AMX

[Shagoneer]

Being the horrible uncle that I am, I promised my nephew a muscle car for his 16th birthday. SInce then I've decided to keep it AMC to match my Waggy and rebuild an AMX for him. At this point my only thoughts are "Dear Gd, what did I get myself into" and "where do I even start" SO looks like my waggy is gonna have to take the back burner for awhile.

[Stuka]

Do not let a 16 year old drive a pony/muscle car. Only bad things will happen. And I am speaking from experience.

But would be fun to rebuild a first gen AMX

[Shagoneer]

I realize it's a bad idea. However I've seen the high schools in the town he lives in and ALL of the kids have BADASS cars. I saw a couple of Porsche (what would the plural of porsche be? Porsches doesn't sound right) a few classic mustangs and camaros, one or two stingrays, a bunch of escalades and navigators even a few AUDI/Mercedes/BMW/Lexus sports cars And I don't want my nephew t be seen as the poor kid who can't afford a nice car, also this way his car will be unique.

[E_DIGG]

Hey, you promised him a muscle car for his Birthday. You didn't say it needed to be running or not. Get him a Jalopy and the 2 of you can restore it together and when it is done he will be older and more wise. He will also respect the time and effort that went into the car and wont abuse or mistreat it.

[carnuck]

Plus one on that. I helped my middle son get his first FSJ and it was stolen because he took it to a friend's to park while he was messing around with Jobcorps and it was gone when he came back. Then it was shoulder shrug and "Oh well". Now he wishes he still had it. That '83 Cherokee pop top was badass!

[Brizio]

I like what E_DIGG said, you can find a honest AMX as Uncle nephew project, that I think will be cool, will bond him more to you, he will learn a lot and will never regret this time, plus he will learn the value of the car, and how much sacrifice can go in it, this will prevent also doing stupid stuff with it.
If the car need to show off a status symbol, well, sell what you can and buy him a show quality AMX.

[letank]

Anything with airbags, 3 point seat belts and working AC with over 25mpg...

[fulsizjeep]

Do what ya gotta do. I would drive it if he loses interest.

[Grand_Wag_85]

You can find drivable Javelins all day long for $3500. They ain't beauty queens but they do move under their own power.

[bigun]

You can find drivable Javelins all day long for $3500. They ain't beauty queens but they do move under their own power.

Where?
Get him a wagon or one of the old Ramblers that the back seat folds down, he'll love you when he starts dating

[will e]

Have you already picked up an AMX? They are hard to find but here is a great choice:

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/AMC-AMX- ... e6&vxp=mtr

Okay, just kidding. The AMX is a good idea. No back seat.

It might not impress the other kids, you should check with him to see if it is something he would want. And I really like the idea of working on it together. It will lessen the chance that he will abuse/wreck it if he has some sweat and blood into it.

If you really wanted to get him something different... Pantera.

[Shagoneer]

I offered both my nieces and my nephew a car for their 16th. My oldest niece said that classic cars are for old people. The second niece is gonna get a nova or javelin. Something that is nice but not overly expensive that I buy running and then just restore the interior. My nephew I was gonna go all out for. My basic olan was to buy a 69 or 70 AMX and give it a cage, an EFI dominator, bucket seats, and a nice sound system.

[Grand_Wag_85]

You can find drivable Javelins all day long for $3500. They ain't beauty queens but they do move under their own power.

Where?
Get him a wagon or one of the old Ramblers that the back seat folds down, he'll love you when he starts dating

I can't give away all my secrets.

[ProTouring442]

Bad idea? Well, my first car was a 1966 Chevelle convertible my father and I built, and which my parents financed. We installed an LS-6 454 crate engine, an M-20 4 speed, and a 3.31:1 posi 12-bolt. It ran a best time of 12.03 in the 1/4 (I want to say 115mph, but I could be mistaken).

Never wrecked it, never got a ticket in it.

My sister was given an IROC-Z for her 16th birthday, and she never got a ticket or wrecked it either.

Then there was the friend of mine who had a Ford Falcon with a 4-banger in it... he rolled that one six or seven times out into a field.

It's more about respect than age.

