Trying to make sense of my fleet of cars...

Hi All- I figured it might be therapeutic to post here. I have a lot going on with my cars and am trying to make a decision that makes sense (for once). My daily driver is a 98 Saab 9000 CSE. I bought it last June and now have the car in good running shape. It is a great highway car, but the 5 speed is starting to wear on my in the awful metro nyc area. I have put a little over 20k on the car in the last year. I drive a lot for work (mileage reimbursed) and the hatch works great for loading in all my samples. It is going to be in need of some tires and a alignment in the not too distant future.

I have a 95 Mercedes E320 wagon with a C36 engine swap. The car has been mechanically restored/upgraded. I never thought that I would sell the car, but something unusual came up (see below) that has prompted me to be listing it soon. It is in my buddy's garage right now. We are in the process of pulling the motor/trans back out to do a lot of maintenance and to also swap the trans out for a better one. With any luck, the wagon will be sorted out in or around the 4th of July weekend.

My plans were to convert the wagon to a 5 speed manual to fix the trans issue, but I ended up buying a crazy 3.5 twin turbo engine and 5 speed auto trans instead. The sale of all the 5 speed swap parts enabled me to pick up the motor and trans. I just recently bought the entire rear subframe with quaife lsd from the seller of the turbo motor. We installed the drivetrain into a test car and it is at a friends hobby shop getting a proper intercooler fitted and wiring sorted out.

I need to buy a emissions exempt w124 1990-92 sedan to swap the turbo engine into. It should be a pretty easy task as I just need a clean body.

I am considering selling my Saab 9000 and picking up local 2008 Prius that I saw listed for sale. It is a one owner car with about 135,000 on it. It looks super clean and I will likely check it out tomorrow evening. The car is listed for $6,000. I drive about 25,000 miles a year (mostly for work) am getting worn out tinkering around with minor stuff on all the cars. The Saab isn't worth a whole lot, but I will be able to get decent money for my wagon- most likely by the end of the summer.

This would leave me with a Prius as a daily and the super turbo w124 project car.

Any thoughts on this plan and/or daily driving a second gen prius?

All I have say is for an appliance the prius almost untouchable. I never thought I would grow to like it but I have. We have an 08 with 195k on it. I will be sad to see it go when the time comes. I highly recommend them for what you plan on using it for. I think the 04-09 are 2nd gens. Hold out for one with a smart key. The convenience is great. I also vote for keeping the wagon if at all possible and drop in the turbo engine. It seems like you still like it enough and I like sleeper wagons.

The turbo engine doesn't work well with the w124 ASR system. ASR is a mercedes traction control system and my wagon has it. The big issue is that the intake on the turbo kit gets blocked by the large ASR/ABS pump. It is not worth the effort to make the engine work on a car with ASR.

What are the benefits of the smart key on the prius?

Ah i see why you are willing to part with the wagon.

Benefit of the smart key is you never have to take it out of your pocket to lock, unlock or start the car. If you get in and out of the car a lot it is a nice feature. Don't leave any valuables in the car as I just read last week that some thieves are amplifying the signal and unlocking cars with smart keys. You can disable it though so not such a big deal now that I think of it.

In reply to hotchocolate:

So, you are saying that a smart key is a "must have", but he's gonna have to disable it because it's too easy for thieves to intercept the signal, right?

No thanks.

In reply to ccrelan:

Good plan.

I agree that the 2nd gen Prius is hard to beat as a commuter appliance.

It's a soul sucker, but a great commuter.

If you're as much of a car guy as it seems, you're going to have to be OK with understanding the Prius is as vanilla, plain, boring, snore of a drive as any other car on the road.

Don't get me wrong, it's phenomenal at doing the job it was created to do. Get you from point A to point B, using very little fuel, never breaking and never being obtrusive or call attention to itself in any way. It is the textbook definition of transportation appliance. I had a 2010 Prius III that I used to commute 50 miles each way. It earned my deepest respect for what it is capable of doing. But loving cars like I do, the driving experience was mind numbing and frustrating. It provided zero feedback. Nada, zip, zilch. My 9 year old minivan on worn out shocks was more fun to drive.

So as long as you can live with it's complete lack of driver involvement, it's a fantastic commuter.

I went to check out the 08 Prius tonight. It was a one owner car with about 137k on it. The car was 100% spotless- not a single ding. It had been maintained at the local dealer and records showed up on the carfax. I will be picking it up for just under 6k on Saturday. Hope to move the Saab here soon.

Based on your description, I think you're going down the right path by picking up the Prius. There's something to be said for having a daily driver that you can just drive, and drop off for service anywhere if you don't want to deal with it. That will free up some time for the turbo project (which sounds great).

I bought the 08 Prius for $5900. My first full fill up ($30) took me 488 miles over the last week in mixed driving. I will likely change out the spark plugs soon. I probably need to top off the AC refrigerant as it was a little weak today in the heat.