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moloo posted:I'm going for a compression test tomorrow. I'm thinking I'm looking at new rings? Really hope not... Sounds like the rings in #4 are shot. If the compression test confirms it, you're probably better off just sourcing out another motor. It would cost as much, if not cheaper, and get done a hell of a lot faster. Hell a motor swap in a Miata can be done in less than a day with the right tools and a few buddies to help out. Even if you had a mechanic do it, the labor to swap and the cost of a good used motor would be cheaper than labor/parts to tear down and rebuild the original. [edit] Or you could go with a used short block, but that's a lot more labor intensive so it might even out anyway after labor (unless you do it yourself). Long blocks go for around $700 and short blocks $300. But really, the Miata's motor is pretty drat easy to do. Applebees Appetizer fucked around with this message at 04:42 on Dec 16, 2007 |
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Dec 16, 2007 04:32
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I would just like to take this opportunity to say gently caress YOU AND loving DIE to everyone at Robbins tops. If any other piece of equipment was this poorly manufactured, people would be making GBS threads bricks over it. Ive never seen so many holes misplaced (by up to more than 1/4 inch) or such poor initial fitment. It took three god damned people almost an hour just to get the loving thing latched for the first time, even with the latches adjusted all the way out. I hope everyone at Robbins gets AIDs, cancer and maybe kidney stones and dies. gently caress them all.
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Dec 18, 2007 13:36
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Anyone near NYC? There is a car I put a deposit down thats located at Long Island - all was great until he refused to take it to a dealership for inspection. He is allowing someone to check out the car at his residence though  Anyone willing to check it out for me? Biggest thing I really am fearful of is the #4 bearing issue on the 99/00 miatas. I'll compensate for time or gas or whatever if anyone is willing.
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Dec 18, 2007 14:46
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Schwack posted:I would just like to take this opportunity to say gently caress YOU AND loving DIE to everyone at Robbins tops. If any other piece of equipment was this poorly manufactured, people would be making GBS threads bricks over it. Ive never seen so many holes misplaced (by up to more than 1/4 inch) or such poor initial fitment. It took three god damned people almost an hour just to get the loving thing latched for the first time, even with the latches adjusted all the way out. I hope everyone at Robbins gets AIDs, cancer and maybe kidney stones and dies. gently caress them all. Aaaand this is why I am trying to look for good NB tops on the frame already 
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Dec 18, 2007 15:26
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IOwnCalculus posted:Aaaand this is why I am trying to look for good NB tops on the frame already Has nothing to do with being on the frame. That was easy as hell. The problem came when mounting it back to the car. Half of the holes along the back were just flat out in the wrong spots. gently caress Robbins.
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Dec 18, 2007 19:14
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leica posted:Sounds like the rings in #4 are shot. If the compression test confirms it, you're probably better off just sourcing out another motor. It would cost as much, if not cheaper, and get done a hell of a lot faster. Hell a motor swap in a Miata can be done in less than a day with the right tools and a few buddies to help out. Even if you had a mechanic do it, the labor to swap and the cost of a good used motor would be cheaper than labor/parts to tear down and rebuild the original. Just got my garage warm enough to do a compression test... #1 195 psi #2 185 psi #3 195 psi #4 ~15 psi - enough to move the needle a bit and make a noise when disconnecting ouch... I'm thinking about just going motor swap because I don't have too much cash and I really need the car. I would rather go for a 95 1.8l with OBDI. Does anyone know a good place for miata engines? Ebay is ridiculous and I've already checked miata.net and turbo miata for sale postings. I have a friend that i've helped (hand the guy tools mostly...) swap engines in 240sx's, he's got a cherry picker and a ton of tools but I don't have a ton of free time and it would be pretty cold since he doesn't have a heated garage. Any reccomendations for a good (miata) shop in St. Louis?
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Dec 18, 2007 20:34
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Schwack posted:Has nothing to do with being on the frame. That was easy as hell. The problem came when mounting it back to the car. Half of the holes along the back were just flat out in the wrong spots. gently caress Robbins. I think you missed his point, which was OEM tops are the best way to go frame or no frame. moloo posted:Does anyone know a good place for miata engines? Ebay is ridiculous and I've already checked miata.net and turbo miata for sale postings. http://www.planetmiata.com/ Or just go to a local import used parts place. Or try a pick-n-pull you might get lucky. 
