Previous Owner Horror Stories - Let's Hear 'em

[white_n_slow]

I forgot, I did once get a *****in' Ace of Base cassette with one of my cars. That brought back some fond memories

 

[hang10]

[
Edit: I just remembered that my 02 that was wrecked had a Celine Dion cd in it. I bought it from a guy. I should've taken his mancard[/QUOTE]

:guitar3::amen:

 

[D Farms]

[MENTION=122900]AZBub[/MENTION] said he found one nice crisp dorito under the center console, he said it was cool ranch and still tasted pretty good even though it must been there for more than a year.

 

[MN4runnerman]

[MENTION=122900]AZBub[/MENTION] said he found one nice crisp dorito under the center console, he said it was cool ranch and still tasted pretty good even though it must been there for more than a year.

Cool ranch Doritos never go bad kind of like twinkies

 

[cashmoney]

Mine had a busted heater core that the guy put stop leak in to fix. The one system I didn't test before I bought it. What a pain in the ass that's been to get rid of. Worst part is even after 6 months of flushing my brand new heater core is partially clogged with the shit!!!

 

[WATony]

I hope you got a really good price on that truck.

My previous owner was a smoker. It's a good thing that I gut and clean the interior of every vehicle I buy used. Now there is zero smell, just a few cigarette burns in inconspicuous parts of the carpet to remind me of this 4Runner's smoky past.

what did you use to clean the interior, My previous own was a smoker and it drives me nuts.

 

[AZBub]

[MENTION=122900]AZBub[/MENTION] said he found one nice crisp dorito under the center console, he said it was cool ranch and still tasted pretty good even though it must been there for more than a year.

after shampooing the carpet in the back I have been getting a weird petroleum jelly smell. I don't know what that means but I haven't found any used condoms or opossums giving birth so that's good.

 

[StreetCreeper]

I think I get the award for nastiest find from a PO. I went to inventory the truck after acquiring it, and found about 50 dead mummified maggot/worm-thingy carcasses all around the bottle Jack under the back seat. I have no idea how they got there and I didn't see any indication of old food or anything. Just maggot husks...

Btw — they weren't as tasty as cool ranch Doritos either...

Edit: I just remembered that my 02 that was wrecked had a Celine Dion cd in it. I bought it from a guy. I should've taken his mancard

Just a guess on my part, but if he was rockin out to Celine Dion — he was probably never issued a man-card to begin with.

 

[T4R2014]

what did you use to clean the interior, My previous own was a smoker and it drives me nuts.

Remove the seats from the vehicle. I had leather, so I scrubbed them will a light brush and a mix of Woolite and water. If you have cloth, rent a rug doctor or buy one of those portable Bissell extractors, you might want it later anyway.. Now that the seats are out, start carefully removing the plastic panels around the footwells. Clean these with a light brush and all purpose cleaner.

Now you can remove the carpet. I sprayed the shit out of mine over and over with every product I had access to. Laundry detergent, purple power, dollar store carpet cleaner, and even fast orange hand cleaner on oil stains. I would hose out the carpet in between each product I used until I used nothing and the water running out of it was clear.

I started pulling apart the dash. The dried soda behind it from previous spills really held in that cigarette smell. All purpose cleaner and a hose on those. I actually used oven cleaner on the metal part of the ash tray since it was the only product able to get rid of the discoloration. The HVAC vent tubing also holds a lot of stink, so clean it will all purpose as well(removed from the vehicle of course).

Your last step is the headliner. I didn't want to remove it so I used purple power in a Bissell carpet extractor machine. It worked like a dream.

Put your interior back together once everything dries and you are done

 

[WATony]

Thank you. I have leather and I'm frabreeze the crap out of the carpet but it's still there. I may have to get serious and follow your instructions.

But my current horror story is when I was replacing the front suspension I was checking torques on the ball joints. I pulled the cotter pin on the passagner side LBJ and the nut was less finger tight.

 

[etc.]

I spent about an hour looking at my 3rd gen prior to buying it. No surprises. It took me a little while to figure out why the 4x4 didn't work though. It was behind on maintenance, which I'm still slowly catching up on.

So far in the past couple months I have done:

Lower ball joints.
Upper ball joints.
Inner tie rods
Outer tie rods.
Struts.
Axle bearings and seals.
Alignment.
Tire rotation and balance
Tint.
Replaced the DS window switch
And today, the steering rack bushings.

I'm only pending the rear shocks and possibly a bit of armor.

I was originally looking at picking up a 2005-2006 Tundra, but after looking thru the "How many miles on your 4runner", I changed my mind. Instead, I'll save that money and put a little time and money in my 4runner to get another 230,000 miles out of it.

 

[T4R2014]

Thank you. I have leather and I'm frabreeze the crap out of the carpet but it's still there. I may have to get serious and follow your instructions.

But my current horror story is when I was replacing the front suspension I was checking torques on the ball joints. I pulled the cotter pin on the passagner side LBJ and the nut was less finger tight.

Febreze masks smells. It is bound to wear off. Disassembly and a deep cleaning is the only way to to permanently ditch that nasty smell. Believe me, mine was BAD. I bought it from the original owner, who I'm friends with. Stand-up guy, but his 19 years of smoking didn't do the interior of that 4Runner any good.

