I was running through some of the older threads on the forum and I got to thinking about some of the laughable and stupid things that I found on my car after I bought it and started to work on it, thought to see what others found when they bought theirs.
When I bought my Malibu I thought it was in great shape, no frame rot holes yet, strong engine, good transmission, clean interior. All and all it was a good initial deal.
After getting the car inspected, that same day my transmission failed so I had to scramble to find a new one, picked one up two days later and installed it the next day.
What I found surprised me. The rear transmission mounts had the wrong bolts and were not tight (explained the clunk when I hit the gas). Two of the bolts to the block were tight, yikes. After this I thought surely the previous owner hadn't screwed any thing else up.
I was so wrong after changing the oil the engine started to burn bad, found out he was running really heavy oil to keep her from burning.
Then one day when changing the brake pads I found that some of my lug nuts were not tight. When I inspected them I found that they were the wrong thread. Also none of them really matched on the car. Turns out the only thing holding the wheels on tight was the lock nuts. Scary when I had had the car up to 125 the other night. Turns out he had eight different types of nuts on the car. I also found that when he took the time to put the center console in the car he used wood screws to secure it to the floor.
Anyways all these issues were fixed properly and in hindsight it was pretty funny to see these things happen
When I bought my Malibu I thought it was in great shape, no frame rot holes yet, strong engine, good transmission, clean interior. All and all it was a good initial deal.
After getting the car inspected, that same day my transmission failed so I had to scramble to find a new one, picked one up two days later and installed it the next day.
What I found surprised me. The rear transmission mounts had the wrong bolts and were not tight (explained the clunk when I hit the gas). Two of the bolts to the block were tight, yikes. After this I thought surely the previous owner hadn't screwed any thing else up.
I was so wrong after changing the oil the engine started to burn bad, found out he was running really heavy oil to keep her from burning.
Then one day when changing the brake pads I found that some of my lug nuts were not tight. When I inspected them I found that they were the wrong thread. Also none of them really matched on the car. Turns out the only thing holding the wheels on tight was the lock nuts. Scary when I had had the car up to 125 the other night. Turns out he had eight different types of nuts on the car. I also found that when he took the time to put the center console in the car he used wood screws to secure it to the floor.
Anyways all these issues were fixed properly and in hindsight it was pretty funny to see these things happen
