Not a good time for a new car....

mrwillie wrote: @jrw -- Do you happen to know how much room there is in the back for two car seats and baby stuff??

Tons of room. These were GM's first "Cross-over" listed as an SUV but built on the same GM minivan frame. It really is a short minivan with rear traditional doors rather than sliding doors. The goal was to look and appeal to Lexus crossover buyers.

Standard was a rear bench seat. Optional was center captains chairs and a third row two person bench. With the bench the back is fully open and ample space (comparable to your Explorer but taller) Picture with bench 2nd row. The bench also folds for lumber hauling.

http://www.cargurus.com/Cars/2007-Buick-Rendezvous-Pictures-c7755_pi62419?picturesTabFilter=INTERIOR

I never owned one but in years past I used to ask for them as rental cars because with the bench they were very good at moving adults with ample legroom and the rental companies did not gouge for them like they did minivans.
My b-i-l had a couple of them that he used as high mile per year "salesman cars."

mrwillie wrote: In reply to HStockSolo: I don't know much about these. I tend to dislike toyotas, but I'll consider it. How are they room-wise?

I like the size a lot. It has enough room in back for a load of groceries. It is an XLE so it has 2 seats in the middle and sliding doors on both sides.

We previously had a 6-passenger 2001 Dodge Intrepid SE and then a 6-passenger 1999 Buick Century both of which got considerably better mileage, but were pretty packed with all 6 of us in them. Both required some engine work too.

My wife drives the new cars. I drive the old E36 M3.

I work on our cars mostly after the kids go to bed (8 pm) and on weekends.

I have saved us 10's of thousands of dollars working on our cars myself, so occasionally when I screw-up, I put it under the "experience" column. I know my limitations and I keep to them. Some stuff goes to a shop but I do a lot myself. I recently tore into a transmission (my spare) which is a new experience. Get yourself a shop manual, do online research and arm yourself with knowledge. Then keep up the good work - even the pros screw up sometimes!

mrwillie wrote: I can't really talk around here w/o being told what I should have done or what I need to do.

Forgive me if I making the wrong assumption, but having been there before the statement above worries me.

There's only 24 hours in the day. That's why there are fast food resturants, oil change shops, and Maytag repairmen. You cannot do it all yourself.

You will not catch all the impending disasters. You will make mistakes. You will get in over your head. Some days you will look like a champ, and other days you will be a total chump.

That is life. And your son will watch you. He will learn how to handle life by watching how you handle your life.

@everybody -- Thanks again for everything said thus far. Due to frustration, I haven't been thinking clearly lately. Overall, we're in a good spot right now and could be alot worse. No one got hurt and everything is still gonna be ok. We've decided that we're gonna start looking at odysseys this weekend. We need room for two car seats, and all of the appropriate baby baggage plus room to carry stuff for our business when necessary.

Thanks again and I'll let you know how it turns out.

P.S. -- Anybody need any parts off of a 1999 explorer limited??? It's getting scrapped next week probably....

Don't beat yourself up too badly about it. Those SOHC Explorers chuck timing chains randomly, and they don't actually have a service interval, so if you're not in the know, there would be no reason at all to change them. Even if you are in the know, I'd rather put and engine in one than a set of timing chains. What a terrible job.

mrwillie wrote: P.S. -- Anybody need any parts off of a 1999 explorer limited??? It's getting scrapped next week probably....

What colour is the interior?

I need a grey console lid, if its not cracked.

Side note... are the late 90's-early 2k caravans worth spending money on??

I love those things. The 3.0 is rock solid other than needing a water pump here and there, and sometimes smoking a little. The 3.3/3.8 are rock solid.. the end! They hardly ever break .

