What is worst condition you've bought a car in?

Intentionally or unintentionally. I'm sure that a good number of us have bought some rather crusty vehicles at various points in time. Did you bring home a rusted-out Jeep carcass with a blown transmission? Did you buy an old rotary Mazda off Craigslist and end up burning 2 quarts of oil on the way home? Are you that guy who has the old Trans-Am up on blocks in his front yard?

I recently bought myself a 2000 Subaru Outback as a project vehicle. It has bad body rust in a few places, the engine has eaten a few head gaskets, and the previous owner stripped out most of the interior. I have to fix a blown brake line on it this weekend.

So what's your highly-questionable used car story?

 

Late 70’s Chevy Cavalier 2 liter throttle body. Needed to keep it moving otherwise it would over heat, but not over 65 otherwise it would over heat. Bought it with 50 k miles, transmission went south at 125 k.

 

My 04 Tacoma. Bought it with a seized 3.4 and my triple locked 95 Landcruiser. Bought it with a bad hg.

 

You mean late 80's?

 

Bought a 1970 beetle with rusted out heater channels and floor pans, it’s a wonder it didn’t fold in half getting towed home.

 

1990 Pontiac grand am. First vehicle I bought when I was sixteen. Biggest POS car ever produced. Went through two engines and countless other parts. I could’ve bought a brand new car and made monthly payments and the high premium insurance and still spent less money. Only good thing that came out of that car is I learned how to fix almost everything on a vehicle.

 

1976 Plymouth Duster....$350 backyard special....looked like shit but it got me to work for a couple of years when I had no money. As you can see I was never much into status symbols

 

Sounds like you missed a chance to build a Flintstones car.

 

The floor pans that were in it were siliconed in place!

 

A tie between my first car, a 1974 Datsun B210 and a 1972 BMW 2002. The Datsun I bought off my Dad for $400. Baby diarrhea brown. Gas gauge did not work and it burned copious amounts of oil. Pulling into a gas station I really did need to say, "Fill the oil and check the gas". Plus it was rusting out everywhere. Drove through a puddle once and the INSIDE of the windshield was suddenly wet. The BMW I bought for a $1000. Looked great. Brought it home to discover the previous owner had paper mached in the rust holes in the wheel wells, spray painted it black, then drove it through some dirt to cover up the "repair". I learned a lot about what to look for by buying that car but sold it for parts for $500.

 

I had a chance to buy a Volkswagen Jetta with a trashed 2nd gear from a friend of a friend for $200 or the option of buying him dinner and hauling the thing away myself. Very tempting, but I decided to go with my rust-tastic Subaru instead.

 

The Cavalier didn't come out until 1982.

 

Dodge

 

Dodge the testing, Ram it through production, and have Tony fix it again.

 

Down in the beach communities out here the salt water ocean spray really dose a job on unprotected cars One of my first cars my brother gave me was a Datsun 510 "rust bucket special". When I slammed the door. the mirror fell off, Eventually the drivers side door fell off. Other then having no ignition and you had to hot wire it, it ran great.

 

Rust? You mean "free weight reduction"?

 

I once bought a car on eBay and ended up being a 7k paperweight ended up parting out completely to recoup as much as possible.

 

That’s a cold shower, damn. No legal recourse?

 

Same as very late '70's. No?

 

Worst condition? Bought a pos SAS'ed '87 Toyota pickup for $500 off of a tweaker that had completely torn apart the wiring in it and lost the title/pink slip. That was an experience to say the least. I was 18 years old and too ambitious for my own good to think I could get it working again. Ended up selling it as a parts truck for $300 lol.