My father initially told me he wanted this car, but is giving me mixed signals. So I'm posting it here to get an idea- would anyone be interested in it since it's still up for grabs?
Basics:
1993 Caprice Classic. Car is white with the "Very Dark Sapphire" blue interior, in cloth.
305, 700R4, 2.56 open rear end. Skinny-tire FE1 suspension car.
Car has 88,000 original miles on it, I purchased it in December of 2009 from an elderly woman with 57,000 miles on it, and have maintained it very well. Oil changed by myself every 3-4K with Mobil oil (not synthetic, I was afraid to change it over).
Starts, runs, drives, and stops great. Will not set any records at the dragway but I did get 28MPG on a trip to Maine in this car once (I tried to do it, I should mention).
Not a base model, not loaded either. It has power windows, locks, tilt, cruise, mirrors, trunk, map light mirror, etc. It has A/C, which works, and is COLD. I had it checked out and recharged when I bought this car. Emergency brake works and always has. No check engine lights.
This car is very, very clean inside and out, those who have seen it can probably attest. Door panels are excellent and not all broken or cracked. Mint armrests. Seats not ripped, really nice shape. Nice dash, unswirled and unfaded gauges and inst. cluster lens, nice dash pad. I treated the entire interior plastics with 303 Aerospace Protectant, multiple times. If you don't know what that stuff is, google it.
Non-smoker car, I'm a neat freak and I didn't even let people eat in this thing, and I cleaned it up surgically when I had bought it. The car does not smell like mold or BO or sausage pizza or anything else ass-related.
New or replaced parts:
-Alternator was brand new and non-rebuilt unit, I installed it a few days after I bought the car in '09.
-I had this aligned at Duff Spring in Medford, MA. This is a REAL alignment shop. It was also done to the specs floating around on the big board for SS wheels/tires. Still tracks straight.
-4 215/75R15 Dunlop SP 60 all season whitewall tires mounted on stock civi wheels (which aren't rusty and never were), painted gloss black. These tires are amazing and probably have about 15-20K miles on them since for a time I had SS wheels on the car, and also my chrome rally wheels/BFGs for a bit. I bought the Dunlops when I bought the car because it needed new tires.
-I tuned it up about 20-25K miles ago with plugs, wires, cap, rotor, etc. All parts were high quality stuff, not the cheapest one from VatoZone or anything, Packard wires, Delco plugs, etc. Everything is accessible from ABOVE with no special tools on a TBI car, btw.
-Brake line that passes under the engine from the ABS block was replaced a couple years ago. Previous owner had others done along with other repairs it seems.
-AC Delco U-joints about a year and a half ago.
-New GM parking brake T-handle.
-Fixed commonly broken 91-93 horn buttons with industrial momentary contact switches (aka, doorbells).
-Moog "Problem Solver" (beefy) ball joints and idler arm maybe 20K miles ago.
-New Moog sway bar end links at the same time.
-New windshield.
-BRAND NEW front brakes, AC Delco rotors, Delco Durastop ceramic pads, Timken inner and outer bearings. I just did this a couple months ago.
"Mods"
-Added the T87 cornering lamp headlight harness to the car, and they work great. Cornering lamp lenses as well in very nice shape too.
-Pillars are blacked out w/vinyl, can be peeled off if desired.
-I had the 92-98 Chevy truck caps on this car. I will probably be keeping the chrome lug nut caps and the center caps themselves, but will likely leave the set of outside-thread special lugs on the car in case you wanted to do what I did. May include the caps, just haven't decided. Will come with the finned wheel covers, but I'm leaving them off the car for now so the paint on the wheels isn't scratched.
-The stock grille had some worn looking chrome, as did the chrome strip on the trunk. I painted both with Dover White Krylon Fusion, and I painted the eggcrate section of the grille black. Grille still looks good, rear lip thingy has a couple small chips from car keys.
Issues of note:
-Left turn signal doesn't cancel after turning. I got used to it. The SS does that too!
-Cruise does work, but sometimes the 1MPH up or down feature cancels the cruise. I think it's a loose connection in the stalk. I never cared.
-The car needs at least an over the axle pipe for the exhaust system. This piece rotted at the muffler exit and came loose, so I took it off and have essentially been driving the car as if it had a turndown on it. Might be able to just get an OTA pipe and put it on the existing muffler (I think the stub on the back of the muffler might be okay), but might also be a good time for custom exhaust of some sort, because why not? It's not loud the way it is. The resonator and tailpipe, which are in good shape and not rusty, will go with the car. A new OTA pipe for this car is $12.93 from Rockauto.com.
-Pass. side rear window needs a roller, but I never bothered to fix it because I don't sit back there, those windows only go down halfway, the front windows go down, and the car has WORKING A/C
-When I went to clean the cap and rotor, one of the screws snapped in the distributor body. It's never happened to me before but I guess it's pretty common. For now, I took some zip ties, and made them into a circle, tightening down the front of the cap. It hasn't given me problems. I just planned on getting it out next time I needed to do a cap and rotor. "Worst case Ontario" you may have to remove the distributor, but on this car it's about a 1 on the difficulty scale compared with a 10 being an Optispark.
