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Porsche 914-6 in NY
Hi there
I've bought a 914-6 and need your opinion. I've bought it a few days ago on e-Bay. 2 or 3 days ago, the seller informed me that - to his big suprise - the engine doesn't start anymore. In his description he claimed that everything had been rebuilt about a 1000 miles ago by DeMan Motorsport in Nyack (I believe this to be true). Yesterday, he informed me that DeMan has checked the engine and that it needs a complete rebuild cause water had entered the engine. He then offered to return the money and to keep the car. I have a hard time to believe it since the carbs are equipped with rain hats....
I've told him that I see 2 options: a) he has the engine rebuilt or b) I pay max. 30% of the costs to have it rebuilt to my specs (he said it's pretty radical with high compression etc. at the moment).
My question: Does anybody of you live in the area of South Salem NY or near to DeMan Motorsport and could look at the car? I'd be happy to pay a nice dinner for this very appreciated help. I need somebody to look at it and give me an independent opinion. Do any of you have any experience with DeMan?
Thanks,
Mike
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Mike, sent you an eamil. I'd be happy to try and help.
Tom
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I can't help you with your current situation but I will say this:
DO WHATEVER YOU HAVE TO - within reason - TO GET THE CAR.
Sometimes I wish I'd never sold mine ...
Best of luck.
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I just saw this Mike, and while i do not have much to add regarding opinion on engine etc (as i would know little about engines), I can say that i use Rick Deman on my car, and he has been straight up with me. He did some valve work and little bits and pieces when i got the car last year, and he is a nice guy.
If you search on rennlist, with "deman" you should see some more comments and all good. Ditto on pelican. He races and preps, does support, rebuilds, lots of stuff, does Road Atlanta, etc and can be hard to book to do work it would seem when race season is on, but he is a nice guy, from my dealings with him.
And he knows his stuff.
Don;t know if it helps, but there you go.
His website is here
Karl.
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Thank you for your feedback. The guy has tried to back out of the deal in the meantime i.e. has just told me that he sends a check for the full sum. Strange... I guess he has had second thoughts about selling it. I'm not quite sure at the moment about how to react. Basically, I've bought the car, sent the money and therefore am the legal owner. Suddenly, the engine is full of water (????) and he wants to return the money? How to react? Is a mediocre 914-6 with a broken engine worth 12k? Decisions, decisions... What do you think?
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Has the title changed hands? If it's not in your name, I wouldn't think you've got much leverage.
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The way I see it your choices are 1/ accept the returned payment in full or 2/ insist he follow through & sell you the car as is for the price agreed upon (in which case if he declines you may have some legal grounds to force him to follow through... although whether this is worth the hassle is very debatable!).
If there really is a problem with the engine then he would certainly not be obliged to have it fixed for you at his cost- his offer to keep the car and refund your purchase price in full is completely fair.
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Mike, i just bought another 916-6 from auto junction, paid 22 for it, have to do nothing, also there is a green 914-6 for sale in the pelican site, so it might be worht whle to pass it uop, unless its pretty cvheap.
i hope this helps.
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Mike, sent you a pm. I hope it will help you.
Tom
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This happened to me one time. The seller was offered more money and all of a sudden there were a dozen problems and odd circumstances arose, and to make a long story short, no car for me. He never told me he was offered more, but I later found out through the small P-World that it was the case.
But ultimately there's not a lot you can do until you take delivery and/or have title in hand.