Tell me what's in your ear then. Here is what I gathered. Not interested in going fast, no toy funds to buy new or expensive and hence not much money for mods to go fast. C4 is an old car and the usual PO wouldn't have taken care of it so substantial work is going to have to be done on it. Car is going to be a money pit unless you work in a Vette recycling yard and can DIY. So what is the point of buying a C4 if you are not trying to go fast and have no money to fix it up?

I bought my car about 10 years ago, late year '86 so it has the aluminum head L98 with something like 245 screaming HP. I put the following into mine:

New leather interior and carpet.
Paint job.
New U joints.
Urethane suspension bushings.
Fluidamper.
Double roller timing chain with cam gear bearing.
New cats and Y pipe.
New OD switch.
Centerforce clutch, flywheel, throw out bearing, PP.
Pop filters on audio system (to correct previous hack job)
New antenna mast.
New clutch master and slave cylinders.
New ignition parts, cap, rotor, plugs, wires.
Emissions crap cleaned up and repaired.

Basically, I fixed all the stuff the previous owner neglected to.

The car drives great now and needs nothing (weather strip is kind of leaky as stated above). I would sell it for $5000.

How much did you sink into that for parts and labor and sale price? 5 grand is kinda low for all that work.

lots of guys just add a aldl diagnostic port / pigtail lead to that gen GM computer that did not have it at bottom DS of the dash.

Oh, I don't know. If I added it all up, I'd be depressed. I don't expect to get my money back out of the car. It's a decent car but not impressive. I had it listed for 6200 nego. but people want impressive for that money.

I did all the work myself except for the clutch. It's such a low car to try and pull the tranny out of so I just handed it over to a local performance shop.

Taking the water pump off is no more difficult than the older coil in cap Chevy.

RA is showing a known brand rebuilt distributor with cap for ~ $ 150 , with markup figure $ 250 , that leaves 750 to 1,000 for labor? Any other " while we are here" repairs don't count towards the dist replacement.

It all boils down to buying what you like and not worry about what it is worth. Be sure to leave some $ to go over the car, brakes, water pump , hoses other odd bits.

If the interior / paint is a bit ragged so what as long as the car is kept clean(ish). If it was perfect you probably wouldn't want to drive it.

For $10k or less buy an R129, they are better cars. I have driven a number of C4's and have never felt they were a very good car.

Cheap, poor brakes, low power, handle pretty well. Now an R129 with an M119 is just simply better in every area.:D

If you want to talk Corvette you need to talk C7, OMFG I want one. Guys are getting them into the 10 second range at the strip with very little work!:eek::D

The C4 was a world apart from the C3 it replaced. the suspension is pretty high tech even by today's standards. It handles amazingly well, albeit a little wiggly and rattly.

This ^^^^^^^^^ when the C4 came out, it was like OMG...this is waay above what preceded it. It is a real sports car

Kinda my point. Many don't feel they will get the money back either so they skimp out on the repair and pass it to the next guy. If I had all that work in it, I wouldn't sell. When I bought my 91, I knew it was for keeps and would never sell the thing unless I desperately needed money. Since the OP didn't want a fast car or to spend all kinds of money, my suggestion was to pass on a C4.

And miss the corvette experience?

Adding bigger slip on rotors was baked into the design,, and later ones got em.
A place I used to work for was into all the gaudy kits for c 4s back then "the greenwood kit" a testarosa style one too.
The cars were cheap as quality could be, they were little more than a stretched fiero.

:D
I knew I'd get a slew of "advice" here on this, LOL! But no, really, I'm pretty serious about this. I know they're a dog in the go-fast department. So, what's the point? Dunno really. Guess in my old-ish age I'm just happy being a poser anymore:cool: I'm familiar with "no such thing as a cheap Corvette". Heck, I've owned a handful of Audi's. Been there, done that!:eek: So, compared to that, Vette's are chicken feed.
I've dug into C5 info, and talked to a couple friends. Good cars, not too much more initial $$ to buy, but that rear transaxle can get super-spendy to fix real fast, along with other issues.
But I may upgrade after I get tired of a C4. I just figured C4's will be a good entry point for now. At least until I decide to quit with my most expensive hobby, snowmobiling. If you want a money pit, take up that hobby:eek: Rates up there with owning a horse;)
So, thanks for all the input, positive AND negative. I take it all in. I'll post pics if/when I pull the trigger.:)