One other question / comment: Do S owners switch out hardtops for the winter, then go back to soft top in the spring? I wonder if that is plausible and worth the trouble IF someone was to drive it in the winter.

 

The hard top fits over the soft top. Its a 2 minute install.


fold the soft top down.

Mount the hard top.

I suppose it would be a good idea for snow or ice. But hard tops with defrosters are MASSIVELY expensive.

 

I had a relatively high mileage (bought at about 100k and sold at 150k) AP1 that I daily drove for 6 years in West Virginia. It was garage kept at home. I enjoyed driving it every single day. I didn't have much of the rust issue. My only advice is to get another set of all rear AP1 wheels (for tire rotation) and have snow tires on so you can do the swap yourself when winter comes. It's so much fun to drive this car in snow with the correct tires.

S is so reliable and very easy to work on and you can find step by step instructions for anything and everything.

 

I just bought an AP1 in Chicago and im a newbie who plans to daily it. Im a little hesitant in the winter because this car is so beautiful and I dont want it to rust.

 

Let me start off by saying the S2000 is an awesome daily driver. I bought mine back in 2013 as a trade in when I worked at a BMW dealer in Florida. It was 2013 when I had purchased it with 92K miles on it and was completely stock. It now has 249K miles on the original engine, and has been supercharged since 220K miles (still haven’t rebuilt). I still daily drive the car and love almost everything about it. I’ve had to replace a trans and a diff but with more power I’m sure it fatigues the metal in certain areas more and more over time. At one point I lived in northern South Carolina for 10 months where it did snow and I refused to drive the car. I did once and at 30 mph I spun out in the middle of the road to oncoming traffic. Luckily the light ahead was red so I didn’t get hit. Keep in mind this is an 06 with traction control. Then In 2014 I moved back down to Florida and have been enjoying the car and work on several s2000s year round. Keep them maintained and they will love you back unconditionally haha.

 

The winters here so bad here in terms of salt damage, bruv. I would buy a winter car if your S2000 has not seen winters already.

All upper midwest daily driven cars get ruined underneath pretty quickly.

For long term cars, that means you'll be dealing with and fighting rust every time you need to do anything to the chassis (maintenance, mods, etc).

For short term sports cars, you'll be taking a huge hit in resale value. You've seen ads boasting about, "never driven in snow" and the price premium reflects that.

If you ever want to roll the fenders to fit wheels, you'll 100% for sure be dealing with rust perforation on the fenders within a season or two.

Salt fukken ruins everything.

 

Yep, this.

My S2000 had a little rust when I bought it. As a result I paid about $5000 less than I would've for the same car without rust.

Most people aren't willing to put with the stuff that I did to get the car right.

And even then there's a lot that's still frustrating.

 

Ja feel ya boy-ee.

One of my S2000's is a bit crusty as well.

I've replaced the entire suspension AND welded in a new trunk pan because this person cannot deal with dirty or rusted shit.

When I did the clutch, I had to struggle with this monster:

 

^^ well its a good thing subframe bolts are cheap :P


Mine does not get driven in snow. Not sure if it ever was previous to me (car came from PA, then to MN but I know the only owner of it here in MN). I do have some rust coming out on the dreaded rear fender lips, so will end up having to have that fixed. I will get it repainted in the next year or two I think. Underneath has only a few spots of very light surface rust that I am cleaning up. But all fasteners are free of rust and the car is still very easy to work on because of that. And all that is because I do not drive it in the winter. Gets put away before the snow flies and comes out after the first spring rains have washed the salt residue off the roads.

 

I was --> <--- that close to actually using my torch. Like a caveman.