Helaman-99
Proven Member
- 143
- 68
- May 10, 2019
-
Spokane Valley,
Washington
My 1999 Mitsubishi Eclipse GST.
Before I tell you my mod list and future mod list, I'm gonna tell you the story behind this DSM. The car truly chose the driver and I've definitely grown to love this car. I don't expect you to read all this (ecpecially since it's the size of a small book ), I'm writing all this mostly for my own purpose of having a record of my 2G.
So, first things first, I used to work at Discount Tire. While I was there I had a good friend that had a white 2g GS. I liked it, thought it was the best looking Eclipse (generation-wise). A few months later in November he said that he wanted to sell it and I was interested. However he decided not give it up to since he had put so much into it. I still wanted to buy a car though so I started looking. I came across a 2003 Hyundai Tiburon GT-V6 with a 6 speed manual. I had a bad feeling about it, almost backed out the day before my Dad and I drove down the three hours to see it, but I wanted it really bad. An NA V6?? That's awesome! Except it wasn't. I was told it was in great shape; no leaks, no accidents, etc. There were red flags EVERYWHERE but I didn't care. I bought it for $2,250 with 93,000 miles.
Yep, I loved it. The shifting was rough but that V6 power was intoxicating. 170HP on tap was more than I had ever really experienced, let alone owned. I took it in to get inspected a couple days later and the bad news came crashing in.
First off, it had leaks... a lot of leaks. So what? It leaked some oil and power steering fluid and who knows what else, but I could fix that. What came next though, I could NOT fix. Turns out the vehicle had been in an accident... a bad one. So bad in fact that the transmission had come clean off somehow, and someone had decided it'd be worth the risk to just weld it back on... to the frame. It was in place, right? Well, that's not even the worst of it. Remember the 93K miles it had? Yeah, the last CarFax was in 2013ish, and it reported that the Tiburon had 136K miles on it... the miles had been rolled back sometime between then and now. Yeah, I wasn't happy.
I and my Dad both decided that I should demand they take it back and give me a refund. I feel kind of bad since I was not nice to them, and they told me that they had the vehicle for only 3 months and barely drove it (it was "too small") so they didn't know about all of the problems. They were trying to go after the guy that sold the car to them, but he denied everything. They ended up driving the three long hours over to Spokane Valley to take the car back and gave me a full refund in cash. I never heard from them again.
This all happened in December. There I was. No car. Not burned financially (which is a blessing), but definitely burned mentally. I loved that Tiburon, problems and all. I would've kept it had they given me $2,000 back to help pay for the repairs, but I knew that wouldn't happen. So now I was back in the market, but I decided that I wouldn't buy a car until I had a good feeling about it. I came across a lot of options between Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, and Ebay; 300ZXs, MR2s, Preludes, and my dream tuner car the SC300 (I couldn't find any manuals). The Eclipse was towards the bottom of my list. I've met eclipse drivers that were not very nice people, so the word "Eclipse" left a bad taste in my mouth. And then there were the "ricer" stereotypes. But who cares what other people think of a 19-20 year old driving a commonly modified car? Anyways, I didn't really want an Eclipse. Until I did.
There it was. A black, 1999 GST with 133,000 miles on it. Instantly my heart jumped. I had a good feeling about this one! It was February, and after almost two months of nothing, I felt something! The listed price was $2,500 (my budget was $3,000), so I decided to go for it. I contacted the owner, and he said that he just didn't drive it any more, so it had been sitting for a year in front of his house. It was Sunday, the day before my Dad and I drove (coincidentally) another 3 hours to another city, Omak, to look at the car. OK, I was going to buy it... I know this was stupid, but I wasn't going to drive three hours to look at a car. So I logged on to Facebook to look at the car again and the price jumped up from $2,500 to $3,800! I instantly messaged the guy to see what was up. He told me a friend of his told him that it was worth more, so he hiked the price another $1,300. No way I was going to pay that. I am not a very aggressive person... at all... so I made the mistake of not holding my ground and I told him I'd pay no more than $3,000 for the car. We agreed, and the deal moved forward.
