A bout seven months ago I was driving my mini, STK TRUK, up to a show in Central California when the motor took a crap on me.
It was quick and painless, but it did leave me stranded in the middle of the Mojave Desert. Luckily for me and Lowlife Mike we had friends following us in actual stock trucks. I ended up going to the show anyways, and my Mitsu eventually found its way back to my shop. After some investigating, a few new parts, and some temper tantrums, my boy Steve Wilk and I came to the conclusion that the motor was blown. All the money and time I had put into this truck and now it needed a new motor, man was I pissed.
This got me to thinking, how much is a 1994 Mitsubishi Mighty Max really worth. If you look in the paper around here, you can pick up a fuel-injected Mitsu for roughly two thousand dollars or less. I already have thousands and thousands of dollars invested in this truck, now I would have to spend another thousand to buy a motor with a warranty, and that wasn't even rebuilt, so it's still a gamble. Why do we do these things? We pour a ton of money into these trucks, only to get almost zero return.
A good example of this is Steve, which you guys should know by now from previous tech articles as the fabricator at Bio Kustumz working alongside Max Fish. Steve recently finished another mini project, which you will see in an upcoming issue of MT. Steve calculated that he spent $10,000 putting this truck together. Now by many of our standards that's not all that much, when you consider most people I talk to have at least $15,000 to $20,000 into their projects. But Steve, does all his own work, doesn't pay anything out in labor, and he started with a body-dropped S-10 already. Wow, was I shocked when he told me what he was into it for. And Steve knows that he will only get about $10,000 for the truck when he sells it, if he's lucky. So why do we do it? Is it passion? Is it the love of being different? Or is it stupidity as I've been told many times by family members.
I think for all of us it's something different. For me it's a definite passion. I can't live without a mini in my garage. I feel like I'm living without oxygen. Is that extreme? I believe it is. Does this mean that I haven't grown up? I don't believe so; my wife and my kids love it right alongside me. When I see so many older guys out in the show scene enjoying their $2,000 trucks wearing $20,000 dollars worth of paint and accessories I know that I still have a huge future ahead of me, cutting trucks up at a loss of money. But then again, if you're doing it for the money, you're probably doing it for all the wrong reasons. Now you know why I do it, pure passion! Why do you do it? Let me know what makes you tick by emailing me what's on your mind at mindofmacias@gmail.com.