Half of me says keep my XB stock, with TRD and scion parts only. The other half says go all out and buy the best of the best. What should I do? Anybody feel like this?

 

Do what feels right to you.
wonmyxB

 

Well, you might have a tought time finding out what exactly is "the best of the best". EVERYBODY is goingto have a different opinion there. But you will have more options by NOT limiting yourself to TRD/Scion stuff only.

 

Let your bank account guide the way

 

You own the car. The car doesn't own you.

This is why I shake my head at the car restoration folks who want to keep everything 100% stock. Why? Why spend so much to have, say, a '69 Mustang that's no better than what Ford decided to give you, no better than the thousands of other Mustangs that rolled off the assembly line? If you can improve it, if you can change it so it's looks or performs exactly the way YOU want, go for it.

It's a car, not a religion. There are no car gods to award you special brownie points in heaven for keeping your car 100% Toyota. Toyota isn't even going to send you a card thanking you for your devotion.

Don't let the car own you. Do whatever YOU want -- even if that does mean sticking only with Scion/Toyota parts.

 

What about the JDM Gods??

 

Do what you like.

 

For the answer to this one, watch Barrett-Jackson.
As for the xB, If you are really worried about origional parts just keep the ones you take off. Toyota is not always going to have the best part (or the most economical) on the market. Go with what feels right.

 

Yeah, I know fools will pay a lot of money for perfectly stock cars -- but then they still just have a '69 Mustang that's no better than what Ford decided to give you, no better than the thousands of other Mustangs that rolled off the assembly line. Only you payed way too much for it. In fact, if you improve the car it's worth LESS. It's crazy.

 

VERY WELL PUT!!

 

O/T
When I used to work at the auto parts store, we had this one regular customer, he wrenched out of his home garage. Anyways, he said when he was a "kid" back in the 50s, he used to work in Ford's assy. plant where they built T-birds. He told us the when they would run out of misc. hardware, they would send the new guy or who ever the gopher was, to the hardware store down the street to get more nuts and bolts.
The "moral" of his story was these people who judge the "concours" events are wrong [read: super-**** retards] because they apparently take points off for the wrong nuts and other piddly crap like that. So with that being said, you could hypothetically buy a brand new 1956 T-bird, put it in a giant zip-lock bag, take it out of the bag 50 years later, in pristine condition, and trailer it to an event and still get points off for the wrong bolt.