My Dad and I made the kind of fun, but mostly just long drive over to the remote town of Omak. The plan was to get the vehicle inspected there and then we arrive around the time it's finished... that didn't work out. We were late, he was late. We met up at a shop that was closed, but one of the mechanics checked over the car for about 5 seconds and told us it was ok. So we took the car to another shop that was also closed, but they knew the owner and his Dad (who was helping the son sell his car) and they let us use their lift to look for anything that didn't look right. To me, a lot didn't look right but I also didn't know what I was looking at so I didn't say much. Did I mention I'm not aggressive? I'm also not very out spoken... but being a Mercedes salesman has helped with that But I was at Discount Tire still, so I was still timid me and didn't say anything. Turns out the car could have been sitting for almost 3 years, not one, and the previous owners had raced it at some point. Truth or tall tale? I haven't found that out yet, but I decided to buy the car: $500 cash, $2,500 with Apple Pay. Soon the red flags started to trickle in on this car too, but it was a 20 year old car so it was going to have problems, or at least that's what I told myself. I wanted to have a working car so bad! That would bite me a bit later on, but I'm not going to spoil anything.
The car came with studded winter tires on some 16" steelies, and he also had a set of 17" wheels with "summer" Federal SuperSteel 595s on; great looks, not so great rubber, but at least it had two different sets. But the issues with the car manifested itself as soon as I went to start it after buying it. They told me it sometimes won't start unless you hold the battery terminal a certain way, and they helped me start it that first time and it didn't have issues starting after that so I didn't think much of it. So then I drove it home. I had never driven a car that was boosted before (at least for performance reasons) and I loved it! It wasn't as punchy as the Tiburon's V6, but the turbo lag was so much fun to play with, and when you hit boost I could feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins, running from my chest all the way into my fingers; this was a fun car. It wasn't perfect though, I still wasn't super satisfied with the car I had chosen as my first car. I didn't want an Eclipse, I wanted a 300Z, an MR2, an SC300, but not an Eclipse. But that was before I really knew what was under the hood.
So I got it home, and the next few months were, well, eventful. The initial inspection had good news: no major issues! However,a bout four days after buying the car, it wouldn't shift into 2nd, 4th, or reverse. So I limped it over to my Dad's favorite shop in 1st and 3rd. The next two months consisted of "it'll be done soon", "it seized up", "we finished it, but it seized up again so are still working on it". I even went to pick it up because it was "done", but it wasn't shifting... the stage 2 clutch in it didn't like the stock tranny. 2 weeks later I had my car back. Finally! Except it started dying... I'd go to start it in the morning after not driving it for a couple days and the battery would be dead. Thus begins my electrical adventures. A kill switch stopped that because I had some parasitic leaks come to find out, but it ended up causing more issues in the future. The car also had a really weird bogging issue. I would drive it for a couple minutes, then it would start lurching like it was in way too high of a gear. I'd pull over (since the car basically would lose all power) and it would idle super low and super rough, almost like a misfire. After about 5 minutes, the RPMs jump back up to normal levels and I can continue my commute. So then I warmed the car up every morning that it would do it's bogging thing and I could just jump in and drive after it's done.
You guys ready for another car mechanic horror story? We'll I took the car into the same shop as before to get all of the belts and fluids replaced, and they found out that the balance shaft belt had broken... and it had been broken for a looong time... awesome. This was literally a couple days after I had bombed a back road (not going over 4,500 RPMs mind you). I was thoroughly terrified. 5 labor hours later my car was done. I go in to pick my car up, and as I'm paying the $1,600 bill, the cashier hands me the door check arm (I didn't know what it was) and told me "the door sags a bit now". Well, to be fair, the door sagged a bit before this but all I had to do was lift the door up about half an inch and close it, no big deal. So I leave and go to open my door. Huh, it wont open... and there is a crease in the door too with some of the paint chipped off the edge of the front fender. Oh boy. Both perplexed and angry, I go to try to open the door again and it instantly attempts to dive bomb towards the concrete. It "sags" huh? The thing is hanging by one hinge. I'm done with this place. I don't say anything and I leave. I soon found out that the pins that hold ground effects on the other side had been broken too. Yeah, I'm never going there again. I asked them to fix it free of charge, but they said that since it had issues before hand that they couldn't do it for free, but would "work with me on the price". I said ok, but I never showed. Screw that place.
