Bargain Project Car Deals

This is one of many car-mag stories that have been done a million times. But the thing is, the concept of what's a bargain and the cars that fit the definition continue to change. There was a time when Hot Rod told you to go buy a '70 Barracuda and turn it into a fake ’Cuda because it was so much cheaper.

Too late; these days, we can't afford any Mopar E-body. The cores just aren't out there. Same for most of the traditional musclecars and their more mundane taxicab counterparts. Man, even ugly four-doors are starting to command real money.

So what's a kid to do when he's got a V-8 jones in a four-banger clique? We asked ourselves that in a staff meeting and proceeded to get depressed enough to go home for the day when we realized that truly swanky opportunities for project cars don't present themselves as often as they used to. We hesitate to reveal that a simple airline ticket to the Southwest could solve that (we just bought a mint '65 Comet 404 for $900 at the Pomona Swap Meet), so instead, we came up with this list of cars that we felt were affordable, available, and prime for hosing down with aftermarket goodies. Of prime importance was determining models that might not even be rusted into the ground.

Naturally, these 10 picks are not the only good cheap cars out there. Plenty of you will write to point out our stupidity and glaring omissions. So, since you’ve got the angry pen out anyway, look to the Prime Pickin's and Also Ran comments to see why there might be similar cars we didn’t pick. And when you write to berate us, at least send photos of your current budget project to prove that we're idiots.

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