Either/or. 6 of one, half dozen of another. I let my machinist assemble the race engine, not because I cant, hell I wanted to assemble it, but if I let him do it, and then if something goes sideways, he is on the hook, not me. I spent just over $23k on the longblock, with that kind of investment I wanted my machinist to put it together. I personally have built (read assembled) dozens and dozens of engines, mostly when I ran my own shop, but I defered to the expert on this one. I assembled my own rear diff, but paid to have it welded and braced and set up for 9" axle ends. I tore the car down to a bare shell on the inside, stripped out the entire vehicle wire harness and put in a FAST XFI engine management system and programed it and got the car started and running for the first time last Sun. I did not solder a circuit bord or add transistors or whatnot, but I did install the system and make it work. I wired from scratch with switches and relays ect ect the electric fuel pump, electric water pump, electric evac pump, electric fan, lights, electric inter-cooler pump, electric pump for the liqid cooled S/C. wired the MSD ignition and the tachometer. So in my mind, yes, your damn right I built this car, even with all of the outside help and money spent on major components. If I start a thread, I am not going to get my shorts in a twist because it is arbitrarily called a progress thread, not a build thread. I know what I did, that is all that matters. Some here have mad skills and the facilities to exploit that. Some of us have mad skills and dont have the space or equipment to showcase it. Some of my build I did at home, some at work where all my tools are along with a lift, compressed air, welder ect, and some work at my buddys house where he has a simular build and is a good pair of extra hands.
Wow, did I just rant or what? Anyway props to the people who do their own stuff, I have a ton of respect for the abilities shown. I personally like stuff that is outside the box, another HCI "build" is meh....to me. What MadMike does, along with Raceoholic and others is what makes this the place to be. My build/progress thingy is one of those outside the box exercises, even if I "didn't build that"