Folks,
In 1997 I bought my 1993 Lexus SC300. It had around 95,000 miles on it and I didn't expect it to run forever. But it seems it almost did. I put around 175,000 miles on the car myself. I did replace the front and rear engine seals. But that about it, and it never did smoke are use oil. Man, I love that car......page 2.
One day the car cranked but did not fire. After much research I thought I discovered the problem and set out to fix it myself. I am somewhat mechanical inclined, but certainly not a professional. I changed out a switch on the fuel system (forgot the actual part name) and used a feeler guage to set everything back to proper on the "fuel system". Bingo...it fired and I drove it around 3 or 4 miles, went home, parked, and it has not fired since. I rechecked all the settings several times, but could never get it to fire again, and found the plug were all carbon'd up. So, I started looking for other issues and found that it was not getting fuel from the fuel rail to the plugs. So, thinking something was clogged up, I began taking the fuel rail off to get to the problem. Unfortunately, that is where the repair story ends. I am a software consultant and travel 100%. Having a family, and a traveling job takes all my time. The car is great, and I love it, but I just don't have time to tinker. So, here's my question.....how much could I expect to receive for the car if I sold it "as is"? Body is great. Interior not so great. And engine...well you know that situation by now. It's a classic and I toyed with the thought of buying a new engine, turbos, replacing the auto transmission with a manual transmission, and replacing the interior. If I was wealthy I would probably do that, but you can add those dollars up and see that I would be talking about serious money to do it right.
So, I digress....but I am really going to miss that car. When it quit running I went out and bought a boxter. That boxter holds the road like no other. But that SC300 would run circles around it. Geez, I feel like I'm going through a divorce. :(
Thoughts?
I'll post pictures as a follow up.
Dan