As Is, How Is, and Where Is. Is my rule of thumb when I buy another vehicle from a privet party. Those wern't realy bad problems, and they are a fixable by you. just look at the other side it could have been a new transmission to replace or another high dollar item the motor.

 

Wow, lets see, on my '78. . .

-460 swap using the factory 351 mounts. 1 bolt per side in the block to keep the motor in there. Twisted the mounts so the 2 holes lined up. . .missing 1 bolt. . .
-4" lift. Didn't get an extended drag link or drop pitman arm. . .instead used a 3" aluminum spacer block with UNGRADED BOLTS and 4 washers to space the steering arm up. 2 washers under 2 bolts BETWEEN the steering arm and spacer, only air space between 3rd bolt. . .
-Oilpressure guage that works, but is mounted in the dash over by the glove box
-Redrilled factory 460 power steering bracket to clock it up, only put 2 bolts back in. . .severely cracked.
-Didn't tell me it couldn't be started until I got there. . .had to do the ol push it down a hill and drop the clutch trick to fire it up.
-The usual rats nest of wires that lead to nowhere.
-Vacuum lines to nowhere
-Cut a chunk out of the frame which I had to patch so the passenger exuast would pas through instead of getting the right manifold. . .

All of which has cost me way more than I had imagined when i started this project

 

I saw a high boy in the junkyard with about a 4" lift, 4" blocks front and rear, no extended brake lines, and a couple pieces of metal welded together for some kind of pitman arm. The bumpers on that thing look like they were designed by a 3 year old and welded together by a 8 year old.

 

Guys you are not describing Previous Owner(s) (PO) here. You have had what is commonly referred to as Previous Idiot(s), abbreviated as PI... -So just use that PI designation and we will know what you are talking about.

 

What a fool...everybody knows that a 4-penny box nail is the proper method to close off un-needed brake lines. Slide the stem into the line, and tighten 'er down, problem "fixed". Not surprisingly, this was shown to me by a Chebby owner

 

With that mentality, it's a wonder the "PI" didn't hook up a spark plug wire to it so he could have power brakes.

Now that's scary. Just think there are people driving around with trucks "b**tardised" like this...

This is your brain, this is your brain on drugs....

 

the way i look at people that do stuff like that is, natural selection will eventually take over.

 

The truck belongs to a friend of mine. I went with him to look at it and the guy we talked to was selling it for the real owner. Don't know why the owner couldn't be there, but the guy we talked to said he was a little "unbalanced". After seeing that I'd have to agree.

 

The only trouble is the natural selection may skip over to the unsuspecting new owner.

 

OK I may have you all beat ...I bought A 75 4x4 with a 460..PO had put in after blowing up the 390 that was in it ....well I didn't drive it long and the 460 went ...I was going to rebuild it ...tore it apart and found that he had apparently taken three 460 motors apart to make this one...as was evident from all of the number ones stamped on the conecting rod caps...had two 8's and and three 4's ....Iwent through the whole truck ...found lots ...but that was the tops !

 

And take a few innocent bystanders along with 'em

 

When I got my truck, I wondered why the sound quality was so horrible. Took me about a week to check out the speakers...turns out, the PO had wired household speakers (not even good ones, they looked about 10 years old) to the stereo and had them behind the seat. Classy.

 

On the 72 f100 the PO had rigged up cherry bomb ehaust, At one point he has about 20 diffrent pipes togeather for about 5 feet. Coat hangers holding the exhaust on and chrome duct tape exhaust Tips. lol. He also took the automatic shifter off the column and out it on the floor, Were he made a whole it looks like he used dinomite and blew the whole drivers side floor out then fixed it all with wood and jb weld. A Piece of rubber hose holds the choke open, The horn works off a toggle swith that the driver cant even rear, Revers lights run off a secound toggle not able to be reached by the driver. Wood blocks for a body lift that have rotted over the years.A bag with duct tape for a radiator cap and fixed a hole in the gas tank with expoxy. Overall Im surprised the truck didnt fall appart on the way home. It has all been correctly repaid except the rev lights.

 

Yeah I know how previous owners are. When I bought my 73 F250, the previous owner didn't do much to keep the truck up. I had to do so much work to it just to get it to run decent again. These were the problems with it when I bought it:

1. Very bad oil leak, previous owner had no idea where the oil was coming from. Just kept driving it and adding oil as needed (up to a half quart a day).

2. There were wires under the truck being grounded on the frame, causing the brake lights to short out and not work. Made the turn signals work intermittently also.

3. Fuel gauge didn't work. Previous owner said that it worked off and on. Turned out to be a bad fuel gauge, but the owner had no idea that it was or not.

4. Bad radiator. Previous owner had to leave the radiator cap off at all times so it could not overheat.

5. One of the front tires were a different size than the rest of the tires, causing uneven wear on all tires. One of the back tires had a slight bulge on the sidewall, which wasn't good at all.

6. One of the hangers on one of the exhaust pipes was broken, so someone used a coat hanger to attach it back to the frame. Bad idea.

7. One of the exhaust pipes was loose on the engine, causing exhaust to escape under the hood.

8. Carburetor was out of tune, truck was very hard to start, ran rough. Bolts were loose throughout the whole entire truck.

9. One of the front grills was broken. Had to replace.

10. Rear window didn't close..was all scratched up and non-usable pretty much.

11. Bad water pump, bad power steering pump, bad battery, bad belts, radiator, oil leak, bad carburetor, etc.

12. Inside of truck, the steering wheel that was in it was partially broken. Didn't turn right...steering wheel rubbed on the shifter piece.

13. Side mirrors on truck were bent out of shape. Door panels rattled (were not anchored to the doors correctly). Inside of truck was completely dirty, took half a day just to clean it out. Gauges were in bad shape, all faded and some didn't work quite right.

14. Inside light didn't work. Dome light was broken. Shifter indicator was broken. The check cable for the glove box was broken. The truck was VERY dirty outside. Took a whole two days to clean it up. Top white part of cab was black from not being cleaned in years. Rest of truck was blackish instead of white, from not being cleaned in a couple of years.

Overall, as you can tell, there was just a LOT of stuff wrong with it. Granted I got everything fixed on it within a couple months. Now it's much better, everything's fixed, and it's a very reliable truck now.

Another thing that pissed me off, was that the previous owner's son...he used to drive it now and then. He caused the broken grill, all the dents throughout the truck. He tried to fix some things that he didn't know how to fix, and made them even worse.

Oh well. That's all in the past now.

Dan

 

As I read all these posts, The title should be changed from "Previous owners suck" to "What the hell did you buy it for?!!"