My '89 Lincoln Town Car

[Mainemantom]

Is it a paid internship ?

[L1011tristar17]

Yeah it will be paid. 30 hours a week at $10 an hour sounds like a fair deal to me! It's something I enjoy doing and I can definitely see myself working there after college. Since it's only 30 hours a week I'll also be working at my other job at Firehouse Subs. I'm a shift leader there and my boss is pretty flexible with scheduling.

[L1011tristar17]

Took it for a drive today for the first time in about a week. I noticed that whenever I depress the gas pedal, the CEL comes on and the engine hesitates, as if it tries to die. I still don't know if this is the same Code 34 I got, but the problem goes away after 2-3 minutes. Unfortunately I won't be able to really tear into it until I am finished with my finals. Hopefully it will make the 170 mile drive back from Charlotte and I can just drive the van until I have the time and money to fix that and the front brakes.

[L1011tristar17]

Working on a little problem with the defroster not working. Hopefully it's a little part I can grab at a salvage yard, although lately the local yard won't let me buy anything anymore (like a little spring or switch) without having me buy the whole $100 steering column.

I drove it to Roanoke and back to go to a car show. Lots of awesome cars there! The drive was much more pleasant now that I have working cruise control. No major mechanical issues to report although I think the motor is beginning to show it's mileage. I don't know if it's the timing or ac compressor, but the motor sounds a little bit like a diesel at idle. In case the motor decides to quit, I'll try and tackle as much of the rebuild as I can with the money I have already saved up just in case.

Sway bar bushings are frigged, at least on the driver's side. Time to order a pair of new ones. I also noticed that a bit of insulation is touching the heat shield on the exhaust. I don't know what it's for, so should I worry about removing it?

[gadget73]

sound deadning for the car. I'd cut away the stuff thats laying on the converter and leave the rest be.

The diesel at idle thing is just a high mileage lopo. If it still makes oil pressure most of the time, ignore it.

[L1011tristar17]

Over the last few days I replaced the sagging headliner. It was falling down in the back and starting to in the front, so I wrestled the board out of the car without (miraculously) breaking anything. The end product looks nice, except for a small crease in the fabric behind the dome light that was my fault. I also managed to knock off the rearview mirror installing the new board. That's the way she goes boys.

The new blower motor also came in today. Said it was for a -98 or later Crown Vic, but it fit right in. It also came with two wiring adapters. The fan now blows nice and fast, although I'll still do the relay upgrade when I have the time.

[Louis]

Beautiful car you have there. Do a youtube search for the CNN report on the old man who has over 1,300,000 miles on his Towncar.

I doubt if I will ever part with my '84, highly unlikely that a car will ever be made like that again.

[Mainemantom]

Good going on the headliner.

[L1011tristar17]

Here's a pic of the new headliner (it's dark, so it doesn't show much)

[L1011tristar17]

Beautiful car you have there. Do a youtube search for the CNN report on the old man who has over 1,300,000 miles on his Towncar.

I doubt if I will ever part with my '84, highly unlikely that a car will ever be made like that again.

I did watch that! I also went on some car review website (don't remember the name) and a few guys there had Town Cars with over 400k miles on them. I plan on keeping mine for a while since everything works fine. No rust either, which is also great.

[L1011tristar17]

In the process of changing the transmission fluid on the Lincoln. I found that the local Ford dealer still sells 5-quart containers of Mercon V for $30, but in the end it is cheaper at Walmart or Autozone with the individual quarts. I also got the blower motor working again and fixed a little bit of the wiring. I have all the parts for the blower relay upgrade but since the new motor blows nice and strong I might do it later. I'm driving back to Charlotte next Sunday so I want to make sure it's definitely roadworthy.

[L1011tristar17]

Looks like I'll be dropping the pan again. I opened the box for the new filter and found the little gasket that's supposed to go into the filter. I had driven my car for a little bit without one of the gaskets and it seemed normal to me, but I'm going to go ahead and park it until I drop the pan again and add the gasket.

[L1011tristar17]

Update on the Lincoln:

-Just rolled over 238,000 last week so it is in need of an oil change.
-I still need to change those u-joints. I haven't yet because I mostly drive across or through campus and rarely go above 35.
-Rear shocks need to be replaced. They're fine for now, but there is heavy scraping sounds whenever people are sitting in the back seat as well as overall ride quality issues.
-I'm not sure if the transmission is slipping, but sometimes in first gear whenever I apply throttle the car revs up as if it was in neutral and then lurches forward. This only happens on occasion but more often than it used to.
-CEL is back on whenever I apply more than 50% throttle, along with the engine hesitating and not responding quickly.

I hope to get most (or all) of these issues taken care of this upcoming weekend. As much as I love this car, I'm trying to be mindful of what's worth fixing on a car with this many miles.

[L1011tristar17]

Another update:

Just rolled over 239,000 earlier last week on a trip down to South Carolina. The ride there and back was smooth for the most part, but I did hear some knocking from the engine that concerned me a bit. Under normal acceleration from a stoplight, the knocking starts once the vehicle shifts to third gear and goes away if you let off the pedal. If this becomes a more serious issue, I may rebuild/swap the engine this summer.

I've had all four of the "new" shocks ready to go in, but one of the crap-tastic Autozone locking lug nuts stripped out on me. Pretty frustrating since I left my spare lug nuts and hammer back home. I don't drive my car that much anyways, so it can wait. I'm trying to decide what I'm going to be doing with this car and what my long-term plans for it are.

I also installed a new TPS, which helped the idling issues out tremendously.

[watchdog]

That thing is MINTY fresh. The guys here are right, a litthe rattle at idle on a high millage lopo is normal. I think the came from the factory like that. A knock though, I'd at least want to know where that is coming from. If it is termnal, an HO swap might be in order.