Got a "new" car today

[ben91]

Since I've back to working construction again, I picked up an appropriate vehicle...
97 Ford Taurus Wagon.
Seats 7 with the fold away 3rd row seat, has lots of cargo room, 75% of the power windows work including the all important driver's front, V6, automatic, alloy wheels. Seems to pretty much be in good shape (as fine as you'd expect a 97 Taurus w 110K to be in at least), but needs a major detailing. Battery is dead, but runs fine when jumped. Drives like a boat, but it has all 4 forward gears, the air blows cold, and it even sports the premium am/fm/tape. Beautiful seafoam green exterior with matching interior. Liftgate works fine, but the liftgate window's shocks are bad making it hard to open just the window portion. A veritable bargain at $700.

I wanted to get something I could drive on a job site that actually had some ground clearance and that I wouldn't care about getting dirty. It's been burning my stomach to sit in my 10AE's suede seat every day when I go home. Plus I can't keep my tools in the 10AE since they don't fit.

I need to go pick it up Saturday.

[ben91]

edit that, looks like it seats not 7 but 8!!! ;)

[metalman]

Wow..youre a brave man to get into construction work in this economy.
That car should be fairly bulletproof. We all make fun of Taurus but actually they are fairly reliable cars for Ford crap. I have seen the engines go 350k without a hitch. There used to be a major junk yard that sold Taurus/Sable engines for $49.95....that should tell you something.

[silver280zx]

can you say sho 3.4 v8 swap, lol

[ben91]

The company I started with seems to have carved itself a little niche that allows it to stay busy. They've sold 2 new jobs that I know of since I started a couple weeks ago. The jobs they do are large. I've got a lower end position, but the people over me do pretty well. So far, so good. The days can be hard, but for the first time ever I'm capped at 40 hrs/week. I've never worked only 40 hours before, and that feels really good. I'm also learning a new trade which is great.

My mom owns a Sable, which has been a very good car for her. Which is amazing; she's pretty good at killing cars.

On the way home, I actually came up behind a SHO and thought that was a funny conicedence. I'm not interested in doing anything like that in this car though. It defeats the purpose. I'll deal with 9 seconds 0-60 and 17 second quarters 5 days a week. I have been thinking about doing an LS3 and 6 speed in my E class. :)

[RotorNutFD3S]

We (Yamaha) made the SHO engines! :D
Get some people to carpool with you and charge them some gas money, help defer some costs. And I do agree on the capped 40 hours a week, sometimes I work more, but damn it's great to be able to not have to work as much.

[silver280zx]

We (Yamaha) made the SHO engines! :D

You are correct sir!

Did you work for yamamha?

Of all the yamaha motors, i have to say that either the 4a-ge 20v blacktop, or the 3s-ge beams motors are my fav's.

[simontibbett]

Sho v6>v8

[wildfire0310]

You are correct sir!

Did you work for yamamha?

Of all the yamaha motors, i have to say that either the 4a-ge 20v blacktop, or the 3s-ge beams motors are my fav's.

that is where he Currently works

[MeFryRice]

Be honest, you bought the Taurus cause the Miata wouldn't fit your crew of 50! :p

[RotorNutFD3S]

Yes, I do work for Yamaha. My favorite engine at the moment is our supercharged 1800cc 4-cyl. that goes in some of our WaveRunners. I started a thread for it on here somewhere.

Be honest, you bought the Taurus cause the Miata wouldn't fit your crew of 50! :p

Crew? Oh, you mean those guys he goes and picks up every morning from the Home Depot parking lot?

[MeFryRice]

Yeah those guys...

[ben91]

LOL, actually the beaners are on staff. But I will take some of them to lunch next week in the "new" car. I'm starting to pick up on the language OK if they speak slowly enough. Check this out (don't grade me on spelling though please): Yo compre de ayer un Ford Taurus. Also chinga, puta, pendejo. The former was I bought a Ford Taurus yesterday, in past tense and everything. The latter, well maybe you can google it. ;)

[ben91]

Went ahead and got it home this evening with the assistance of Mr Wildfire. Thanks again dude.

Battery is dead as a doornail. I have it sitting on the 2A charger. I'm not hopeful that it will resurrect, but it can't hurt to try.

[wildfire0310]

Went ahead and got it home this evening with the assistance of Mr Wildfire. Thanks again dude.