 

[mtbtim]

I bought my 2000 almost 2 years ago. When I test drove it before buying it, I noticed the door locks would actuate when I depressed the brake pedal. I mentioned it to the person selling it and he said his mechanic thought it was one of the door lock switches malfunctioning and it would be an easy fix. His explanation didn't make sense to me but I bought it anyways because it was in very good shape and only had 111,000 miles on it. I decided to diagnose the problem myself after talking to a good mechanic I know regarding the problem and he had no clue how using the brakes could affect the door locks. I looked under the dash and noticed a wire bundle was rubbing against the return spring for the brake pedal. One of the wires had a 1mm section of bare wire exposed from it rubbing against the spring over time. It must have been the wire for the door locks because after I wrapped it with some electrical tape and zip tied the bundle away from the spring, the problem was fixed.

 

[mtbtim]

My story is probably the worst of all,

My previous owner followed the pocket service handbook and did all of the regular maintenence at the dealership at the miles they were due. He drove it for 140k miles without ever being in snow, salt, or heavy water. He kept everything working and the interior spotless.
I picked it up for $1200 because of a bad battery and a faulty O2 sensor causing engine lights.
And the worst part, he had never even engaged 4wd, much less even taken it on a dirt road!

Yeah I lucked out on my 02 SR5

$1200 is an absolute steal! I'm surprised you were able to buy it for that because usually when a 3rd Gen pops up with that low a sales price, the person's phone is blowing up with phone calls and they usually get more than they're asking for. You should of also played the lottery that day because you were seriously lucky to score that deal. I'm guessing it was priced at least $6000 under value. Incredible!

 

[Saintnick]

$1200 is an absolute steal! I'm surprised you were able to buy it for that because usually when a 3rd Gen pops up with that low a sales price, the person's phone is blowing up with phone calls and they usually get more than they're asking for. You should of also played the lottery that day because you were seriously lucky to score that deal. I'm guessing it was priced at least $6000 under value. Incredible!

Yeah I probably should've played the lotto. But I was happy enough for my win

 

[Norwester]

I have been searching for one so I bought a 1996 4runner 2wd SR5 v6 a week ago. Love it!
Driving home after purchasing and the check engine light magically appears...:sobbing:

Pull code with my reader and it is P0303, misfire cylinder # 3. Did not notice because it runs so well, but now that I know I can feel it shaking a bit at idle.

So tonight I finally have some time and will try to diagnose the issue. Fingers crossed it will be spark or fuel injector, something not too expensive.

Previous owner had the vehicle for only 3 months, that should have been a red flag :frusty:

She runs amazing nonetheless, no accidents, clean title all original Yota bumpers, lights, everything. Also got it for the low price of $1700. No regrets, every used vehicle will have problems. Know when to ditch a bad car, or end up married to it.

I was lucky. The CEL came on when I was test driving it. BOOM! Another $600 off. $80 fuel injector and 1 1/2 worth of work and it was fine. Had a nasty vibration that I thought was tied to the FI but it turned out to be a crappy wheel balance job. Took it to Les Schwab and $60 later that was fixed. There was "New Car Smell" little tree air fresheners everywhere in the thing! I think I found 7-8 and theres probably more that the smell just dissipated from. They should have stuck to the pine smell as new cars smell nothing like that. Otherwise people wouldn't buy them.

 

[cleanrunner]

Bought mine from a used lot that was a one owner but had Nissan frontier floor mats and autolite spark plugs.all in all after 6.5 years Im very happy with it

 

[Kevlar]

Not as bad of a horror story as some here. My 98 LTD was driven by a high school kid and when something went wrong, she just dealt with it instead of fixing it. The clock and 12v lighter outlet had fallen behind the dash, it needed a tune up like nobody's business, the wood grain on all the window switches was loose, shaking after about 65mph, loose vent shades......

Well, basically a tuneup, a few clips, a balance/alignment, and just putting the clock/12v back into place and removing the shades, it's really driving well.

Forgot to say I picked it up for 3500 so I'm into it for 3900. Not a bad deal

 

[64rat]

When I traded a vw for my current 2001 sr5 4wd the transaction occurred at night. I looked over what I could with a flashlight and everything seemed fine. The next day while doing an oil change I found the PO filled it with a ton of lucas or heavy additive of some sort. It ran good but the amount of sludge in the motor was unreal.

 

[LeeMajors]

When I traded a vw for my current 2001 sr5 4wd the transaction occurred at night. I looked over what I could with a flashlight and everything seemed fine. The next day while doing an oil change I found the PO filled it with a ton of lucas or heavy additive of some sort. It ran good but the amount of sludge in the motor was unreal.

AHHHHH.

Jesus!

Mine just had a pretty gnarly VC leak and various other maintenance items that needed to be performed (TB/WP, incorrect spark plugs, new wires, new shocks).

I get an isolated P0446 whenever it gets warm but we don't smog here and it runs fine.

Otherwise, she has run like a champ. I've put ~20k on it in a year. Love it!