[spud69]

Phil you are very right, it's a very hard business to be in. I think all of us you've mentioned started out after buying the book and building our own cars or being involved in some way and then falling in love with the whole concept / community of the "self build sportscar". It's perceived as a low cost way of producing a hi-tec roadster on a budget whereas the components take a lot of time and effort to make and as we all know material prices are going through the roof and builders don't expect to pay anymore for parts due to the locost attitudes and state of the economy. You end up working more and more hours for no gains and just end up chasing your tail and getting more stressed and worried about it. There is a business to be made out of it but it's low margins and very hard work. At the end of the day personally i took on too much with trying to develop the industry with the single seater, mx5 build and virtually supplying a free car to a company for the race track when he turned out to be a complete knob while keeping up with roadster orders basically on my own with a 60 hour week and no quality family time.

I've just got to the stage where i am chilled again and am enjoying producing the grp parts in my own time with minimal overheads and stress plus we've just been upgraded to band 2 foster parents on the pay scale so things are starting to come together now, should have done it years ago and got into roadster supply just as a supplement but it's easy to get sucked into it more and more especially when you've got Haynes as a customer. The suppliers you have mentioned have all maintained a high level of customer service and not been out to rip of other builders, you even hear off some bad goings on from the big suppliers of other marques, so hopefully we can hold our heads high in what we have achieved and still enjoy the community. Still got roadster to blast about in and now got a good quality family life again so it can be turned around Phil.

Other builders don't take it the wrong way, i'm not having a bitch at the community it's just the way it is...........AndyH