New England B.S. Thread

My vote is trade it before it starts getting expensive! Sounds like just nickle and dime stuff so far...

 

I agree with Pugga, trade for something with less rust and less issues but don't get rid of those wheels!

 

@tacobell007

 

Its tempting, my one issue is that I don't want to mess up getting a mortgage from a bank in a couple years when I go to buy a house.

Yea I would keep the wheels with my new tires and the wheel spacers for the next truck

I don't think I could bring myself to buy one honestly

 

go get a quote. Worst that happens is you walk away. It’s not a commitment - have them take a look at it.

 

I know modern Fords aren’t bad, but my Mom had a 1991 Escort Wagon that legitimately put her into debt, and I’m still angry about that.

Like, the Focus ST/RS and Fiesta ST are pretty rad, but all I can think of is that stupid Escort.

 

Not a lot of redeeming qualities to a `91 Escort, they were pretty terrible. I had one from that era as a work vehicle for a bit. It really all does come down to personal experience with brands. I`ve been lucky so far and had good luck with Fords. My co worker had terrible luck with Ford and has been having great luck with Dodge. My old man had bad luck with Ford and ran to Chevy and never left. Theres an ass for every seat. Statistics will tell you what should be the best but people buy what they like.

 

For rust repair or trade-in? Cause the rust repair will probably cost at least half the trade in value to have done and painted properly.

Exactly

 

Wall of text time.

After my Dad passed my Mom and I moved out of our house and had to find something smaller. She had a 1986 Cavalier Wagon my Dad bought new. Now, my Dad made great money, they spent thousands of dollars landscaping on the house they had built, but my Dad was not a car guy. Yes, he had briefly owned a Porsche 914, but his favorite car was the one with four inflated pneuamtic tires and a full tank of gas. So he ordered the Cavalier wagon with effectively no options. We are talking no AC, crank windows, AM/FM radio, no clock, etc etc. While we were looking for a house we moved in with my aunt and uncle and the Cavalier started to act up and throw CELs. Later we learned it was just a bad ECU, but it was frustrating and my Mom was afraid to drive it. Enter the Escort.

The Escort was my uncle's neighbor's car. The story and setup were great. It was a one-owner car with like 70,000 miles on it, always dealer serviced etc. It had AC and a tape deck! It had a rear windshield wiper! It was something I wasn't going to get made fun of being dropped of in at junior high! So my Mom bought it. It was a heap and she didn't know any better. We noticed first that the passenger door lock didn't actually do anything from the outside of the car. Ford still used two keys at that point in time, but unlike GM the key heads were identical, so there was always a piece of duct tape on one key. If you lost the tape, you'd have to fiddle with both keys, which was a pain in the rain. Then the "Check Coolant" light came on. A trip to the mechanic determined nothing was wrong, a quick conversation with the previous owner said "oh that has been on for years". Whatever, cars have quirks. Over the next 2-3 years it needed an exhaust, the fuel gauge stopped working, the temperature gauge stopped working, the display on the radio burned out and it the faceplate got hot to the touch. The AC kinda worked but with 88 HP on tap it was being able to keep up with traffic or being cool. The driver side window wouldn't roll up/down much anymore.

(3 years later).

The Escort, while being a heap, wasn't acting up too much. Everything electronic in the interior stopped working short of the heater and radio (cluster, AC, self cancelling turn signals, the headlight retaining bezels disintegrated) I left for college and my Mom started a new job that required a 20 mile daily commute. At least once a month, sometimes twice a month for the next two years it required a $300 repair. It was always a different part, exhaust systems, front and rear shocks, control arms, front sway bar, MAF sensors, EGR sensors, valve gaskets, radiators, thermostats. It got to the point where my Mom was literally going into credit card debt for this car (I think she was up to $2,500 at one point). She needed the car to get to work to pay for the repairs to the car. I kept saying get another car, but she was worried about taking on a car payment since her place of work was notorious for random, deep, layoffs. Finally our mechanic said to her no more, don't fix anything else on this car, there's too much that is going to fail in the next 3-6 months. My Mom was heartbroken. She pulled into the driveway and the exhaust snapped for the...3rd? time. The next morning the entire fluid contents of the automatic transmission was sitting in our driveway, I kid you not. This car had 106,000 milese on it. It was maintained well, serviced regularly AND repaired regularly. I ended up buying her a $1,000 Accord I found that would get her from Point A to Point B as she had been recently laid off to boot.

