HobokenViper
Enthusiast
So, I can still remember buying Motor Trend Magazine as a kid and seeing pics of the old Viper concept car in the late 80's, and then sometime in late 1992 when I was about 12 years old, I went to the local Dodge dealer with my parents to buy our first Dodge Caravan, and there it was, a brand new red Dodge Viper RT/10. I fell in love and couldn't believe how expensive it was at the time at over $50,000! It seemed like an absolute fortune to me at the time, and I thought it would be a dream that I would never realize. It was THE car that took my love for cars to the next level to the point of being obsessed with everything about cars, but especially Vipers. I swore to work very hard in school and at work and one day get myself one...
Fast forward 20 years, I'm now 33 years old, married with a beautiful 8 month old baby boy at home, and somehow finally pulled off getting my first Viper, a 2008 vert in GTS Blue with Silver stripes (1 of 9 in this color combo as I understand), with only 1,900 miles on it when I bought it. Funny thing is, I wasn't actually in the market to get one when this whole thing started going down, but when my cousin bought himself a 2011 Camaro SS, and another good friend bought a 2007 Porsche Carrera 4S, I found myself getting a real itch to step into something a bit more loud, mean, and exotic than my black 2008 Audi TT 3.2 (a car that I thoroughly enjoyed owning and driving). I randomly found a couple local Vipers online at Autotrader.com and Cars.com, but didn't think I could actually pull off buying one for myself, however I still wanted to test drive them and go take a look regardless. After a beautiful red one with white stripes was sold the day before I was supposed to go see it, I found a gorgeous blue/silver one not 30 miles from where I lived, and it was the only one like it in the country. Went to check it out at the seller's house (they were such nice people and clearly took extra special care of it), and took it for a great test drive where I had this huge stupid smile plastered onto my face that I couldn't wipe off. That smile stayed with me for the next few weeks and I couldn't help but to start negotiating with the seller within a week of my test drive. Only problem was that I still had HUGE negotiations to be done with my wife who wanted no part of me getting a new car that was even remotely like the Viper. When I showed her pictures of it and played sounds of the exhaust, boy did she hate everything about it!!! This was going to be mission impossible, and I actually gave up on buying the car at least a couple times..... Well, all in all it took 4 months of negotiations with the seller of the car and 3 much more difficult months of negotiating with my wife, but somehow I finally made it happen and took delivery of my new Viper in the end of August, and my wife now likes the car, but still HATES how loud it is. Now I can't wait until my son is old enough to where I am able to take him for his first drive in the car with me, but that's quite a few years away still......
I have to admit that I have had a huge smile on my face since I picked it up, and have been thoroughly enjoying the car since I got it. It has a nice home in my building's garage blocked in by our other car and is always covered up by a great CoverKing cover that I bought. I find that just knowing that I actually own my lifelong dream car is enough to put a huge smile on my face, even if I had a crummy day at work. I have to admit though that although I've owned many sports cars in the past that I felt comfortable exploiting the limits of on the road, I have real fear of doing the same with the Viper so far as I recognize that I don't yet possess the skills to take this car even near its limits. I also see this car as the first real car of my future collection, yet one that I also do want to enjoy driving. I keep the car perfectly clean, polished, and waxed to the point that the paint looks like glass, and I'm installing the Invisashield vinyl coating on it next weekend to protect the front and side sills from any chips or road rash. Any advice anyone on here has for a new owner like me is greatly appreciated, especially advice on where I might be able to attend a racing school where they teach you how to drive on a Viper or very comparable car...?
This is my first post on this site, and I'm really happy to now finally be a member of the Viper community. For now I have a picture of my car as my profile picture, but I'll post more pics of it when I figure out how to do that.....
Fast forward 20 years, I'm now 33 years old, married with a beautiful 8 month old baby boy at home, and somehow finally pulled off getting my first Viper, a 2008 vert in GTS Blue with Silver stripes (1 of 9 in this color combo as I understand), with only 1,900 miles on it when I bought it. Funny thing is, I wasn't actually in the market to get one when this whole thing started going down, but when my cousin bought himself a 2011 Camaro SS, and another good friend bought a 2007 Porsche Carrera 4S, I found myself getting a real itch to step into something a bit more loud, mean, and exotic than my black 2008 Audi TT 3.2 (a car that I thoroughly enjoyed owning and driving). I randomly found a couple local Vipers online at Autotrader.com and Cars.com, but didn't think I could actually pull off buying one for myself, however I still wanted to test drive them and go take a look regardless. After a beautiful red one with white stripes was sold the day before I was supposed to go see it, I found a gorgeous blue/silver one not 30 miles from where I lived, and it was the only one like it in the country. Went to check it out at the seller's house (they were such nice people and clearly took extra special care of it), and took it for a great test drive where I had this huge stupid smile plastered onto my face that I couldn't wipe off. That smile stayed with me for the next few weeks and I couldn't help but to start negotiating with the seller within a week of my test drive. Only problem was that I still had HUGE negotiations to be done with my wife who wanted no part of me getting a new car that was even remotely like the Viper. When I showed her pictures of it and played sounds of the exhaust, boy did she hate everything about it!!! This was going to be mission impossible, and I actually gave up on buying the car at least a couple times..... Well, all in all it took 4 months of negotiations with the seller of the car and 3 much more difficult months of negotiating with my wife, but somehow I finally made it happen and took delivery of my new Viper in the end of August, and my wife now likes the car, but still HATES how loud it is. Now I can't wait until my son is old enough to where I am able to take him for his first drive in the car with me, but that's quite a few years away still......
I have to admit that I have had a huge smile on my face since I picked it up, and have been thoroughly enjoying the car since I got it. It has a nice home in my building's garage blocked in by our other car and is always covered up by a great CoverKing cover that I bought. I find that just knowing that I actually own my lifelong dream car is enough to put a huge smile on my face, even if I had a crummy day at work. I have to admit though that although I've owned many sports cars in the past that I felt comfortable exploiting the limits of on the road, I have real fear of doing the same with the Viper so far as I recognize that I don't yet possess the skills to take this car even near its limits. I also see this car as the first real car of my future collection, yet one that I also do want to enjoy driving. I keep the car perfectly clean, polished, and waxed to the point that the paint looks like glass, and I'm installing the Invisashield vinyl coating on it next weekend to protect the front and side sills from any chips or road rash. Any advice anyone on here has for a new owner like me is greatly appreciated, especially advice on where I might be able to attend a racing school where they teach you how to drive on a Viper or very comparable car...?
This is my first post on this site, and I'm really happy to now finally be a member of the Viper community. For now I have a picture of my car as my profile picture, but I'll post more pics of it when I figure out how to do that.....
Beautiful color combo!
- reminds me; Every night for 2 weeks after buying it I would always go out in the garage and flip the light switch to get a quick looksey before going to bed. 
