After the other guy's insurance company paid me off, I bought my first car ever with a debit card: A decent 1997 I30. It's got 177k miles and the body is in pretty good shape with the exception of normal paint fade on the top edges of the doors and a little ding on the driver's side rear door. There are also a few areas like the door handle liners that show evidence of the mileage. The interior is, as far as I can tell, perfect. Remarkable, given the age and mileage of the car.
I paid a little less than $3k for the car. The motor sounds fine, with no unexplainable mechanical noises, and it pulls pretty good. Kicking into the passing gear on the freeway produces a more interesting result than my poor old Honda (265k miles) ever could. The biggest issue seems to be the suspension. I promise you, I could drive over a penny with this car and tell you if it heads up or tails. It wallows through corners like a '72 Ford LTD. I don't think the struts have been changed once in this car's lifetime. There are two other things that nag at me and make me want to take a couple of vacation days until I get them straightened out: Thanks to this forum, I learned how to trigger and then interpret the flashes on the SES light. What I got was an 05-05, which translated to "no problem, mon" or words to that effect. I reset the light successfully, only to have it reappear less than 12 hours later. Second, the cruise control doesn't work. Again, thanks to this forum, I went through the FSM section on the cruise control and got as far as determining that the steering wheel switches are OK. I'm not seeing voltage on pin 5 on the CC module connector when I have the ignition on and the trans. in "D" and take my foot off the brake. I also have a color code mismatch on the wire to that pin. The next step is to test the inhibitor switch on the transaxle, the inhibitor relay and the brake switch relay. Any tips here would be most welcome. One more nugget: If I turn on the main CC switch and immediately press the "set" button, I can get the "cruise" light to flash. If I turn the main switch on and wait a couple of seconds before pressing "set", I get no lights at all.
Without further ado, here is the car:
And here are the lists:
Immediately
Eibach Pro-kit springs
KYB GR-2 struts
New strut pads
Camber bolts
2 new Falken 205/65/15's up front
Re-shoot the alignment
New pucks in the front brakes, then bleed the whole system
Polish the headlight lenses
Fix the cornering lights
Replace the inhibitor switch on the transaxle
Redo the crappy tint film on the rear window
Replace the aftermarket Pioneer single DIN head unit with a n AVH-P2400BT
Fix the backlighting on the AC control panel
Fix the cruise control
Isolate the SES light problem and fix (Ha!)
Drain & fill three times on the transaxle, then flush and service
Drain & fill on the crankcase, then switch to synthetic
Eliminate the cheap air freshener smell
Questions
Should I add new bushings to the list? What is a good source?
How much road noise should I expect to eliminate with what I'm replacing underneath?
How do I test the motor mounts to see if they are completely shot?
Is there a known good source for new door and trunk rubber? (LOTS of wind noise)
Is there a good "How-to" for installing a bluetooth mic in the headliner near the sunroof/mirror?
I'm debating doing a full-on LED swap for the dashboard backlighting when I do the head unit and the AC control panel. What color combination is preferred?
Are LED dash lights dimmable with the regular dimmer?
Again, thanks to you all for such a great forum. I'm through about the first 30 pages or so, and I'm trying to avoid asking stuff that could be answered in the sticky pages up front.