Selling car/rims: What would you sell, what would you keep?

[Great White]

I'm moving into a smaller house and a 1 car garage and some of my stuff has to go.

I have a 1962 TBird project I'm keeping and I have to sell off my 2004 300M Special. Looks just like:

https://static1.pt-content.com/images/pt/2015/01/silver300mSPECIAL-1.jpg

I really like the M, it's a pleasure to drive. Smooth, quiet, reasonably quick, handles well (for what it is), in great shape, all leather and power everything. Just a nice driving car.

But it doesn't suit our family any longer (me, the missus and 3 big Jeebus dogs, don't ask, not my idea) and it's just gotta go for space reasons.

I have to keep my truck for towing the 34 foot travel trailer (plus a truck is just too handy to give up) and I've still got an 83 foxstang to get rid of...that one will probably just get scrapped. The missus' car also takes up a slot in our soon to be very small driveway.

for perspective, this is all the space I have to work with for about the next 3-5 years:

https://static1.pt-content.com/images/noimg.gif

That's it. Well, I am stealing a room or two int eh basement for storage and maybe a work room for "non smelly things" like working on wiring and such. No painting, fiberglass, oil or grease or any other such business....wife has warned me.

I've got two sets of rims for the 300M: the factory 18's and a set of crappier 17's. The 300m has the same bolt pattern as the 62 TBird and I was planning to use one of the sets of rims from the M to keep it a roller while I adapt 13" brakes. Since it's a 1 car garage, the 62 needs to stay a roller. A cheap set of spacers will do for the time being to deal with the offset issues.

I grabbed a pic of the net of a 61 TBird in the "Silver Mink" paint I have planned for the car and did a couple quick photochops.

17's:

https://static1.pt-content.com/images/noimg.gif

18's:

https://static1.pt-content.com/images/noimg.gif

here's a closer pic of the 17's so we can see how "mungy" they really are:

https://static1.pt-content.com/images/noimg.gif

The Chryler OEM 18's are a s fresh as the day they rolled off the line. Painted/powdercoated silver.

I have to pick one or the other since I don't have the money to do all the metal work, paint, brakes AND buy new rims and tires in one go.

It's entirely likely I will end up running these for a while after the metal work and paint are done (need to save up cash) so I need to put a little thought into which to keep and which to sell.

The 17's have more tire choices (and cost less) but they're kinda funky and beat up. The 18's have fresh tires on them, but I want to get as much as I can for the M when I sell it. The 18's might also be a bit harsh riding on the old 'Bird. They're not harsh riding on the M, but you sure know if you have the 17's or 18's on it.

I'm kinda leaning to selling the 18's with the M to get the most money out of the car. Take the 17's and strip the centers, repaint it silver and then just re-polish the rims lips. Run those until I scrape up enough cash for some 5 spokers (like bullit rims or similar).

What would you do?

[NJSPEEDER]

I like the Chrysler 18's. The car has such clean, simple lines and the don't have so much going on to detract from that. The 17's with the criss crossing web and bolt heads and everything just seem too busy for the T-bird.

JMHO

-Tim

[Great White]

Good points.

[BMR Sales]

I like the 18"s

[NOT A TA]

Sell the 18's on the M to get the most out of the car plus the tires will get old & dry anyway even if they sit in the garage... Put the 17's on the bird as rollers since it's gonna sit without doing any work to them and they'll look worse once paint is done so wifey will be more likely to give a go ahead on new tires/rims when it's ready to hit the streets. .

[Johnny Blaze]

^Agreed

[Great White]

Oh, missus isn't the barrier to spending money on rims.

The bank account is.....:(

I'm actually leaning towards the 18's now.

Maybe as a permanent solution.

I kinda like the understated look that doesn't draw too much attention, but still aggressive enough rubber to get some fun out of it. I sure don't intend to make this a restoration project, but I don't want to mess with the OEM "look" much either. These cars are hard to change the styling much without making it look......."overdone".

The car will only be worked on for about a year before the finish coat of paint goes on it and I start driving it, so "tire rot" shouldn't be an issue. I can sew up some covers from tarp (IE: cheap) to cover them for paint and body work.

As a rule of thumb, I generally don't like using spacers/adapters, but beggars can't be choosers and it's hard to argue with a couple hundred for a decent set of spacers/adapters VS $2000+ for rims and tires.

Plus, I can have a matching spare. The 300M has a full size spare with a Michelin pilot tire on it. I'll just pick up a "doughnut spare" and chuck it in the trunk when I sell the car. It's not going to tweak anyone when they look at the car and see the temporary spare, it's pretty much the norm on newer cars these days. Granted, a spare at all on a weekend play toy isn't really that important, but it's a "nice to have" when I go a couple hundred miles away on a cruise day.

One last little possible "perk" is the rims have TPMS built in and I have a spare 300M overhead display on the shelf.

If I do it right, I might be able to have TPMS on the bird. I can just hide the readout in the ashtray (I don't smoke) or somewhere similar. Would be nice to have a TPMS since it's only going to be a weekend toy. I was planning on hiding the cruise control buttons in the ashtray anyways.....

[1965gp]

Agree- the 17's are too busy and you probably won't get that much more for the 300M with the 18's.

[MonzaRacer]

18s look better on bird, why not bead blast 17s, and use some plastidip to spruce them up for 300M sale. Just an idea.
And either way you need spacers and as for the other fact you can probably pick up a set 17s or 18s for the 300M at Pepboys for around $300-$400 from proline sets if you need them to push its sale.
Used to be you could pick up full new set at PepBoys cheap. at least couple years back when I worked there AND last time I checked the store for prices.

[Great White]

Canada.

No pep boys.

Everything is expensive here.

:(

Finding plastidip here is near impossible.

Decided to keep the 18's and sell the 300 with the 17's.

:)