So I continued trying to fix my car myself. I replaced the valve cover gasket myself and successfully stopped an oil leak, and it being my first time ever doing something like that I was pumped! I soon replaced the stock intake with an Injen aluminum pip and cone, and I put in some new NGK spark plug wires and some NGK BPR7ES spark plugs. I also replaced the fuel pump (It needed one badly) with a 190LPH Walbro. My beast is slowly rising from the metaphorical ashes. The new fuel pump also pretty much eliminated the bogging issue, it still does it every now and then (especially after starting it after a long time of no starts) but at least it was much less common. Next step was to replace the warped rotors, but then the car stopped starting again... great. Thankfully I found an EXCELLENT local shop that will work on just about anything, but specializes in Mitsubishis and DSMs, called Raven Fabrication. Kind of a hole in the wall shop, but don't let that fool you. These guys have been doing this for around 20 years. Anyways, they found out that it was my battery master switch that was causing me issues. This was after about 3-4 weeks of me tearing the interior of my car apart just to give them a wiring harness that I was sure was the problem, but it wasn't. At least it starts now!
So here we are, present day. My car still has A LOT of issues and I have to be honest, I originally didn't like the Eclipse. It had cost me so much, I loved it but I also hated it. But this community is what helped me realize what I had; a gem, really. I just love this car, the looks, the aftermarket potential, and "PSHH" of the blow off valve... ugh I love this thing. After reading so much of the threads on this website, I also fell in love with the culture and I know that you guys have my back. Thanks.
... and sorry about the MASSIVE post
I have a lot of plans for this thing, so stay tuned. Thanks again. I am convinced this is one of the best car communities ever, and you guys helped me love my car and want nothing else
Before I tell you my mod list and future mod list, I'm gonna tell you the story behind this DSM. The car truly chose the driver and I've definitely grown to love this car. I don't expect you to read all this (ecpecially since it's the size of a small book ), I'm writing all this mostly for my own purpose of having a record of my 2G.
So, first things first, I used to work at Discount Tire. While I was there I had a good friend that had a white 2g GS. I liked it, thought it was the best looking Eclipse (generation-wise). A few months later in November he said that he wanted to sell it and I was interested. However he decided not give it up to since he had put so much into it. I still wanted to buy a car though so I started looking. I came across a 2003 Hyundai Tiburon GT-V6 with a 6 speed manual. I had a bad feeling about it, almost backed out the day before my Dad and I drove down the three hours to see it, but I wanted it really bad. An NA V6?? That's awesome! Except it wasn't. I was told it was in great shape; no leaks, no accidents, etc. There were red flags EVERYWHERE but I didn't care. I bought it for $2,250 with 93,000 miles.
Yep, I loved it. The shifting was rough but that V6 power was intoxicating. 170HP on tap was more than I had ever really experienced, let alone owned. I took it in to get inspected a couple days later and the bad news came crashing in.
First off, it had leaks... a lot of leaks. So what? It leaked some oil and power steering fluid and who knows what else, but I could fix that. What came next though, I could NOT fix. Turns out the vehicle had been in an accident... a bad one. So bad in fact that the transmission had come clean off somehow, and someone had decided it'd be worth the risk to just weld it back on... to the frame. It was in place, right? Well, that's not even the worst of it. Remember the 93K miles it had? Yeah, the last CarFax was in 2013ish, and it reported that the Tiburon had 136K miles on it... the miles had been rolled back sometime between then and now. Yeah, I wasn't happy.
