Originally Posted by Lolvoguy
Why not drive down, and fly home.
I'm sure your grandson would love to see you, and it'd be a great "farewell" to the car.
I haven't shipped but close family has. I don't know if this is the norm or was unique to the service they used, but I felt the whole process was a bit too casual for my tastes.
They were given a window of 5-7 days when the driver would be available to pick up the vehicle (and that was IF they had a truck going near their pickup point), and another window of time when the car would arrive. So one time, they beat the car to the destination by 4 days and had to rent while they waited and the other time the car left about a week before the family member did and he had to bum a ride to get around until he left.
If you have the time and are up for it, I'd just drive it out there.
You wouldn't be sending your Spark to Sparks, NV, would you? Sorry, I had to do that.
There is normally two choices with transporting cars. One is when you car goes into it's own carrier, goes from point A to point B. Pretty expensive. The other is when is goes with a group of other cars on a normal car carrier. This only works between major cities. They group the cars in the trucker's yard until they have a full load and then the truck leaves with the load. The truck might make a few stops in other cities before it gets to yours. Your grandson would then have to get down to the trucking yard with ID to pick it up. That's more reasonable in cost.
Originally Posted by Al
Driving 2500 miles on an underpowered manual spark ain't happening.
INTO THE WIND THE WHOLE WAY TOO!! And you wonder why buyers aren't lining up??
My only semi-direct experience with shipping a car was a friend had his built Charger shipped from Houston to somewhere in Maryland for more high dollar motor work and it got lost. The shipper lost his car. It finally was found several months later, damaged. No it wasn't hot-wired and run like a rental, it was put somewhere and got body damage.
Before that fiasco I looked into having a car shipped from Ca to here and thought the same as above, too casual, too many ifs involved.
Did 2 enclosed carrier ships on collector cars by top name companies that advertise in Hemmings Motor News. Both cars arrived damaged....J hook damage on the frames from straps pulling on them as the cars shifted. An open carrier can be less expensive though more chance of damage to your vehicle...not any more than if you drove it yourself. Sometimes you can find a smaller carrier who is heading out that way with an empty slot....and can give you a better rate. You'd have to check in car mags or on line in the shipping/carrier section.
Originally Posted by FordBroncoVWJeta
Originally Posted by Al
Driving 2500 miles on an underpowered manual spark ain't happening. Looks like $1200 with any number of reputable carriers.
Ill do it for $900. Sounds fun!
What he said. (Except I can't do it, no time off work.)
Makes little sense to spend that much on shipping a cheap car. You would be better off selling the car locally and sending him the money to buy something in his area. Not spending the $1200 on shipping means an extra $1200 he can spend on the new car.
Originally Posted by atikovi
Makes little sense to spend that much on shipping a cheap car. You would be better off selling the car locally and sending him the money to buy something in his area. Not spending the $1200 on shipping means an extra $1200 he can spend on the new car.