Just Sold, $600.00, Purchased one year ago, 600.00.  Easy come, Easy go.  Yah I tried to get 800.00 for it, but I took what I could get, heck I got a year out of it.

I know my dad will be sad to see it go, the look on his face when EJ showed him Dad's new car was price less.

The ad as it appeared on Craigs list:

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1989 Buick Century - $800 (Grandview)

1989 Buick Century. 140K miles. Runs good. Has good tires.

Runs great. I drove it every day for the last year to work downtown. The paints not pretty on it, but neither am I. The only issue is the transmission fluid needs to be topped up once a month, about 1/2 quart a month depending on how much you drive. 6 cylinder, 3.8, Front wheel drive, heat, a/c, 25/27mpg, Cruise control, No radio. I will get it inspected prior to selling. Has clean title.

 

The Fleet of vehicles has expanded with a 2006 Chevy Express Van, 1500.

What I needed was a reliable, large people mover.

I stumbled across this vehicle for sale at ICOP, a Lenexa Kansas based company (i'm always amazed at the companies I find head-quartered around Kansas City).  This is an All Wheel Drive Van, with dual doors, tow package, Rear Air and heat, 8900 miles.   Drives like large luxury car, excellent, Wife is happy and I may be able to preserve my sanity on long trips.  It's got the basic interior of Cloth and bench seats, but with young kids - that is what is needed.  For long trips we'll be adding the DVD. 

 

1989 Buick Century Thermostat replacement.

 

Thermostats are a simple replacement on most cars.  After a week of 5-10 degree temperatures it became apparrent that something was wrong with the Buick, no heat at all unless the vehicle is idling, at highway speeds the temperature just dropped. 

 

Thermostats are cheap and easy to replace, so it was a good starting point, of course the easy part did not hold true.  Most vehicles have the thermostat easily accessible at the top of the engine on head, just follow the large hose from the top of the radiator, but on the 3.3 liter buick century, the large hose attaches to a filler pipe that goes underneath the mass air flow sensor and intake throttle body, joy.... But wait it gets even better.

 

After finally wiggling and working my fingers between the exahaust and under the mass air-flow sensor, a new surprise, there is a bracket on one of the bolts going to the air-intake, and it was welded on !  Nothing a good hack-saw can't fix, as there was no way I was going to remove all that stuff.  After cutting the bracket, it was just a job of removing the bolts, which was not hard, but not easy, as there was not enough room to get a socket in there, so I had to use box wrenches with about 1/8 of a turn, argh.  Eventually both bolts came out, pipe removed, thermostat replaced, than the frustrating task of getting the bolts back in and putting here back together.

 

A close inspection of the old thermostat shows that it is in a stuck open position, which when it's 10 degrees outside and your moving at 70 mph, means no heat.  Now the Buick has heat.

 

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Bracket Holding the thermostat on:

 

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The Bracket now cut:

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Finally the Thermostat can be reached and removed.

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Old and New Thermostat, Don't forget a new gasket.

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Old Thermostat, notice it is stuck in the open position!

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Putting it all back together !

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She's running good, park in the driveway.  Standing out front, enjoying a cold beer, thud.  Muffler down.

 

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Current Fleet being maintained

69 VW Micro Bus - Sunroof

77 VW Micro Bus - Westfalia camper

2000 Windstar blue

2000 Windstar tan