After a nationwide search, I was very happy to find exactly the Astro I wanted right here in central Ohio. I wanted a rust-free first gen shorty just like my dad had, and here it is. After months of searching, I had resigned myself to buying a second gen van, all of which had the long tail. The PO, deceased, had loved and cared for this van and reserved it for family trips and vacations, and that is my purpose for the van as well. No daily service, no salt, no commuting--just family fun.
The van was advertised as having 235,XXX miles. I was surprised that the van could be in such condition with that many miles and years--in Ohio. The seller (the deceased owner's son in law) had misread the mileage; this van has a five digit odometer with a tenths place at the end. Displayed miles were actually 23,5XX.X, so the question then was had the odometer flipped, and if so, how many times? I speculated on the drive home after buying it that maybe the mileage was original. But the PO had left enough records behind to help me determine that it has 123,5XX miles. At least they were kind and gentle miles.
The Astro needs a headliner and AC service.
AC service might be a conversion. I am not sure about the AC; there is no conversion sticker under the hood, but the seller gave me an empty R134 can that he said was inside the van. That not being enough evidence to convince me that the system has been converted, I will convert to be certain that all is right. Since I have no AC equipment, I will probably have a shop do this work for me.
The headliner is no surprise either. It's a 34 year old vehicle. I have no upholstery experience, but surely the only right way to do this would be to remove the whole headliner, replace the fabric, and glue it on. I might chicken out and have a shop do this also. The plastic side panels that overlap the headliner are long (left runs from the rear to the B pillar and the right if half that length due to the sliding door) and I don't want to break the plastic bits because I would never find replacements as nice as these.
But just because it's a family hauler doesn't mean it has to be slow, right? I finally picked up an L31 for a build and swap. The L31 with a carb and headers would be a substantial improvement over the 190HP V6, but I will install a better cam and rebuild the bottom end. I might even overbore it if the cylinders aren't really nice.
Might even overbore...
Not that I would ever believe the seller of a used engine when they say "it was pulled a month ago and sheltered," but this was not quite as nice as I had been hoping for. Ah, well... It's nothing that an overbore can't fix. It's a $250 rebuildable core. As long as the heads are healthy, I will still be happy. They are the 062 heads, also. Hey, maybe the crank is jacked up and I am forced to build a stroker.