In a perfect world, your competition car is always on the move. At least once a month you head out to an event and have #funwithcars in it. But it’s not a perfect world, and sometimes life gets in the way. For many, that means a vehicle may sit for a few months. For others, the break could involve a year or two or three. As if not participating in SCCA® events isn’t bad enough, if it sits long enough (or if you decide to purchase a used car that hasn’t moved in a while), your competition vehicle will likely need some TLC before getting back out to an event – something Hagerty, SCCA’s official insurance partner, recently brought to light in an article on Hagerty.com/media.
While the Grace Houghton-written article revolves around classic vehicles and potential restoration, much of what’s covered in the article applies to competition vehicles that may have sat for a little too long.
“The trouble is that automobiles, like everything else, are subject to the law of entropy,” writes Houghton. “‘Preservation’ is about more than just keeping the odometer reading low. ‘Like-new’ means something different after one, two, or three decades….”
In the article, Houghton speaks to experts who have seen a thing or two when collecting cars.
“Just because a car has low miles doesn’t mean it was well cared for,” says Tom Cotter, host of Hagerty’s show Barn Find Hunter. “Cars go bad when they sit. There are things that happen inside the systems of a car that break down, like the rubber in a brake system or the rubber in our fuel system. It doesn’t matter if the car is hot or cold or clean or dirty, those things are going to break down.”
Cotter adds that a car that’s sat for a while might require the evaluation of parts you may not have considered. “For every gallon of fuel that’s burned in a car, a gallon of water comes out the tailpipe,” he says. “It’s just part of the combustion process. And so if you run the car and then turn it off and park it for 20 years, you’ve got at least a gallon of water sitting in the exhaust system – most of it, in the muffler. Unless it’s made of stainless steel or something, it’s going to just rot right out. There’s really nothing you can do about that.”
The anecdotes and suggestions in the Hagerty article aren’t a 1:1 for everyone reviving an older competition vehicle for SCCA use, but it certainly helps shed light on a topic you may know little about. Like, for instance, whether a vehicle that’s sat for a decade absolutely needs an engine rebuild.
Read the entire article on Hagerty’s website.
Photo courtesy Jordan Lewis/Hagerty
