Do I bother reviving a tired 95 Neon

For those who may or may not have been following my postings, I have a
95 2 door Neon with the SOHO engine and a manual transmission. Now
that I know that the car has over 365,000km on it (228,125 miles for
those south of the boarder), instead of the 134,000km that I was told
it had, my question is, do I bother trying to rebuild the engine,
transmission and clutch, or drive this call to the ground and move on?
I have owned the car now for just over 2 months and have noticed the
shifter is becoming harder to shift when the car is cold.
The only reason I bother considering to do all this work is that the
body is in amazing shape. Not a spot of rust on it, and all of the
other machanics are in good working order. (all except the front wheel
bearings, which are being fixed this week coming).
Just in case anyone is wondering, I paid $1700 for the car cert. and
e-tested.

Mike
mlawrenc(at)rcc.on.ca

 

Look into a synthetic gear oil for the transmission, that may help your
cold shifting problem. I use Redline MT-90 in my cars but I don't know
what's appropriate for yours. Might not have to sink lots of $$ into
it... I'd just fix what breaks and then dump it whenever you think it's
time to move on.

nate

 

I would choose the OR option.

Steve B.

 

Not speaking from personal experience, but only what I've read on some
forums regarding the Redline gear oil: There are two types of Redline
oil (which I have heard only good things about, BTW) - the kind with
friction modifiers, and the kind without friction modifiers, and it is
critical for a given transmission model that the right type be used
(affects function and longevity of the syncros - use the wrong type, and
the syncros will not work right, and will possibly be permanently
ruined). IOW, if you take Nate's advice on using Redline, be sure to
inquire of Redline which is the correct type for that car if it's not
crystal clear from the applications information on their web site.

Bill Putney
(to reply by e-mail, replace the last letter of the alphabet in my
address with "x")

 

Go back to the seller and demand your money back, tell him that you are
going to have criminal charges filed against him if he doesn't take the
car back. A Neon with 228K miles on it is worth $0. A Neon is a cheap car,
it was designed to go 100K miles not 228K. I wouldn't put a penny into
that car.

 

Now while I may question why one would pay $1700 for a 10 year old vehicle
with even 134,000miles on the odometer, your statement that these cars are
only designed to go 100k miles is pure crap. That has not been the case with
anything made since the early 80's and even then was not by design.
I have put all of my Caravans into the upper 100k miles and 2 of them over
200k with no problems. My mother had a New Yorker that had 161k on it when
she passed away. I have a friend that regularly rebuilds neon wrecks (body
work we are talking here) and many have well over 100k and still run like a
champ.

As for the odometer reading on the vehicle in question here, before you talk
criminal charges perhaps a carFax check is in order. Could be that this high
mileage has actually been reported at one point and this individual himself
may not have been aware of it. I am curious what the hell kind of use this
car was getting to rack up those miles in 10 years!! That's almost double
the average mileage.

 

Here is Ontario, we have what is known as a Seller's package. It is
the same as a CarFax report, and is required by law to register a car
in the Province. This is where I found the milage issue.
As for the purchasing a 10 year old car for $1700, this also included
the safty and emissions tests. I think both aren't worth the paper
they where printed on, but they make it possible to obtain plates and
insurance and all.
This car was bought as a second car, so that I could drive it the 10km
to and from work each day, and let the wife use my car. (tired of the
complaints of public transit) So $1700 worth of pocket change for a
car and less bitching, it was worth it. I was really only looking for
a car to last one or two years.

Mike

 

Why only if he doesn't take the car back. No matter what happens you should
file a complaint against the thief. Because he takes the car back does not
make him any less of a thief.

 

I agree.. A car will last a long time if properly taken care of.

I had a 1990 Ford Taurus station wagon that I put 352,418 miles on before it
died.

Even then, the only reason it died was because I let my girlfriend at the
time drive it, and she deadpanned the transmission pan on a high curb and
punched a hole in it, then failed to mention it to me...

 

Well now $1700 Canadian is also a big difference. I thought you were in the
states.