Perfection is a trap.
I’m not saying that perfect, beautiful things don’t have a place in our lives; of course they do! They’re perfect and beautiful, after all. But they’re also a burden. And in the automotive world, I think this is even more true. You know what I’d do if I had a Singer 911? – sorry, a Porsche Re-Imagined by Singer? Probably develop an ulcer. A horrible, painful ulcer, because I knew that if I even looked at that absolutely perfectly engineered and designed machine too hard, my moist sub-par eyes would somehow be de-valuing it with their vision-rays, or however eyes work.
Every trip in that perfect Singer would be a tense journey of worry, every parking job would be a mild crisis, each large curb would be a cruel adversary, hungry to scrape the clams out of your wheels. I’m sure there’s people who enjoy their Singers and other beautiful, perfect cars, but I’m going to go out on a rusty, musty-smelling limb and say that when it comes to just pure, raw, visceral enjoyment, a genuine shitbox beats a perfect car hands down, every single time.
I know what you’re thinking, thanks to a service Amazon offers to Prime members, and you’re quite skeptical. Very likely, you’ve been conditioned by culture and society to believe that, somehow, good things are good and lousy things are, you know, lousy. I’m here to tell you this just isn’t the case.
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This is something I think I’ve always known, deep down, but became wildly clear and obvious during our whole adventure driving our $800, 375,000-mile ex-NYC taxi across the country. That car was an absolute, unadulterated, unrepentant, uncouth, unclean heap, and that is precisely why I ended up loving that filthy yellow hunk of crap. Copart, our partner on this journey, had a lot of much nicer cars we could have bought, but we all found this one deeply appealing because of its deep imperfections.
Look, here’s a video about the whole remarkable and grueling experience!
If that taxi was perfectly preserved and came into my life gleaming bright and running like a well-oiled top, then I doubt I would have cared about it at all. Because why would I need to?
I think that may be at the root of the appeal of the quite imperfect car: it needs us. Without you, the car will likely end up as many steel cylinders containing a small volume of soup on a store shelves. You’re a direct part of this car’s continued existence and future.
It’s not fine when it comes into your life. In fact, it’s often a basket case. You want your friends to see it and shake their heads in disgust and dismay when they see what you’ve dragged home from the junkyard. You want them to believe that you’re a fool, and this car will never run, and maybe you want one of them to take you aside and tell you, in somber, hushed tones, that perhaps you should seek the counsel of your clergyperson.
All of that, though, those reactions of disbelief and rolled eyes, those are all seeds that you’ll be planting and growing, and then will harvest the fruits of glorious satisfaction when you do, eventually, get your heap running. An imperfect car offers these opportunities, ones that just going out and buying something perfect can never provide. There’s no real satisfaction in just buying something perfect; it’s done, it doesn’t need you to believe in it or have a vision, it just needs you to have money, and what kind of story is that?
Imperfect cars come with stories, both from their own, often murky pasts and creating new stories the moment you get involved with the imperfect car.
I keep coming back to the example of our taxi, because it really is a sort of textbook example: it had a past, one that we only knew about in general terms. It was a hardworking taxi in New York City, and the sheer volume of miles and the incredibly worn condition of its interior told that tale. The shattered subframe and suspension damage and leaking crankcase all hinted at some manner of violent end, and this all just added to the lore.
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Then, once we purchased the taxi, chance immediately started writing new chapters in the Tale of the Taxi, like when it rolled off the tow vehicle and smashed into a tree. While this is objectively terrible and could have actually been downright tragic, we got lucky and no one was hurt, so the end result was this blighted machine had a new level of tragic backstory applied to it, which just added to the car’s character and story.
It took a lot of work on the taxi to get it running and driving again, and that is also part of the appeal of an imperfect car. The work is the process! It’s how you bond with the car, it’s how you earn the perverse pride you’ll feel when you actually get to drive it around!
And that, of course, is the purpose of a car: to drive it. Imperfect cars can be some of the best driving experiences – well, maybe “best” is the wrong word here – let’s say engaging driving experiences, because an imperfect car is inherently full of strange quirks and idiosyncrasies that keep your drives from ever being, you know, boring.
An imperfect car – once you get it safe enough and all that, of course – is one that you can enjoy almost more than any “nice” car because you’re freed from the burden of being careful. You can push it, abuse it, do whatever feels fun at the time, and if something gets scratched or dented or breaks then oh well! That’s part of life! And you go on, still delighted.
