TerminalTalon said:

The thing about all these people with fancy cars is they can’t afford them. They might be able to make a payment but as soon as some real world fix is needed they either humble themselves or complain about the price. It’s usually complain about the price because they have no concept of an actual legal business.
My quick breakdown
2.1hr alternator r&r with parts price $600 cost $1100+ list if even available
2.0hr lower pan r&r with parts price at $200-600 if even available.
Both of those in my parts matrix say unavailable.
LOF probably $120-140
The batteries themselves would probably be $6-800
It has active body control so the struts or components that need to be replaced are super expensive.
Whatever shop rate is XXX
This is just to give a perspective of how fast I can mechanically total a car out with just parts and labor. They will probably not fix it. To get it rolling it’s probably in the $2500-3500 depending on how far and how much they want to do.

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Thats what ive been trying to get across to my sister, because my brother in law is always trying to talk her into a German car. I think she gets it now after 2 moneypit BMWs. Theyre fine before 100k as long as you have the money to do the maintenance.. If not they go to shit. For me, I look for the prices of a engine/transmission replacement and head gasket. I figure those 3 equate to the most amount of money i would have to emergency spend if i had to.

SixBolt_16G said:

Thats what ive been trying to get across to my sister, because my brother in law is always trying to talk her into a German car. I think she gets it now after 2 moneypit BMWs. Theyre fine before 100k as long as you have the money to do the maintenance.. If not they go to shit. For me, I look for the prices of a engine/transmission replacement and head gasket. I figure those 3 equate to the most amount of money i would have to emergency spend if i had to.

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I see it all the time. What people drive doesn’t impress me anymore—I’ve seen behind the curtain. I know the APRs, I’ve seen the buy sheets, and I know what people actually owe versus what the car is worth.
If I told someone that every year people take their tax returns and use them to get into cars they can’t afford—just to look good for a couple months before it gets repossessed—they’d think I was exaggerating. But it happens constantly.

We had a lady who bought a BMW years ago and had four repossessions with the same dealership. Every year she’d come back with a bigger tax return. She didn’t even work. I knew because she showed up in a ’98 Grand Caravan with all eight of her kids in it—new hair, clothes, boots, purse. Then she’d get in “her” BMW while the van full of kids followed behind.
And it’s not just one case. You’ve got people from their 20s all the way up into their 60s having friends or family make payments for their vehicles.
From what I see, maybe 25% of vehicles are properly maintained. The other 75%? Someone is paying for it one way or another.

Even “by-the-book” maintenance can be misleading. “Lifetime” transmission fluid usually just means you’ll eventually be replacing the whole transmission. Manufacturer oil change intervals—especially with short-trip driving—lead to timing chains, tensioners, and solenoids failing. None of those are cheap repairs.
When something major fails, most people don’t repair—they replace. And usually it’s with a used engine or transmission from another vehicle that wasn’t taken care of either. Then the cycle repeats.
I get that it’s expensive, but it’s almost always better to do the job right once than to cut corners and end up doing it multiple times—or chasing problems caused by bad parts. That’s the side of things most people never see.

Not working on, just drooling over..

My 996 got rear ended last September and even though the damage was minor, it set off the rabbit hole of "well, if it's going in the shop for some paint, I might as well..."

After several months of collecting parts and then waiting for a slot to open with my paint guy, and then trying to find the time to put the car back together I finally have a complete car again.

New rear bumper with the reverse sensors shaved, GT2 front end conversion, headlights sanded down and recleared to get rid of the old age yellowing, some other odds and ends repainted. And finally got the summer wheels mounted again.



Now I can finally work on the Talon again.

Very nice. This bad boy was at the local Cars and Coffee this past weekend. Will have to put some coins together and get one in maybe 40 years haha...

Finished gluing the front section of bumper together. It looks pretty massive, but it is the correct size. I may change the route I was originally going. I was going to block sand the plug smooth, pull a mold off, and have 100% carbon body panels. The 3dprinted lambo guy just covered this cheap plastic with carbon and called it a day. PLA (cheap filament) can distort if left in a hot car. I figure sandwiched between a couple layers of carbon can't be much better. I've started printing the sideskirts in a polycarbonate blend, which is rated for ~110C before it starts to deform. I may print the entire car in polycarbonate, and then cover both sides with carbon, using the polycarbonate as a core material.

Havent had reverse lights in this truck (2003 Dodge Durango SXT) due to a malfunctioning Transmission Range Sensor. Dodge decided to put it inside the transmission for the last year of the first generation. The other side effect is a no crank/no start that progressively got worse over the last year to the point of almost leaving me stranded last week. I had to rock the shift lever back and forth through each gear and usually after 3 of 4 times it would catch park or neutral so that i could start the truck but began to slip out of park into reverse after a crank or two. Got it to start after 15 minutes. Decided to replace it myself since its not a main vehicle anymore and already had the part sitting arounbd for a couple of years. No time crunch.

No drain plug, so its gonna be a mess. Luckily, I remembered that my mom had this huge 3x4 ft container in the rafters of her garage for just such a job. I still went through a whole roll of paper towel. Shit gets on everything, even with this big ass tub and disposible gloves.


The TRS is on the other side of this panel.



This plug made me confused at first. But i got it quicker than i thought i would. Red safety comes down, white lever comes down while pulling up. It sits in a very tight spot and this photo is taken from this angle because thats the only view you have.



Out! But have to note that this is the most amazingly clean thing on this Rust Belt Salt Bucket. Really need to ditch this truck before it becomes a safety issue because the rust is horrendous.



Old sensor


New sensor installed and back up we go!
I used rtv the first time around and i missed one little spot that it leaked from, so had to remove it, clean it up and used the gasket instead. No leaks!

The AI lied to me. I rounded off one of the trans pan bolts and overnighted a pack of bolts from amazon. The smart Claude AI said it was 25mm long. The slightly dumber regular AI said 32mm. 12mm. Its 12mm

Checked under for leaks after coming back from a short drive down the street and noticed that my driver side ball joint ripped open at some point and slinging grease everywhere. THen went to check the drivers side and the a big wad of grease under the shock on that side...



So here we are with another weekend project replacing ball joints. So now i have 3 cars that need alignments. But this garage is starting to feel big as f*** with all the parts that ive gotten out of here and actually on cars now. Ashame that this truck has so much rust and its taken me this long to experience the joys on working on a vehicle that is so simple. For as rusted as this thing is, everything has come apart easily.