Goodbye to my 156, and an appeal for help

[L4OMEO]

Hi everyone

This is not the post I ever wanted to make, but my beautiful 156 is no more. A couple of weeks ago, in a split-second of glancing right when it should have been left, I rear-ended the car in front. Despite being at no more than 25km/h, the angle of impact was such that front-end damage was significant. While the structure of the car was intact the cost of parts bumped the repair quote to over 10k.

It still may have been economical to repair at this point, but somehow in between getting collected on a flat-deck at the accident scene and arriving at the panel-beaters it was involved in a second collision which added substantial damage to the rear worth another 5k+. The insurance company has assured us that this was not a factor in the assessment process and the vehicle was deemed a total loss on the strength of the front-end damage alone, however we have reason to believe the contrary and are challenging the outcome. Just to make matters worse, their market value assessment methodology was just laughable (including benchmarking a tatty V6 Q-System on the market at 6k) so we are challenging that also. We do stand to lose a lot out of this.

Regardless of how the challenge goes it is highly unlikely that the car will be repaired. It is possible though that we will receive the car back, and if this eventuates the intention is to salvage all the good bits and look for a suitable replacement to install these into. We will then sell off as much of the rest as we can to offset the financial loss.

The problem I've got in executing this cunning plan is that I have no facilities to undertake such an exercise, and am therefore appealing for some help. What I need is a corner of a garage or workshop for hopefully no more than a couple of weekends where I can strip it down and then have the shell removed. Access to any exotic tools (ie anything more sophisticated than my hammer) would be useful but not essential, while any suggestions on how to dispose of the shell at the end would also be appreciated.

The car will be available for delivery to a designated address sometime within the next fortnight or so, and since it can be driven very short distances getting it in position would not be a problem. Getting the gutted shell out I've not figured out yet. Ideally, somewhere on Brisbane's Northside would be preferable for reasons of practicality, but I am willing to look further afield depending on what may be available.

This does need to be done on the cheap for it to make any sense, so I'm really hoping that someone is in a position to help out. I you can please send me a PM and we can discuss things further.

Thanks everyone
Rory

[Brad M]

Condolences Rory, I'd be gutted. Hope you get a suitable replacement.

On the bright side (for me), I'd be interested if you sell the rims. 

[L4OMEO]

Thanks Brad,

Yeah, gutted for sure. At the end of the day it's 'only' a car, no-one was hurt, you don't need to look far to find people who are having it tougher than you ... all true, but the connection you establish with these cars still makes the loss hard to accept.

Ahhh, my coveted GTA rims (**** cough ***** you vulture ****) ... look, they are something I'm hoping to keep but nothing's definite. Frankly, if the sale of those helps get me into something better that I couldn't otherwise afford then I'll gladly let them go. I'll pencil your name in beside them in the meantime.

Cheers
Rory

[Davidm1600]

Gee Rory that is tough luck, it is sad, as looking at the pic shown all it needed was a new bonnet, perhaps a drivers side guard, passengers perhaps as well, a new grill and maybe some work in the engine bay/radiator support ?  plus new grills/lights (basically front end stuff).  Then of course the rear damage ? 

It looked like such a nice car before the accident.  I guess that is the really sad part about our 156s, they were pretty pricey when new but these days are relatively so cheap, that to fix them simply isn't worth it. I really dislike that, as I am sure any of us would be in the same position as you if we were to have an accident, apart from anything really minor.  Hope you find something nice to replace it.

[Darryl]

I feel your pain. Been in a similar situation a long time ago... Good luck.
If it was anyone else I'd suggest a wanted ad (for shed space) in aroca qld mag but I guess you have that covered!

[L4OMEO]

Hi David - thanks for your comments, and right on both fronts. The front-end is basically a case of unbolt the broken parts and bolt on the replacements, but there are a lot of them and due to the insurance company's policy of only using new/OEM parts (fair enough if they are to provide a lifetime repair warranty) then it adds up frightening quickly. If I could source the parts myself from overseas I could halve the parts cost, making a repair quite realistic. But then there's the back end .... that's taken it beyond being economical, hence my resentment over the second collision which I'm certain has influenced the decision to write it off. Ultimately, with all this in mind (and remembering it was also rear-ended late last year, a reasonably substantial hit) the integrity of the car has just been too compromised to make a repair viable.

Darryl - yeah, have made a similar appeal in the mag which went to the printer yesterday, may be delivered before Easter so we'll see what response that brings.

Cheers guys
Rory