25+ years ago, i bought a toyota corola off the doper neighbor punk for a whopping $35.00 because the local junkyard would only give him $25.00 for it.
the front was slightly munched, and it looked like a rotten banana, yellow with lots of black spots on it !
however, it ran good, the interior was ok, although it looked like someone took an axe to the dash to install an aftermarket radio, and there was [unbelievably] no rust on the body except for a few spots on the paint [banana peel ? ] that were bare.
i drove it home, and even though the front was munched, it drove well, and the radiator was ok.
i searched a few local junkyards for a front clip, but nothing was out there.
i finally decided a celica front clip was close enough i could make it fit. this was long before roadkill was even thought of.
anyway, that clip cost me a whopping $40.00 !
after a couple of extra holes drilled in the inner fenders, the celica clip was on. the bumper brackets needed a little "heat and beat" to fit, and now the car was whole again.
it looked pretty neat as well, a corola coupe with a celica front clip. it was now a corelica ? or maybe a celola ? anyway, it now needed paint.
i DA'd it with 80 grit in my driveway, then drove it over to my buddy's house for a "beer paint job"..............
we looked it over while consuming a couple of beers, then decided it would look best by mixing up a bunch of leftover paint he had on the shelf, thereby creating a "custom" color.
as it turned out, it was kind'a close to panther pink, but a bit on the reddish side. we called it "fox pecker pink".
a couple hours later, the "rotten banana" was now bathed in a fabulous new coat !
it looked so great, we decided it needed a nice rusty chrome exhaust tip he dad in the corner. this was long before the giant fart can craze came about.
when we went to stick it on, we discovered the muffler was missing ! it was there when i left my place, but the exhaust note never changed as i drove over to his place, so i never heard it fall off.
i found it laying on the road going home, so i stopped and picked it up. unfortunately, it had been run over by something, so i couldn't re-install it.
after it got back to my driveway, i decided it needed snazzy wheels to go with that great "fox pecker pink" paint.
"chrome in a can" to the rescue ! wheels looked great now !
as for the muffler, i dug around in my "stuff" collection and came up with a used cherry bomb glass pack and enough pipe and adapters to make the first "fart can" !
i squared up the "axe hole" in the dash with a nice aluminum plate, and installed an am/fm radio i had on the shelf. the car was now complete, so on the lawn next to the street it went with the for sale signs in the windows.
all told, i was into the car for $125.00 and change, including the beer my buddy and i had during the fabulous "pain job".
it was there only a few hours with a $900.00 price on it when a couple of guys stopped. they took it for a ride, then beat me down to $750.00 !
i couldn't believe it. my one and only toyota experience.