thehackmechanic

Actually what's frightening is that we're all getting old enough that the 2002 sitting out in the field was someone's grandmother's....

A 2002ti should be a tii but with dual sidedraft carbs instead of the Kugelfisher fuel injection. That is, it should also have the big brake booster, the big front calipers and rotors, and the boxed rear A-arms. As another poster said, tis were never commercially imported, thus the odds of a big-bumpered square-taillight 2002 being a true ti are zero. If you have a thing for dual sidedraft carbs, you can essentially make yourself a 'ti by pulling the FI off a tii, but most on this board would regard it as blasphemy, and most who have done it have probably regretted it. My advice for any newbie is to decide whether you want a pre-74 small-bumpered round-taillight car or a 74-76 big-bumpered square taillight car, and then to go out and find the best most rust-free possible example of that car you can afford.

Hey, Mike, thanks for the encouragement. And yes to all.

02for2: That was just beautiful. Some women get this. Obviously ours do. I read it to Maire Anne who loved it. Glenn: My wife quilts as well; she loved the butterscotch sash comment. And, yes, regarding the interplay between bugs and bugs, there are several of these but this is a nice pic: http://best.berkeley.edu/~jhey03/img/photo_albums/joshua_tree_national_park_nov_06/VW%20Beetle%20spider.jpg

From my book Car Guy: Why Men (of which I am one) Buy, Drive, Fix, Collect, and Love Cars, and How They Save My Sanity (the cars, not the men) that I am trying to get published: My mother, easily the wisest person I’ve ever met, once said to me “if your children show interest in anything, treat it like a flower, because if you don’t, you’ll kill it with neglect or worse.” It was easily the best piece of advice I’ve ever gotten from anyone, anywhere, about anything. Maire Anne and I have raised our boys, Ethan, Kyle, and Aaron, with my mother’s don’t kill the flower mechanism front and center. All three have found their passions (Ethan film; Kyle theater technology; Aaron photography) and have evolved into wonderful interesting human beings. And as you give, hopefully you shall receive. What was the theme song from that old TV show? It’s about time, it’s about space. I love playing with cars. It appears to be something that is essential to my continuing emotional well being. My family gets that and gives me the physical, temporal, emotional, and financial space to do it. Let me lay this out for you. When I’m in the midst of a major repair, I will retreat to the garage every evening for weeks plus consecutive weekends. And if, in the middle of the repair, I catch a whiff of some car that’s advertised, I will drop everything on a moment’s notice, run out, withdraw several thousand dollars in cash from the bank, drive a hundred miles, and come home with another hobbled car that I’ll then work on for months, starting the cycle all over again. Maire Anne won’t say another car? What are you, nuts? She won’t say we’re due at my mother’s at 3:00. She won’t put her hands on her hips and shrilly declare I want to buy new furniture you’ll have to sell one of those things if I can’t buy new furniture. She sees that buying and working on cars gives me pleasure. She trusts that I am responsible, and that, for the most part, I know what I am doing. I would say that, for this, I love her, but it’s the other way around – in our world, this is how people who love and respect each other behave. Maire Anne has her flower as well, and unlike my automotive hobby, hers is also her livelihood. Her interest in animals led to a degree in zoology, which then led to her becoming the co-owner of a business called Bugworks. She and her business partner bring insects and arthropods into classrooms to teach kids about respecting the natural world (professionally, she is “the bug lady”). So in our house, in addition to my garage, we have “the bug room,” which hosts terraria that contain tarantulas, scorpions, praying mantises, giant African millipedes, lubbers (grasshoppers of biblical proportion), Madagascar hissing cockroaches, meal worms, the beetles they metamorphose into, and a vinegaroon, which sounds like a cookie but I assure you is not. In return for the bliss I receive working in the garage, I leave Maire Anne alone when she is upstairs feeding the tarantulas. One could say, “Oh your wife brings bugs home so she can’t really complain when you bring cars home,” but that misses the point. It’s not like we keep score, where one new project car equals two tarantulas and a millipede (though I should try that; her roaches alone should justify at least that ’63 Rambler). Maire Anne has no more squeamishness about coming into the garage than I do journeying into the bug room; in fact, she probably has the same overall reaction, which can be summed up as: what is that smell? In my space it’s the curious combination of brake fluid and rust inhibitor; in hers, high humidity and dead crickets. I did give her a hard time when, one night, while working at the computer, I felt something on my ankle and found a cockroach the size of a Swiss Army knife crawling up my leg. (Response: “Honey, one of your cockroaches got out. Again.”) But then again, she still doesn’t know about the time I used The Good Bread Knife to trim a power steering hose. At this point, men are probably thinking “who is this woman and how do I inject her Zen-like emotional state into my wife’s body?” I suspect that many women are thinking two things: “I would never let my husband do that. What does she get out of it?” (If you have to ask, you don’t get it, but how about love, respect, fidelity, and your own space?) The second thing is, “Bugs? Really?” Now, you could say, “Well, a woman who handles live tarantulas is the poster girl for non-traditional gender roles, so okay, they’re both weirdos no wonder she puts up with him,” but, actually, Maire Anne has documented the parameters of her tolerance: “I don’t know what my limit for these cars is, but I’ll know it when I see it. Just remember that I have threatened to get dung beetles if you overstep the car line. “And regarding dung beetles, some insect caretakers have observed that, with respect to dietary preferences, dung beetles can be sustained on something other than poop (“preferred poop” seems more vital to breeding and rearing). Beetle chow can be mixed by adding the following to a blender: half an apple, half a banana, a protein source (a four-inch minnow or about ten earthworms), a quarter cup of wheat germ, a handful of freshly pulled grass grown from bird seed, including the roots and a bit of soil. The resulting mash is rolled into little pellets and stored in the fridge. DO YOU WANT THIS IN OUR FRIDGE? Think about that when that next ad on Craigslist lights a fire under your creeper.” God I love this woman. But I must point out that threats of nasty bug-related entities in the refrigerator don’t scare me; we have had a dead solpugid (sun spider; go ahead and Google it) in the freezer for six years. Why? Beats the shit out of me, but who am I to question passion? It does give me food for thought, though, every time I go in there for a Popsicle. (copyright 2010, Rob Siegel, from what is hopefully the upcoming book Car Guy: Why Men (of which I am one) Buy, Drive, Fix, Collect, and Love Cars, and How They Save My Sanity (the cars, not the men).)

