Off topic post: Car guys/gals, where art thou?

[CyclicalLoser 155]

If this is not the appropriate place, I totally get it. I did a quick search and didn't see any "watercooler" type discussion areas, so I figured I make a thread and we could keep the off topic chatter in here?

So that being out of the way, I'm a gearhead big time. Lived in the Motor City for a while and have 0w-40 in my veins LOL. Just figured we could talk shop here. LOL "Cars and Pouches" I suppose. I'll start first. I've had 31 cars so far, no I'm not loaded, and none of them have been spectacular by any means. When you live in the midwest a fun car has to be paired with a winter/beater though. I got tired of the beater idea, so I fixed it by moving here to California where the smog laws are incredible. I'll try and break down what I've had:

• 1980 GTI 8v
• 1982 Camaro Berlinetta with the T5 and the 305, the world's worst engine. That car I had to give away it was so bad.
• 1986 Pontiac Fiero GT. Oh how I miss that car. I loved it. Fun fact: The last Mid engine car GM made...(Well, until the c8 comes out next year and that will be awesome!). I sold it because of? Can't even remember to be honest. I was young, I was stupid.
• 1986 Ford Bronco II "Beater". Had the 2.9L v6, probably the 3rd worst engine ever made.
• 1986 Chevrolet Blazer (The S10 version). Had the 2.8V6 which was great in my 2800# Fiero...In a 4000# SUV? No way. Not that I recommend this, but I got it up to 83MPH on a very long downhill stretch of the road. That's how bad it was.
• 1988 Chevrolet Camaro RS/305. I thought it had the 350. It didn't, so I sold it.
• 1989 Ford Mustang LX 5.0. Now we're talking. The car was a POS, but man was it fast. I loved it, but I got rid of it because the oil pressure was getting low because I really did drive it like I stole it.
• 1987? Cavalier Z24. Can you say Torque Steer? Fast and fun, and cheap. Not bad on gas either.
• 1991 Chevrolet Beretta GTZ. Had the "Quad 4". Redlined at about 6800 RPM, which was really high for the day. 4 valves per cylinder, it was practically a Honda motor. I sold it because a mechanic lied to me about a bunch of stuff, and I didn't know how to work on cars at that point of my life.
• 1997 Dodge Dakota Sport 5.2. Leased it brand new. Also the last time I've leased anything. Ran great, really fast for a truck, loved the V8, but got terrible gas mileage. I sweat if you hit the gas, you could see the needle move on the gas gauge.
• I had an 80's Escort that was a real POS. I paid $500 for it though and it worked as a beater.
• I had an 80's Cavilier that was a "little" bit better than the escort. Not by much, but I paid $400 for it, and it was a better beater.
• I've had two more Camaros (So four of them). 1994 Z28 Automatic and 1994 Z28 Stick. The Stick one was built pretty good, had a cam and 4.11 gears in the back.
• I've had two SRT-4's. 2004 with a stage 2 turbo and a 2003 stage 3 turbo. These are great cars and the 3 that survive kids beating on them will eventually fetch a lot of money.
• I've had 2 more dakota's as well. 1994 5.2L to pull a boat and a 2001 4.7L to haul drywall and stuff.
• 2003 Nissan 350z. Pretty cool, but got tired of it.
• 2005 Hyundai Tiburon GT. I literally owned this car for 2 weeks. I broke even. I was happy.
• 2000? S10 with the 4-banger. What a POS. Every time I fixed something, somthing else broke. Had the top ball joint go out on me on the freeway. Try steering when the knuckle is floating around on it's free will. Amazing I didn't flip it or hit someone.
• 1990 Ford Ranger 4-banger. This was the goofy 2-sparkplug per cylinder engine. I literally bought it for $100. I put a lot of labor into cleaning it up, drove it around for 2 years and sold it for $1000. Not bad. Ran really well.
• 2006 Lexus IS350. Fast! Comfy! But it wallowed like a couch riding atop a mattress. Out it went.
• 2010 BMW 135i. First BMW. It really was the best driving machine I've ever had. Maitenance? Oh my gosh. $500 for a Water pump? Just the part. I chipped it and had 400HP. Traded it in and bought a house.
• 2010 Kia Sorrento. Eh. A very light but nervous-handling SUV. But it was pretty quick with the V6.
• 2013 Dodge Grand Caravan R/T. Yes they make an R/T version, but sadly no HEMI. Got tired of SUV's that couldn't transport large items like dressers or big screen TV's

