Ordered 6 solenoid valves, a mini compressor and pressure switch through e-bay, when they arrive I am going to make an air suspension control system for my buggy for under R2000 (under 200usd).Cant wait. Unfortunately everything will only arrive in 2-5 weeks. But I will post a video when its done.
I've done some stuff on my car this weekend: Yesterday I changed the valvecover gasket. I had to remove the air cleaner and some electrical connections to the central injection system to make space to remove the valve cover. The old gasket was more like plastic than rubber and was leaking a lot of oil onto the manifold. So I cleaned off the surfaces the gasket was going, cleaned the valve cover and the manifold with Brääkleen, put the gasket in place, bolted the valve cover to the engine, reattached all the electrical connections and the air cleaner. Started up the car and took it for a ride hoping it wouldn't leak...and it didn't! Hooray, no more burned oil smell in the car! And today I changed the oil and oil filter. The hardest part of this job was the plastic skid plate under the engine bay...grr. It took like 30 minutes just to get it back on the car. Oh, and I noticed today that my fuel filter is leaking. Ordered one of those.
Marauder headlights? Cool. My friends dad used to have a marauder. That thing was so cool. He moved away 2 years ago, and last I heard it was totaled in an accident. :| I continued waiting for the crown vic title. Been 4 weeks since they sent it off again. Oh wait I never mentioned that here did I? Nashville sent some stuff back saying that they didn't have enough information to give a new title, so they had to re-send it off with more paperwork and stuff, which put us aaaaalll the way back at day 1. I've stayed patient and kept my cool for 10 weeks now. Now I'm starting to get antsy and impatient. I fucking swear if I don't end up with that car I will be pissed. I don't know anything. NOTHING. I haven't even seen the damn thing in a month. It's just a waiting game. A terrible, continually repeating waiting game. Such a needlessly long and drawn out process. There are much, much easier ways to get a new title than to send it off to The Department of Revenue, in the capital of the state. Shit. You could haul that thing off the dmv in some podunk county, where the only proof of ownership required to issue a new title is a "verbal statement". Anyway, gonna give the guy a call sometime here soon to see if anything has happened. 5 weeks is the average time it takes to process stuff like this, and we're approaching that. /rant
i may have misjudged an upcoming railroad track and i might not have seen how big of a drop was following so i kind of got some air and sort of blew the shocks and possibly damaged what I want to say is the engine block. (imported from here)
Engine block? Nah dude, that looks like a frame crossmember or something of the sorts. It's just a little scraped up. Tis but a flesh wound. And blown shocks? Ehh, who needs shocks anyway?
I got pissed at my gmarquis today for deciding it wanted to squeak louder than my old pos 86 camry did. Damn belt. Oh and the thermostat housing is leaking coolant. AND it needs an alignment sooo bad that i have to hold the steering wheel about 40 degrees tilted more than usual just to go straight.
A moment of silence for a fellow panther owner... Looks like you've got an intake manifold replacement coming up. The coolant runner is the first thing to go bad on those plastic manifolds, which happens to be where the thermostat housing is.
!! On another note: Would you happen to know if any decent looking aftermarket trim pieces could be found for a 96 grand marquis? I heard of some people using mach one chin spoilers, but they were on 98+ years usually
I wouldn't worry brutha. I've heard you can use headgasket sealer as a temporary fix for it. Not sure how well it works or how long it lasts, though. But if you do decide to replace it, I recommend doing so with one of the manifolds with aluminum coolant runners. They last much, much longer. And afaik they all have the same bolt patterns. There are also a lot of walkthroughs and guides about how to go about replacing it, as it's quite a common thing. I've found this one to be very informative, and I laughed my ass off the belch at 2:23 I'm sure there are better ones, but the belch really makes this video one of the best in my book. And I can't really tell you much about the trim. Apart from the engine, I'm not very knowledgable at all about those aero body panthers.
I assume the guy didn't have the title any where? No money has been dealt with though right? I got mine through the dealer so, money was handed over at 2pm and I was on my way home with the car by 8pm that night. Got the insurance and registration in 4 hours. Dealer was an hour away.
It's a bit of a long story. The dude I'm buying the car from owns a machine shop, and I noticed it sitting at the very back of the lot when we took the firebird parts over there. I went over there and looked at it, of course, not really thinking anything of it. Just figured it was there to get some work done. It was dirty as all fuck though, which was the first thing that kinda raised suspicion. We went back 2 weeks later to pick the parts back up, and it was still sitting there, in the same exact spot. I asked the owner about it, and he said that he'd be "tickled to get a thousand for it". We went back there and looked at it, and apparently the story is that some dude brought it in because it blew out a spark plug (nothing to worry about those 4.6's are very prone to that problem), and after the work had been done and it came time to pay, the dude just told him to keep the car and he ran off down to florida. When he signed the title over and sent it up here, however, he signed both where the previous owner signs, and where the person that the title is being signed over to is supposed to sign. imo that could have been fixed with a little bit of whiteout, but this guy likes to do everything the hard way, apparently. So he let the car sit on the lot for about 6 months, then when I asked about it, he got his secretary or something to send the paperwork off for a new title. That's when the waiting game started. 5 weeks later, when the papers got to the top of the pile and we should have been getting a nice, brand new title in the mail, they didn't have enough info and sent back a request for more. Lady sent all the stuff off again about 4 weeks ago, and that's the last we've heard about it. And to answer your question; no money has been handed over yet. We agreed that it will be as soon as the title comes in.
You think they (RMV) could even contact the old owner and ask if he did in fact sign it over. Seems like that would be easier then whatever I imagine they are attempting to do.
At this point I think about anything would be easier than what they're trying to do. So needlessly complicated and difficult. I'm to the point to where if their attempts at getting a title fail I'll just take my chances and get a bill of sale. Then I'll take it to a dmv out in some podunk county and get a new title in like 10 minutes. Then if that fails I'll just thrash it around offroad till it doesn't run anymore.
Even if you have to do all of that, 1000 seems like a pretty great deal depending on the mileage. I got my gmarq for 1400, and it has 170,000 miles.
It's got ~185k on it. I'm sure I gave it a good bath, fixed a few problems, then sold it I could turn a decent profit. The body and interior are really straight under all the grime. I'm not looking to make a profit though. Well...at least not at the moment. I'd like to keep it in the shape it's in right now so I can at least get my money back when I sell it, but I doubt that'll happen. It's inevitable that I'll put some minor dents and scratches in the body as a result of being stupid and messing around with it.
