PennSilverTaco's "Perfect 5-Lug Regular Cab" Build, Aspergers, and General BS MegaThread!

I kinda wanted a stick shift truck anyway; No A/C is also a bit of a dealbreaker, though my uncle put A/C in his ‘91 with no issue...

 

My aunt’s ‘09 has the factory JBL system and it kicks some serious ass!

 

Also, aunt’s ‘09 Limited has pushbutton start while cousin’s is a base model and has the traditional ignition key; Aunt’s is pushing 140K miles while cousin’s has yet to crack 80K...

 

That is shell and skeleton of a turtle that has been cut in half to show the structure (the turtle had already died of natural causes, of course); This is pretty cool!

 

Not sure off my head but I believe the 14 is just basic. We found it July 2019 at a used car only place about an hour away from us. Our usual is Copeland Toyota in Brockton MA but they didn't have anything she liked..that's where 3 or 4 of hers came from as well as my truck. Only had 17K on it, she turned 18K while bringing it home.

 

The ‘99 E320 was one of my favorite vehicles that I got to detail during my time at the detail shop...

My boss gave his granddaughter a 2000 E320 which currently has less than 100K miles; My boss has put more money into the car than it’s worth due to it being something of a family heirloom of sorts, but granddaughter wants a Jeep now. I would totally buy this Benz due to all of the expensive work being done, but for one thing; The damn thing doesn’t have AWD and that would be my only reason for buying it (so I could have a winter beater to keep the Tacoma off the road when it snows).

Normally, vehicles this old end up getting wholesaled even if they have relatively low miles and are in decent condition.

There are, however, exceptions to the rule; During my tenure at the detail shop, someone traded in a much nicer version of this same car. It was a 1998 E-class AMG, in mint condition, with less than 30K miles (This was in 2018 or 2019, so the miles could safely be considered “ridiculously low”)! Obviously, there’s a significant profit margin there if the dealer buys the car for a rock bottom price (which it no doubt did).

 

Most bid cars are genuine shitboxes like the black 2010 Jetta Sportwagon above...

I only worked at the detail shop for ten months, but the majority of the shitty “bid cars” I detailed did seem to have working A/C; The Jetta was one of two exceptions to the rule, the other being a 2008-2010ish Ford Focus that had also been used and abused by the poor bastard who traded it in...

As stated in the 2019 post, the Jetta was the definition of a shitbox; The A/C did not work, the interior was totally trashed, the exterior was not in very good shape, the rear liftgate would not open, and as you can see it was rolling on a temporary spare...

 

I got into a huge argument with my boss over the Jetta, over one of the primary reasons I quit a month after posting these photos to TW; Everything was flat rate, meaning you got the flat rate of pay no matter how long it took to do a vehicle...

New cars and most used cars were generally no big deal, as I could get those done within an hour. Turds like this Jetta only paid out an hour, at the equivalent of $10 an hour, because they were not waxed.

Like I said, the Jetta was TOTALLY TRASHED! I will admit I was partially at fault here because I kind of rushed through it due to wanting to move onto a much more profitable job (had this car been a “spot”, slang at the dealer for a new or used vehicle that had been sold and the customer was waiting for, I believe I would have gotten 1.5 or 1.7 hours).

However, I just wanted to be done with the turd, and I overlooked a lot of stuff including a rotten apple that had been underneath the passenger seat.




My boss chewed me out over a shitty Jetta that was just going to wholesale and would likely be stripped for parts or sold to another person who just wanted a beater and didn’t care how it looked. My boss said "This car looks like ass" and made me bring the damn thing back in to detail it to his liking...




I spent over an hour on a shitty car and yielded only ten bucks for my time!



That was pretty pretty much the beginning of the end, though it was during a weekend trip to York for a car show just four days after I posted the pics of the Jetta to TW that I really thought long and hard about where My life was heading...

I posted the photos of the Jetta on May 28th, 2019 (this was a Tuesday); I remember that the Jetta was definitely on a Saturday, so it was likely May 25th. I took the next Saturday off and spent an entire weekend in York at a car show (June 1st and 2nd). I put in my two weeks’ notice sometime in mid-June, and June 29th, 2019 was my last day. I had loaded up the Tacoma the night before and made a stop at the local beer store before immediately driving 75 miles to my cousin’s house in the Wilkes-Barre area, where I spent the remainder of Saturday and the first half of Sunday (I hit 99K miles about 2 miles from my cousin’s house hit the magical 100K mark about two weeks later).

I may have been unemployed, but at least I had Mandy to look forward to. Mandy was another reason I left that shitty job. We adopted Mandy less than a month after I started the detailing job, and within a month we found out she had a terminal kidney disease. I felt like this job was depriving of time with my terminally ill puppy; In a cruel twist of fate, Mandy really nosedived during that weekend and the difficult decision was made to put her to sleep on July 1st.

 

Another shitbox was the 2007 Pontiac G6 with a flat tire; Unlike the Jetta, the A/C in the Pontiac worked and the car was actually in halfway decent condition with the exception of the obviously flat tire and some cosmetic issues. I happened to notice that the CD player had a disc in it, and when I pressed the eject button I ended up getting myself a free copy of High School Dropout (Kanye West); Detailers were allowed to keep anything they found in trade-in vehicles, as long was it legal.

