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Have you actually seen the car? Posted by Ari [Email]  (#2847) [Profile/Gallery]
(more from Ari) on Sat, 3 Jan 2009 05:30:44
In Reply to: 92 9kt TCS/throttle body issues? Huh? Heard of such????, mike h., Fri, 2 Jan 2009 17:54:15 Members do not see ads below this line. - Help Keep This Site Online - Signup |
If you can actually see and drive the car, one would expect to see the "TCS" light brilliantly illuminated if there is a TCS issue.
It would further be interesting to see if the TCS light is out after the car is started and then comes on when you start driving, or if it is on and stays on from the start.
In Limp Home mode, the car would be driveable, but barely - the gas pedal would only do so much and the car won't go very fast.
The downside of LHM (other than the car isn't driveable) is the you can't check anything else out on the car. Yes, it is clean, but does the transmission shift at the right places (I think the Griffin is a automatic). Does the front end shimmy, do the brakes work? It also draws your attention from other things - does the heat and AC work? Does the car come up to temperature right? You can't tell if the turbocharger works.
Do you have maintenance records for the car? Do you know that everything has been maintained well?
When I see a car that is very clean, I know for sure someone has spend money on detailing. And there are plenty of folks that make sure the car looks really nice, but all that squirmy stuff under the hood they just plain ignore.
Yes, it is entirely possible that somebody has a car that they've treated very well, and now faced with an expensive problem (a throttle body replacement can easily cost $1K or more from a dealer) have decided enough is enough. I know I've bought very well maintained cars where the PO just had the last straw, and I reaped the benefits.
And I've also seen some very nice looking cars that were a mess mechanically. I have a simple rule when it comes to people selling cars - I assume both are lying weasels. Nothing personal. If the PO says something, I take it as pure fiction unless I see documentation. The car is the same - I assume it is a barely operational bag of bolts held together with a nice paint job. Lord knows, I've seen enough cars like that to last two lifetimes. The car then has to prove itself to me. It has to show me that it works, that it has been maintained.
In this case, you should see paperwork showing the guy had the car troubleshot and a definitive diagnosis from a shop whose name doesn't end in "bar and grill." You should also see paperwork that the guy has been trying to fix this for a bit, along with paperwork showing all the other maintenance done on the car. If you need to take his/her/its word for it, it's used cat litter.
Your approach should not be that you've found a great car and that you need a reason not to buy it. Your approach should be that you've found a scumbag seller and a mechanical nightmare, and you need to be convinced not to run away immediately. That's not how humans work - we see pretty things and we want them. And we end up with mechanical nightmares sold by scumbags.
But if the engine won't go above 2000 rpm and the turbo won't kick in, the car is going to have a very hard time convincing me that it works just fine.
Yes, TCS problems are very real, and can be tricky to fix. Or sometimes easy. But the question is if the rest of the car works. Otherwise, don't pay more for it than the parts you can see work are worth to you.
posted by 76.221.218...
, Sat, 3 Jan 2009 05:30:44 <-- Viewing This Message
, Sat, 3 Jan 2009 14:48:06
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