Need Serious Advice ASAP!!

[95 yellow 5 0]

lifter is knocking and the car is losing power up top.
i owe $13,000 which is a big problem. Until this happened, I was sure I could get over $14,000. Now it may be a problem unless someone without any knowledge test drives it.
anyway... One guy told me it'll be near $2500 to take my heads off and do everything.. I dunno if he meant upgrading the valves, rockers, and porting and polishing the heads, because I mentioned it. Is that something worth doing if the engine is apart? How much money does this stuff generally cost?
just to fix the lifter price? also rebuilding the engine price? I would like to see my car bored out to a 5.0 DOHC but not if i'm going into more debt on a car that is 8 years old. soon it will be the transmission.. i'm really clueless right now as of what to do. it's for sale in a local paper now.. I mean it doenst make the noise ALL the time but most of it now. not too loud but me driving it everyday, i notice it. this really sucks right now. I dunno if i go and charge my credit card to fix it, pay over $3000, doing major upgrades and basically keeping it till it's paid off in 3-4 years?? help meeeee

 

[Uncle Meat]

Do you know for SURE that the problem is just a bad lifter or are you just guessing?

U.M.

 

[95 yellow 5 0]

that's what the guy at the shop told me. he has had a 96 cobra and worked on it himself and many others. my friends agree. you can hear metal to metal, like the piston taps the lifter? when the throttle is pressed only and as it is released.

 

[Uncle Meat]

If you can unload the car now without losing a lot of dough i say get rid of it. Otherwise you're going to have to sink some cash into it to have a mechanic replace the lifter.

U.M.

 

[95 yellow 5 0]

do i tell someone about the noise and tell them it's minor though? the mechanic told me to just keep driving it, that it's not worth fixing. if someone buys the car they'll notice it very soon...

 

[5.0's 4 ever]

Its just going to get worse over time. I think if you try to sell it to someone my guess is that they will hear it and walk away. When I bought my three mustangs I did long test drives to make sure everything was ok. Now if you try to sell it to a dealership a lot of the time they will barely if even test drive the car. Mostly just a look over just to see what condition its in. They will low ball you, but you could counter if you plan on buying a vehicle from them. In the long run it may be cheaper to just trade the car in right now.

 

[95 yellow 5 0]

but i owe $13,000 and dealerships have offered $7700-8000. I would rather flip it on the highway than do that.

there's gotta be a sucker out there (reading my posts and knowing the car's problems) to buy it.

How much does this usually cost to fix? I was thinking it was gonna be $500-600. The guy is laughing saying "just keep driving it, it's not worth it"

or i should lower the price to $13,000 as is and if they notice the noise, i'll tell them what it is and how to fix it???? this really sucks.

 

[TheDukeOfEarl]

I see a big problem here.

"I would like to see my car bored out to a 5.0 DOHC"

You have a DOHC motor... How can you have a bad lifter?

 

[5.0's 4 ever]

What exactly is this tech going to "fix" if he is going to do the repair. I would have to know what he is going to do to say if this is a good deal or not.

 

[TheDukeOfEarl]

What exactly is this tech going to "fix" if he is going to do the repair. I would have to know what he is going to do to say if this is a good deal or not.

If he said he is going to replace the lifters on a 4.6 DOHC motor.. I would not only never go back to him.. I would report him for being a scam. DOHC 4.6 is not a pushrod motor.. No lifters!


"you can hear metal to metal, like the piston taps the lifter?"

This line also worries me. In a car that does have lifters and pushrods like a 5.0. To get the piston to hit the lifter would mean the entire engine has blown into pieces and the block has come apart.

 

[95 yellow 5 0]

I see a big problem here.

"I would like to see my car bored out to a 5.0 DOHC"

You have a DOHC motor... How can you have a bad lifter?

i really don't know much about the engines internally. Do these people mean roller rocker arm then? passenger side, tapping as throttle is pressed and released. loudest 1500-2200 rpms.

i have no clue what a job like that would cost to fix. that's what i'm trying to ask is if it is worth while or trying to sell the car as is. i really don't want to spend more than $500 or so to do this. This is just a bad situation for me and i don't know what to do. now is the time to sell a mustang and mine's gotta have problems now.

 

[blkstangman88]

Fixing somthing like that, means u should have both sides fixed, in my opinion, other wise ull spend more later when the other head starts falling appart.
I got a quote from ford of roughly $2800 plus machine shop time to have then take my heads off anh hace them rebuilt.

OR i could buy ford original parts, seals, gaskets, head gaskets ect, for roughly $600-$800 and take the heads off my self and have a machine shop rebuild them for $200 each, so i would spend max $1200 doing the work my self.

If u love ur car and have wrench time, id say rip the heads off and do all the labor ur self and have a shop rebuild both heads.

 

[95 yellow 5 0]

Fixing somthing like that, means u should have both sides fixed, in my opinion, other wise ull spend more later when the other head starts falling appart.
I got a quote from ford of roughly $2800 plus machine shop time to have then take my heads off anh hace them rebuilt.

OR i could buy ford original parts, seals, gaskets, head gaskets ect, for roughly $600-$800 and take the heads off my self and have a machine shop rebuild them for $200 each, so i would spend max $1200 doing the work my self.

If u love ur car and have wrench time, id say rip the heads off and do all the labor ur self and have a shop rebuild both heads.

oh my god, so this guy wasn't BSing.... just for a F***** rocker arm. I'm not dumping anymore money into this car. I'll sell it the way it is to a complete moron if one comes along. I think may take a break from mustangs and all this dumping money into a car thing, it's really pissin me off after getting raped for labor on for the mods i have on it now.

 

[95 yellow 5 0]

If he said he is going to replace the lifters on a 4.6 DOHC motor.. I would not only never go back to him.. I would report him for being a scam. DOHC 4.6 is not a pushrod motor.. No lifters!


"you can hear metal to metal, like the piston taps the lifter?"

This line also worries me. In a car that does have lifters and pushrods like a 5.0. To get the piston to hit the lifter would mean the entire engine has blown into pieces and the block has come apart.

ummmm, explain this then about "no lifters"

http://www.secondstreetspeed.com/articles/modular rock & roll/modular_roll.htm

 

[96SVTpilot]

oh my god, so this guy wasn't BSing.... just for a F***** rocker arm. I'm not dumping anymore money into this car. I'll sell it the way it is to a complete moron if one comes along. I think may take a break from mustangs and all this dumping money into a car thing, it's really pissin me off after getting raped for labor on for the mods i have on it now.

What mods did you get raped on labor for? Everything on your installed list you can do yourself in your driveway or garage. I can see maybe farming out the clutch job but all those bolt ons you should be doing yourself. That's the easiest way to learn about your car and graduate to the bigger jobs.

 

[95 yellow 5 0]

What mods did you get raped on labor for? Everything on your installed list you can do yourself in your driveway or garage. I can see maybe farming out the clutch job but all those bolt ons you should be doing yourself. That's the easiest way to learn about your car and graduate to the bigger jobs.

well originally me and my friend were going to do them all and just have the shop do the clutch but we are good customers to this guy right, so he's all "oh don't worry about it, we'll treat ya right" wouldn't shut up about how fair he'd do all my ***** for. So i'm like ***** it, i rather have everythign done at once anyway so i'm thinking i'm gonna spend $600 tops for everything. Then he charges like $1200 or so... so basically i'm never going there again.
i'm gettin sick of this *****... might see me in a CLK430 when my car goes.