@Chelonian Get rid of this rusty death trap as soon as possible! A simple collision will crumple this car.
I’m starting to believe you are really cheap (as you indicated) rather than FRUGAL.
Where I live your vehicle would not pass an inspection.
Buy the Camry and live happily for the next 10 years!
Speaking of breaking in two, just as I was about to pull out of a parking lot into traffic the other day, an old Mazda pick up which did not “look” rusted, bowed up and down between the cab and the bed as it accelerated. I cannot imagine anything was holding it together other then the drive train and a few strands of cables. How people drive cars/trucks like that is way beyond me. All I can think of when I see people drive rusted Junkers is those half dozen remakes of " Death Wish " with Charles Bronson. Numbers 1,2,3,4…
The pictures are not reassuring. That is a fair bit of rust and it will get worse and worse. There isn’t any practical/economical way to repair all of the significant rust. You are just going to be pouring your maintenance and repair budget down the drain and end up with nothing but scrap, which is what you have now.
The Camry sounds like a good deal as there aren’t many good cars for $4000 these days. Years of recession dramatically cut new car sales and people hung onto their cars longer. That caused a serious shortage of decent used cars and even pushed up the prices on older and crummier cars. It will take several years of strong new car sales before used car prices come down.
Thanks. I actually had somewhat similar rust in Mar 2010, and got a body guy to repair the four door bottoms, the trunk, and one wheel area for $650, and it lasted about 3 years. Given the car was still on the road for 4.5 yrs after that, I feel we did quite well on that choice, though I would have been advised at that time to scrap the car.
And the advice would have been good then. You were fortunate not to be in an accident where the weakened body would have been a problem.
Look, if you want to keep the car and fix it, fine. Up to you.
@texases
We’re not decided yet, because we’ve had some significant conflicting input, and other reasons. If I weren’t taking these points of safety (and possibly better financial decision long term) seriously I would have certainly just repaired the old car by now and been done with it and back on the road (which I am very eager to be!). You have to imagine that well-intentioned and informed people on the internet count a little differently than two actual mechanics who had it up on a lift and told me the structure was reasonable. That said, I have reason to wonder about them, too. The new buy would be about 5 years of average repair costs on the old car in one shot, so it’s something that is not easy for me to pull the trigger on at all, particularly given having recently gone through two major life/financial decisions quite recently, one of which turned out to be more costly than I thought and possibly the wrong one. I am also looking into the local used market to see what’s out there that would be a compromise purchase. Thanks.
You’re right to discount our views to some degree, even if we have the best intent - we are not there, we can’t see the car, and we can’t know all the factors you’re juggling in making this decision. Good luck!
I’ve noticed that those of us who frequent this joint are a cautious lot. The mechanics have seen so many bad things happen to cars it isn’t surprising they’re cautious, and it seems to rub off on the rest of us, too. What I also see is that you’re spending a fair amount of money per year keeping a very old car running. When it finally dies all of that money will be gone for good because all you’ll get is scrap value. All cars eventually reach the point where it is no longer economical to keep them running. With most cars it is a big repair like major engine work or a new transmission. You’ve been lucky enough not to have had one of those catastrophic failures where the decision to scrap it would be easy. Instead you’re paying for it in bits and pieces that add up. When it is only a couple of hundred at a time it’s harder to decide when the car isn’t the worth keeping. Significant rust, like this, can be repaired, but the car will never be as safe as it was, and an older economy car wasn’t that safe even when new. If it were my car I’d be thinking that I was really lucky with this car and got a lot of years and miles out of it, more than expected. And hope that my next car is just as good.