[1965gp]

Man the things I saw people do to new cars when I worked at car dealerships was crazy.

[mgarblik]

Originally Posted by 1965gp

Man the things I saw people do to new cars when I worked at car dealerships was crazy.

Your not kidding: Three little examples of how new cars were delivered to my Pontiac dealer. 1. Three carrier loads of Pontiac Sunbirds, all exactly the same, for the local power company DP&L. Dark green exteriors Paint so thin/so bad, primer showing. All the cars had to be repainted below the beltline in the body shop. 2. Grand Prix on top level of carrier. Driver gets in, pulls out of park and car flies off carrier and smashes into retaining wall. Heavy damage. Master cylinder was stolen in transit to dealer. 3. My favorite: Turbo Trans AM 301 delivered to dealer, driven off truck and presented to me for pre-delivery. It had 7 pistons installed at the factory! One piston and rod were missing entirely. Low oil pressure, smoke and a hell of a mis-fire. But built, installed and delivered that way? Tech put one piston, rod, and bearing in it, a couple gaskets and it was sold as a new car. That's the way it was done in the late 70's early 80's.

[unruhjonny]

Originally Posted by mgarblik

3. My favorite: Turbo Trans AM 301 delivered to dealer, driven off truck and presented to me for pre-delivery. It had 7 pistons installed at the factory! One piston and rod were missing entirely. Low oil pressure, smoke and a hell of a mis-fire. But built, installed and delivered that way? Tech put one piston, rod, and bearing in it, a couple gaskets and it was sold as a new car. That's the way it was done in the late 70's early 80's.

I'm not suggesting you're wrong, but how would that even be possible!?
Wow, that would be several checkpoints that it would have had to go through, and then they were driven out from assembly...
wow, just wow.

[mgarblik]

Originally Posted by unruhjonny

I'm not suggesting you're wrong, but how would that even be possible!?
Wow, that would be several checkpoints that it would have had to go through, and then they were driven out from assembly...
wow, just wow.

This is probably not the place to elaborate. But if you want to PM me, I can provide more detail. I was a first year technician and did not do the actual repair, but I did do some of the diagnosis. Your right, just incredible. What I would have given for a cell phone camera in those days! The look on the technicians face when he pulled the head was priceless.

[66sprint6]

This guy posted this car earlier for 99,000.00. Super rare '77 Chevelle SE. Now he wants you to lend him 20,000.00 so that he can fix it up. It's guaranteed, in his mind, because after it's fixed up, maybe he feels that it will be worth 200,000.00.

They should have a convention where all of these wackos get together and talk about their rare and highly valuable cars. We could have the guy with the '70 Firebird WT5, that guy with the prototype Firebird (or Camaro, I can't remember) and any other person that has decided on their own that they have some super rare and valuable "one of one" car.


https://www.kijiji.ca/v-classic-cars...eed/1482011985

[66sprint6]

OOPS , posted in the wrong section...supposed to be in epic Craigslist ad section. Sorry about that.

Originally Posted by 66sprint6

This guy posted this car earlier for 99,000.00. Super rare '77 Chevelle SE. Now he wants you to lend him 20,000.00 so that he can fix it up. It's guaranteed, in his mind, because after it's fixed up, maybe he feels that it will be worth 200,000.00.

They should have a convention where all of these wackos get together and talk about their rare and highly valuable cars. We could have the guy with the '70 Firebird WT5, that guy with the prototype Firebird (or Camaro, I can't remember) and any other person that has decided on their own that they have some super rare and valuable "one of one" car.


https://www.kijiji.ca/v-classic-cars...eed/1482011985

[goatless]

Not sure what the big deal is. There are occasional issues with almost all new cars. I would think that they would be more prevalent in higher performance, hand built cars. Warranty will cover it- if not for the poorly thought out decision of this tech to post the video, no one but the guys involved would have ever even known.

[Formulabruce]

Originally Posted by unruhjonny

I'm not suggesting you're wrong, but how would that even be possible!?
Wow, that would be several checkpoints that it would have had to go through, and then they were driven out from assembly...
wow, just wow.

I was recieving And Set up on cars at my Pontiac Dealer. I signed off on the bill of lading, which looked just like a build sheet, in triplicate. All cars condition and parts, wheel covers, etc, had to be there to sign for the delivery. If it ran like crap, it did not matter. During set up you could put in a warranty claim. I know this, the special models like pace cars were a low quality build on most cars. By ' 79 there were as many or more birds coming off the line as Camaros. One a minute basically. Lots of ordered cars came late due to the unfinished car lot being so busy with problems. Many people think things are all cut and dry. We had to lock up floor mats, pull off wheels with full size tires, owner's manuals, wheel covers, etc due to SALES . This started because new cars came through missing owner's manuals, decals, mats, etc. Replacement paperwork was a Long time coming. Lots of interesting memories ..

[unruhjonny]

Originally Posted by Formulabruce

I was recieving And Set up on cars at my Pontiac Dealer. ...

I was never trying to suggest it didn't happen.

I was in shock at how it could happen.

I have understood that there was a holding area at the end of the production line which would have quarantined any cars with observed issues - I would think that a severe miss would have warranted quarantine.
But even before that, before the engine left the engine plant, it would have been assembled, then test run;
If the engine was assembled during shift change, and a rod/slug were missed, wouldn't it have been caught when it was test run on propane??!

I have read of many the problems these cars could have had when built, but it was this singular example which seems to encapsulate so many opportunities for an issue to have been identified with the engine... such a huge failure for all checkpoints, that it's utterly astounding.

[salem1912]

Once had a 3.8L Plymouth van for new car prep. Had a missfire that gave me a hard time. Lower compression in one cylinder(15 lower) than other cylinders. Turn out it had 5 3.8L rods and one 3.3L rod installed. Factory screw up but we didn't call the newspaper. (no facebook in 1990)