a wierd chance came up the other day. i work in retail, and one of my regular customers came in swearing at his car. he tells me he will be getting rid of his late 80's-early 90's style cougar once he gets cleared for a honda (yes, i tried to get him in a volvo, but he's made up his mind). he offered to sell me his piece of crap for $100.

my nephew becomes driving age at the end of the year, i figured id snag it up, make it safe and give it to him for his first. afterall, the first car is usually a sacrificial lamb anyways, why make it anythingmore than a total crapper.

the guy tells me its overheating with a brand new radiator. my first thoughts is a water pump and thermostat. old ford, cheap fix.

also, it has trouble starting, mostly anything below 50*F, new battery. alternator and selenoid. again, old ford, cheap fix.

then, my dad brought something interesting to mind. i need to check for a cracked head, or head gasket replacement before anything else, there may be a huge underlying issue.

so.... if anybody has had / or currently has one of these, what else could be goin on? i figure if i spend $100, then get a compression test fail, then it wasnt a total waste. ive never owned or worked on a ford car, but ive had a handfull of mid-late 80's cars, so i can get non-major things done in the garage (cracked heads, it'll go in the junkyard)

looks something like this one


http://img138.imageshack.us/i/coug.jpg/
87-90, large square rear quater window
http://www.coolcats.net/welcome/cougarhistory.html

 

i have a generation before that, it depends on alot, is it the 3.8 V6 or is it the 5.0L?
More likely it is a 3.8, honestly ive had this car for 2 years now (93 000 kms when i got it) and have put about 10 000kms on it since, and i tell you its pretty tough. I even ran it all winter and it started ran like noones buisness, its slow as all hell, and the only problems i had with it were easy and REALLY cheap to fix from parts you get at the parts store down the street.
Last summer the only problem i think i had was i blew 2 rad hoses (those dam 25 year old hoses cant take the heat!)
Things i did to the car:
1. new carb (the new one is worse than the old one) but yours is EFI
2. new valve cover seals (fel-pro FTW)
3. new tires + rims
4. complete soundsystem
5. new power window motors (PITA)
6. haha good story on this one, tranny was ?leaking fluid, but not on the ground, but every couple days it slipped and needed to be filled, but it wasnt on the ground, so i jerked around with that for a bit before i gave up and brought it to a tranny shop, it literally took the old man that works there 10 seconds after i popped my hood to tell me that the seal in the vaccume solenoid on the transmission was shot and needed to be replaced like (35$ and he had it in stock) so the fluid was getting sucked into the engine and burned, and he proved it by showing me the greesy vaccume line.... 5 minute fix from there.

honestly it'll probably be a good experience if you buy that car, and if you need help, http://forums.tccoa.com/ these guys swear by these cars, and they mostly drive cars around your year too.

for 100$ id take it for sure.

 

I hate the sound of head gasket trouble. If it has a warped head or head gasket leak, which is likely due to the overheating, I would run because of the cost of getting a head fixed at the machine shop. You can pick up a lot of old cars for next to nothing when they need a little work.

 

hahaha, saw this thread and thought it was about something else...
oh the CAR!

 

no answer from op

 

When I first seen the heading on this thread, I thought it was some young guy that had a special way to hook up with older women. It is off topic.

 

ditto