Don’t believe me? Look at the obvious joy of this man has about his entire yard full of imperfect cars:
This lightly unhinged freedom that you see exhibited in that video, this is at the heart of the joy of an imperfect car. An imperfect car is like a bonkers, charming dog that runs flat out into a wall, rolls around, shakes it off, and keeps going, delight not even remotely impacted by the impact. A car that you can use for anything, that you can leave parked anywhere without worry, that you don’t fret about if it gets full of beach sand or mud or confetti or whatever, that’s the essence of an enjoyable car.
Plus, the almost guaranteed unreliability of such a lovable heap all but guarantees more adventure injected into your life. Getting stuck places is just an opportunity to see new things and meet new people, after all, and a pleasingly crappy car can act as a sort of serendipity-generating machine, if you approach it with the right sort of accepting and relaxed attitude.
I also tend to think the best ramshackle imperfect cars are ones that started life as the opposite; luxury cars brought down multiple pegs, thanks to the cruel, unrelenting abuse of time and the powerful hammer of depreciation. Look at something like this, for example:
That Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow there is currently at a bid of $1,700 and while, yes, it’s objectively a terrible idea, this would make a truly fantastic imperfect car. The contrast is what would make it so good, of course, driving something that was once the pinnacle of luxury and is now a battered, dusty heap with rust spots, but still retaining some ghosts of its former dignity.
The options really are limitless, and with some careful and judicious lowering of your standards of quality – standards that only serve to disappoint, if we’re honest – you can find yourself with the opportunity to experience some really remarkable cars. Cars with 12 cylinders, boxy Italian wonders, under-appreciated Americans, forbidden fruits, and old favorites. And all you need to do is make peace with owning and enjoying an imperfect example. It’s not only rewarding, it’s also likely going to be a lot cheaper.
It’s easier than you think, really. Our brains seem to be wired to find affection and sympathy for the underdog, and the right kind of ramshackle car can tick all those boxes. A car is meant to be enjoyed and driven, and, once freed from the shackles of status and quality and perfection, it’s something that can be truly and completely enjoyed.
Get yourself a crappy car that needs you. There’s happiness there.
Just realized I’ve been driving my newly repainted car less, once I got another new-to-me used car with a bad paint job from the previous owner. The paint cracks like an eggshell on the bumpers if I press too hard, and there are tiny pinhole bubbles on the roof.
Last night I misjudged a store driveway and scraped the front skirt on the curb by stopping beyond the step to the store. An embarrasingly loud scrape and some paint flakes all around, but I was surprised it didn’t bother me much when I walked away
You would know with all the junkers parked around your house. And mold covered too. Poor yellow bug.
I’d have no such fears. If I’m rich enough to afford such a vehicle, then making repairs, fixing scuffs, etc. is no big deal.
It’s the car you give to your teenager. My father has made it quite clear that he doesn’t want to know what my brother and I did to / in / with the old Chevy Celebrity. In my case, the daughter is – as I type this – out in the beater Legacy (hopefully not) pulling the same shit we did.
This makes me miss my old oil guzzling ’95 Neon. Rusting front edge of the hood. Broken driver side window crank and busted A/C. I could park anywhere and not give a damn. Go ahead, door ding me and see if I can spot it among the other ones already there! Here in south Orange County I could ward off tailgaters by dropping down a gear and blowing a nice big puff of blue smoke their way. The car had a failing head gasket (the 6th one installed since new) and the repair was more than the car was worth. So I’d put a quart of oil in every two weeks or so and keep it going.
Because of this the car eventually couldn’t pass smog out here, so I was finally able to get my Evo.
Also, that pic of the Rolls strangely makes me want a Shadow of that vintage but all in bare metal.
I’m driving a Camry with peeling clearcoat while the DD is getting a bit of body work (from a hit-and-run jackass). It feels… invisible, invincible and if someone door-dinged it by accident, I wouldn’t get too upset. There are many identical Camrys of the same era in the same color out driving around, and as a spare car, it fulfills its role perfectly. Nothing special, except for its outstanding longevity, economy and practicality… and working air conditioner.
They are so invisible that my mom’s silver Camry was involved in a wreck 3 times while she wasn’t even inside it before insurance totalled it. Twice while actively fueling at a gas station.
May I offer up this example?
