Purist Or 205 Fan?

[sensualt101 31 1 Cars]

how would you regard yourself?

 

this is my general view

 

i regard myself as generally a purist when it comes to our favourite model of car in that i see a distinction between a restoration and a remanufacture.

 

by this i mean when restoring a 205 to save any of the original shell and parts wherever possible to keep originality and the maximum oem parts as it left the dealership ( i dont say factory as so many were fitted with dealer fit options before sale )

 

i know this can be a hell of a lot of work time and effort as well as a huge expense but will ultimately make the car as near to new as is possible and in many cases better than new as many members here have done!

 

i believe with determination and all of the above almost any car is restorable.

 

on the other hand i see another group which i would see as 205 fans.

 

who while we have a healthy supply of later shells available would instead of going down the restoration route would consider reshelling instead ( although both would be equally time consuming! ) thereby making a completely unoriginal car.

 

also many seek to modify and improve their cars to personalise them or sometimes just to keep them on the road.

 

i am just happy to see as many 205's on the road as is possible and think that too many saveable cars are being scrapped sadly but as time goes on and numbers continue to dwindle the value of low milage and unmodified 205 gti's will undoubtably go up and we are seeing that trend already which will mean values generally go up.

 

whilst i understand that among restorations and modifications a lot of time effort and of course money goes in to our cars i feel that some people will make choices based on the value of a finished car ( if indeed they are ever finished , i am sure you know what i mean lol! ) in effect what an insurer would call economically viable ( at the present time many cars i see for sale are definitely not economically viable! so get broken for spares ) but it seems to me that a completely restored car will ultimately be an investment that can recover the cost for those who are that way inclined it is doubtful that a modified example will be able to recover the cost spent on it unless it is split as parts?

 

i should add that i am not a complete purist and i also feel that what anyone does to their own car is their own business so i dont mean to alienate any tuner or modifier i am always amazed at the ingenuity and skill that people use to modify their cars in our forum community and see that those skills could apply to restoration as well and also that without scrapped examples we would have a lot less spares available as so much is now not available new.

 

so which would you decribe yourself as?

 

does anyone think that previously modified cars will soon start to be returned to oem spec as values increase?

Edited December 9, 2012 by sensualt101

[Batfink 201]

Depends what modifications and the market you want to sell your car to.

I've got a 205 thats completely hacked to pieces to be a great track car, but thats a keeper and it's what I want in a 205.

I've also got a more standardish do upper. When I picked it up I made sure I was buying one with an original factory sunroof for example as I know I'll not keep this forever. It will have a few modifications but nothing that could not be reversed simply.

 

I might be more a purist if I didn't have to run a larger more modern car as my daily hack, but saying that it costs a lot to use original parts when aftermarket parts can be so much cheaper.

Edited December 9, 2012 by Batfink

[johnnyboy666 195 1 Cars]

With my current car, it was very ratty and scruffy when I bought it, so modifying it wasnt going to spoil anything. I think if I had a nice condition Gti I'd keep it completely standard, but I've never had the spare cash to buy a decent example to start with!

 

I think reshelling is done often by people who are handy with a spanner but not so handy (or confident) with a welder. Personally having done very little welding, I'd find reshelling a car a lot less daunting than structural welding. But i'd make sure that the old shell gets recycled as well as possible

[SurGie 54]

Im a modified purist, want it the way Peugeot should have made them lol, making the best even better in my view of coarse.

[AlexRS2782 136 1 Cars]

Considering how heavily i modified my limited build Mk1 Focus RS from standard, there's no way i can claim to be a purist with any car hehe

 

With regards to my 205 GTI, my intention has always been to keep it pretty much as i got it with the Peugeot kit, but only change a few things like maybe the alloys & fit a stainless exhaust - albeit one with a subtle tip. Otherwise the engine is totally standard/untuned, but tidied up with improved parts from the likes of BakerBM, Pug Racing, etc. I've also been sourcing some of the now NFP o.e parts so that i can futureproof the car if things need to be replaced if / when they need to be, rather than relying on some of the not so great pattern parts out there. If the engine ever did go, i would consider dropping a GTI6 lump in, but part of me would probably end up stopping myself from doing it and keeping a 1.9 8v purely for the sake of originality.

 

That being said, i would love to own a GTI6 engined one at some point, so if / when funds allow in the future i probably would consider getting one for a bit of fast road/track fun in replacement for the current Saxo VTS.