I know I'm forgetting some, but If I'm forgetting them, then you know how lousy or boring they were. Next cars: I'm thinking about buying am older Infiniti FX45. It's made from the 350Z but has a V8. Who can say no to that? I also plan on buying a 3rd or 4th generation Dodge Viper once I'm done paying for grad school loans. I love everything about the viper. I got to go to the factory before it closed, and I actually got to interview Bob Lutz (The person who started the idea of the Viper) as part of my Thesis. No traction control, no nagging stuff, no back seat? The car will literally burn your leg when you step out of it. And it has that huge 505 cubic inch V10. It has a horrible yet brutish sounding exhaust. Sign me up, seriously. I'd take it over a C6 Z06 or a C7 Z51. It gets like 8 mpg in the city. I'm surprised California even allows them in the state.

I do almost all of my maintenance now. I don't have an alignment rack, nor tire mounting stuff and I don't do body repairs, but I do pretty much everything else. I bought a MIG welder (Little Lincoln 120v box) so I could widen the seat on my Neon. Hey! A benefit of the surgery is I won't have to do it anymore!

But...Enough about me? What are you driving, what have you had in the past, and let's start the stories LOL. No beer, but we got Protein drinks! Look forward to wasting time just chit chatting about cars

[Born in Missouri 1,264]

My first car was a 1974 Chevrolet Nova. According to Wikipedia that makes it third generation. My Nova was green. Not sure, based on the color guides, whether it was medium green or light green. Anyway, I called it my Green Machine. (I wish I could have claimed that it was metallic mint-green paint like in My Cousin Vinny... but it was just boring green. )

(An urban legend claims that the Chevy Nova sold poorly in Spanish-speaking countries because its name, spaced no va, literally translates to "it doesn't go". This has since been debunked.)

I later got rid of my Nova (which I regret because it ran great) and got a ... wait for it ... wait a little longer ... an 80s Escort, which as you so eloquently and accurately referred to it as a POS. It konked out on the side of the interstate once, where I had to abandon it for a while, and when I returned... a semi... I kid you not ... flattened it. Boy, was I upset. I had two baskets of clean laundry in the backseat!

That's all for now. I don't know the first thing about fixing cars, so my comment is pretty worthless, I guess.

The other cars we've had, car that have taken my oldest two sons through medical school and beyond are Toyota Camrys and Honda Accords. Like Timex watches... they take a licking and keep on ticking. One of the Toyotas has over 300,000 miles on it.

[KimTriesRNY 1,853]

Currently driving 2017 Dodge Charger R/T. The love of my life.

[CyclicalLoser 155]

Awesome ladies! Keep 'em coming! To be honest, I think every car is cool, even if it's a POS. Sometimes it takes me a while to think of something cool about particular cars, but usually there is something. I'm at a loss right now for the escort, other than the European version was nothing like the ones we had here in the states. The European ones were Rally cars and had cosworth engines. Very very cool.

Nova's got a bad rap, I actually think they were a cool car. They have a huge following now, and I've seen some with superchargers sticking out of the hood (As all cars should be LOL). I love some of the colors out of the 60/70's. I seriously would love to have a Plum Crazy car. There is a person with a purple Challenger 392 Scat Pack in my parking lot at work. It is gorgeous. Green has kind of faded away, don't see many green cars now, which is too bad. The 4th generation Vipers have an awesome lime green pearlescent metallic color that is amazing. I grew up in an Omni that was forest green. Really a nice darker green color.

And Charger R/T? Doesn't even need to be explained, wow what a cool ride. A classmate of mine bought the Hellcat version and he told me he still giggles like a kid when he punches it. He said it's going to get him a lot of tickets, and he said it goes through gas like it's free. I love the front ends and the rear lighting on the newer Chargers. I also think the Chargers and the Challengers are probably the most "truthful" replica of the 70's musclecars. Unlike the Ford Thunderbird, Mustang and Camaro, they didn't try to re-envision the car, they simply faithfully replicated it, but with some styling tweaks and modern performance. I bet that Hemi sounds awesome!

[Orchids&Dragons 9,047]

I think the forum you were looking for is called "The Lounge".

My first car (in '75) was a gold '72 Chevy Vega. Ran great but had to keep a case of oil in the trunk. It didn't burn oil; the oil just kind of "fell out". Put in about a can a week. Didn't have to buy the good stuff, it wasn't going to be in there long anyway. After several wrecks, the car was various colors and I still loved it. One final wreck did it in. None of the wrecks were my fault, although I concede that I wasn't good at avoiding them.

