RE: OT - geocaching

["Chasteen, Howard" <Howard.Chasteen(at)fotf.org>]

I just built a 94 Geo Metro from salvage parts. The body was perfect but it needed an engine.This is the third one of these cars I have owned since the original Chevy Sprint ER I purchased new in 1986. That first car with the Hitachi carb, special gearing etc got 63 MPG on the highway. The two Metros I have had get around 50-55 on the Highway and certainly have enough pickup to get around. I drive the BMW on weekends and keep collector plates on it!

 

Metros are not all that unsafe either. The self sacrificing body design protects the passengers well. There is only one known bug with these cars and that is that the fuel injected models tend to get the EGR valve ports clogged in the head which can cause severe overheating of #3 cylinder an melt the valves. This is rare but does happen. The thing to do is if you notice the car running hot have the EGR passages and valve cleaned.

 

My first Sprint required zero, nil, no $ maintenance for 259,000 miles and then it was hit by and Oldsmobile and totaled but I was unhurt. The clutch was still good and I had adjusted the valves around 5 or 6 times. Tires cost $15 each then. I think they are around $20 now at Wally World.

 

Second car same story but it was not wrecked.

 

I bought a car with a bad head and a salvage car and put together the one I am driving now and enjoy going for 3 weeks between fill-ups! It irks me to have the cash sucked out of my wallet just to go back and forth to work. Some folks are dropping $150 to fuel their cars. Hey I have nothing against large cars. I love them.

 

Isn't it ironic all the buzz we hear about hybrids! They base their environmental impact on the mileage and the amount of pollution required to manufacture the car. The Metro wins hands down in both categories. Most of the hybrids only get around 35 or 40 in town. My Metro beats that and when the hybrid dies you have to either give the car back to be recycled or a huge hazardous waste disposal problem.

 

Typical of the big three. Now they are all in trouble and if they were still building Metros they could sell faster than they are made. Now we are wide open for a Chinese mini car invasion and it is happening as we speak. They showed several models at the 2006 car shows.

 

Howard

---

From: owner-ds(at)Softimage.COM [mailto:owner-ds(at)Softimage.COM] On Behalf Of Brandon Bussinger
Sent: Monday, January 30, 2006 1:41 PM
To: DS(at)Softimage.COM
Subject: Re: OT - geocaching

I had a Geo Prizm with over 200,000 miles on it and it always ran 
great.  It even survived multiple collisions with the front end from a Ford 
Explorer (which wouldn't run after the first few collisions).  It's a long 
story but let's just say I walked outside and found a Ford Explorer running back 
and forth between a brick wall and my Prizm (The driver's decision to do this 
was apparently preceeded by about a half a bottle of Valium a full bottle of 
hard liqour and a rather depressing Thanksgiving at church).  The point is, 
the Explorer was done for, and I drove the Prizm home.

Brandon

On Jan 19, 2006, at 3:25 PM, michael thomas wrote:

I bought a metro brand new in 93 for $7,999. Drove it 150,000K miles with hardly a problem. Worked out to about 5 cents a mile. Best value I had with a vehicle. Drove it from Atlanta to Detroit with 5 passengers and 5 suitcases!

 

 

 

 

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Scott Malkie

To: DS(at)Softimage.COM

Sent: Thursday, January 19, 2006 3:07 PM

Subject: Re: OT - geocaching

Hoarding small, cheaply made but very gas effiecient cars from the mid-1990s?  

I had a friend with a purple Geo Metro once.   We laughed at him a lot.

On 1/19/06, Judy Ranelli <jranelli(at)ewtn.com> wrote:

OT – anyone else on here geocaching?  I just started and it's already an obsession.

JUDY