[Mars]

My first was a 67 Camaro convertible with 350 LT1. Followed by a 71 Lemans Sport with a superduty 455. Never had so much as a parking ticket in those. The one I did something stupid in? The 77 cutlass, 143mph in a 55mph zone.. yehaw

[carnuck]

First car was a Vauxhall Victor Super 101 we put a clutch in and I drove around the fields (I had to reach through a hole in the floor to shift it) I tried 4 wheeling it and couldn't figure out why it got stuck while crossing the creek (my dad and my uncle welded the rear diff after that) Next car was a Toyota Corolla that I drove once. I learned how to change brake pads (first car I saw with disc brakes) and shoes, then we took it for a tune up at the dealer. $800 later I had a "new motor" with a bag full of old parts (that I now know came from a 1.6L and not a 1.2L) They didn't even bother to degrease the motor before they painted it.
2 weeks later one of the sawdust trucks at work backed into it and my dad was so mad he sold it to the driver for $1500 and we used that money to get my Mazda RX2 (from the ripoff Mazda dealer I worked for part time as a lot boy. I got the car body in lieu of my paycheck since they filed bankruptcy) a "new" motor. I ended up with a 3 rotor Cosmo engine with 5 speed and the Mazda racing team helped me build it with twin turbos and nitrous. A car capable of 175 mph is NOT good for a high school kid! I drove to Calgary, AB from Vancover, BC in 10 hours (before the Coquihalla highway) and managed pretty well, except ending up in a corn field (when the cigarette lighter ejected into my lap) then getting knocked off the highway by Cache Creek on the way back and landing in the Nightshift pub's parking lot after doing an endo and landing on it's wheels.
Much later I had a rusted out 71 AMX body I put on a Chevy Blazer frame (and a Chrysler New Yorker I helped put on an IH truck frame) and lots of other AMCs and other vehicles (my nickname was not Junkyard Jim for nothing!). The last AMX I had was a '77 that I pulled the 304 from for my '73 J4000 but I still drool over them at car shows.

[FSJunkie]

Get him an AMX with a 232 I6. All the cool factor, better gas mileage, and he won't get antsy.

[Shagoneer]

The problem with that is I want to play with it for awhile before I give it to him just to ensure "it is safe"

[DarkMonohue]

Perhaps Shagoneer is just winding us up. If so, well done...but if not, here's my two cents.

I realize it's a bad idea. However I've seen the high schools in the town he lives in and ALL of the kids have BADASS cars...And I don't want my nephew t be seen as the poor kid who can't afford a nice car...

Really, who gives a sputtering-wet broccoli fart about the approval of rich high school kids? Your nephew is under no obligation to impress a bunch of spoiled, fickle little squirrels via his possessions. Most of those people won't even be a part of his life after he graduates high school and they all go their separate ways. If your nephew doesn't have the security or self-esteem to survive without buying the attention of other spoiled rich kids via a free cool car, then there are other issues to be addressed. If he is reasonably secure and mature, he'll know he owes his friends nothing and will realize how little peer approval is worth in that context. Maybe he won't, and will channel that frustration into some serious goals, decide to apply himself toward an education, etc.

Anyway, having to work for what you have ain't so bad. I suspect about 99% of us on this forum fit that model. It builds character. People to whom everything is handed free and clear tend to be...well...A-holes, really. Or worse.

Back to the skill and experience thing - and this is a big issue for me, because the vast majority of Americans are equally arrogant and ignorant when behind the wheel - have you considered getting the kid into some serious driver training? There are tons of high-performance driving schools that can actually teach a person how to handle a car when things get weird. A little bit of real training, followed by a few HPDEs (track days), will do more for him than you can imagine. Driver training beyond learning how to adjust the mirrors and parallel park is a huge advantage and very likely a genuine life-saver.

Oh, since you mentioned it - the plural of Porsche is Porsches. If you pronounce it correctly (you say "Porsha", not "Porsh") then the plural Porsches sounds just fine. That assumes you can afford to house, feed, and insure them all.

The problem with that is I want to play with it for awhile before I give it to him just to ensure "it is safe"

Might be safe enough for you. Safe in a kid's hands? Hell no, and he won't be safe in it if he or another road user does something dumb, which they inevitably do.

I realize that the above tirade contains enough cynicism to choke and/or float a horse and/or battleship. I'm not taking this tone to come off like a self-righteous jerk. It is because I feel very strongly about this. Please understand that I am not trying to judge or chastise you. Yes, AMXs are cooler than two refrigerators roped together with a bag of ice on top, but handing one to a kid...hell, no. Never in a million.

The kid can survive in the real world the rest of us working folk have to live in.

EDIT: Nevermind. It appears that this is primarily a "wouldn't it be cool if" scenario.

[Shagoneer]

Im not trying to wind anyone up. I"m genuinely saving up money to buy either a 1970 or 1974 AMX to restore, I haven't decided which yet because the 1970 has a more Muscle car looks to it whereas the 1974 looks like the bastard child of a muscle car and an Italian sports car.