92RS(real slow)

Here's a good one my best friend decided he wanted to get an iroc just like mine well I told him to wait to go look at this one like 5 hours away, and I would go with him seeing as I know a lot about these cars. Anyways he decided to not listen to me went and bought it, and boy did he make a mistake car died multiple times on the way home, needed a new alternator, blows oil out the oil cap and dipstick wont stay running at all anymore, has the most messed up wiring I have ever seen, has ford speakers squeezed under the front seats, car has been in multiple accidents, paint is terrible, mileage is unknown.....and the list goes on and on so he spend $4,200 bucks on a car that he has only drove for like 4 hours, and who knows how much money he has dumped into I dont even ask cause it's his own fault.......So moral of the story is if you don't know your stuff make sure you have someone look at the car for you before you buy it.

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the solitaire

92RS, true that, having someone look at the car before purchase.

Living in europe it´s not that easy to find a decent US domestic vehicle, and most vehicles found are either far overpriced or projects halfway done.

I´ll translate currency and distances for convenience here, but I do live in Germany at the time.

With some $10 000 in cash I decided the time had come to buy a ar. I had some money returned from insurance after my last car got stolen. Up to here I had only owned european or japanese vehicles as is quite common in europe.

Being a bit of a car enthousiast I tried to find a decent rotary engine to work on, as I previously owned an 1989 RX7 for which the insurane gave me $6000 after it was stolen.

I happened to find a 1989 GTA in apparently good shape 3 hours driving from me so I contacted the guy, who happened to be a used car salesman buying his stock from a US army base nearby.

The GTA is my first horror story, and I ended up leaving it there. It was a original GTA, full options and the bodywork was, apart from some rust, in rather good shape. Driver side dor higes needed replacement but snce the car wasn´t new I let that slip.
The car however appeared to have less torque then a 1,3l rotary and stalled on me a few times during a test drive. I asked the shop owner to drive it and he had to step on it to keep the engine spinning. That car is still for sale today.

He happened to have a 1989 camaro RS on his parkinglot however, with 120 000 miles on it and in apparenty rather good shape. He showed me the papers. Car was a US domestic, imported by a US soldier stationed in Germany at the time, passed smog and technical test. (the papers turned out to be faked), was exported from germany to switzerland and imported back to germany 8 years after, which is two weeks before I purchased it.

In germany VIN needs to be on the passenger side shock dome, when I tried to register the car it appeared to be on there, but incomplete.

I had to go through bureaucratic hell to get the car registered to me, but made cerain to make the bureaucrats suffer in the process, ony to find out that the VIN was now complete but papers faked and the exhaust had some holes.
I dated the secretary registering the car to me in exchange for faking another smog test and letting me pass (I have to pass it about a year and a half from now).

After driving the car for a while (some 1500 miles) the chassis fan gave up and by now I fitted a dual fan setup according to willies instructions, incl. switch, swapped thermostat and found out that these cars really need an airdam. I´faricating one since getting these model specific parts in germany can be quite difficult.

All in all, I owned cars with fewer problems in the firs 6 months after purchase but I really like the car and plan on a full restauration somehere within now and the next two years.

I still have to date some more secretaries up untill I´m finished but if that helps me in doing things in the pace I prefer or can afford, then to me that´s worth it.

Up to date I paid $5500 for the car, $200 for registration, $50 for a dinner, $1000 in fixes, $1000 in taxes and $750 in insurance. The res went into a digicam.

musclecar70sfan

LOL something kinda scary happened to me a few days ago actually...
I was driving my 91 T/A 'vert to my friends house who lives about 8 miles away. This was just after I threw the front bumper/fenders on temporarily since I was slowly working on the car. The weather became unusually nice for this time of year so I just wanted to take the T/A out before she's parked for the winter. I did a decent job putting the car together, I just skipped a few screws/bolts since I knew I was tearing it back apart rather soon. Anyway, I had just gotten off the highway and I had to slow down to about 10 mph to pass through a road work zone. I noticed that the construction guys were giving me strange stares (I was about to shout... "WHAT?! You've never seen a heterosexual guy driving a convertible?!") and once I pulled out of the road work zone and started speeding up, I noticed that the car was pulling pretty strongly to the right and a squealing/chirping sound was coming from the front pass. wheel. It didn't feel like a flat so I was expecting the worst... ie broken steering link etc. I crawled into a parking lot and found out that my front pass side inner fender came loose and was rubbing against the tire. It must've been doing that for a little while too since it was slightly melted (gotta buy a new one now )... apparently I didn't notice it while doing 85 mph on the highway. I kinda fudged the installation since I only used a few screws and apparently the wind ripped the inner fender off of them. I tucked it back into the fender and kept it under 35 mph for the rest of the trip... which was only about 1 mile. I got to my friends house and after explaining the situation, all I got was "smooth move ex-lax" and fortunately he had some screws I was able to bolt into it.