I actually really like the 604 trans that's in most of them. I and my family have had many of them and never had a bad experience, although a lot of that is probably due to the owners.. I worked for a trans shop for 2 years and rebuilt the 604s that came in. Generally they were overheated because of no tranny cooler, degraded trans fluid, and clogging cooler valves. The hard parts themselves are pretty reliable and if you keep them cool and with good fluid in them they pretty much last forever.

on't get the Caravan, 93EXCivic is right - I have never seen one that hasn't gone through at least 1 transmission. My girlfriend's dad drove one as a work vehicle and at 240k it had been through 5 When it came to #6 they went out and got him a brand new Kia van...

At that point it might help to get a trans builder who knows WTF he's doing. My parents had a 97 caravan with a 604 that had no issues until the seals got hard around 200k. I went through and rebuilt it with JUST seals and clutches (really just needed seals) and it was still kicking on that original trans with all original hard parts at 240k when they traded it in on cash for clunkers. Original speed sensors and solenoid pack, too. But it had a trans cooler and at least a few fluid changes, so that makes it pretty much an invalid comparison against 95% of the 604 failures in the world.

I think the worst experiences ive had with 604s out of the dozen or so that have been in the family, were the FIRST-YEAR 89 caravan that slipped at ~190k.. (no complaints there), and the 97 intrepid that i owned that i burned out 4th gear doing 130mph. 4th gear is a known weak point in that design and while a stock car generally cant burn through it anyway, a modded one can. I broke it, it didnt break itself. Not really relevant info for a family hauler caravan. The rest of them were great.

In reply to NGTD: its got the tan interior.

@everybody -- I live about 2mils from the place the truck is at. Could a v8 make it that distance w/ no traffic and no compression on cylinder 1?

Ok...just as an update my explorer isn't toast. I ran well enough for me to drive it home from the shop it was being looked at. Turns out that I have a crack in my egr pipe( visible -- almost big enough to stick the tip of my pinkie into ), a crack in the plastic tank of the radiator and maybe a bad egr valve. The tech barely cracked the hood of the car.

I haven't had any time to look at it w/ daylight, but I do have two codes from the car: P0301 - Misfire cyl 1( bad coil, wires, plugs ) P0401 - insufficient egr flow( from the cracked pipe..)

Could either of these lead the tech into thinking that there was "no compression in cyl1"? I'm thinking that between some JB weld and a muffler repair kit, I can fix the metal egr tube. Then I just need to buy a radiator. Once I fix all of these issues are there other major issues I need to be on the lookout for( warped heads, bad thermostat, overheated tranny, etc...)? I was gonna replace the thermostat just in case, though.

$$? I'm not that cynical though- he probably read "misfire" as something more serious. Glad to hear it's "serviceable". Do you want to do a pressure check on the cooling system before the major work?

Teh E36 M3 wrote: $$? I'm not that cynical though- he probably read "misfire" as something more serious. Glad to hear it's "serviceable". Do you want to do a pressure check on the cooling system before the major work?

Nah - just a bad tech, he heard misfire and assumed the worst.

Glad to hear you're out of the woods, though. JB weld probably won't hold up to that temperature, but at least it's not a new engine.

Teh E36 M3 wrote: $$? I'm not that cynical though- he probably read "misfire" as something more serious. Glad to hear it's "serviceable". Do you want to do a pressure check on the cooling system before the major work?

I hadn't thought about that, but I could. Those kits are cheap from HF. Thanks for the info.

I don't think that they were intentionally trying to mislead my w/ my diagnosis, but it makes it hard for me to trust farming out any other work to them. I really want to find someone local I can trust again w/ my cars.

Update.... turns out that I have a milkshake in my engine. Im kinda frustrated by this whole situation. Im in the process of buying tires for our honda as it will be the primary car for awhile. The explorer has over 220k on it and i dont have the skillset to diag it cheaply. Could be a cracked block or just a head gasket. Either way, its over my head right now.Gonna start shopping for a beater for me w/ somewhat decent mileage, room for 4 and under $2k. Gonna need something that rel easy for the diy weekender to maintain. Thanks for all the info on the explorer.