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  #101  
Old 02-10-2012, 01:46 AM
luke strawwalker's Avatar
luke strawwalker luke strawwalker is offline
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Join Date: Dec 2007
Location: Needville and Shiner, TX
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Quote:
Originally Posted by BEC
Me, too.

The next to last time I bought a new car (in 1988!) I was shopping small and darn near bought a Festiva of the sort that OL JR loved. But instead I got a larger car for about the same money - a base Mazda 323 hatchback. That car taught three kids to drive, survived a trip into a guard rail at the hands of my eldest son, went away to college for five years with second daughter - and I was so glad to get it back when she wanted a 4x4 pickup. It went back to being my daily driver at that point - with well over 250K on it.

It finally died in a moment of inattention on the way to work about a year and a half ago - with over 316K miles on it. It was still running strong and using about the same amount of oil it had been for over 200K miles. There were a couple of minor things that didn't work any more but all the basics were good. It had had one clutch in that time (and thanks to a worn syncrho went from being a 4-speed to a 5-speed by means of a wrecking yard tranny at the same time the clutch was put in - 160K or so). It regularly gave me milage in the mid 30s in the commute.

My thought as I was sliding on the wet road that June morning when I knew I wasn't going to stop was "oh no, this is going to be the end of this car! ".

A few days later my regular mechanic told me of a similar 323 (a year older) on a car lot in town - one of those charity donation places. It turned out to be the higher trim level ( 5-speed, cloth interior, intermittent wipers, stuff like that) and only had 120K on it then. I snapped it up and brought the maintenance up to date and now that one is my daily driver (and rocket hauler). You sure can put a bunch of stuff in a good hatchback.

Two of the other three cars in the fleet are mid-90's Proteges - each has over 200K on it now (and about 50K on the current clutch). One is driven by my wife and the other by younger son (who is 21). Eldest daughter is now driving the 95 626 that the second daughter had more recently after she returned from Ireland (she sold the pickup before she went there). The 626 has about 160K on it I think.

That second daughter is now driving a 2000 Subaru Outback - with 230K or so on it - one that was clearly well maintained.

Every now and then I look at new stuff but there's really nothing out there that appeals to me enough to take on car payments again. I'd have to get at least 35-40% better milage than I'm getting now, with at least as much room for rockets and planes, for me to even consider it. I know of nothing like that available at the moment.