Applebees Appetizer fucked around with this message at 03:30 on Dec 19, 2007 |
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Dec 19, 2007 03:26
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Is there a simple way to remove the dash blank? I cant seem to get the bastard to pop out and I dont want to mess up my dash prying on it too hard. (This is for the defroster switch)
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Dec 20, 2007 02:16
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I've been shopping for stuff to upgrade in my 1999, but I'm stumped over what to get. I know I'll budget up to $1,200 because I have nothing to do from January to March 2008. The odometer is approximately 53,670 miles and the only thing I've done since buying the car is put in Blizzaks and a block heater last month. I can get... - A set of Kosei 15" wheels and Bridgestone Potenzas for $1,000. I'll need new tires for Spring to Fall 2008, but getting new wheels AND tires would be nice. - A new non-Bose head unit, speakers and amplifier for around $1,200. I would like to listen to music contained in a 200GB notebook hard drive next year. - A pre-emptive timing belt change, oil/water/fuel pump change, sparkplug change and anything else I (or the local Mazda-dealer mechanics) can do within the ~$1,200 budget. As long as I can do it one day at a time, I'm good. It's a daily driver and I can also rent a garage in the local military base to do any dirty work. I'm open to suggestions.
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Dec 20, 2007 06:57
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You probably need new shocks. Go with Konis, if you'd like adjustable shocks, or Bilstein HDs if you don't want to mess with knobs. You could upgrade bushings, too, but that's a serious pain in the rear end, it'll take more than a day to do, and yours are probably at least decent. The shocks ought to take about six hours at a relaxed pace. The improvement will blow your mind. You can shoehorn a timing belt and waterpump change into the budget, as well, and still have cash left over.
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Dec 20, 2007 12:28
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Well, poo poo. I woke up this morning and started my car to get to the store to a symphony of crappy noises. My A/C compressor sounds like it ate sand for breakfast. Merry loving Christmas to me. Luckily I am without P/S, so I cut the belt and disabled it for now. So, fellow Miata fags, advice? Do I rebuild this expensive piece of poo poo, or do I rip the system out entirely for JDM tyte weight savings?
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Dec 25, 2007 00:54
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brosef deluxe posted:Well, poo poo. I woke up this morning and started my car to get to the store to a symphony of crappy noises. My A/C compressor sounds like it ate sand for breakfast. Merry loving Christmas to me. Luckily I am without P/S, so I cut the belt and disabled it for now. I'd just rip it out if I lived up north, especially if it's a toy and not a daily driver. But it depends I guess....If the summers get brutal, it's nice having A/C. My next Miata will be totally stripped of all that poo poo, but it won't be a DD.
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Dec 25, 2007 01:01
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leica posted:I'd just rip it out if I lived up north, especially if it's a toy and not a daily driver. But it depends I guess....If the summers get brutal, it's nice having A/C. I too considered ripping out the AC, but then I realized that on rainy summer days when I'm forced to put the top up, it can get loving hot in there without AC.