[Richie 32]

I like to see tidy standard 205's over modified ones, but I don't mind what others do with their 205's. Standard cars float my boat more, thats all.

[MiniGibbo 142]

I build a car to how I want it not to it I'm with a certain scene.

[24seven 104]

I appreciate a good, standard "as OEM as possible" 205 as much as the next man, but to me I think anything the genuinely improves upon the driving experience and typical characteristics of the original can only be a good thing. Things like. a proper 1905cc Mi16 with motronic or well-mapped aftermarket management (none of that piggyback rubbish, something that's been done to an OEM-like standard instead of just on the cheap), brakes that are more resilient, suspension that hasn't just been slapped on to lower the car but has been properly thought out to balance the handling (i.e. rear beams that have been lowered with stiffer torsion bars and matching dampers rather than just lowered).

 

Stylistically though the standard car looks spot on as it left the dealership, so splitters, sideskirts, twin exit exhausts, smoothed and/or polished exterior trip, colour coded mirrors, tinted windows, tinted foglights etc are all out. The only exception is the wheels and that's only if they're replaced with SL434's.

Edited December 10, 2012 by 24seven

[ALEX 98 1 Cars]

I started my restoration with the intention of just getting it back on the road.

After fitting a couple of new "clean" parts that it needed for its MOT got me cleaning up or replacing other parts.

To the point I had most of the engine out... That lead to pulling the suspension to bits...then out came the interior.... you can see where this is going.

I've found loads of parts that were either bodge repaired, on their last legs or completely knackered. (there's a few shown in my restoration project, feeler gauge used as shims and hole in block)

I'd only buy a 205 as a project in future now as buying a restored one I wouldn't trust the work without fully detailed photos of stages of the restoration. And original low mileage examples are overpriced and probably not that reliable.

Part of the fun for me is the restoration, it's quite satisfying fitting shiny or cleaned up parts to a freshly painted shell.

I wouldn't say I was just a purist though a bit of both as I'm all up for any brave projects.

I just don't have any experience outside of copying what the factory supplied.

Edited December 10, 2012 by ALEX

[GLPoomobile 958]

 

i regard myself as generally a purist when it comes to our favourite model of car

 

I think you may have mentioned this once or twice before

[vtifan 26]

not a purist in the slightest even though i do appreciate a nice standard 205 or most retro cars tbh,i like to improve the car over standard but not so much that it doesn't resemble the original,

i was originally going to build a kind of nineties themed nicely modified with tasty imo ecosse or auto tuning93 parts but have now kind of slipped into a more oem kind of a ride with rarer body parts and wheels just to make it stand out a bit from the purist crowd ,mechanically everything will be replaced and renewed,i have bought borbet a 7.5x16 wheels and they are going on the car no matter what so they are going to dictate the body styling,hoping to be able to get away with gti arches but if not then plan b or c will have to be implemented to complete my roland garros redux,waiting for the purists to tell me there are less than 100 left

[Darrens205GTI 10]

I think I am just a lover of the 205. I don't care if they are OEM, Modified or pimped. Everyone has their taste in cars and as long as they are enjoying them I think its great. Lets face it not everyone's going to run their 205 how you would but its still an achievement to keep one on the road now a days.

 

It's always so good to see the Red one or the Miami Blue one round the streets where I live. (You know who you are slow down so I can talk to you in my Jag LOL) I am not even sure if they are standard or modified, not seen them up close but always makes me smile and makes me even more determined to get mine back on the road..... Must get down the body shop at the weekend and see how its coming along.

 

I am going to keep mine looking Standard but I always thought the car should be deep deep Black metallic not flat so thats the first of the changes I will make to it. I am also fitting an updated Rad and BBM Hoses just to try and protect the engine a little. But I want to keep the Interior looking as standard as I can just because it is so iconic and I love it. I am not really looking to sell it for a profit, its being done for me, I am enjoying the search for parts, cleaning up and restoring/upgrading parts and don't really care if it isn't worth the same as a concourse or heavily modified version.

 

But lets all enjoy our own cars as we want to and respect others whether they mod them, pimp them or whatever. At least we are trying to keep them on the road.

[SurGie 54]

Well said Darren, keeping them on the road no matter how they look is a good thing, some like theirs to be the one and only type and some are part of the sheep, neither matters apart from keeping them going strong.

[speno 239 2 Cars]

Im a driver and that is the main thing :O0)

I have never been too sure on the whole 'have a mint example and never use it kind of thing'