Hate to have to admit it, but in my 30's when I really wanted one, I couldn't afford a nice lift in the garage when I was dragging home lots of projects.
Now that I'm closer to 70 than 60 and could easily afford one, I'd just as soon take the car to a local, competent mechanic who has a lift for any job big enough to require one.
Seems like I had time/energy to work full time, remodel my home, help my wife raise our daughter, and play with cars. Now daughter is approaching middle age, the remodelled home is too big and we should move and downsize, and I've been retired for 3 years and haven't brought home any more projects, and actually gotten rid of one car, so I'm now down to 6 and am barely able to keep up with regular maintenance on them. ;-) Reminds me of that song by Little Feat:
You know when you're over the hill, when your mind makes a promise that your body can't fulfill.
I still do plenty of tinkering and all the normal maintenance, but I'm not getting any exhaust system rust in my eyes anymore, and I'm not wrestling with ball joints or lower control arm bushings. Been there, done that, and bled on the t-shirt. I'll stick to carb and distributor rebuilds, alternators, starters, water pumps and the like- even brake jobs and electrical work, just no more heavy, greasy, rusty junk like rear axle bearings, etc. I used to beat on them with the attitude, "I built it, so if I break it, I'll just fix it.", but now, I'd prefer to drive them a bit easier just so I don't have to fix them as often. I had a nasty habit of going through u-joints far too often from too many holeshots.
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