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Dec 25, 2007 03:12
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This is kind of a dumb question I suppose, but here goes. In these cold winter months, I've been dreaming about what I'd like to get done on my car once the weather lightens up come spring/summer time. Which is fine, since I can't really afford to dump large amounts of cash into my car until then, anyway. I've got a 95 M-Edition and it's slowly creeping toward the 75,000 mile mark. It has been well cared for its whole life, and was driven by an older guy (original owner since new) before I bought it. It had its full 60k mile service, and it probably isn't due for any big tune up until 90k, but I put so few miles on the car, and plus I'm just hankering to get some wrenching time in, so once I cross 75k in the next few weeks/months, I'm planning on doing plugs, wires, air/fuel filters, fluids, etc. After that I would like to address the brakes, which mostly just need to be bled out and have some fresher fluid put in, but I might just go all out with new pads, rotors, and lines. But then after the general tune-up parts and brakes, I come to the part of cars that I really know next to nothing about : suspension. Okay, well I know the basics, but I've never done suspension work or anything. Anyway, people always seem to rant on about how the factory suspension on Miatas is "shot" by 30k miles, which seems pretty ridiculous. Mine is still on the 12 year old factory shocks and springs, and even pushing 75k miles it still seems exceptionally firm. The common symptoms of blown shocks (excessive bouncing after bumps, funny thunks or creaks) are definitely not present on my car - quite the opposite in fact. In corners the car still feels entirely planted and confident with very minimal body roll - no worse than the much newer 1999, 2001, and 2003 models I test drove (fairly hard) when I was car shopping at the beginning of this year. Even though the car was driven by a grandpa, I'm sure the suspension isn't like-new after 12 years and 75k miles, but how can I gauge how "bad" it is? I'm the type of person who doesn't like to buy cheap alternatives, but I don't really want to drop $500+ on shocks (and springs?) if there isn't a really big incentive to do so. I probably just don't realize how worn my suspension bits are, but even compared to much newer Miatas with low miles (the best comparison I can come up with) my car just doesn't feel much worse or worn out. So I guess my biggest question is, how can I tell when my shocks and springs really need to be replaced? I don't want to wait for them to get entirely blown out, but I don't want to spend a crapload of cash for a small improvement, either. I'm pretty dumb on this suspension stuff just from lack of experience. Guinness fucked around with this message at 12:19 on Dec 27, 2007 |
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Dec 27, 2007 12:16
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Just take a ride in a Miata with new shocks (if you know of one) and you'll know. The original shocks wear out slowly so it's hard to tell unless they're completely blown out. But if you're fine with the way it's handling now, I wouldn't put any money into shocks.
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Dec 27, 2007 17:07
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So about two months ago, someone slashed my plastic window on my 1991 Miata. Then over time, pressure buckled it down, it kept ripping, and eventually someone furthered the damage by punching a whole in it. All this happened in my work's parking lot. So eventually the top looked like this: Just a lot of tape. So I ordered a new Robbins top with a glass window for around $570 and set on installing it myself with my wife and roomate and fellow goon BeatSetRadio. We tore the old top apart with knives and pry tools and our hands and got the car to eventually look like this!:  That took all of Saturday from 10AM to almost 4PM. Then on Sunday, we set upon installing the new top. What a pain in the rear end that was. Everything was off, we had to drill new holes everywhere and kind of figure it out as we went a long. But, at 4:10PM, when the hobby shop was closing down, we finally finished. And it looked beautiful.   For the first time in a little while, I was very happy with my Miata. I went to go get it washed, and it was spotless. I was planning on getting it painted in the coming month, a nice blue color with a black hood. I talked to my wife about replacing the seats and belts with harnesses, installing a roll bar, fixing up some of the trim.. it was going to be a beautiful auto-crossing machine. Then came Friday. I had the new top on for four and a half days when my wife called me at 6:45AM. I had left my cell phone in her car. Needed that thing that day, so I immediately got up and went down there. Got my cell phone, and was on my way home. Now, I live in San Diego. Weather here is great. But for some reason, on the on ramp to the highway, I guess I hit a wet spot in the road. Maybe an oil slick. Hell, maybe a tire blew and I didn't realize it. In any case, my car started fishtailing all over the road at about 35MPH on the on-ramp to the I-5. I tried to regain control of my car. But I just wasn't able to. I panicked like an idiot, and hit the brake. The car spun in a total 360, and the passenger side wheels hit the right side of the road's curb. My car proceeded to topple over, rolling down the hill, onto it's top, and back onto it's wheels, smashing into a fence at the bottom of a hill. Somewhere in this process, it also did a horizontal 180, as my car ended up facing the opposite direction of the way it was when it hit the curb. It was actually kind of fun, looking back on it. When the car started fishtailing, I had a nice smile on my face as I fought it to gain control. As the car started to hit air, I screamed "What the gently caress?!". It wasn't until I hit the ground and could feel how the airbag had just hit me in the face and the rails on the top had scraped up my head that I really started to yell in agony. So now, my car looks like this:      The top, however, looks wonderful, still:  It's just too bad that the car's totaled. Oh, and so is my face...  Down one Miata. But at least I'm still alive, and with no permanent injury. Which was close, because I just had refractive surgery on my eyes, and that airbag could've screwed that up nice if it had hit the wrong way. So the question is: What year should my next Miata be? I love the look of the NA. But I'm unsure of the differences between them. I know the '94 model saw the 1.8L, but HP went up in the NA at some point, and I'm not sure what year that was. Also, when were Torsen LSD's introduced? Info will help. I want to make sure this next Miata is the right Miata. amadeo fucked around with this message at 04:59 on Dec 30, 2007 |
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Dec 30, 2007 03:34
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I just knew you were you going to say the top looked fine.
