89 XJ Vanden Plas
190,000 miles
asking $1000
driver side door was knocked by a tractor, won’t open, assuming I can have a body shop fix it later down the road, car looks sweet in my opinion, I’m just a ******** 24 year old tho what’d I know lmfao this is the first jaguar xj I’ve been exposed to and I honestly love how the thing looks

 

I think $1000 for that is too much. I would make an offer of $600 and then go no higher than $750.

 

I'm not familiar with that model Jaguar, but generically, I have done a few successful turbo conversions on other cars and seen a lot of frankenstein builds. Thing about these kind of builds is that they are often trying to pawn off a failed project, cobbled together with a bunch of worn-out salvage parts that they never could get to run right. (And I shudder to think what might be hiding under that soap). Unless you are experienced doing turbo conversions and know what to look for, they could've plumbed the oil lines wrong and the bearings are all now toast or something else just as bad. Its a lot of risk that it could be a big paperweight tomorrow if its not already a paperweight. On the other hand, if they did it even halfway decent and it actually runs and drive, you could never get that far on $1,000 doing it piece-by-piece even cobbling together a bunch of used and worn out parts. Its definitely not a car to rely on to get you back and forth to work. Its just a very large toy. Think of it as buying a few cases of tannerite just to have fun with. The more spectacularly it blows up, the more you got for your money.

 

For another grand you could probably find a running and driving car without the body damage. That car wouldn't be perfect and would probably need a bunch of work, but it would be more fun to start out with a running car.

 

So I did end up purchasing it for less than asking price. It runs and drives fine. The electronics look like they're going to be a pain in the *** but I figure I could use the learning experience seeing as it's only my 3rd car owned (the other 2 worked pretty much flawlessly aside from some belt failures and misfires along the way) and I have aspirations to do some full restorations/builds down the line. It'll do its job for the 5 minute drive up the road for work, at least in the mean time. And if it blows, ill post it up for a week and scrap if no one buys. And if it doesn't blow I'll probably freak it out and enter it in the Gambler 500 up here in Oregon, I think it'd look super badass all "mad-maxed" out. Think the blessing is that it was less than 1k, not the biggest loss in the world imo.

 

Doesn't look like a Vanden Plas to me, no fluted grille, no square headlights, more than likely a Sovereign. Are you sure it has a limited slip rear end in it? Lots didn't and my VDP doesn't either.
Still, a banged in door isn't the end of the world, get another from pick and pull and you should be just fine.

Larry