Hello Allpar community.
I'm a new member living in the Washington, DC area. I've used Allpar a lot in researching a number of cars I was thinking about buying, so I have appreciated your help for some months.
Some background on my mechanical ability: Very little. I'm a 51 year old bureaucrat who does all of his own house maintenance and repair, but has not done much car stuff since I worked in a gas station all through high school (I'm from Texas). I did a lot of work on my old cars then and in the immediate years after that when I had no money, but have done very little except interior restoration and easy things like changing belts, batteries, trim, or fuses, etc, since then (other than one fuel injector replacement on an old BMW). That is changing, which is why I'm joining the forums.
I own too many cars (seven right now, but one is for sale), but sold an old Mercedes a couple of months ago and decided-- for reasons I can't explain-- that I wanted a K car. I never owned a K car, so it's not nostalgia (in fact, I only ever owned one Chrysler product, a 73 Dart). But for some reason they spoke to me at this time of my life.
Anyway, my quest turned into, "buy the cheapest decent K car possible and turn fixing it into something fun to do." So about three weeks ago I bought an 84 Lebaron convertible sight unseen. It has only 45k miles (legit, since it sat for at least twelve years somewhere in there), but the owner misrepresented it in many ways, so my hands are literally full (of rust, grease, Chilton and Haynes manuals, burned out relays, etc). The car passed a state inspection (not the state I live in) last October, but I have to wonder how. I did drive it almost 200 miles home after buying it, but that was, well, a much more exciting experience than I had hoped for. Since then it's been one thing after another-- usually things I cannot find help for in the manuals. I'll be posting some of those things on forums.
I don't mind, though. I haven't even spent half of the PROFIT on selling my Mercedes on this car yet, so I'm in no hurry and enjoying having to relearn and learn things. But I ain't getting it painted until I'm sure it will survive my attempts to make it at least safe and roadworthy.
Looking forward to it.
I'm a new member living in the Washington, DC area. I've used Allpar a lot in researching a number of cars I was thinking about buying, so I have appreciated your help for some months.
Some background on my mechanical ability: Very little. I'm a 51 year old bureaucrat who does all of his own house maintenance and repair, but has not done much car stuff since I worked in a gas station all through high school (I'm from Texas). I did a lot of work on my old cars then and in the immediate years after that when I had no money, but have done very little except interior restoration and easy things like changing belts, batteries, trim, or fuses, etc, since then (other than one fuel injector replacement on an old BMW). That is changing, which is why I'm joining the forums.
I own too many cars (seven right now, but one is for sale), but sold an old Mercedes a couple of months ago and decided-- for reasons I can't explain-- that I wanted a K car. I never owned a K car, so it's not nostalgia (in fact, I only ever owned one Chrysler product, a 73 Dart). But for some reason they spoke to me at this time of my life.
Anyway, my quest turned into, "buy the cheapest decent K car possible and turn fixing it into something fun to do." So about three weeks ago I bought an 84 Lebaron convertible sight unseen. It has only 45k miles (legit, since it sat for at least twelve years somewhere in there), but the owner misrepresented it in many ways, so my hands are literally full (of rust, grease, Chilton and Haynes manuals, burned out relays, etc). The car passed a state inspection (not the state I live in) last October, but I have to wonder how. I did drive it almost 200 miles home after buying it, but that was, well, a much more exciting experience than I had hoped for. Since then it's been one thing after another-- usually things I cannot find help for in the manuals. I'll be posting some of those things on forums.
I don't mind, though. I haven't even spent half of the PROFIT on selling my Mercedes on this car yet, so I'm in no hurry and enjoying having to relearn and learn things. But I ain't getting it painted until I'm sure it will survive my attempts to make it at least safe and roadworthy.
Looking forward to it.
