I bought a 91 firebird v6 a week ago from a private seller. Ever since then, the car has been hard to start..usually taking 2 tries or so. Well it got worse, and then there's also a coolant leak. Long story short, I found out from the shop that it would cost $1095 to fix. I only paid $900 for the car. My mom says i should call the girl and ask her to share the costs , saying she could have known about this, ect. The lemon law doesnt apply because it's a private seller. I really dont have the money to put into repairing the car. What do u guys think? The shop says it needs a new fuel pump and water pump

 

First rule of car shopping is "buyer beware." You could ask the seller to front a bit of money but she's under no obligation to do so, especially if you only paid $900 for the car. You should be able to replace the water pump yourself for <$100 and a couple hours; the fuel pump is a bit more involved and will require either dropping the axle and tank or cutting an access panel from above. Both methods will take a while, count on two afternoons or a long Saturday minimum. Lots of information on either method is easily found with a search.

 

It sounds like normal wear and tear. Why didn't you have your shop look the car over before you bought it? You also got to remember the car is almost 20 years old stuff will start to go south if not taken care of

 

Like the rest of us, you need to get tools and stay away from 'the shop'. At today's rate of $90+ an hour, $1000 at a shop won't get you far at all. Plus, shops charge 'book rates' for labor - even if a fuel pump only takes 3 hours, they charge you for 8.

Welcome to car ownership! And welcome to TGO! You've landed upon the best resource available for the 3rd gen F-body - we can help you do your own repairs - but you have to have some basic tools, be willing to learn, and be willing to get dirty, and be patient - we all have jobs, wives, kids, and our own cars to work on - sometimes it takes a day or 2 for someone to get back with you.

Now...

1) get yourself a Haynes or Chilton's book for the car - $20
2) where is the coolant leaking from?
3) if the car starts at all, then the fuel pump is more than likely not an issue at all

#3 is another reason to stay away from shops. There is no such thing as a "mechanic" anymore - there are only "technicians". What's the difference? A mechanic will drive the car, and diagnose issues from knowledge and experience. A technician listens to YOU (which you have no idea what your talking about or you'd fix it yourself), and then looks through a book of potential problems based on YOUR inadequate description and starts at the top of that list and replaces parts until the issue is resolved.

YOU can do that on your own! So stay away from the 'shop'.

Now - we need a detailed description from you as to what the car is doing when you attempt to start it, and where the coolant is leaking from.

 

The shop said that there's a hose that needs to be replaced. The heater hose from the heater to the intake. They said the weep hole on the water pump is leaking, and that the car needs a new water pump. the fuel pump needs to be replaced because there's no pressure, and something about the check valve. Now, about the car. I drove the car down there ysterday. A good 20 mins. If the fuel pump is indeed bad, how did I drive the car?

 

1st you bought a used car without having it checked out by a mechainc first.

2nd you expected a $900 car to be in perferct A1 shape.

And 3rd you really think they should pay half of the repair bill for a car they don't own anymore.


I got a bridge to sell ya, cheap too.


And yep Im busting your *****, unless you know how to work on cars or can afford to pay steep shop prices, do not buy $900 cars.

Even $9000 cars will need work.

 

i knew there would be issues. Although given the history of what the girl said she had replaced, i didnt think i'd have all this at once. I didnt expect the girl to put up any money to fix it, no would i ask her to. I know when u buy a car off of a private seller, it's 'as is". It's just something my mom had said to me.
I bought the car for my gf as a beat around town car, because she moved here recently and doesnt have a car or job yet. She sold her car to afford to move here. I dont have much extra money, but I was trying to do this so she wouldnt be stuck at my house all the time.

 

So replace the water pump and the hose. About 1 hour of your time, and defintely under $100 (even if you have to buy tools). Like you said, if there was a fuel pump issue, the car wouldn't run at all. If it's taking several seconds or tries to start, I'd look at the fuel pump relay. If the relay is bad, the car will still start when the starter gets the motor turning enough for the oil pressure sending unit to sense oil pressure - then the OPSU runs the pump - so I'd look into a $10 fuel pump relay.

 

Well a Fp is only $80-$100 WP $40 and a hose maybe $20, the rest is labor cost.

Your only hope is to roll up your sleves and dig in.

Only sucky part is dropping the tank to change a FP unless you make an access door.

which allot don't like, only cause folks do a butcher job of it, but no way id nearly pull the rearend to drop the tank, to change one, then what if you gotta go back in?

Access door is the only smart way unless you got time and loads of tools, or money.

Im glad I made one.

Does the car have a oil gauge?