-Sometimes the driveline has a "clunk" when shifting, like slack in a u-joint or something like that. It's probably not worth mentioning but I am.
-A few years ago, a trans. line had a leak, so I cut the section out and put trans. cooler hose in its place. It's never given me an issue.
-Car would come with the factory AM/FM cassette. It has a Roadmaster CD player in it, but it's not mine. The car's antenna connector was giving me issues, so I bypassed it with one of those beam style amplified car antennas up at the top of the windshield. It works okay, not the best, but better than the factory one did, and I haven't fiddled with it to find the best signal either. For some reason it gets bitchin' AM signal...lol. Some people un-ground it to get a better signal, or install a toggle switch in that ground wire to use it either way. The wire is hidden in the dash and A-pillar.
Body:
Overall, it's in very good shape. The paint needs a cut and buff, but since it's white, it cleans up nice and looks good. Nice clear headlight lenses, all in all a real nice looking car.
I wire brushed, cleaned, primed, painted, and undercoated everything accessible inside the wheel wells a couple of years back, and they still look good under there. Nice inner fenders. The B-pillars are still solid from what I can tell and the rear wheelhouses are not rotted in that spot where they meet the trunk floor like many you see. The undercarriage is not "crusty", it has rust of course, but it's solid under there, and can be cleaned up with a wire brush for paint. Nice tank straps and things of that nature.
The lower rear quarters have your typical rust spots. I believe this to have been caused by either bad seam sealer from the factory, or condensation pooling there while the car sat being driven sparingly by the previous owner and sitting, along with the fact that someone left a set of keys to the car, probably since new, in the pass. side trunk extension. When I bought it, I found a hole starting there, and when I looked behind the trunk wall upholstery, I found the keys (brass) there looking like a green Hostess Snoball of electrolysis. The trunk does not smell like a water leak.
Either way, pass side. has a piece of metal tape covering where there's a hole, and the driver's side has pinholes starting, I've been painting over them every once in a while to hide it. Never had a problem getting a sticker personally. The quarters definitely do not reflect the rest of the car. Included with the car would be a solid driver's side rear quarter patch cut out of another car. I don't think the rust HAS to be fixed for a while, either way.
I have extra parts and stuff for this car, that I have listed for sale on here separately:
SS grille,
SS tails,
Blue Roadmaster dash vents,
White trunklid drilled for the SS spoiler,
SS spoiler to go with that,
Set of KYB Gas-A-Just shocks with hardly any miles on them (they were in my old green '74 for a short time),
9c1/SS solid sway bars.
I love this car, and it KILLS me to sell it because I've grown attached to it, but I cannot have 4 cars taking up space here, something HAS to go. (Shouldn't really even have three, but I wanted to have an SS for a while and see how it goes). If I did not buy the DGGM, this car would not be for sale.
I'd prefer this vehicle to go to a good home, instead of to someone who is going to trash it with french fries all over the floor, drive it in the salt and never wash it off, beat on it in front of their friends for entertainment, hack it all up, bounce shopping carts off of it, turn it into a chicken coop, or any of that. It's too nice and deserves better, I've taken care of it and the next owner should, because you don't see many in this shape anymore. In 5 years this thing will be cruise night material. For some, it might be now!
Now, a 5.3 swap, lowered, sleeper status and what have you...that would be different.
Either way, if someone buys it, it's theirs, but if someone I know trashes it, I will definitely give you a ration of crap for it.
It's a clean, cool and reliable cruiser, Caprice or not. All in all, this is a great car that is reliable, good looking, conversation starting, and it has never let me down. I was never worried driving it. Believe it or not, people asked me about this car as much as they did the yellow '74.
The car is unregistered now because I swapped my plates to the SS. The car does come with a clean MA title and a copy I made of the previous RI one and other paperwork I have, records, etc. Sold as-is, as-shown, of course.
I'd really like to get $1900 for the car itself as it sits. For $2200 even, I'd throw in the SS grille, tails, the trunklid and SS spoiler, dash vents, shocks, 9c1/SS sway bars, that quarter panel patch, an extra chrome grille, etc. There is wiggle room here, and a lot of the extras I DON'T have to include, so make me an offer, the worst I can say is no. These are prices for known BADASS membahs, btw. If I put it on CL or the end of my driveway, I'll try to get more.
These are the most recent photos of this car- the chrome wheels are now on the SS, and the car now has the whitewalls mounted with the steelies. The factory hubcaps go with the car, but I have left them off for now in order to avoid scratching the black paint on the wheels in case you wanted to do what I did with centers but no trim rings. And also doesn't have the SS grille and tails on it right now.
Randoms:
I'll take some new pictures of it this week when it's not crappy out. Let me know.