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aaronth777

Proven Member
92
26
Apr 12, 2015
Dayton, Ohio
Hello all, I'm sure you know exactly what I mean from the title. Here's a fun topic, what are some ridiculous things you've found on your car that the previous owner left for you?

I've owned my car for over 3 years and driven it across the country. Just today my front half shaft fell and starting bouncing around. I go to inspect and find that there are no bolts and none are broken off... they just fell out. Okay so I go to replace them but one bolt has no threads to thread into. Turns out I have a proper 97-99 front carrier bearing but a 95-96 A/C bracket... I've been driving with one bolt missing for 3 years LOL. How the A/C bracket got changed for the wrong year I'll never know. Oh this same guy also ran with no thermostat so that was a fun find too
 
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You probably don't even need a thermostat in California. I have came across some crazy things myself, I found warranty pictures of broken metal parts, still can't identify what broken parts they were, the pictures were too close up of them, it does look like cast iron though so maybe an engine block, who knows.
 
I found a very nice quality dental pic/scraper under my windshield cowl. I'm guessing it was from new assembly because I had the car since 36k and the maintenance records did not show a new windshield.
 
https://www.dsmtuners.com/threads/found-some-goodies-under-the-carpet-while-swapping-seats.531555/

My Talon came with no fewer than 10 lemon air fresheners and a full off-brand SAE socket set under the back seat. My current Eclipse is a shining example of neglect and incompetence from the previous owner, but my most problematic PO discovery was a tie between picking up a car in a snowstorm to find that the previous owner used straight water instead of antifreeze and the time I picked up a new car at port to find that its battery was dead and it was missing an alternator belt but for legal reasons it was required to leave port under its own power. I never found the correct alternator belt locally but I was at least able to get something to work to the tune of $200 in hourly port fees.

People are the worst.
 
Mine was on my first DSM, 95 Talon TSI FWD roughly in 2003-04 time frame.

Bought it as a project car, fresh 6 bolt motor and head, neither installed in the car. Supposedly only needed motor mounts. Clutch already installed onto the motor, so just assemble the head onto the motor and install, seems simple enough. LOOONG story short, install engine, trans etc.. First start up is good, drive it around the shop and pull it back in only to notice a massive oil trail.

Turns out the previous owner did not have a 6bolt rear engine seal assembly, so he used the original 7 bolt assembly... The PO drilled new mounting holes into the aluminum seal plate and tried to use orange RTV to seal between the actual seal and the crankshaft. Damn near 1/4" difference in the crank shaft OD between 6 and 7 bolt crankshafts.... Probably the dumbest thing I have seen on a car. I still have the seal plate for the wall of shame to remind me never trust previous owners.

Good presents, I found a Snap-on 13mm swivel impact socket behind the passenger side rear seat plastic panel. Still use that.
 
When i bought my 97 the previous owner's son has fancied himself to be a mechanic. Told me he had changed the timing belt just before they put the car up for sale. Was pulling out of my driveway one day and CLUNK, something sounded like it fell in the engine bay. Pop the hood the engine was resting on the cross member. Turns out the son forgot the put the bolt in the belt-side engine mount and it sheered the studs in half. That was fun to drill out and retap with the engine in the car...

After that I trusted nothing and went in to inspect the timing belt. The balance belt was hanging on by threads and he had totally botched the front main seal install.
 
I don't like to complain.. So I will say I was left with a wonderful opportunity to support my local mechanic. LOL I've also been fortunate in that I was able to do business with some cool people in the classifieds section, support a bunch of small businesses including a few site sponsors, and even save a few parts from the scrap yard.

This incredible journey has also led me to some amazing communities like this one, where there is no shortage of passionate builds to be inspired by. :thumb: It's all been pretty cool...

And when I think about that journey, it's much easier for me to overlook my frustration with all the missing bits, deferred maintenance, and dents.. But hey, back on the bright side- I found a quarter in the center console, and that's not nothing. LOL
 
Does it count if the car had been sold to me without knowledge of any mods on it?

10 years ago I was looking for my first dsm and I found one in Minneapolis for 2500$ only issue was it had a bad alternator and and needed a battery.

I lived in north Dakota at the time and thats 5 hours to drive for a dsm that was "complete with one minor issue" I said screw it and went there.

Turns out it belonged to a 17 year old kid who just shipped off to basic training and his dad wanted the car gone. Little did he know......

Once I got it home and felt comfortable giving it the onion I scared myself badddd. It had a superhahn 20g, 3" full exhaust with a dynomax muffler, old school hks external waste gate, rc 550 injectors, hacked maf, greedy turbo timer, and an old school hks electronic boost controller.

Time went on and I had to sell it because of hard ships. I sold it to my best friend and one night he was out spanking a 5.0 and an injector clip let loose and he scored a cylinder. I traded him my zx 10r for it back because I missed it but part of the deal was he would pay for the rebuild.

Start taking it apart and found more goodies like an act 2600, arp hardware everywhere, a fidanza flywheel,

But the peculiar thing was we were gone to order the pistons and decided to mic it out. To our surprise they were .040 over! You know what I checked next? The stroke baby! Sure enough it was stroked to a 2.4!
Right there and then I thought about this kid who had it before and I had sooooo many questions. I dont have the car anymore but I still have that engine built and in my garage just waiting...... sorry for long post but its probably coolest story I have
 
I owned 4 DSMs from age 17-22 and had to give up the hobby when I went off to college. At age 31 I bought my current DSM and forgot everything I knew about DSMs and mechanics in general. I had the PO tow the car to my parent's house in Houston for storage as I was living in San Antonio at the time. The PO was very happy to tow it that 45 minutes and wouldn't accept payment. I later found out why. The car was a total piece of shit. Everything was wrong but one thing WAS VERY WRONG: it had an evo headgasket. That car would never have made it home had that guy not towed me. The car revved like complete shit but I was arrogant and thoguht it would be something simple I could easily fix...
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