Often the FP relay is toast, and not till you reach 7psi of oil psi will the backup swtich kick it on, which might mean turing it over a few times to build oil psi. And if the car has low oil psi..... it can take longer.

 

well the guys at the shop said that the fuel pressure was either low or there was none. But somehow i made it to the shop. I want to do it myself, I'm gonna have a friend help me. I want to do the trap door method...This car has over 200k on it, and im sure it's not going into a museum somewhere, so im not worried about making a few holes. Tell me how it's done. Are there any how to write ups? Also, are there any write ups on replacing the water pump?

 

also, the fuel pump relay, do u have a pic of where it would be on a 91 v6?

 

This is not my car but pics of a job someone did.

Kind of a butcher job, the reason he cut so far to the right was to un-do the lines.

They are steel and go a long way over n no way to pull it out with em hooked up.

But the steel hard line can be cut and spliced back together with fuel injection rated rubber hose. If you do it in a turn and they want to kink, put a hose clamp in the turn to make the line stay round.






Id do the water pump bolts with the engine hot, bolts will come lose easier, just break all the bolts lose while it still hot then wait for it to cool to finish.
[A stuck or broken bolt will screw up your day.]

 

yea i will use the 8X12 method everyone else has used. Are all the lines metal? How do u cut them? and how do u cut them without creating sparks? I've been researching but cant find out the answer to that. also, do you know where the fuel pump relay is? I want to try this before I go and cut up the car. If the filter's clogged, Then I wont have to do the rest, and save myself some big bucks

 

[quote=LWCS561;4644873]yea i will use the 8X12 method everyone else has used. Are all the lines metal? How do u cut them? and how do u cut them without creating sparks?


A tubing cutter. Most any parts store or hardware store will have them.

Mark.

 

air chisel works good on the body stuff, line I use snips then reshape ends.
a tiny pipe cuting tool fro ma plumbing dept makes nice cuts but you need a bit of space.

 

I'm not directing this at you, but some of the stuff you said is a common misconception about shops and techs so I figured I would clear some of it up. First most of us like to be called technicians because we actually diag a problem whereas your typical mechanic will just throw parts at it. I know at the dealership where I work they monitor recheck cars very closely. If I was just throwing parts at every car without it fixing the problem, I would be out of a job very quickly. I have to take the time (and not get paid for this a lot of the time) and check everything over to find the actuall problem. Sometimes there is some guess work involved. There is no way around that. I also use the same attention to detail on customer cars that I use on my own Camaro.

Also we get paid flat rate. So for every car where we can get it done under book time, there is another car where it will take us a lot longer than book time to get it done. I usually dont even make 40 hours a week right now, yet I'm here 8-5 Monday thru Friday. Some weeks I've only made 20 hours. Also, out of that $100 an hour the shop charges, I only get $15 of it. If I quoted as cheap as possible on every job for the labor, I wouldnt be able to eat.

Now I'm not saying all this to talk the OP into going to a shop. Nor am I defending every tech or shop. There are absolutely shops out there that rip people off. I engourage the OP to learn to work on his own car. I know there is no way I could afford to take my car somewhere to get worked on.

 

Here is one of the MANY threads on cutting the hole and doing it somewhat neatly. https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/fabr...cess-hole.html Do a search for fuel pump hole on the fabrication forum and you will find lots more
And here's another one http://www.turbobuick.com/forums/tur...utes-less.html

 

Where exactly are you? There may be one of us near you that can lend a hand, or do a visual inspection just so your not throwing parts at the car, that you are repairing it properly, along with give you insight on the tools needed per whats on your cars, because you know after 20 years, some people could have cop jobed something on that car.

 

im in peoria arizona. im not sure if there are any thirdgens near me, but any help would be appreciated. ive got food and beer ( for the over 21 crowd ) lol

 

yeah, you got raped, for 900 you should have received a pristine car

 

Change the radiator hose and the water pump yourself. A water pump will be $30 and a radiator hose $20 bucks. Now your car won't damage itself from losing all of it's coolant and over-heating.

Now, look up the process on changing your fuel pump. Read it a few times. Read several different topics and threads. Then drive the car until it's almost out of gas, and do it. You'll probably spend another 100 to 150 bucks.

Voila, a good running V6 Camaro for 1100 bucks, about what I paid for mine. You didn't get ripped off...

 

Don't cut holes in your car. Jesus Christ it doesn't take much more time or effort to do the job right. If your concerned about going back in then switch to an inline fuel pump and avoid the hassle in the future. Seriously, dropping the rear end and pulling the gas tank out isn't that hard or much more time consuming than pulling your interior apart and cutting into the sheet metal. A pair of jack stands and a good jack is basically all you really need.

