Even under the hood?I found this last night and was creeped out at how IDENTICAL this Vega is to mine. (minus the stripes) ...identical
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbKiOMsP_F0
Lets see your cars!!
- Thread starter sheebz
- Start date
lol, different air cleaner and valve covers, but yea. Also I still have a stock dash, but same gauges mounted in it in the same way. He needs to address that glare his dash gives off.
Bought the wife a "new" car in September. I'm not a big GM guy but I worked in parts long enough to know which ones are tolerable. I wanted to find a newer Honda or Acura, unfortunately they hold their resale value. You can get alot of Impala for under $15k. 48k miles, that's low to me, as I drive a 16yo Accord with 230k miles to work 6 days a week, 50 miles a day.... and the misses drives maybe 6 miles a day, oh well. Good family car at least.
My father passed away in December, I inherited is most prized posession, which I'm honored to drive, as he never let anyone but his mechanic sit in the driver's seat. He Owned it since brand new, well taken care of - remarkably pristine for a 2004 Wisconsin truck.
Fully loaded, captain's chairs, real wood trim, blinds, you name it. Its More of an RV than a van. The rear seat folds into a twin bed, because you know, being an old hippie, even at 64 years old, a man's gotta have that magic bus, if you know what im sayin...
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Lol @magic bus and agreed on the Impala,in that vintage they can be gotten at pretty good prices here too.There are quite a few of them in the parking lot at work.I'm considering a SS in a year or so if I can find one with good numbers.Which trim level is yours?
I bought a base (ls) it's all cloth, cheesy plastic interior. But its got cruise and AC power junk. UNFORTUNATLEY it has ABS and stabilitrak. Somehow we managed to not have onstar on that car which is cool. Im a minimalist.
I specifically tried to find one without leather since its going to be a dedicated kid hauler, and well you know how kids and carseats are.
I climbed under probably 6 or 7 impalas at the dealership and made my decision almost solely on the amount of corrosion on the unibody, turns out the car was a Pennsylvania auction vehicle and still had the factory parts tags on the brake/fuellines. No galvanic corrosion on the aluminum either. All the Wisconsin cars had rust Inside the Fenders and rocker Panel covers.
I dont like the word "auction" so I took it on an extended test drive and put it on stands, pulled both bumper covers off to check for collision damage, it checked out so I paid for it.
The GM 60* v6 had a rough upbringing, finally by the late 2000's after almost 30 years of being boat anchors, they decided to not use a wet intake and have the coolant go between heads with a crossover pipe and not use such inferior materials. The 3.5 is solid, its just a big dumb gutless low compression pushrod v6. Which is what i wanted.
The SS 5.3 LS4 V8 is a fast car, my friend has one. he loves it, the problem is its a big front heavy FWD car and it torque steers like a mad man. The thing pulls hard to one side (left?) when you give it gas. It also his 2008ss has that stupid variable speed sensative steering where the turning ratios change in the rack at speed. Its something you gotta get used to, because if your hotdogging around and thrashing the car hard you might just abruptly turn into a brickwall. Lol
If corrosion is an issue I'd rustproof the car. The front sub (k) frame is aluminum along with the control arms, the suspension is totally archaic and basic. The gas tank is plastic... that's all good... However the bottom of the car looks galvanized, its not epoxy coated and does not have a rubberized undercoating. The seems under the car are folded and tack welded, the seems aren't caulked. Drainage seems poor and there are a lot of lips and edges to hold water.
I tore off all the plastic trim - bumper covers, rocker covers, side skirts, wheel well covers, and engine splash guard. I rust proofed the entire underbody of the car with fluidfilm, which is an aresol lanolin based oil which is like a petroleum wax that protects steel from corrosion. I pulled soundproofing foam out of the fender panels, which was soaking wet, and basically just there to help the metal oxidize. Hopefully I can get 20 years from this car without it folding in half.
That's about all I know about impalas.
tldr: its a solid car for the money but suffers from the inherent poor workmanship and materials you'd come to expect on a modern American auto
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I specifically tried to find one without leather since its going to be a dedicated kid hauler, and well you know how kids and carseats are.
I climbed under probably 6 or 7 impalas at the dealership and made my decision almost solely on the amount of corrosion on the unibody, turns out the car was a Pennsylvania auction vehicle and still had the factory parts tags on the brake/fuellines. No galvanic corrosion on the aluminum either. All the Wisconsin cars had rust Inside the Fenders and rocker Panel covers.
I dont like the word "auction" so I took it on an extended test drive and put it on stands, pulled both bumper covers off to check for collision damage, it checked out so I paid for it.
The GM 60* v6 had a rough upbringing, finally by the late 2000's after almost 30 years of being boat anchors, they decided to not use a wet intake and have the coolant go between heads with a crossover pipe and not use such inferior materials. The 3.5 is solid, its just a big dumb gutless low compression pushrod v6. Which is what i wanted.
The SS 5.3 LS4 V8 is a fast car, my friend has one. he loves it, the problem is its a big front heavy FWD car and it torque steers like a mad man. The thing pulls hard to one side (left?) when you give it gas. It also his 2008ss has that stupid variable speed sensative steering where the turning ratios change in the rack at speed. Its something you gotta get used to, because if your hotdogging around and thrashing the car hard you might just abruptly turn into a brickwall. Lol
If corrosion is an issue I'd rustproof the car. The front sub (k) frame is aluminum along with the control arms, the suspension is totally archaic and basic. The gas tank is plastic... that's all good... However the bottom of the car looks galvanized, its not epoxy coated and does not have a rubberized undercoating. The seems under the car are folded and tack welded, the seems aren't caulked. Drainage seems poor and there are a lot of lips and edges to hold water.
I tore off all the plastic trim - bumper covers, rocker covers, side skirts, wheel well covers, and engine splash guard. I rust proofed the entire underbody of the car with fluidfilm, which is an aresol lanolin based oil which is like a petroleum wax that protects steel from corrosion. I pulled soundproofing foam out of the fender panels, which was soaking wet, and basically just there to help the metal oxidize. Hopefully I can get 20 years from this car without it folding in half.
That's about all I know about impalas.
tldr: its a solid car for the money but suffers from the inherent poor workmanship and materials you'd come to expect on a modern American auto
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Impallas were a very common fleet car so there are a lot of them out there which drives down the value.
If they use em for rentals, cop cars, and taxis it's a good indication that its a decent low maintenance car
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