Picked it up! '99 Ebony, 0562, back in the fold
I've wanted one of these things for about 8 years... I remember the first time I really saw one was on the show "Blind Date." There was this douchebag guy on the show who had a Proton one and I was torn, thinking it looked pretty sweet but being convinced it had to be a poser SUV, capable of nothing offroad, because this guy was such a tool. I did some research and found that it was actually VERY capable.
I like weird cars... my daily driver is a BMW M Coupe:
http://www.davidparis.org/coupe/dab031204-1s.jpg
I always thought the VehiCROSS would be a perfect off-road compliment for it. I do a lot of hiking and backpacking, yet with the M Coupe, and my other car ('70 Chevelle) I've always been very limited on where I can go. About four years ago I turned up the search pretty intensely for a VehiCROSS, and was actually the high bidder on one on ebay in Georgia. I was ready to book my flight when the guy told me even though I was the high bidder, he found someone willing to pay more for it so he sold it to this other guy! Lame... I got distracted with something at the time... maybe I bought another motorcycle ('06 Yamaha R1) around that time. So anyway... about a month ago I really wanted to do this particular hike on Mt. Hood, and we drove my wife's BMW 330Ci up this 9 mile gravel and dirt road, with these drain channels all over it... the car was bottoming out all over the place and it really sucked. I had my mind made up, it was VehiCROSS time!
I used this forum, ebay, and the site mash tool to search craigslists. The site mash thing seemed to lag the actual listings, so I also was manually searching craigslists around me (denver, seattle, portland, sfbay, boise, losangeles, etc). It paid off, as on the boise one I was the first to notice a '99 Ebony with 94k miles. Some of the pictures included:
http://www.davidparis.org/vehicross/pic1.jpg
http://www.davidparis.org/vehicross/pic2.jpg
The front emblem made me think perhaps it was previously owned by an enthusiast. Once I called the owner and got the VIN, I searched for it here and learned this is vxDAKINECHICvx's VehiCROSS! It was cool, because doing searching on the site I was able to unravel some of the mysteries about it. Like... why does this '99 have stock 18" wheels? Why does it have this fake carbon hood scoop? It was pretty cool unraveling the story! After some deliberation, and receiving a bunch more pictures (lots of the undercarriage (virtually ZERO rust)), I bought a plane ticket to Boise and Sunday morning at 4:30am I walked to the MAX (train) with $6,500 cash in my pocket. The truck was as clean as expected when I arrived. No ABS light on. The windows work! It has a sunroof. The only issue that wasn't noticed in the photos was how dull the paint is. It looks like it's never been waxed and whoever washed it didn't know how to do so properly, with tons of scratches all over the place. It looks to just be in the clear coat, so I'll try and get it professionally buffed soon.
The tires on it are 32.3" (stock ride height, front cladding trimmed), but these really nasty Bridgestone Dueler H/T D684 II HIGHWAY tires! They are rated "46 out of 59 tires (Score of 5.6 vs best tire in category score of 9)" on tirerack, with over 7 million miles logged. I like the size, but the thing looks like a damn school bus or monster minivan with these tires on there, and they are mushy like a marshmallow around turns. My impressions on the 440 mile drive back were all very favorable... It really does drive like a car on the road, and a really nice car at that. It really eats up the miles, almost like a GT car. I recently drove my friend's Honda Element to Seattle and back (~350 miles) and it was incredibly uncomfortable on the long trip. One surprise was considering it was straight highway travel, I was expecting to get better millage than the 15.5mpg I did (average speed 70mph), but there were a couple 4000 foot passes from Boise.
Another thing is the brakes definitely do suck... yeah, my '70 Chevelle is a 12 second car with drums, but I don't drive that thing anymore. I'm used to the M Coupe, 330Ci, and motorcycles that stop like crazy. Part of the problem is the mushy feel, so stainless steel lines are ordered and should be here soon.
New wheels and tires are ordered... should arrive today. Expect a post on the modification forum once I have photos (also did a 913 lift yesterday).
Anyway, just wanted to introduce my new VehiCROSS! I'm excited for sure, and look forward to some serious off road adventures in it. I'll post my own photos once I get everything prettied up!
David