So I despise that car and have a tough time separating that from Ford. The epilogue is that my Mom was close enough to retirement age she just did that, paid off the small note on the house. She gone thorugh a few cars since, but she's got a 2019 Forester she loves, so that's all that matters.

 

You said the rust was confined to the bed, right? What's a replacement bed run? I would have to believe that would be a quicker and easier solution than repairing rusty panels.

 

Trade in. Worst that they do is not give you a good offer and you walk away. Not like bringing it in there is a death sentence gotta take their offer.





also I might be in the market for a new dash cam. I just learned mine doesn't like saving the last file at shut down - sounds like a battery problem. It might be relatively weather dependent. Guess I need to peruse that topic again

 

Ooof! That thing was clearly a lemon. My parents had an eagle back in the day. Not sure what it was. 4 door sedan that much I know. They had sold their two Toyotas to buy a house and share one car. Then there was the list of vehicles I dont even remember them owning. Eventually they bought a used GMC Jimmy Like early 2000s and a second gen ram sport. The Ram was awesome and huge. Magnum 5.9L v8. Looked cool, sounded great, unstoppable in snow. The Jimmy suffered the ignition issue that the mechanic couldn't figure out I sort of weant both of those a jimmy and second gen ram but impossible to find a clean one. Ram had a couple issues at some point so my dad dumped it. Ram went away first for an 02 Tundra 4.7 regular cab 8ft bed. Truck hauled more mulch then it ever should have. Jimmy got cleaned up, washed, premium put in, and traded in on a new 03 Sequoia. Still wished we had the Sequoia. It was rusty and they wouldn't replace the frame. Body was rotting too. It went away for a 17 Tundra. 02 Tundra had gone away for an 08 Mercedes E350.

 

Those early Sequoias were nice!

From the cradle through college my Mom had a 1979 Buick Regal bought new, a 1986 Cavalier Wagon and the infamous 1991 Escort. I had my first car from high school through until the summer after college, so buying my STi was a crazy deal. My Dad had a 1968 Skylark, a 1972 Chevelle base model, the afromentioned 1974 Porsche 914 (both the Chevelle and 914 were $500 cars in the mid-1980s) and then my Mom's Regal for a bunch of years. He actually asked me when I was like 9-10 what color I would paint it if I could. I said black with a red lightning bolt down the side. The gray Regal showed up one day in black with a red pin stripe with a lightning bolt in the side. That died about a year before he passed and he bought a 1986 Cavalier Wagon idnetical to my Mom's. My Dad had a strict limit of $500 for cars (this was the mid-90s now) and I think to this day he'd have a $500 car. At the time we lived in a brand new development in a monster Colonial house with a two car garage, 3-season porch, professional landscaping, and there's my dad with his 15 year old Buick that required jamming a wiper blade in the carb to start correctly. As a kid it was the least cool thing ever, as an adult it's where you set your priorities.

How I ended up an absolutely nutty car guy, I have no clue, but I could name basically every car on the street by the time I was 4-5. I can still do it as a party trick, although I've lost track a bit of the newer cars. But if you want someone to identify the difference between a 73, 74 and 77 Cutlass Supreme, I'm your guy?

 

Bed, pinch welds under the doors, inner rockers, floor pan, rear axle housing. Frame isnt too bad but who knows. Right now the floo on the bed needs about 4 spots that 6x4 or 8x6 sheet metal would probably fix. Its in front of and behind the wheel wells inside the bed

 

You can get a new car loan now and it won't have a big impact in a few years, if you pay it on time every month it might even help. The biggest thing is to not buy a new car/used AFTER your original pre-approval for a home, that is where people screw themselves. If you got something with a similar payment to what you have now it wouldn't change anything. As long as a new one doesn't turn your debt ratio upside down it shouldn't change much.

Also, you know you need a new one based off of what I'm quoting, it's just gonna hurt to do it. Sometimes you gotta pull the band-aid. I'd not get the new toyota, at least wait a year on that based off of all the issues we saw on the 16' tacos and supply chain etc... You could be waiting a long time and end up with a lemon.

 

I wish you took a look in the bed of my truck! See if Jared has anything that will work and I can replace it for him or bring him some goodies when i see him at wool wax in a few weeks

 

Much wisdom so early in the morning

 

Oh, also...


It's Friday for me!