Now I know why those road workers were giving me funny looks.

Rumblin70SS

Here's my story.........!

I have an 88 IROC thats my daily driver. Car runs and looks great for the most part. Have the big idea of taking the car on the Hot Rod Power Tour this year. Prep the car, replacing hoses, belts, waterpump......all the little stuff I thought could go wrong and a full detail to boot.

Start of on the first day of our trip to WI from DE.....about 900 miles. Its raining, and we decide to stop for dinner in the first hour out. I drop my g/f off at the front door of the resraurant and upon pulling away, catch the sidewall on the curb. I tear the sidewall, but not enough to flatten the tire. Decide to head back home for a new tire, since I don't trust anyone where we are at. Get the tire replaced and start out again the next day.

We get moving, again raining quite a bit. After about 4 hours, the rain lets up, and I hear the 9 bolt making some whining noise. Stop at a rest area and check the fluid. It's a little low, but not too bad. Decide to take a detour to Pittsburg and fill her up with fluid. Find an Auto Zone in the burg and fill it on the side of the road. My g/f watches to make sure I don't get run over.

Head out of Pennsylvania and into Ohio. Still hear the noise at certain speeds, but doesn't seem to be getting any worse, so we press on. Through Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and finally Wisconsin. Getting off on the last exit at 1:00AM, we hear a banging in the rear. I say this things coming apart, but we did make it to the Hotel that night. Being a 9 bolt, its not like you can go get parts at the corner store. I call some buddies and everyones opinion is the same, try and drive it home, you might make it, you might not.....LOL.

So, here we are, at the hotel, cars all getting ready to start the first leg of the tour and we are heading home. We drove during the day and made it back in two days, banging and all. The most depressing vacation I had ever had.

Picked up a new NOS carrier on ebay and she is good to go now. Plan on trying again next year!

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Thanks!

Tony Z

1970 SS396 Chevelle with a 580 BBC
1974 Corvette Convertible
1992 Camaro B4C (SOLD)
1993 Firehawk
1998 Kawasaki ZX-9R
1997 Mazda Millenia

1988 S10 Truck....10.31 @129 Best R/T .002

Do I really own all this junk?

Bullydawg

I got one since you mentioned your 9 bolt

Well, I had just spend a grip of time rebuilding my 9 bolt including machining the POSI cones, and shimming, and everything... Well, I finally get it all back together, do a test drive everything is good! Start DD the car again, and im driving with my buddy and I go around a turn and BANG, wheels lock up and everything... I get picked and floor it, screw the rear... Bang again, and rear starts knocking... WTF, everything I would take a turn hard it would bang... and everytime I let off the gas it starts knocking..

Well, I get it home, tear is apart... and a bolt had backed out of the carrier and got wedged in the gears... when I floored it, it chewed up the bolt and chipped my ring gear... I pulled out all the pieces and have been driving it with the chipped ring gear for ages, have taken it to the track twice... It has worked fine, just knocks on decel. I will pick up a LS1 rear when I finda good deal. I want bigger rear brakes anyway.

