PennSilverTaco's American CAR Thread

@Lt. Dangle
@shakerhood

From what I could tell by looking under the hood, the A/C still seems to be R-12!

 

Now that's a car I fully expect the owner of which to lecture me, incorrectly, on the positives of Reaganomics from.

 

@ColoradoTJ

The car dealer selling the 1990 Ciera is located practically next door to the scrapyard I go to, and this blue 1993 Buick Century Limited belongs to somebody who lives near both the scrapyard and the car lot; I have been driving past the Buick for months and finally stopped to take pics. I ran the license plate through Carfax, and the original owner was the US Navy, specifically the DC Navy Yard! It remained with the Navy until October 1997, when it was sold to a private owner in Warminster, PA with less than 35K miles. The car is on its 4th owner, who has owned it since December 2007. The last odometer reading was a little under 158K miles in September 2021. The inspection expired in September 2022 and the last Carfax entry was a registration renewal in December 2022; I have a feeling that this car is no longer being driven. Either way, it’s in remarkable condition for having spent its entire life in the Northeast; I’m guessing it has maybe 160K on it at the most, which is LOW for a 1993 model…


January 7th, 2025:

Hatboro, Pennsylvania

 

These come from a long line of GM econo boxes that I've never known anyone personally to own. Like I know a lot of people have them but they're just the cars that populate the background to me. Like this is the official car of other people, not people I know, but someone.

 

Reaganomics has absolutely nothing to do with it; American cars of this era could not hold a candle to Japanese and German cars of the same era. My mom had a 1990 Toyota Camry LE V6, and that car was awesome! We owned it from 1990 to 1998…

That said, I have a serious soft spot for certain pre-1997 GM cars. My aunt and uncle had a 1989 Cutlass Ciera in the early 2000s, which was given to them by my uncle’s parents (I am only related to my uncle by marriage). My uncle drove the Olds for about a year and a half, then replaced it with a brand new Nissan Frontier at the end of 2002. My cousin, then 16, started learning to drive in it. The car died in about 2003 with like 140K miles, was donated to Purple Heart, and was promptly replaced with a 1994 Olds Eight-eight that came from my uncle’s parents as well. My cousin nuked the transmission in that car sometime prior to 2010, my aunt and uncle bought him an 2003 Mazda6, and the 1994 Olds was also donated to charity. Go figure, my cousin nuked the tranny in the Mazda as well, and got a 2009 Maxima with his own money.

Again, the only thing government-related that had negatively affected cars in my opinion was the stupid emissions laws that resulted in V8 engines having less power than my 4-banger Tacoma!

 

My aunt and uncle owned two hand-me-down Oldsmobiles from my uncle’s grandparents, as stated above. My uncle bought a brand new 1985 Mazda GLC and drove it for about 16 years, begrudgingly donating it to Purple Heart in about 2001 because the carburetor was having issues and it wouldn’t pass emissions. He drove the 1989 Oldsmobile Cutlass Ciera for more than a year, then gave the Olds to my cousin and bought the aforementioned 2002 Nissan Frontier in October 2002.

My aunt and uncle had numerous underwhelming cars over the years, despite having the money to buy much nicer vehicles, and drove them into the ground.

A year after buying the Mazda, my aunt and uncle special ordered a new 1986 Plymouth Voyager LE. My aunt was pregnant with the cousin who ended up getting the two Oldsmobiles. In an era when most 1st Gen Chrysler minivans were sent to the scrapyard before the new millennium, my aunt and uncle kept the first Voyager going until 1997! It was in remarkable condition despite being 11 years old and having well over 100K miles, and everything worked. The liftgate struts gave out in the early 1990s and they resorted to carrying a wooden fence post in the van to hold the hatch open, and the A/C compressor seized in 1994 or 1995 and had to be replaced, but they held onto that damn thing way longer than they should have so they could buy a nice house. They finally traded it for a brand new 1997 Plymouth Voyager, which they kept for 12 years and traded for a 2009 RAV4 Limited under the “Cash for Clunkers” program.

The 2002 Nissan Frontier was sold to CarMax in 2023, with like 140K miles and zero mechanical issues, and the 2009 RAV4 was just sold to CarMax with 160K miles. My aunt drives a 2019 Toyota Highlander XLE, and my uncle just bought a brand new Honda CRV Hybrid. The Frontier was a 5-speed stick and my uncle, who is now almost 72, misses driving manual already!

 

My Mom had one of those as did my Grandpa, his was blue just like that one.

 

Looks like it's in damn good shape all around, wow. Probably has a lot of miles left.

I had a few cars that had that GM Delco radio, ahhh memories..at least when I first got them that is..

 

In terms of reliability and fuel mileage, correct. Longevity on the whole, not so much in the rust belt. The old joke about the 80s foreign cars was the body would fall off the damn things in 10 yrs or so no matter how much you drove them. Having owned nothing but GM since I was about 18 and almost all being 10 yrs or older they were a little easier to work on as well in my book, at least for a college kid with limited tools and a couple of books.

And yeah re the power thing they choked the hell out of cars of all kinds with that, though in general the automakers in all countries were able to work around those things in terms of power and efficiency with fuel injection and comptuterization in time.

 

1991 Mercury Capri XR2 Turbo


February 14th, 2025:

Doylestown, Pennsylvania

 

@6 gearT444E
@ABA180
@Bishop84
@ColoradoTJ
@Just_A_Guy
@shakerhood
@Speedytech7
@steelcity2
@TnShooter

1986 Dodge Aries K


March 16th, 2025:

Hatfield, Pennsylvania

 

5-digit odometer, so more than likely 122K miles, but still pretty low!

 

AM/FM stereo, A/C, and intermittent wipers!

 

Someone even went to the trouble of converting the A/C to R134a!