The ghetto fuel access doors are an example of why these cars are in such terrible shape and why they've got that "*******" car reputation. People don't care about doing the job right and just want to fix everything fast.

 

Wrong, its 100times easier to go in from the inside.

[ Ill glady race ya on a FP change any day.]

And you really think stranger driving down the road go what a ghetto car, he has a fuel access door?

And when did people start to get x-ray eyes???



---
LWCS561
Avoid folks that depend on the approval of strangers for their self worth.



.

 

It seems to me that there's an access Cover on the side of the car for adding Fuel.
There is also an access cover in the front of the car to access the Engine.
There's an access cover on each side of the car to get to the inside.
The Rear Axle Gear Housing has an Access Cover.
Most Batteries have an access Cover.
The Hatch is really nothing more than an Access Cover

There's nothing wrong with access covers. You could argue that it's not original, but i would be that almost EVERYONE here has upgraded their third gen in some way. So long as the access panel is done well, i don't see the problem. it's actually an improvement over the original design.

 

Yea but the car's in AZ, it should be damn near rust free, so dropping the axle won't be as difficult as a northern car. Exhaust is the headache to drop compared to the axle.

And to the comments above, do you want someone with no experience or a lack of common sense going at it with a sawzall or grinder?! Not that this is the situation, but I hate seeing these convo's cause I'm waiting to watch a thread pop up saying "Well, I listened to you guys and..." I'd rather take the 3-4 hours to do a fuel pump, than to spend 2 hours to initially make the door, and risk a leak or something later on. Not that the sheet metal is protective, the idea of not having an access door on our cars was to protect and seal the car from getting fuel leaks or exhaust leaks into the car. Also if the vehicle rolls over, it keeps the gas from pouring into the passenger compartment if it was punctured or leaked to begin with. I know this may be a little drastic, but just the facts.

Anyways, first best piece of advise is to get a haynes manual or chilton manual, they will cover the step by step procedures for the things that need to get replaced.

 

BTW, i haven't done this myself. I have a 1982 with a 305. My Pump is on the engine. I might have a Sender problem though. If i determine that i do have a sender problem, i'll make an access panel. You bet your sweet ***!

 

I'm not disputing that it repairing things the RIGHT WAY is the first consideration, but putting the fuel pump into the Tank was a poor design. Making the access door serves to improve that design. Again, so long as it's done with care.

 

Not gonna argue that at all, but in the same principle they should have made an access door for oil pumps too, lol. You know? Not gonna argue one way or another, just want it to be out there the common sense things that need to be addressed when cutting holes in the body.

 

You do not need to drop the rear axle? Do it the proper way.Why cut an access panel ?how many times do you plan on changing the fuel pump? Why would you want to butcher your car? Jack up the car,put jackstands under support tank(gas is heavy) unhook hoses, unbolt straps,loosen clamp on fill hose.lower tank remove sending unit from top of tank 2 hours tops

 

just paid about 9 grand for my other camaro, 3-4 weeks later, had to change the driver's window motor

and it seems like everyones nailing everything, only advice i have is, when you do it yourself, take the money you'd be paying for labor and put it into your mod fund.

 

tell her to get a job to where she can at least walk and then you guys can put your checks into the car just saying

 

I agree with everyone else here. Do the work yourself you wont regret it. By the time your 20, like me youll be able to swap out a motor or trans in your garage with all that knowledge and searching the forums not to mention ull save A LOT of money.

 

I can vouch for that, used to dealer everything, picked up a firebird, dealer service manual, and a tool set and haven't looked back. You'll be happy when you learn enough to rebuild a motor or fully diagnose a symptom, so as mentioned above, the money you save doing the work yourself, you can put it all back into the modifications.

 

Do the job right, or don't do it at all. Cutting a hole instead of removing bolts and parts is a hackjob. All the arguments are irrelevant, there's a right way to do the job and it doesn't involve compression fittings, rubber hose/clamp splices, or any of that.

 

+ 1 NO HACKY THE FLOOR!

 

Did mine in my 92 the right way and to be honest it was not that bad. And I learned some new things about my car. I doubt I have to do it ever again as my car is now a summer driver so not that many miles on her. But no cutting of the body unless I need to. I prefer the GM way if possible but to each their own.

 

I have removed the axle from my IROC, and rust was the least of my concerns. It took impact tools, and lots of time! I have yet to be asked by a stranger to have me peal back my carpet to inspect my access hole! I would be pleasantly surprised if I found one pre cut on my car!