I and my Dad both decided that I should demand they take it back and give me a refund. I feel kind of bad since I was not nice to them, and they told me that they had the vehicle for only 3 months and barely drove it (it was "too small") so they didn't know about all of the problems. They were trying to go after the guy that sold the car to them, but he denied everything. They ended up driving the three long hours over to Spokane Valley to take the car back and gave me a full refund in cash. I never heard from them again.
This all happened in December. There I was. No car. Not burned financially (which is a blessing), but definitely burned mentally. I loved that Tiburon, problems and all. I would've kept it had they given me $2,000 back to help pay for the repairs, but I knew that wouldn't happen. So now I was back in the market, but I decided that I wouldn't buy a car until I had a good feeling about it. I came across a lot of options between Facebook Marketplace, Craigslist, and Ebay; 300ZXs, MR2s, Preludes, and my dream tuner car the SC300 (I couldn't find any manuals). The Eclipse was towards the bottom of my list. I've met eclipse drivers that were not very nice people, so the word "Eclipse" left a bad taste in my mouth. And then there were the "ricer" stereotypes. But who cares what other people think of a 19-20 year old driving a commonly modified car? Anyways, I didn't really want an Eclipse. Until I did.
There it was. A black, 1999 GST with 133,000 miles on it. Instantly my heart jumped. I had a good feeling about this one! It was February, and after almost two months of nothing, I felt something! The listed price was $2,500 (my budget was $3,000), so I decided to go for it. I contacted the owner, and he said that he just didn't drive it any more, so it had been sitting for a year in front of his house. It was Sunday, the day before my Dad and I drove (coincidentally) another 3 hours to another city, Omak, to look at the car. OK, I was going to buy it... I know this was stupid, but I wasn't going to drive three hours to look at a car. So I logged on to Facebook to look at the car again and the price jumped up from $2,500 to $3,800! I instantly messaged the guy to see what was up. He told me a friend of his told him that it was worth more, so he hiked the price another $1,300. No way I was going to pay that. I am not a very aggressive person... at all... so I made the mistake of not holding my ground and I told him I'd pay no more than $3,000 for the car. We agreed, and the deal moved forward.
My Dad and I made the kind of fun, but mostly just long drive over to the remote town of Omak. The plan was to get the vehicle inspected there and then we arrive around the time it's finished... that didn't work out. We were late, he was late. We met up at a shop that was closed, but one of the mechanics checked over the car for about 5 seconds and told us it was ok. So we took the car to another shop that was also closed, but they knew the owner and his Dad (who was helping the son sell his car) and they let us use their lift to look for anything that didn't look right. To me, a lot didn't look right but I also didn't know what I was looking at so I didn't say much. Did I mention I'm not aggressive? I'm also not very out spoken... but being a Mercedes salesman has helped with that But I was at Discount Tire still, so I was still timid me and didn't say anything. Turns out the car could have been sitting for almost 3 years, not one, and the previous owners had raced it at some point. Truth or tall tale? I haven't found that out yet, but I decided to buy the car: $500 cash, $2,500 with Apple Pay. Soon the red flags started to trickle in on this car too, but it was a 20 year old car so it was going to have problems, or at least that's what I told myself. I wanted to have a working car so bad! That would bite me a bit later on, but I'm not going to spoil anything.
The car came with studded winter tires on some 16" steelies, and he also had a set of 17" wheels with "summer" Federal SuperSteel 595s on; great looks, not so great rubber, but at least it had two different sets. But the issues with the car manifested itself as soon as I went to start it after buying it. They told me it sometimes won't start unless you hold the battery terminal a certain way, and they helped me start it that first time and it didn't have issues starting after that so I didn't think much of it. So then I drove it home. I had never driven a car that was boosted before (at least for performance reasons) and I loved it! It wasn't as punchy as the Tiburon's V6, but the turbo lag was so much fun to play with, and when you hit boost I could feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins, running from my chest all the way into my fingers; this was a fun car. It wasn't perfect though, I still wasn't super satisfied with the car I had chosen as my first car. I didn't want an Eclipse, I wanted a 300Z, an MR2, an SC300, but not an Eclipse. But that was before I really knew what was under the hood.