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Dec 30, 2007 05:11
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Sorry about your accident, Im surprised your top went on with seeming ease. I suppose having someone to help would make it easier, haha. That and not doing it when its below freezing and night time. I used: http://www.miata.net/faq/miatachanges.html and http://www.geocities.com/MotorCity/5361/ Both are great references when searching for a Miata. Good luck, it only took me 5 months or so to find mine, but its much colder up here.
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Dec 30, 2007 08:57
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No thanks
Return Of JimmyJars fucked around with this message at 17:57 on Sep 23, 2010 |
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Dec 30, 2007 18:01
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Washed my car today, and it looked really good so I took a picture   It's not nearly this orange in person. GoblinBomb fucked around with this message at 08:13 on Jan 11, 2008 |
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Jan 11, 2008 08:07
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I spy AZ plates I think I've seen maybe one hardtop NC driving around, plus the one parked at the dealer when I had to buy some of the clips that hold the drat underbody together.
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Jan 11, 2008 08:15
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IOwnCalculus posted:I spy AZ plates I live at Chaparral and Hayden. As I was washing it, a guy who lives down the street drove past in his Speed NB (says he just got it last week) and complimented me on my wash job 
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Jan 11, 2008 08:18
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GoblinBomb posted:I live at Chaparral and Hayden. As I was washing it, a guy who lives down the street drove past in his Speed NB (says he just got it last week) and complimented me on my wash job The same thing has happened to me a few times while I was washing my 95M. Two or three times have passerby Miata drivers stopped to compliment me. One time a 2000 in Merlot (the only other year it was offered) stopped and yelled out "Nice car color!", and it turns out before his 2000 he had a 95M as well. It is a great color on this car.
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Jan 11, 2008 08:35
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Guinness posted:The same thing has happened to me a few times while I was washing my 95M. Two or three times have passerby Miata drivers stopped to compliment me. One time a 2000 in Merlot (the only other year it was offered) stopped and yelled out "Nice car color!", and it turns out before his 2000 he had a 95M as well. AHEM, I think you mean Mahogany Mica. Also, this is driving me nuts because I havent had time to finish this yet, but when I do I stop because I dont want to shred my dash by poking it with screwdrivers. To get the switch blank out (the ones that sit right by the drivers left knee) what the hell do I need to do? Do I need to pull off the bottom plastic below the steering wheel or would two narrow screwdrivers work?
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Jan 11, 2008 13:45
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I've got the immobilizer blues  Last time I closed the top, it didn't seal 100 percent and it rained hard. I ended up with water inside, and didn't realize it for several days. So the inside stewed in the sun for all that time; I was able to dry out the carpet but apparently all the water has now hosed up the immobilizer. It takes forever and a dozen tries to get the engine to catch. I'm assuming just because it's an anti-theft device that it's a dealer-level repair; how much am I looking at for a new one?
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Jan 11, 2008 15:39
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Hagetaka posted:I've got the immobilizer blues Call your local Mazda dealer, they should be able to quote you a price for the part(s) and labor. You more than likely will have to have the keys re-programed and that's 75 bucks alone IIRC.
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Jan 11, 2008 16:49
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Priced the whole thing with parts, labor, and re-programming keys- 325 bucks. Make sure you secure that top tight, everyone.
