Tslice

I picked up a beautiful 84' bright red vette this January with 67,xxx miles in automatic (its only flaw, but I still love it), for $3,500.

Some ******* rear ended my vette, and I filed an insurance claim and did the work myself. I ended up with a check for $2,0xx dollars. That means I essentially paid $2,000 or less for my corvette.

Now, even though I love the car, my volvo 740 turbo with a 4spd stick is on the same performance level as my vette, quarter mile wise (if not faster), even though they are two different beasts.

I want more performance from a corvette.

Would it be more cost effective to put $2,000-$3,000 worth of mods in the vette to up the performance,
OR sell the corvette for $5,000 or so (maybe lower, maybe higher$) and pick up a 91-96 corvette for $6500-7500?

Thanks

mcm95403

All depends on the condition of what you have (interior, engine, paint, etc.) and if you like the changes to the later cars - coupled with what you want to do with it.

If you just want a nice driver, the later cars may do that for you. The LTx engines are certainly great-running, but like all cars come with their own set of problems.

If your 84 is in good shape and you like it, there is certainly plenty you can do to improve it easily - up to a point. After that it becomes more difficult as the fuel system was only used for 3 years (82 and 84 in the Corvette, but also 83 in the f-body cars) so there isn't nearly the aftermarket support for it that there is for the TPI and LTx engines.

You can retro-fit a hydraulic roller cam into it which will help a lot, but the stock heads suck, so those would need to change. To keep the EGR working (for smog requirements) you'd need to use heads that have an exhaust crossover, which means cast iron or a very limited choice of aluminum. The alternative would be to build an EGR supply tube similar to what was done on the L-98's. The stock exhaust is actually simple to upgrade since the 84's don't have precats and don't have the complicated air injections tubes like the L-98's. You could pretty easily do an LT-1 manifold upgrade like I did unless you decide to go to long tube headers. They headers would be better, but are more expensive as the only good ones (to me) would be the coated Hedmans that run about $650.

Maybe if you elaborate more on what you expect out of the car we can be more helpful.

GREGGPENN

Considering that air bags could be a life-saving part of that upgrade, I'd consider it the more cost effective option. Even that aside, you could potentially be trading 10yrs newer. If you can swing that for a couple grand, you should do it in a heartbeat. The loss of A/C alone could drain you of most of the difference.

Parts simply get old and aren't as reliable -- regardless of mileage.

Age is a factor. Technology too.

There's no way you'll put $2k in that 84...and make it as good as a 10-yr newer model.

OTOH, enjoying a low-mileage specimen (regardless of power) isn't a bad idea for a while....maybe even a year. Prolly will look less suspicious if you're not flipping it right away.

96 Vette CE

Do some porting to your current intake and upgrade your exhaust, you'll be surprised at how much it will wake up your '84.

Tslice

It really is a healthy specimen. The paint is shiny, wheels are mint, it runs very good for an 84. The interior is great, no cracking, looks close to mint, and I love the color scheme (tan {saddle} leather/on black). Looks less cheesy then most other vette interiors I have seen. Even the bose speakers still work. They're definitely not great, but tolerable to me.

It sounds good, runs good, handles good. I'm not so much worried about air bags or AC. And I'm not too worried about emissions. I'm in colo. springs and they dropped emissions a few years back. There has been talk about adding them again, but no word yet.

If my vette runs 15's right now, I'd like it to run 13's and I'd be happy.

From what I understand I need to revamp the x-fire fuel system with a ported and polished intake manifold, 85 fuel pump with regulator, new head, cams to match, and 1.6 roller rockers. If I did all that I could be in only $2,000.

It's ultimately my choice. On one hand, it is a beautiful fairly low mile specimen that could be vamped up. On the other hand a 8-10 year newer car would be nice..

Tslice

Then on the other hand, I've always thought about enjoying the car as a cruiser in stock form. And just going more wild with my volvo. Just a boost guage (which I have), and a manual boost controller, which I need to add, can get my volvo into the high 13's.

Tslice

Thanks! That's what I have heard/read. I feel like just those two mods will really put a smile on my face. I'm not looking for huge performance, just some noticable gains. Because right now my volvo just feels faster than my vette. That's what a stick and a 4cyl turbo do for ya. And my 2000 impreza rs feels faster than both of them (even though it is quite a bit slower than both haha). Funny how that works.

Slow_Lane

At your altitude the boosted car will always have an advantage.

In my opinion, an 84 running 15 flats in Co Springs is a pretty healthy specimin.

If the car is as nice as you say and you enjoy it, by all means do some simple mods to it be happy.

Sure you could sell it and buy a newer one but chances are the newer car will have it's own set of issues at that price point.

Tslice

Right on!!!!

That's what I wanna hear. When I get some time, I'll post some more pics including some interior pics of my vette. She's got a friggin awesome interior!

And I'm leaning towards just going wild with my volvo. I bought it for $1200 3.5 years ago with 164k miles. Now I've got 240k miles and my compression is still 110-110-109-110 across the cylinders.

So I'm gonna up the boost to 11psi and see what happens. The cool thing with volvos is I can find lots of junk yard volvos and take things like 16v heads and swap out my 8v head for cheap. Or take the turbo out of a wrecked newer volvo and swap that too. There's norwegian guys that do their own work, and get junk yard parts, and have 500+ rwhp 740's