I just spent Christmas in New England, and was shocked to not see any cars more than 10 years old. If you don't live on the beach, your cars don't rust here. I wonder if it's an environmental policy as much as anything else. When I lived in Oregon, we had snow and ice - and 4 wheel drive, with sand. I don't understand the fascination with salt. I also don't really understand states east of the Rockies.
When I lived in Buffalo, NY, I always thought packed snow was the best to drive on. Know your limits. But all the lawyers and soccermoms demand dry pavement as soon as they hit the roads. Sooooo, salt a plenty! I used to undercoat my pickup every fall with a gallon of chainsaw bar oil. Environmentally friendly and sticky/clingy. Smeared wheel bearing grease on all the brakelines/nuts/bolts on the underside. Worked well. Really spoiled now in SC, ride yearround and NO RUST
A big reason for salt and other chemical deicers has to do with temperature. In a lot of the Western states, yeah, they get a ton of snow all at once, but in a place like say Denver, they may get a foot of snow, but then it's 50 degrees the next week and a lot of it melts. In the midwest, we may get a foot of snow, and then the temps go down to zero for a week or two or three. If that happens, you end up with a nasty crust of ice on the roads and the only way to get it off is with some sort of deicer. Sand in the quantities needed for traction for weeks on a large freeway system would be prohibitively expensive and make a total mess of the storm sewer systems when they washed all that mud away. Also unlike in the mountains, in most midwestern states, tire chains and studded tires are illegal and their use means a big big fine.
Don't know how much better that Mag Chloride is really. Better for the environment and cheaper but after 3 full brake jobs in as many years and all the fins powdered off out of my AC condenser I sure doubt the "better" claim. My car was dripping yellow in the snow last year after a drive in the liquid "ice preventer" they use here. And now after a long drive on Christmas day in the snow/slush/salt and no time to go wash it, it is now sitting covered with the stuff in the parking lot at work, that's about 100 feet from the ocean. Good thing it does have an aluminium top, will only rust from the doors down or.....the bottom up. Mind you the Shithawks are pretty good at getting to the paint on the roof.
Time for an update. I can't believe its been a year w/ this thing. I haven't done much to it. I added turn signal repeaters on the front fenders. The stock configuration does not display turn signals to the side at all. This is something I have done to all my cars since 1998. I changed the oil and coolant yesterday and while I was down there admiring the soundproofing, I noticed that quite a bit of the flywheel is visible on both sides of the motor... It seems odd. Is it supposed to be like this?
There is an inspection plate that should go there. Sometimes they are sandwiched between the engine and transmission, and some just bolt in place to cover the hole. I don't remember which it is in this case. Don't stick your fingers in there while it's running and you should be fine
You might want to fab up some kind of covers to keep the grit out. Remember anything that gets in there has the easy potential to get in your clutch plate.
My nephew had a used one just like yours, he was in college at the time, had no money, drove that thing for years, he got married and sold it to my cousin, she drove it for several years. I never knew much about Trackers but was impressed at how well it served them, nothing fancy about it, but the darned thing kept going.
I shoehorned a TDI engine into mine...love it! Going to get another one this weekend and do the same thing. They are awesome little tractors
I am enjoying this thread. Still kicking myself for selling mine. Mine had 140K miles on it when I sold it and it was still running fine. One of the best vehicles I've ever owned.
I put the right breather tube between the valve cover and intake last week too. Economy jumped to 37 on a hwy run and 34 mpg in town corrected for tires. We are going up Pikes Peak tomorrow. Have a safe race day everyone!
I really love my little Tracker. I am always curious about how its working. Since I put on some nice little highway tires I have known that my speedo and odometers aren't reading accurately. To find out how far off they are I decided to travel a known distance and measure fuel used and odometer ticks compared to miles. I went to Canon City, CO filled up at a station very near mile marker 280 on US Hwy 50. Then I drove to the top of Monarch pass 81 miles away both by mile markers and by Google maps. Then I turned around and went right back to the same pump and filled up again with 4.37 gallons. 162 miles on 4.37 gallons = 37 MPG!!. This is with a 97 2 door 2WD. 185/65/15 tires. Tires make or break your mileage. Just be sure to measure it accurately. My odo is off a lot w/ the leeeettle tires. I added 181 to the odo in 162 actual miles.
Salt in ohio? Nah. Heres what 11 years in ohio will do to a car. Luckily, when the window lift cables rust out, the door is rotten enough to reach up through the bottom and push the window back up instead of having to pull the door panel. My family is always lecturing me about how i should by a nice car. THIS is why i don't buy a nice car. It'll turn to shit in less than 10 years. I just got back from colorado. I was amazed. Cars i haven't seen since i was a little kid (and those were rusted out then) are driving around well worn but still solid. You're truly lucky to live where the DOT isn't hell bent on destroying your vehicles.
No news is good news in this thread. I bought a trailer hitch and wiring kit. I'm looking at a pretty sweet little $300 trailer that I can take to Indiana to pick up the XT600 I bought this week. The Tracker still delivers 30-33 mpg corrected in town and drops to 27 over 70 mph. Things are looking bright around here lately.