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Jan 12, 2008 00:51
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Hagetaka posted:Priced the whole thing with parts, labor, and re-programming keys- 325 bucks. That's the price I was quoted for a single new remote key. A new key without the remote stuff was 135. 
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Jan 12, 2008 01:58
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Hagetaka posted:Priced the whole thing with parts, labor, and re-programming keys- 325 bucks. That sucks. You might want to check Miata.net to see if there's a way to just disable it or something, unless you like having it.
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Jan 12, 2008 05:34
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leica posted:That sucks. You might want to check Miata.net to see if there's a way to just disable it or something, unless you like having it. I already did, and I found a nifty PDF showing all the pin-outs and voltage readings if you feel like putting a multi-meter on it. But if you remove it, then you have to gently caress around with the PCM and that's waaaaaayyyyy beyond me. Just buying another and swapping it obviously isn't an option because the keys would still have to be matched to the car, and that's a dealer-only thing. Sucks- I was all willing to work on something on the car (this is the first thing that's gone wrong, apart from me spilling oil on the seat), and it turns out to be out of the range of a shadetree mechanic. It seems to only act up in damp weather, so maybe if we get a decent dry spell here the problem will go away.
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Jan 12, 2008 07:00
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What is that little piece of metal that is screwed onto the driver's side wiper blade? What is its function, and why is it only on one side? Mine is rusting (the only part on the whole car) and it's kind of ugly. I can't imagine it is very important and I kind of want to take it off - but I have no idea why it's even there. Can anyone enlighten me?
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Jan 13, 2008 05:40
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Guinness posted:What is that little piece of metal that is screwed onto the driver's side wiper blade? What is its function, and why is it only on one side? Mine is rusting (the only part on the whole car) and it's kind of ugly. I can't imagine it is very important and I kind of want to take it off - but I have no idea why it's even there. Can anyone enlighten me? Its to help press the windshield wiper into the windshield at speed. To stop it lifting from the windshield untimatly.
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Jan 13, 2008 06:33
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Ziploc posted:Its to help press the windshield wiper into the windshield at speed. To stop it lifting from the windshield untimatly. Why is it only on one side, then?
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Jan 14, 2008 02:08
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Because it's on the driver side? Yes, you can probably do without it. Why not pull it off and sandpaper and repaint it?
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Jan 14, 2008 03:15
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The paint was starting to wear off mine, took it off and hit it with some primer and 2 coats of rattle can black, looks nice now.
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Jan 14, 2008 03:18
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So I get in my car to leave work yesterday, and I discover the driver's side window won't roll down. It's a '99, power windows and it was kinda rainy. D'ya think this is something I can fix myself? This is a huge bother for me, and I'd like to fix it ASAP.
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Jan 14, 2008 03:19
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velocityJE posted:So I get in my car to leave work yesterday, and I discover the driver's side window won't roll down. It's a '99, power windows and it was kinda rainy. D'ya think this is something I can fix myself? This is a huge bother for me, and I'd like to fix it ASAP.
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Jan 14, 2008 03:21
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Suniikaa posted:The paint was starting to wear off mine, took it off and hit it with some primer and 2 coats of rattle can black, looks nice now. This one was of the first things I did with my windshield wiper's spoiler. It came out to look quite nice.
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Jan 14, 2008 04:26
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Another '99 question: I have noticed that as of late the interior cable release for the trunk doesn't work as well as it should. Is it a matter of adjustment or some other problem? You can pull it and get a 'click' but unless someone is pulling up on the trunklid at the same time, it doesn't release all the way.
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Jan 14, 2008 04:36
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goku chewbacca posted:Because it's on the driver side? Yes, you can probably do without it. Why not pull it off and sandpaper and repaint it? Suniikaa posted:The paint was starting to wear off mine, took it off and hit it with some primer and 2 coats of rattle can black, looks nice now. Phone posted:This one was of the first things I did with my windshield wiper's spoiler. It came out to look quite nice. Capital idea. Can't believe that hadn't hit me. I'll have to do that. Thanks!
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Jan 14, 2008 05:11
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