repair the body or let it rot and swap drivetrain out later?

[greg donovan]

my 94 is pretty rusty.

however, it also needs new struts, brake pads/rotors/lines/fluid and several gaskets/seals and oil hoses replaced.

the time and money spent on the body would go a long way to making a very mechanically solid but ugly car.

i am leaning towards mecahnical repairs/mods and then swapping everything into another car in a couple years.

the dilemma with that is if i should try to keep it a SS by using another 90-94 legacy or if i should build something else like an 93-01 impreza wagon or forester.

anything other than restoring the car as it sits would diminish the "collector value" of the car. not that i care too much about that, i just hate to see one less authentic SS in the world.

with the amount of work that the car needs i think the easiest thing to do would be to find another rust free 5mt awd 90-94 legacy (is there such a thing?) and strip mine down and swap everything over.

i know of a 91 rust free awd wagon i could get for 1K. but it is an auto and needs new fenders bumper and hood as well as a repaint as it was a texas car and the paint is pretty cooked.

how hard of a swap would it be to put my SS mechanicals into that wagon?