 

After I left, I was told by a friend and former coworker that another detailer found a loaded H&K 9mm handgun in a late model Ford Explorer that had been bought at auction in Ohio and shipped to PA to be sold as CPO on the Ford dealer’s lot; The police were obviously called, and they ran the gun’s serial number. The gun was found to not be stolen, and I believe the owner ended up getting it back, though I seriously question their intelligence if they left such a nice weapon in their car when they traded it in!

 

Going back to the criteria which determines whether a trade-in ends up on the dealer’s lot or goes to the wholesale auction; This has confused me for the longest time...

 

In 2000, my parents had a 1996 Nissan Pathfinder SE and a 1990 Mazda B2600i LE-5 pickup.

My dad just was in the Navy and we knew we’d be moving a bit more often before my dad retired, so my parents decided to buy a conversion van with a TV and VCR in it for those long trips.

The Pathfinder was in perfect condition, only four years old, and not yet paid off, so my dad wasn’t about to sell it. The Mazda had been purchased in October 1998 exclusively as a commuter that my dad knew he’d been getting rid of when we moved in less than two years. My dad parents ended up trading the Mazda for a new 2000 GMC Safari conversion van and got almost nothing for it, but my dad paid only $24K for an originally $32K van so he didn’t particularly care...

The Mazda was a little beat up and had a slight oil leak, but was otherwise mechanically sound and the A/C worked. I asked the dealer staff what they would do with the Mazda, and they said it would go to a wholesale auction because they didn’t sell used vehicles older than 1995 (five years old at the time); This was Hall GMC-Pontiac in Virginia Beach (Pontiac is obviously gone now but the last time I did an online search, Hall was still around).

 

Hall obviously had high standards (at least they did at the time), as do most of the dealers in my area; Every single one of them stocks their fair share of older low-mileage special interest vehicles, like the ‘97 Mustang GT convertible I saw at O’Neil Nissan in February 2020. Obviously, dealers have their standards and will not sell anything with a salvage title or anything that has incredibly miles, but since 2011-2012 the amount of shitboxes I’ve seen at the very dealer where I worked for ten months has amazed me!

 

In 2012, I saw a light blue 1992-1993ish Dodge Grand Caravan ES at this dealer, sitting on the backlot with a busted quarter window. The van was not in bad shape at all, and the interior was surprisingly clean. A week or two later, I saw this same van, with the window replaced of course, shined up to a like-new appearance and sitting on the dealer’s bargain lot with an asking price of just under $3,000 if I remember correctly.

If it had the 3.3L V6 (and not the Shitsubishi 3.0L V6) and 100K or less, then I’d say it was a good deal; However, despite being a fully loaded “ES” model (ES was itself an appearance package for the top LE trim), it did not have rear A/C.

 

Now that I think about it, I believe this particular van may have been AWD...

I don’t remember exactly what year it was but I want to say 1992; If it was a 1992 with AWD, then it makes sense why it didn’t have rear A/C...

For some stupid reason, the 1991-1992 Chrysler minivans COULD NOT be ordered with AWD and rear A/C! Just like rear A/C not becoming an option until 1988 despite the longer “Grand” models coming out in 1987, I think it had something to do with engineering the system to fit properly and work properly. By 1993, rear A/C could be ordered with AWD, but only on “Grand” models.

 

The standard wheelbase vans were NEVER available with rear A/C, until production ended in 2006 and a redesign debuted for the 2007 model year; This brings us to yet another story of a turd that was destined for the wholesale auction...

It was a silver 2003-2004 Chrysler Town & Country that someone traded in; It had over 100K miles, but not particularly high miles for the year. It was also a short wheelbase, so it did not have rear A/C. it was in reasonably good condition appearance-wise, and it ran in the sense that it would start right up and move under its own power, but the CEL was on and it made a lot of disconcerting noises when you drove it...

I did not detail this van myself, but at the end of the shift when we all rushed to get these turds to the bid lot, I ended up with the keys to the Chrysler. It was December 2018 if I remember correctly; Regardless of what month it was, it was COLD outside. As such, I did not get to test the A/C; The heater definitely worked though, and I used that during the short drive to the bid lot.

 

And let’s not forget the green 1999 Dodge Durango that I detailed one night in early 2019; What a turd that thing was! It had about 150K miles, and it ran good, but it was just beat to shit and falling apart!

It was green with a beige interior, and someone spilled something in the third row seat prior to it being traded in; I initially thought it was mold, and it least one coworker believed to be jizz...

The best guess anyone could come up with was a vanilla milkshake, but regardless, my supervisor took one look at it and said I didn’t have to touch it so I was happy!

It was cold outside, but the powerful heaters inside the shop kept it very summer-like, so I was able to test out the A/C in the Durango and determine that it did in fact work! This is a rarity for Dodge Durangos, because most of the owners I’ve talked to have reported problems with the A/C...

I also got the honor of driving the Durango to the bid lot, and it had snowed fairly recently, so I put it in 4-High and had a little fun while the supervisors weren’t present!

 

@shakerhood

Check out these pics of my cousin's house in Northern California!

 

The smell of deployed airbags is something you never forget...

 

Another vehicle from my days at the detail shop that I particularly liked!