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/StratAP2RMB–fender-american-professional-ii-stratocaster-miami-blue-with-rosewood-fingerboard
Pretty nice American made professional quality guitar , but for about three and a half times the price you can get this
https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/Stt63SHRSGSB–fender-custom-shop-1963-stratocaster-super-heavy-relic-electric-guitar-surf-green-over-3-color-sunburst
So I’m thinking, maybe a reverse detailing business, where you bring in a brand new Lamborghini and I spend a week with some steel wool, a mediablaster, and a rubber mallet. Finish it off with a bucket of burning man dust. I think charging $150,000 would be about right, or should I charge more?
There is nothing more freeing than owning a beater. My favorite was a 1990 E-150 conversion van that I bought for $600 in 2004 to use as a winter beater. I also used it as a covered pickup; hauling junk to the dump and even hauled a complete 5.0L engine for a buddy.
https://imgur.com/a/DXmohpv
David needs a new piece of wood. Hilarious
Certainly a beat up bruiser is like a 3 legged dog. Itooks ugly but you can’t help loving it.
Sort of like DT I always get a kick of seeing an excited DT in the videos
The more you pay, the more you expect. The more you expect, the worse you feel. The worse you feel, the more you search for something else.
And the more luxury you allow into your life, the crappier all the regular stuff seems.
Most farmers understand this logic. When buying a farm truck, the best time to buy is after a hail storm. Not only do you get a discount, it is pre beat up, so you dont stress when the inevitable happens and it gets damaged from farm life.
Grant Peterson, owner of Rivendell Bikes and legendary retro-grouch, called it ‘beausage,’
The beauty of use.
There is something uniquely beautiful about the wear and scars that a well-maintained but regularly used, and used hard, acquire.
Like laugh lines and gray hairs, they tell a story of experience and adventure.
I specifically seek out less than mint examples of the cars I want.
I do not want to worry about a car or truck I drive; cars are nothing more than tools; they do a job. Some do it with more fun than others, but it is still just fulfilling a purpose. A car doesn’t have to be flawless to work well for what you need it for.
If I have a less-than-mint car, I do not need to worry about parking as much or feel as bad when the inevitable ding or damage happens.
Buying our Mini, we had two choices, and we picked the one with a couple of small dings and a paint flaw. We never worry about it, and when it recently gained a scratch in a parking lot, while not pleased, I was also not exactly upset.
I won;t bag on people who want flawless cars but it is not the most important metric and can often remove fun.
Just a couple months ago I was talking to some random person about how the best luxury feature for a car is not having to worry about it getting beat up. Turning around a few minutes later, I was telling my 4 year old “at least take your ski boots off first if you’re going to climb on the hood” then “what are you doing on the roof?” I don’t think I would do well with a pristine vehicle.
A less dramatic example than a project car is the dent in the side of my month old, only vehicle I’ve custom ordered, truck from an insane deer. I decided not to go through the trouble of getting it fixed because it was freeing to no longer have that nagging perfection and I had/have every intent to use it like the off-road truck it is over the hopefully 10+ years I’ll own it, so it’ll likely be the first of many imperfections. It’s very freeing to longer worry about the first debt/scratch/chip and just enjoy the vehicle the way it’s meant to be enjoyed. That was nearly 3 years and 70K miles ago and it’s going strong in it’s imperfectly perfect glory.
My very first new car, a preordered RX8 with exactly what I wanted and nothing more lasted 4 days of driving it to work before that happened. It was infuriating and liberating as my expectation was that I’d squeeze the ever-living hell out of the car and replace it in 5-8 years. Still own it and AFAIK it’s still the only dent in the car.
I try to use all my things, which means they get some wear and tear, but that’s the price of using them. None of them are trashed, but they exhibit wear from use. Farther down that path is the beater that you don’t care about at all and there’s a special kind of carefree joy in that, sometimes even pleasure when it accumulates more damage as you know its time is short, anyway. My ’84 Subaru was like that. I bought it for $500 and was told it should get me 1 or 1.5 years thanks to the countdown timer of rust. I beat the ever living hell out of it for 3. Someone keyed it at one point (?!) and that cracked me up. It could even had been keyed for days and I didn’t notice (car was silver). Its replacement, a ’83 Subaru, had a good chunk of tree fall on it while I was driving down the road. Drove it for several more months with the hood caved in and it was great. Maybe it was reading the Hungarian folktale, “the Student Who Became King in Spite of Himself” as a kid, but to me, that gave it real status. Like the magic bread guy to the dragon, I’d look at fancy cars and imagine the GL grinning at them, daring them to shrug off half as much punishment as it had been through.