So I got it home, and the next few months were, well, eventful. The initial inspection had good news: no major issues! However,a bout four days after buying the car, it wouldn't shift into 2nd, 4th, or reverse. So I limped it over to my Dad's favorite shop in 1st and 3rd. The next two months consisted of "it'll be done soon", "it seized up", "we finished it, but it seized up again so are still working on it". I even went to pick it up because it was "done", but it wasn't shifting... the stage 2 clutch in it didn't like the stock tranny. 2 weeks later I had my car back. Finally! Except it started dying... I'd go to start it in the morning after not driving it for a couple days and the battery would be dead. Thus begins my electrical adventures. A kill switch stopped that because I had some parasitic leaks come to find out, but it ended up causing more issues in the future. The car also had a really weird bogging issue. I would drive it for a couple minutes, then it would start lurching like it was in way too high of a gear. I'd pull over (since the car basically would lose all power) and it would idle super low and super rough, almost like a misfire. After about 5 minutes, the RPMs jump back up to normal levels and I can continue my commute. So then I warmed the car up every morning that it would do it's bogging thing and I could just jump in and drive after it's done.
You guys ready for another car mechanic horror story? We'll I took the car into the same shop as before to get all of the belts and fluids replaced, and they found out that the balance shaft belt had broken... and it had been broken for a looong time... awesome. This was literally a couple days after I had bombed a back road (not going over 4,500 RPMs mind you). I was thoroughly terrified. 5 labor hours later my car was done. I go in to pick my car up, and as I'm paying the $1,600 bill, the cashier hands me the door check arm (I didn't know what it was) and told me "the door sags a bit now". Well, to be fair, the door sagged a bit before this but all I had to do was lift the door up about half an inch and close it, no big deal. So I leave and go to open my door. Huh, it wont open... and there is a crease in the door too with some of the paint chipped off the edge of the front fender. Oh boy. Both perplexed and angry, I go to try to open the door again and it instantly attempts to dive bomb towards the concrete. It "sags" huh? The thing is hanging by one hinge. I'm done with this place. I don't say anything and I leave. I soon found out that the pins that hold ground effects on the other side had been broken too. Yeah, I'm never going there again. I asked them to fix it free of charge, but they said that since it had issues before hand that they couldn't do it for free, but would "work with me on the price". I said ok, but I never showed. Screw that place.
So I continued trying to fix my car myself. I replaced the valve cover gasket myself and successfully stopped an oil leak, and it being my first time ever doing something like that I was pumped! I soon replaced the stock intake with an Injen aluminum pip and cone, and I put in some new NGK spark plug wires and some NGK BPR7ES spark plugs. I also replaced the fuel pump (It needed one badly) with a 190LPH Walbro. My beast is slowly rising from the metaphorical ashes. The new fuel pump also pretty much eliminated the bogging issue, it still does it every now and then (especially after starting it after a long time of no starts) but at least it was much less common. Next step was to replace the warped rotors, but then the car stopped starting again... great. Thankfully I found an EXCELLENT local shop that will work on just about anything, but specializes in Mitsubishis and DSMs, called Raven Fabrication. Kind of a hole in the wall shop, but don't let that fool you. These guys have been doing this for around 20 years. Anyways, they found out that it was my battery master switch that was causing me issues. This was after about 3-4 weeks of me tearing the interior of my car apart just to give them a wiring harness that I was sure was the problem, but it wasn't. At least it starts now!
So here we are, present day. My car still has A LOT of issues and I have to be honest, I originally didn't like the Eclipse. It had cost me so much, I loved it but I also hated it. But this community is what helped me realize what I had; a gem, really. I just love this car, the looks, the aftermarket potential, and "PSHH" of the blow off valve... ugh I love this thing. After reading so much of the threads on this website, I also fell in love with the culture and I know that you guys have my back. Thanks.
... and sorry about the MASSIVE post
I have a lot of plans for this thing, so stay tuned. Thanks again. I am convinced this is one of the best car communities ever, and you guys helped me love my car and want nothing else
Last edited: