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rabidmadman
Actual Owner
Joined: 15 Mar 2009
Posts: 142
Location: East Brunswick/Slayerville, NJ
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 Posted: Sun Jun 07, 2009 10:59 am Post subject: Getting Fucked over.... |
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So I bought my Caprice 2 years ago....and I guess I was pretty naive. The car is mechanically sound, but I just noticed today that the ENTIRE front half of my roof is fucking body filler...............................
Before buying the car, I took a magnet across all the panels, hood etc. But I neglected to check the roof thoroughly. Yesterday, I was bored, and I noticed some imperfections in the roof..and then found out the great fucking news!!!
It sucks to be retarded and naive. I don't know that much about cars, but I have some general knowledge and If I knew that the car was in a major accident, I would have kept looking. The Carfax report came back clean.....so I figured it was safe to assume that the car had a clean record.
So what would you recommend that I do eventually? Under the hood the car is clean and well maintained and all of the doors and panels are seemingly fine minus the roof. Should I consider welding new metal or should I be taking the entire back half off a donor Caprice? I'm seriously ashamed of myself.....
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1988 Chevy Caprice Classic Owner.
Engine: 305 V8
Location: New Jersey |
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NotDadsW41
Site Admin
Joined: 10 Dec 2007
Posts: 195
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| Posted: Sun Jun 07, 2009 4:16 pm Post subject: |
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Dude that sucks. My guess would be the car originally had a vinyl roof, it rusted, was removed and repaired, rather than having been in an accident. Thus the clean CarFax.
Properly repairing the roof panel with new metal, understand their will be some filler needed, is the best you can do.
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CD Smalley
Site Owner/Admin
1991 W41 #142
1995 Astro
1989 9C1
1997 C1500
"No sacrifice or service of mine requires any other reward than that which conscience gives to every man who does his duty" - Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain |
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Deathdeelr
Shadetree Mechanic
Joined: 10 Jul 2009
Posts: 161
Location: Sussex, NJ
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| Posted: Sun Jul 19, 2009 10:45 am Post subject: |
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Don't worry too much about a large section having some body filler. It was bound to crack at some point and I happen to agree that the car may have had a rag top. Typical cheap Maaco job. A lot of people are just not willing to pay the money for a top line metal guy to iron out the problems instead of having some illegal spackle the hell out of a roof and paint it.
Check with any local body shop. You may be surprised. I was told by one shop that does resto's that so long as I do the couple of rusty uglies in the lower doors, he'll remove all the dents and dings, mask, prime and shoot the car for $2g's. He said for me to do the rusty stuff as he doesn't allow bondo in his shop so he would not do anything but weld in new metal or just replace the doors. That would run another $1,000. Either way it's still cheap for a top quality body and paint job that will last another 20 years.
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Me hid big dings wid da hamma.
ASE Certified Master Tech
http://www.cardomain.com/ride/3311846 |
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rabidmadman
Actual Owner
Joined: 15 Mar 2009
Posts: 142
Location: East Brunswick/Slayerville, NJ
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| Posted: Sat Aug 08, 2009 12:30 pm Post subject: |
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Yeah I mean my primary concerns for a while are the mechanical issues..it is just sad to have such a hack. I replaced my headliner recently...(the only cosmetic issue I wanted to take care of) and I saw a handful of holes with fillers sticking out of them.Sucks...I'm pretty sure it didn't have a vinyl roof because of the caprice emblem on the roof pillars.
It's factory burgundy in color and I don't think these cars came optioned with a red vinyl roof. The rest of the car is the absolute base package minus the 305 unless the 4.3 was still offered in 1988. Either way, I'm not too upset about it because the rest of the car is clean and it's safe to say that I will have to invest some money into getting the roof properly repaired and looking nice when I have the cash to make the car look clean.
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1988 Chevy Caprice Classic Owner.