Yeah, I'm with you... nothing out there "grabs" me enough to want to take on a $400+ note a month again. I can do a LOT of repairs for what that costs, and you have to drive enough miles to wear it out completely in year to make up the difference in gas saved... (although my Dad DID swear that for what he saved in gasoline, he basically got the Festiva for free...) He went through a lot of work cars, though... He bought an 80 Ford Fiesta (the German one) and wore it clean smooth out (those were GOOD cars too-- never had to put a wrench to it that I can recall), and then a used Renault Fuego (which was a good car, FWD, but with the engine "in line" like a rear wheel drive, so good balance and handling, sadly PARTS costs were it's undoing and he traded it off, though my mother LOVED that car!) He had a spate of used cars, a 70 Gran Torino 4 door with the 351 Cleveland (blow the doors off ANYTHING, even cops... yeah he did coming home a bit too fast one day, cop flip flopped on him, and he floored it... just left him behind... just before the cop was completely out of sight behind him, he turned his cherries off and went on back to what he was doing). He had a 76 Thunderbird (don't recall what it had in it, but it wasn't anywhere NEAR as fast as that Torino (which he sadly traded off) and then a 77 LTD with the 400 in it... pass everything but a gas pump! Solid old car though... Then finally a 79 Cadillac... again pass everything but a gas pump, bit it was a NICE ride... Then he got the new Festiva's, and when they were getting long in the tooth, a 96 Windstar (the sucky ones that had the motors straight out of the Taurus's, and blew the head gaskets as soon as they were out of warranty-- he let it go back when the motor blew a month or so out of warranty and Ford wouldn't fix it... told them to sit on it and twist). Later he got a 96 Escort Wagon, which he didn't like, and then the 2000 Escort coupe, which was a complete POS. Grandma and I had a 94 Escort Wagon-- they bought it used barely broken in good-- some woman got divorced and bought her a new Mustang to "hunt" in... (cougars on the prowl doncha know). I HATED that car when they got it, but I have to say, as a 16-19 year old, I kicked the H3LL out of that car and it was tough as nails... couldn't kill it! It was actually pretty sporty for it's size and handled good, and had a LOT of room for a car its size... We ran all over the farms in it, hauled stuff in it, everything... handled the off-roading with no problems... I remember one day I had a breakdown in the field and hiked over to my folk's house on that end of the farm, and called Grandma to come get me to go get parts to fix the tractor or whatever. In the meantime, since I knew it'd take her 20 minutes to get dressed, get in the car, and come down to the field to get me, I hiked back out to the field and worked on the tractor awhile... I was having a hard time and was more ticked off than a p!ssed-on rattlesnake when she FINALLY came driving up 40 minutes later... She got out and got in the passenger seat and I jumped in the driver's seat, chewing her out for taking so long... we were trading barbs and she was insulting me and I got SUPER PO'd and shoved the car into reverse, took off down the field road backwards as fast as I could, spun the wheel hard over to the left and slammed on the brakes at the same time, spinning the car around 180 degrees in its tracks, let off the brakes in mid-spin, spun the wheel back to the right straight ahead, and dropped the transmission in drive and floored it, all in one smooth motion... the car did a perfect 180 spin on the turning row from backwards to forwards at about 30 mph and kept right on accelerating, drifted around the corner between cotton fields, and I floored it out to the highway... Grandma was screaming at me to slow down and I had a good laugh... hehehe... that 180 spin was as good as ANYTHING you'd see in a James Bond movie... LOL

About the time I got accustomed to the darn thing and started liking the frickin' thing, Dad talked her into trading for something else...

Later! OL JR

PS. Just replaced all the ball joints and tie rod ends and idler/pitman arms in the front end of my 02 F-150 just before Christmas for the trip to Indiana-- did it myself and with the parts and alignment it was $400... not even one month's payment on a new one... The ball joints held up to 250,000 miles, so I can't complain too much... LOL The U-joints finally gave out at 180,000... which is unheard of... she's on her third set of brake rotors in the front and I don't know how many pad replacements... I do a lot of heavy towing with it though, and I don't have trailer brakes on anything, so the truck does all the work...
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  #102  
Old 02-10-2012, 08:50 AM
ghrocketman's Avatar
ghrocketman ghrocketman is offline
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100,000 miles ??? That's nuthin' !
88 Mustang GT, 238,000 with head gaskets twice but nothing else internal before sold in '04.

95 Camaro Z28; 286,000 on original 5.7L LT1 before replacement with 6.2L 383CID heavily modified LT1. Head gsaket went on original engine at 286,000 and decided to turn it into a "toy" with a much wilder engine.

2001 Cadillac STS 245,000 miles on L37 Northstar.

2008 HHR SS Turbo, 55,000 miles; not hardly broken in yet.

My father has '95 and '96 Buick Roadmasters with 5.7 LT1 engines that both have over 325,000 miles on original engines that still use less than 1/4qt of Mobil 1 between 10,000 mile oil changes.

I have come to grips that it will be NORMAL to have a $400+/month car payment FOR LIFE. I do run my cars into the ground by the time I'm done with them, but they usually LOOK pretty good when I ditch 'em. I drive 120mi round-trip for work every day with 90% of that on the freeway. Miles add up quickly, but I also refuse to ride around in just any old POS that looks like trash.
If it has rust on it, FORGET IT.

The ONLY engine that came in 1976 Thunderbirds was the 460 Big Block. The stock engine was a turd though. With single exhaust it was 200hp and 218 with dual exhaust. My dad had one brand new and was the car I drove all through college. I dropped in a high-compression highly modified 550+hp 460 Big Block I built in the garage. That thing SCREAMED. Still have the engine on a stand in garage. Hopefully to go into a Torino or Mustang.
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