New Project 1911 hupmobile

[Jims5543]

Pretty amazing reading through this.

I am envious of the time you have to dedicate to this, my business, my family and everything else I need to deal with takes up so much time, when I finally have down time, I collapse.

I cannot wait to see this car in action again. Very cool build, something I would never consider taking on.

[jeff10049]

Thank you, it's been more work than I thought initially. I never thought so much of the car would have been butchered, but I'm on the home stretch now.  I need to get the wheels off to a wheelwright soon.

Finding time can be tough after selling my business. I got a good run in on it. But then, I started developing a property and getting another shop up to speed, trying to do it differently this time, so I'm not so tied down. I see the need for so many different businesses, I could get fired up. It's hard to stay small. Right now I'm stuck trying to decide which of 10 different directions to go, so we're just doing a little of everything. I am avoiding going back into the RV business, my no-compete is up, and there's plenty to go around, but I don't miss it, and I'd be tied down again. I'm leaning towards a rental equipment business, we don't have one, the shop could support the rental equipment, and some fun work like car restorations.

 Also considered just advertising in Hemmings and doing bench work like starters, generators, waterpumps, carburetors, etc there is a big call for that stuff to be restored and the local shops are going away in most places.
I'm also kicking around the idea of an automotive machine shop. There is a huge demand for that here. Most of the shops are closed, and no one is replacing them. I send everything I can't do over to Eugene, but they're so busy; it's a six-week lead time. Just the POS Subarus could keep a guy full-time around here.   

[MiniDave]

You could build up a Subaru cylinder head business - you'd be inundated with work!

But, that's part of why I quit building engines and gearboxes for Minis and Sprites, it just got to be too much....

You're right about the need for an automotive machine shop, all the old guys are either retiring or dying and no one is replacing them. We are down to one shop that does heads, one shop that still does cranks and one shop that can do limited block work. All three are backed up between two and three months.

[jeff10049]

You could build up a Subaru cylinder head business - you'd be inundated with work!

But, that's part of why I quit building engines and gearboxes for Minis and Sprites, it just got to be too much....

You're right about the need for an automotive machine shop, all the old guys are either retiring or dying and no one is replacing them. We are down to one shop that does heads, one shop that still does cranks and one shop that can do limited block work. All three are backed up between two and three months.

Yep, back when I moved here, I think there were at least 10 machine shops in town and not really enough work for them. Now we have way more work and one shop. There are a couple that only do Subaru heads and only for existing customers. You are correct that a Subaru head shop would be inundated with work; the couple of shops that do them only do Subaru and are months out and not accepting new customers. I could hit up the repair shops that work on Subarus and have piles of heads weekly, but do I want to do that? It'd be a money maker no doubt, but probably get boring. A full-service machine shop and maybe some Subaru heads for steady cash flow sounds better.
After doing this Hupmobile, it might be fun to get into brass-era car engines as well. The work is fun, and it's nothing for owners to drop 100k+ on some of these brass-era engines. Not very many shops are doing the work, but there seems to be a demand for it.   
So many things a guy could do. My main thing is to get into less physically demanding work, I've had enough of the big heavy stuff and general auto repair. Although I did just take in another road grader transmission, stupid thing weighs 2k and every part is heavy, but that's what overhead hoists are for I guess. Some of the gears are 16" diameter.   

[MiniDave]

That's why I always worked on imports, the parts are smaller and lighter!