Battery is dead as a doornail. I have it sitting on the 2A charger. I'm not hopeful that it will resurrect, but it can't hurt to try.

hey man no problem. Thanks again for letting me drive the 10AE.:banana::banana::banana:

[Oblio]

Ben and I work for the same company now. We can tear it up at the Christmas party miata style!

[simontibbett]

It's a HUGE oval, including everything in it. Nothing represented NASCAR like that model Taurus.

[ben91]

It's a HUGE oval, including everything in it. Nothing represented NASCAR like that model Taurus.
That's absolutely correct. Makes me wonder if Mazda used the rotor theme in the RX8 after studying how the oval theme was used in the Taurus. The shape of the body, the badging, the lights, the radio console, the windows, etc etc are all large Ford-badge-esq ovals.

Anywhoo, after a night on the charger, the battery is showing 12.5 volts or so at rest and 14.35 engine running. I removed all the trash and pulled all the decaying pinestraw from the water drainage areas it had collected in. 100% of the power windows now work. I replaced bulbs in a couple of the courtesy lamps, so they work. I'm going to pick up wiper blades and 1 more bulb today, and that all should be done. I tried to take it to one of those places that will change the oil and wash the car for $25, but the 2 I know of near me where both closed for the day. Doesn't make sense to me for a quick oil change place to close at 5 but whatever. I'm not in charge of their business model.

Had a funny moment. In the trunk of the car is a can of WD40. Well, I know why now. I was testing all the car's basic funtions to make sure I could drive it without fear of ticket (brake lights, turn signals, etc). Everything was fine until I tried the 4 way flasher. When I hit the flasher button, nothing happened. But even worse, is aftewards the turn signals stopped working too. I found and tested the appropriate fuse and circuit for power, which all checked good, so I assumed the flasher relay failed. I used the interwebz to locate the relay for me, when I saw a few people had claimed that loss of turn signals is due to a dity hazard switch, and the fix is to spray WD40 around the switch and push it several times until it clears the dirt out. Well, I did that, and that all works now. But part of that problem is oils like WD40 might clean "gunk" out of an area, but they actually are "sticky" and attract dirt. So it will eventually need to be cleaned out again, but who knows how far in the future that will be. I have special gunk free gun cleaning oil, but that stuff costs as much as printer ink, so that's not worthwhile.


I'm debating on if I should put a CD player in it. The problem with doing so is 3 fold. First, it takes an ugly dash kit since the climate controls are built into the stock radio faceplate. The aftermarket replacement panel is $70, plus it's a lot of work, plus it looks like :butt:. Plus, if I add a CD player then I'll actually want/need to lock the doors and have theft worry issues. It's nice to not have to worry about such things. And if I lock the doors, then I'll want to add keyless. Finally, adding the CD player and then keyless costs money. I've got only 720 in the car as it sits, including a tank of gas. I'm not sure that it's reasonable to spend $500 on a $700 car.

[mustangtomiata]

i'm sure you could sell it for 1200 though when the time came.

[ben91]

figured out how to decode the VIN. shows that I have the small motor (which I knew already) but I have the upgrade trans from the SHO. which is great because the stanard trans is a known weak spot. this upgrade is not an available option, it's a random phenomenon and I happened to score. also I have keyless too so I have remotes on order. lastly I am about to start a projector headlamp project with TSX parts and an HID kit. qfter that I will figure out how to get the factory mach headunit and cd changer in there.
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[N3v]

ford taurus?

[ben91]

ford taurus?
Yup. I was basically keeping myself entertained on my lunch break. :lol:

My miata is too pretty and benz too unreliable to drive to work.

[Oblio]

Yup. I was basically keeping myself entertained on my lunch break. :lol:

My miata is too pretty and benz too unreliable to drive to work.
they give you a lunch break..... I'm gona have a talk with your boss

[Atlanta93LE]

Congrats on your beautiful piece of machinery. Good thing you don't need to go trolling for women in it ;)

[metalman]

Congrats on your beautiful piece of machinery. Good thing you don't need to go trolling for women in it ;)

I dunno...you might catch a few. :lol:
http://outhouserag.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/redneck_1.jpg

http://i267.photobucket.com/albums/ii299/Jebstein666/redneck_woman5.jpg

[ben91]

WOOT! It's got KEYLESS! I picked up 2 new transmitters off of ebay for pretty cheap. They programmed in and work! :)