I remember the summer, fall, winter, spring and summer of 1996/97 when I was a bit too ambitious bringing my ’02 BMW on the road. A 1502, pimped with lots of parts including the engine (125hp with minor mods for sure) from a 520/4 (yes, the Stromberg one). Constantly tinkering with that car meant that I had to take the bike to the car mechanic trade school in Neckarsulm (yes, we had lots of Wankels in each corner) in winter, 17km down the hill and 17km up the afternoon (160m altitude gain).
Since then, I do not care about cars anymore. They are funny toys. Nothing more, nothing less. I take the bike to nearly every place that is less than 100km away. And sometimes more.
Regarding the Rolls: I am constantly looking for cheap MAN 8.224 and cars I can drop the drivetrain into. Kinda European equivalent to a Cummins 6BT swap. The Rolls would qualify.
Thanks, I now have the absurdly amusing Bad Idea od Cummins-swapping that Rolls in the ad. And yes, that includes the overwhelming urge to hack it up enough to cram a manual into it, too. I wonder if some judicious cutting and welding could make a body-swap onto a Cummins/Dodge 4×4 chassis? It just gets sillier the more I think about it…
Dammit, now I want to buy that rolls and also a wrecked 150 raptor and merge the body to the frame.
I agree, I’ve enjoyed having my nice car and my project car(s) for about 20 years. I mainly liked cars that are broken and dirt cheap, or have good bones and a bad body so I don’t feel bad when I move on to the next project in 2-3 years. I miss my first generation RX7 that I restored to perfect functionality out of two cars abandoned in the woods, yet other than a good clean, clay bar, and wax did nothing to the external appearance. Have had 3 Miatas now that each cost me less than $500 and there is nothing more enabling than driving a slow car fast without caring if you clip a curb or damage it in any way that doesn’t involve rolling it. I also bought an Audi and learned the horrors of modern German car ownership and their hostility to owners fixing things themselves.
The one project car purchase that I most regret and am most proud of is I wanted a car I could both track and camp in, and as a friend already owned a Legacy GT that wasn’t an option. So 6 years ago I found a Lexus IS300 wagon on ebay that spent 90K in Chicago then 70K in Denver so I was expecting a rusty basketcase despite Lexus generally being best in class at rust prevention and bought it sight unseen and shipped it over. It showed up perfect, and I mean California levels of rust perfect and Canada levels of UV damage perfect. I have a second 2JZ sitting around, a manual conversion about 80% ready, an LSD that I can’t use with the current transmission, and the only thing I’ve done is I found a set of homologation spec Ohlins dampers I ordered for almost half the cost of the car before it showed up, brake upgrades, and a new front sway bar. I was ready to do stupid let’s turbo this supra in disguise to its limits for 2 years before it breaks and I scrap it. Instead I’ve been driving it for 6 years untouched, engine sitting in the basement probably decaying away, but I’ve been patiently waiting for something to break to let me feel not guilty for ruining one of the best examples out of ~4000 of the coolest cars to make it to the US.
I really want to get a new project car but it took so much effort to wean me down to only 2 cars that fit in my garage, and unfortunately they both work.
This is true for us common folk, but the other side of the coin is having enough money that no car is too valuable to get scratched or ruined.. Buying a Singer and abusing it makes perfect sense if it doesn’t dent your savings.
I think you nailed it with “underdog”. There were a lot of Autopians cheering for the taxi simply because it was not expected to succeed, but by golly we wanted it to succeed, to get itself and its passengers all the way to Galpin.
Some people – myself included – look at an extremely imperfect and inexpensive thing and see potential. “I could do A, B, Q, green, threeve, and frax and then it would be a nicer-but-still-imperfect thing – my imperfect thing.” That’s really appealing.
Beware of any sentence that starts with “All I need to do is…”.
Since ALL cars — that’s every car ever built — is (or was) imperfect, that’s a pretty simple task.
I don’t know of any owner — or automotive journalist — who couldn’t say “Gee, if only this had…” after the first spin around the block.
Haven’t had the pleasure of driving a Singer Porsche interpretation yet, and probably never will, but I doubt it would be an exception.
That’s doesn’t make imperfect cars bad. Just real.
Junkies rule! Ah … you know what I mean.
This article is a great corollary to Jeremy Clarkson’s famous declaration on Top Gear that the fastest car you will ever drive is any rental car – absolutely true!
Also attributed to P. J. O’Rourke!
Totally agree. Don’t know who said it, but I *try* to adhere to the adage that “Own your things, don’t let your things own you.”
It’s important to take care of valuable belongings, of course, but not to the point of stress about actually using an item for its intended purpose.