure that I don’t fall into a problem as best I can. I have never bought a kit car before so I didn’t know anything about it last week, so this was a fair chunk of work just to learn what Kansas and my county require. Now I know a ton more than I did then so it would be a lot easier.The shame is that as things progressed I became certainer and certainer of the ability to get the thing legal for myself as the seller got paranoider and paranoider over the same time period. I think it’s because I was putting in effort to learn the facts while she was lazily stewing in her own thoughts. I don’t want to criticize her too much just because ranting on her is a slippery slope I can too easily go down for no gain. It’s tempting because I’m pretty miffed at the seller’s thoughtlessness and laziness. But she has to live inside her own brain ceaselessly which is punishment way beyond what I would ever impose for this small offense.Anyway, I’ll get over it soon.Just so you know, today I saw another local listing for a kit car. Jaguar this time. Kansas title this time. I’m hoping to take it for a test drive just because whether I buy it or not, even a short spin in the things are fun. You veterans probably know better than I know myself – I might have caught a little car fever this week. I’m not sure whether that’s a bad or good thing, but it feels good.I guess if I never try it I’ll never learn the pleasure of financial disaster !vinito2015-05-09 10:23:30
I like this Vinny guy already. Level-headed.
Good luck on the Jag kit. My guess is it’s an XK-120 with Ford running gear. Is it?I kind of want one of those; I think they could be made very nice with a later v-6, five-speed and some properly-sized (15 or 16-inch, not the 14s they usually sport) knock-off wire wheels, powdered gray.But even the silly-looking ones I’ve seen were listed out of my price range.The Jaguar is described to be an X-100, so kind of similar to the TD body style I love so much. Very neat looking car as well. It is built on a Ford 4cyl base. (Pinto?)
It’s small multitudes more expensive than the MiGi I lost (which would have been $3500 by the way – conceive my disappointment ! ). But it may be a reasonable price for what it is, even if it is probably out of my price range as well.If I really catch “the bug”, then upgrading motors and such might be fun and even worth the expense and effort. Being new to the whole thing, I’d be happy for quite a while if a fun little hobby car would scoot me around town sputtering and coughing (the car, not me hopefully).Heck, here’s a pic of the Jag:
The BRG fits “me” better anyway. The car probably physically fits me better too. I don’t think it matters since the price gets me into a commitment I’m not sure I want to take on. I could afford it, but I haven’t fully been infected by the car bug yet so its worth hasn’t spread so far into the gray matter as I’m sure it will be once the disease takes full hold.and just for regret’s sake, here’s one of the MiGi I was looking at:
Side note:It’s kinda funny that I never was a “motorhead”. I am a machinist by trade and I’ve been building and mechanic-ing most of my life, so it seems that I have somehow avoided getting into cars despite myself other than a means to get from here to there. With my background it seems that I should be deep into it by this time in my life, but it just never happened.I know that cars can easily be a source of thorough enjoyment rather than a boring source of transport and I’ve had enough cars in my life that I caught a glimpse of it here and there. Maybe I’m just old and bored enough of the pattern that I’m ready to take it on and have fun with it finally.vinito2015-05-09 12:03:56
Nice, Vinny. That looks like a clean MiGi for $3500, which is about right for a decent one in running kit. I’m not so sure about Jaguar SS100 replica prices. I’d guess they’d be a few bucks more just on the basis of material used.
It is not without precedent that a person of your profession would go a full career and not be car crazed. It happens with other mechanical professionals too. My father was a body & fender guy for 30 years or so, but cars, to him, were just a means to an end.Here’s the sort of thing I was talking about. Nice lines, but the interior is all wrong and the wire hubcaps are just not right, imho. Priced closer to $5,000 it’s be worth a look. It has been listed a very long time at $15k. You see that kind of thing happen a lot.edsnova2015-05-09 13:49:19
You have to laugh…I just talked with the Jaguar owner and it, too, is a Missouri title. The reason is he has a business in MO and he ran into so much problem getting the title transferred in Kansas that he instead did it in MO (transfer fro Colorado).Also, he’s asking $12K and I just don’t see me going there. If I had it in savings or something I might be tempted, but I won’t be getting a loan for it. Plus, the original kit company doesn’t show up anywhere like the FF did so it would be more digging and hoop jumping and frankly I’m kind of burned out on that.But the seller is a really nice feller and invited me to come drive it for a bit tomorrow whether I buy it or not. Maybe he thinks once I drive it I’ll be hooked (I can’t say that wouldn’t happen) or maybe he just likes talking hobbies. Either way I think I’ll be taking him up on it if it isn’t sold by then.That there is a replica of the SS 100 Jaguar, most likely from Antique & Classic, a kit company that was located in upstate NY. Classic Roadsters Ltd. also did an SS 100. Don’t think this is their kit.
And yes, contrary to what most people would tell you, it was not a Jaguar SS 100.
The original was built by SS Cars Limited from 1936 to 1940.
SS Cars. Ltd. was run by (and mostly owned by) William Lyons…founder of Jaguar. The SS likely came from Swallow Sidecar Company (a company they bought). The 100, because the car could do 100 mph. Later the Jaguar 120 was so named because it could do 120!
The company was renamed Jaguar after WWII. Seems “SS” meant something different in 1945 than it had in 1936.
Paul Mossberg
Former Owner of a 1981 Classic Roadsters Ltd. Duchess (VW)
2005 Intermeccanica RoadsterIf you own a TDr and are not in the Registry, please go to https://tdreplica.com/forums/topic/mg-td-replica-registry/ and register (you need to copy and paste the link)
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