New England B.S. Thread

Happy birthday!

 

BTW, yesterday was our 12 year anniversary.

 

Thanks

 

Happy Anniversary!


@Pibbles99 Happy Birthday

 

Not sure on distance. Maybe 5 miles, looking up my splits it hit the water at about 2.25hrs into the race

 

FIFY!

Morning chowder heads.

 

Haha!! You have to admit within our subforum, there’s some special indivuals

 

^this is true

 

I just found out that the project I'm on will have extremely limited parking. I hear that as lots of street parking and random parking garages are in my future. With the SD, that doesn't work so well as I don't physically fit into a lot of the older Boston parking garages. So, in my simple mind, I'm looking for a beater car. In my searches, I'm finding a lot of early 2000's (2000 - 2005) cars and trucks but I don't remember which ones had issues and I should be avoiding. There are a few in particular I'd welcome anyone's opinions on:
Mitsubishi Eclipse GT
Ford Taurus
Chevy S10
Audi A4
Merc C class
Subaru Forester

Any big red flags with any of those? I'm a little apprehensive of the Merc and the Audi, I know repairs for those can be expensive and it's not always something I can do 'in house'. Are early 2000 Subarus prone to the head gasket failures? The S10 I don't remember being anything too exciting, I found one with a 4 banger and one with the Vortec V6 (it's the Xtreme edition with the racing stripes, I wanted that truck like nothing else when I was in high school, not sure I can rock it now though...). I know almost nothing about that era of Mitsubishi. My criteria is decent on gas, small and cheap (looking around $2,000 so I'm sure whatever I buy will have some quirks)

 

Early 2000's Subaru's are notorious for head gaskets. But, Subaru redesigned the gasket in the late 2000's, so it it's been done once before you should be all set for good long while (as long as the rear doglegs don't rust). S10's were POS's but were actually remarkably reliable in terms of the driveline. It was just that all of the accessories were prone to unexpected failure. The Taurus I'm not sure; we never saw too many of them in the shop when I was there, so maybe that's a good sign?
Merc & Audi from that vintage are both pretty reliable, but when something does go wrong it's usually $$$ to fix. The labor is bad enough, but even if you can do it yourself the parts are usually expensive.

 

Speaking of beaters... the truck threw a P0420 yesterday - ironically right after I replaced the wheel bearing. This truck is literally trying to not pass inspections (which I'm overdue for already). Anyone ever catch a P0420 on a 4.0L 2nd gen? I was thinking of just replacing both downstream O2 sensors and praying that is it.

 

@mach1man001 - Happy anniversary
@Pibbles99 - Happy Birfday

 

Congrats! (I think?)

 

Ever been to the open house things they do the day before? I signed up since it's free and I'll be up there anyway.

 

I think it's an evap system leak. Start with the gas cap, then check all the evap system rubber lines. Last would be the charcoal canister

 

Ya, and I've been to the dinners too. Open house was ok, just get to look at the course layout, see/ try some obstacles that are close to the base. The dinner was not worth it IMO

 

Thanks

 

Happy anniversary Rob

 

Thank you! Sounds like the Furtrader is off the list. I don't think it's had the head gasket replaced otherwise they would have noted it in the ad.

I remember the older S10's being decent. My friends had them and they took a lot of abuse! I really like the Audi and the Mitsubishi, those are the top of my list right now. The A4 is in really nice condition, just over 100k miles. The Mitsubishi has 80-some thousand miles and is in really good shape. It has a timing belt that was supposedly changed at 50k miles and will need to be changed at 100k again. I like the idea of just having a small pick up. I'm used to driving them, not sure how I'll like driving a car.

 

@Pibbles99 happy Birthday!