Move on to a '70 boring-brown Chevy Impala. My Dad decided he wanted a little more metal around his driving-challenged daughter. Gawd, it was awful! I'd never had trouble with the Vega stalling (it was a stick), but the damned Impala stalled everywhere! It's favorite spot was in the middle of large intersections. After about 10 minutes, the car would restart and you were back in business.

When that one finally died, I had to drive my Dad's Chrysler Imperial for a while. It "floated" down the road like a tank on water! I went to high school in a little tiny town and if that big-@ss Chrysler was coming down the street, everyone else had to pull onto the shoulder! I drove this for about 6 months. This was the only car I drove with A/C until I was about 22. I live in Texas!

Next up was a brand new Mazda GLC! I think I was around 18 at the time, so maybe 1979? It had a lot of hail damage so my dad got it for about $2,500. I don't remember exactly. It had a CHOKE! First and only car I've ever driven that had a choke! I drove that one all through college, it was a great little car. Yeah, it got wrecked, too. I got t-boned in an intersection when someone ran a red light. Looking back on it, thank heavens my Dad had been part-owner of a service station earlier in his life. It appears that keeping wheels under me was nearly a full-time occupation. He never complained.

Once I was working full-time, I bought:

1981 Datsun 210 - meh, got me around. Hit a telephone pole in the rain. Yeah, that one was my fault.

1986 Toyota Celica - my baby rocketship. Loved it. Wrecked twice. Once when a van ran a stop sign and I couldn't avoid them (I already admitted that this is not my strong suit). The second time, my future husband was driving and we were at a FULL STOP when a pizza delivery guy rear-ended us going 55 mph.(Probably faster, he told the cops 55)

1990 Honda Accord. Meh - it worked.

1996 Plymouth Grand Voyager-I was pregnant with our twins and we needed a vehicle that could hold 4 carseats since our two older kids were 3 and 18 months. I really liked the vehicle although it was a maintenance nightmare.

2000 Plymouth Grand Voyager - still liked the vehicle, still maintenance problems.

2006 Honda Odyssey - thought our maintenance issues were over! HAH! Turns out that was a lemon year for Hondas. I kept going back to the dealership because something wasn't "right" with the transmission and we were only getting about 12 mpg. Finally, after nearly 3 years, there was a recall on the rear wheel bearings on that model year. When they fixed that, the car drove fine and my mileage went up to 20 mpg! All together, I think it got brought back to the dealership for at least 4 separate recalls.

2016 Hyundai Tucson - I hated giving up the space in the Odyssey but my husband insisted I get a car with better mileage. Sadly, when I test drove the car there was no need to crank up the A/C to high. Turns out, the vehicle is desperately underpowed to handle jack-rabbit traffic with the A/C on full. There is an incredible delay in engine power. Really terrifying. So, fortunately, I changed to a job with a shorter commute and stay off the highways as much as I can, at least at rush hour.

Well, that's my auto-biography!

Edited August 11, 2018 by Orchids&Dragons

[KimTriesRNY 1,853]

Hemi sounds awesome. Funny story, I was driving a 2017 completely loaded Kia Sportage and someone ran two stop signs, hitting me in the drivers side wheel, front quarter panel, etc. Long story short, my rental car ended up being a Charger R/T. I tried to find something I liked better, but couldn’t. So I bought one.

[CyclicalLoser 155]

KimTriesRNY, I love it. The wheels are really nice, and I really liked when they went with the narrower headlights with the blacked out bumper support.

I actually made a little purchase myself on Sunday

I picked up a gently used 2015 Mustang GT with the Performance Pack. Competition Orange Color and a proper 6-speed manual transmission.

I checked tonight and there are 44 orange mustangs for sale in the entire country. They are very rare. I looked at my go-to Yellow color, but the orange screams "get outta my way" so I had to get it. When I pulled up at the dealer with well over 100 cars, I could instantly find it. This is not a pic of mine, haven't taken any pics yet, but it looks exactly like this.

This is replacing my Yellow SRT-4 that I've had a record-breaking (For me) ten years. I've put 100,000 Los-Angeles-traffic miles on her. Had to swap the clutch pedal once and the floor mats have a hole where my right leg pivots between the gas and the brake. She was a great car though and as much as I've modified her, she's never let me down (From a cause I didn't bring on myself). As far as the bad rap domestic cars get, at 170,000 miles she's still on her original engine, transmission, alternator, starter, A/C compressor, Heck it still has the original alternator belt on it. The Water pump was replaced when I changed the timing belt, but it would probably still be working fine if I left it.

[KimTriesRNY 1,853]

Looks great!