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redtruck18

My turn... Bought my 87 Camaro 8 days ago, drives great, but knew the tranny was having some issues, talked the guy down to $1200. Drove it about twenty minutes home and after shutting it off and trying to stop smiling like a 6 year old kid with a new bike, i notice smoke/steam coming from under the hood, try to pop the hood.... it wont open. Im paranoid now, having just parted with a pretty thick stack of cash, after toying with it for about half an hour i get the hood to open, and breathing in enough antifreeze to kill a bear, i decided to try new hoses, and they didnt fix it, about this time i decided to go to the car wash since its like a minute down the road, and after a thorough washing, and realizing the paint is in GREAT condition, i try to start her up and go to the local auto parts store, well... it wont crank. Thankfully my buddy was with me washing his car, so we pull the battery and alternator, go get them tested, and theyre perfectly fine. So back to the car we go, after an hour of playing i finally get it started, and head straight to the parts store (O'Reilly's if you were wondering, and these guys were great). By now its dark, so i go ahead and park her there, the guys are fine with me leaving her for an overnighter, so i buy a radiator and new starter, and wait till morning... So i go back in the morning, and start work on the starter, and after about a four hour installation (stupid y-pipe is literaly just in the way, and 23 year old bolts dont like to come loose) i start her up, and she runs great, so now its time to do the radiator, but wait!!! theres a sale downtown on audio equipment, and i just have to go now, so i load up in my buddys car, go downtown, look up factory speaker sizes and get 4x6's up front, and 6 1/4 in the back (yes, i now know that is WRONG!!!) So i drop 200 on speakers, and a great head unit, and head back to do the radiator... After the arduous task of replacing the radiator (tranny cooler lines had stripped nuts on the radiator side, so those got replaced too) i crank it up, and decide to go ahead and fix the timing to see if that helps with my ongoing problem of the engine wanting to diesel after shutdown, so after a late night lesson in timing lights i get it all timed up and ready to run. And the starter is working great, radiator is great, and timing is decent. So off i go to do audio tomorrow.... I wake up eager to hook up my new sound system, and after an hour process of re-working the factory speaker mounts (clearence issues with my rockford fosgare punch 4x6 magnets hitting the plastic underneath) and adding spacers, i get the front speakers and head unit working. Then i pull off the sail panels.... great. Those are 6x9's. So, after finding some good 6x9's, i realize my socket is too fat to fit past the speaker itself to get to the bolt... Oh, and my weatherstripping around the hatch is leaking... nothing a little black silicone and my custom shaping tool (index finger) cant fix. Thought i'd share, still though, to be in for about $1600 all in all, and have a good running STRONG camaro, im exstatic. But, it still needs a tranny, accepting donations :-)

GTA1990

Not really a horror story but an interesting introduction into thirdgen ownership nonetheless.

Went to see a '90 GTA in glasgow with a friend. Quite spontaneous (flew up on a friday evening from london). Checked it all over, done the deal and we were on our way - setting off around 8pm. Was pretty cool, like a mini road trip compared to you guys (circa 700 miles back to central). Usual philosophical talk about life, girlfriends etc > A few stops, petrol station compilation cd's. By about 4am we were really dosing off but were in coventry (about 100 miles to go) so could see the light. Then suddenly the car gets much louder. Pull up at a petrol station and find the exhaust hanging down. It's pouring rain now and we're both still in our suits from work with no tools and more importantly no mechanical abilities!

Manage to fudge it with some rope and take it easy (50-60mph) majorly anxious. Took us around 3hrs to do those last 100 miles and we were absolutely dead!

Had family and friends all eager to check it out the next day, ready with their jibes about buying an american car >> wasn't good!

Since getting the exhaust fixed she's only needed a replacement battery but other than that been trouble free motoring (I only use it for social use but still do circa 100 miles a week). Going through a light restoration and going to treat her to some SFC's and performance brakes soon.

Sonymaster20

do you have any pictures of the evidence of the two cars being welded together? I would like to see that lol.

pbtrilogy

Mine is not so much of a horror story as it is a small scare.

I bought mine back in July for a great price knowing that it was not running.

So the first thing i did when we towed it home was replaced the starter. After a few key turns and a fully charged battery it started right up and sounded strong. It drove fine with decent shifts.

Then after about a week of driving it, it didnt want to shift out of 1st untill redline, and the same with second. Se me and my dad checked the trans fluid and filled that up...no change. So we started to get worried that the transmission might be going out and i would have to drop money of which i didnt have on it. My dad read into it a little bit and decided to adjust the throttle detent cable, which took about 20 seconds, and that fixed the whole problem. We were really relieved at that.

since then it tends to overheat everyonce in a while, but im slowly fixing that as well :/

sorry bout the long post