Putt-putt's yearly major repair

[elSicomoro]

Every year, between January and April, we take Putt-putt (our purple 1995 Geo Metro) into the auto repair shop. Usually, we take it in for something relatively minor, and it becomes major. Fortunately, this year, we budgeted extra money for repairs. And once the car is fixed, it's good to go for another year.

Since Rho bought Putt-putt in the fall of 1998, there's been:

1999: New transmission (It has an automatic Toyota tranny...$2700. This had to be replaced at 48,000 miles. The car had 40K on it when she bought it. Whoever owned the car before her obviously didn't like the lack of power, and probably ran gears 1 and 2 pretty hard.)

2000: New brake system, including calipers ($500); various work for it to pass emissions ($300)

2001: Surprisingly, we only needed new tires and a battery ($300)

2002: New exhaust system, new joint (I don't remember which one), new brake pads ($800)

2003: One lug on each of the front wheels has to be cut off and new ones put on, repair work on each axle (including the balancing and rotating of the tires, which is routine stuff, $630)

Originally, Putt-putt was only in for the lug and tire stuff, then they called me about the axle. It was nice this year to just say, "Yeah, make it happen." Rather than saying, "Shit. We'll have to wait on some of that stuff."

This year, I decided to rent a car for the day, since Rho can't take public transit to work. Plus, I had other stuff to do that would have been a real pain in the ass to do had I used a bus. So, I have a nice 2002 Chevy Impala in the parking lot right now. I'm not a fan of its looks, but it's a nice riding car...lots o' power. I'll probably drive it around some more later...I'm getting my money's worth out of it. And besides, I own a Geo...c'mon!

And I have to give props to the folks over at Morrell Park Exxon. The Millevois have done a good chunk of work on the car over the past year...good guys, good work, good prices, no silly bullshit.

And in the Proof that Nice Folks Still Exist Dept., two weeks ago, we needed a new light for the headlamp. After looking at it, I decided that I would rather have someone else do the work, b/c it looked rather complicated...and I'm mechanically retarded. So, Rho took it over there, and they were more than happy to do it. But they didn't have the part on hand...and their supplier didn't have it either. So, Rho had to go to the Chevy dealership in our neighborhood and buy one. (Surprisingly, it was cheap for a dealer part--$20.) Rho then took the car back over to the station to have it put in. And they did so...for no charge, when they easily could have (and I expected them) to charge $20 or so. Very impressive.

As much as I hate spending money, it obviously has to be done. And most of the stuff that has had to be replaced was original stuff, plus we've put a lot of miles on it (about 100K since Rho bought it, including 40K the year we lived in DC). It has served us well.

I would really like to buy a newer car later this year...this car will be my own (and my first one in 4 years). And eventually, Putt-putt will have to go to scrapheap heaven...I'd like to get at least one more year out of it though...the plates and emissions are due again next March, so we'll see.

[verbatim]

Sounds to me like you're sinking a lot of money into this car. Then again, just this year we had to put a new battery, 4 new tires, a brand new transmission, new brake pades and rotors for all 4, and a new power steering pump into our windstar. Gott sei dank for extended warranties.

[elSicomoro]

I was thinking that a year ago, however...

Realistically, this is an 8-year old Chevy-Suzuki-Toyota hybrid with 140,000 miles on it. We don't know how well it was cared for under its previous owner (and judging from the tranny, I'd suspect it was poor). If I still lived in St. Louis, my stepdad would have been able to fix many of the problems, which would have saved money. Furthermore, one of the most notorious problems with GM cars are the brakes. I've had to have the calipers replaced on 4 of them (including this one). And, as I'm sure you know, we live in a region of the country that is very hard on cars (and don't forget those awesome potholes in Washington, DC and Philadelphia).

In the end, the way I see it, the only thing that was truly out of the ordinary was the transmission. Given how much we've run the car, it's been pretty good to us. Like I said, I'd like one more year out of it...maybe even more. I've seen a Metro run up over 200K miles without a massive repair issue.