Engine: 305 V8
Location: New Jersey |
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rabidmadman
Actual Owner
Joined: 15 Mar 2009
Posts: 142
Location: East Brunswick/Slayerville, NJ
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| Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2009 2:35 pm Post subject: |
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Picture of the roof with the headliner off:
Somebody better have jumped off a building and landed on the car...
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1988 Chevy Caprice Classic Owner.
Engine: 305 V8
Location: New Jersey |
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NotDadsW41
Site Admin
Joined: 10 Dec 2007
Posts: 195
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| Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2009 4:51 pm Post subject: |
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Wowser! Looks like that is what happened!
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CD Smalley
Site Owner/Admin
1991 W41 #142
1995 Astro
1989 9C1
1997 C1500
"No sacrifice or service of mine requires any other reward than that which conscience gives to every man who does his duty" - Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain |
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rabidmadman
Actual Owner
Joined: 15 Mar 2009
Posts: 142
Location: East Brunswick/Slayerville, NJ
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| Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2009 5:03 pm Post subject: |
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Yeah...I'll never know the true story with this car. It seems like all the panels have been replaced at some point. Every time I hear a story on youtube of a 1 owner accident free caprice or random b-body I get jealous haha. I wish my dad kept his 83 lesabre. On the positive side, I'm pretty sure the car was garage kept because the under carriage is very clean with absolutely no rust on the floor boards and the motor is pretty clean.
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1988 Chevy Caprice Classic Owner.
Engine: 305 V8
Location: New Jersey |
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NotDadsW41
Site Admin
Joined: 10 Dec 2007
Posts: 195
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| Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2009 8:16 pm Post subject: |
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That really makes one wonder just what happened then doesn't it... Hmm...
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CD Smalley
Site Owner/Admin
1991 W41 #142
1995 Astro
1989 9C1
1997 C1500
"No sacrifice or service of mine requires any other reward than that which conscience gives to every man who does his duty" - Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain |
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patdaly
Newbie
Joined: 12 Dec 2007
Posts: 16
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| Posted: Sun Sep 27, 2009 6:56 pm Post subject: |
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Rabid, that looks to be an amatur with a drill home repair. No way a reputable bodyshop would do something like that on the roof, it would have been way easier to straighten than fill all those holes, and even then a reputable shop would have used a stud gun, not drilled.......
And that damage was not nearly as bad as it looks, when you get that large of a surface, just an idiot walking on it could have done that. |
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rabidmadman
Actual Owner
Joined: 15 Mar 2009
Posts: 142
Location: East Brunswick/Slayerville, NJ
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| Posted: Tue Sep 29, 2009 6:00 pm Post subject: |
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man...
I'm going to take pictures of the other obvious body work and post it on here. Hopefully I can get the body touched up properly by some decent body mechanics.
Fucking sucks......but at least the car is alright mechanically. I've had it for over 2 years and it's never let me down. Runs a little bit rich and takes premium gas on the little 305....but drives great otherwise.
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1988 Chevy Caprice Classic Owner.
Engine: 305 V8
Location: New Jersey |
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brentalan
Newbie
Joined: 12 Dec 2007
Posts: 47
Location: Alpha, New Jersey
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| Posted: Tue Sep 29, 2009 6:07 pm Post subject: |
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| Check your ignition timing and maybe run a can of carb cleaner through the tank. You shouldn't need to use premium to get the car to run right. |
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rabidmadman
Actual Owner
Joined: 15 Mar 2009
Posts: 142
Location: East Brunswick/Slayerville, NJ
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| Posted: Tue Sep 29, 2009 6:51 pm Post subject: |
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I had my timing checked and it was set right. I was told that my carb is in need of a rebuild. I've cleaned the living piss out of the carb and have seen no results. The carb is also adjusted to specs. I've poured seafoam in the gas and saw no results either. So I figure the carb is in need of a rebuild.
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1988 Chevy Caprice Classic Owner.
Engine: 305 V8
Location: New Jersey |
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