This is why I never take cars completely apart...

I hold Metric in very high regard. I don't know anyone who has had a bad experience with them.

Mileage does not trump condition. Condition trumps mileage. That is, who cares if a car has 35k miles if it is in poor condition? On the other hand, if a car is in great condition, then the low mileage becomes a factor. From what you've described, $5500 sounds high under the best of circumstances, but I think it comes down to: 1) What you mean by "a small amount of rust on the rockers and fenders," and 2) How much work you can do yourself. That is, sorting a car out yourself is far less expensive than paying someone to do it. As one poster said, if this car pulls you, if you feel it is your car, then listen to that voice, but be cold-eyed, do the math, look at what else you can buy for similar $$.

Most likely snappy retort #1: "It's an easy way to provide solvent to clean the paint brushes."

I think the last two posts are outliers on the low side, but without fully inspecting the underbody, rockers, and up under the front fenders, it's difficult to ascribe a number. If the car has absolutely no rust perforations whatsoever and has only minor bubbling and if it goes like a bat out of hell and handles like the parts indicate it should, the high side could stretch into your target range to someone who likes the de-bumpered flared look (not my personal cup of tea).

You are a FAR better photographer than I, sir! Nicely done.

You too Earl... don't fly any choppers without a three-point harness and an air bag!

You came down from MA and we missed each other? How did that happen? Hey, can you see these embedded pics? People are reporting they can't. Here's a FB link to everything if there are problems: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2061124&id=1527636044&l=95587d6270

Aw, crap, not this problem again. They're hosted on my web site. Usually this works just fine. I do it all the time for CL and eBay ads. I just put them all up on Facebook. Try this link: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2061124&id=1527636044&l=95587d6270 Great meeting you, Jim.

Might as well bang this all out and be done with it... here are the non-02 pics. The Signal Red (no it's not Verona) 3.0CSi is mine. Lothar's black 328 is UNBELIEVABLE.

Nick, it was in Dobson NC.

I drove my E9 down (it has air conditioning :^) but I think y'all know where my heart lies. Below are a random assortment of '02-related pics, both from the parking lot at the hotel as well as at the event. --Rob

I'm coming down from Boston. Not much overlap roadwise with y'all from Ohio, but if when you hit Rt 81 you see an arrest-my-ass red 3.0CSi with a WARP9 vanity plate with a set of feet sticking out from under the car, that would be moi displaying the international sign of mechanic down mechanic needs assistance

<> that was Madeline Kahn's line in Young Frankenstein

Don't think you've said if you've checked that there's spark at the plugs. Recommend: 1) Verify, as per the posts, that the crank to cam and crank to FI pump timing are correct. 2) Verify that the distributor is at least in the ball park (rotor points to plug wire #1 when engine is at TDC and #1 cam lobes are pointing down). 3) Verify that the plugs are wired correctly. 4) Verify that there's spark. 5) If it passes the above checks, unhook the fuel pump fuse and give the intake a blast of starting fluid. If it kicks right over but then dies, you have a fuel issue.

Completely agree with Barry on having a fire extinguisher at the ready. I recently looked at an old tii that hadn't run in 20 years, and when I turned the key to ignition which fired up the fuel pump, it pissed fuel everywhere from dry-rotted fuel lines. You say you've replaced yours, great. But check, check, and check again with regard to leaking fuel. That electric fuel pump really cranks it out.

Check out: http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=200468203873&viewitem=&sspagename=STRK%3AMEWAX%3AIT Not a restored car, not a certified "lived in a dry climate its entire life and here's the paper trail to prove it," has photos of shock towers but no photos of rockers or undercarriage, interior certainly decent and presentable but not cherry, smokes on deceleration... even the red paint, 5-speed, wheels, and the owner's honest approachable tone notwithstanding, does this seem high to you?

Actually the best part is the bundle of snakes headers