Got an e-mail from a fellow mav owner that saw a rust free 77 mav, 4,000k miles, in storage since 1977. It was in a body shop getting extensive work done to drivers door. Owner turned the key on while car was in gear with door opened in garage. Owner is said to be asking around $3,500. The guy said it was a 6 cyl. not a speck of rust and very clean under hood. What do you all think of the price? Joe
If it was truly in storage from 1977 ... means all the fluids are toast. Hoses are toast ... not sure it I would trust it mechanically without replacing lots of stuff on it ..
Evidently the car runs. It is at the body shop now. I'm going to stop by on way home from work tomorrw and find more out about it and see it for myself. Either way it's unbelieveable to find one with 4,000k on it. And sounds like it's a standard shift the way the car was damaged.
One thing that a low mileage car has, that is hard to duplicate is the feel of a new car. All the little geegaws are there, the doors slam good, the glass is clear, the seats arn't crushed, all the buttons, knobs, screws, tabs, decals, brackets, gaskets, rubbers, flotsam and jetsam are there. A lotta that stuff can't be found.That really is nice. The low mileage can be deceptive. My son's 77 Buick, w/ 9500 miles, had a rusted thru oil pan. Imagine! The road salt, combined with the lack of leaks allowed rust thru! Is it an air car? any neat stuff like buckets, floor shift? Good color? If the body is straight and the door fixed, first class, and particularly if it is an air car, and a good color, I would spring for the deal.
an easy way to tell if its really that low miles and not only 4k but 104k.. is to pull a valve cover.. an easy way to tell on a car thats comming from someone thats not a gear head... but i'd like see what the thing looks like myself.
Another quick tell-tale indicator of low-mile cars actually being a low mile car; examine the amount of wear on the brake pedal. If it's worn to the metal, well, you know.
One of the car dealers I call on replaces the brake pedal rubber on every car he buys to resell. It is SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) at his dealership.
Just read an article last night in CC magazine. A quick way of determining low/high mileage cars is pull one of the hub caps (if equiped). If it's fairly clean it could possibly be a low mileage car.
Well everyone, I finally found this car today and believe me it has 4,272k original miles on it. Back in 1977 we had a flood here in Johnstown and this was in the flood. The guy drained and replaced all fluids then... it was his niece's car. For some reason the car then sat in a garage since then. He has put a little over $3,ooo into it recently to make it road worthy. It is dark brown, plain jane as they came. 6 banger,3 speed on collumn, tan or sort of yellow int. Paint is not really good and body has a couple little dimples from boxes and other normal garage clutter. But there is no rust any where. Perfect floor,trunk, door bottoms,the front inner spash panal was out for the door repair and the torque box area was shinny and clean! The spring and control arm stickers are still on there. Under the hood is the good part. The air pump,clutch and shift linkage, and all other components look never used and very clean. All the little yellow code or ok marks are in place also. Chrome isn't that great. This all I could get from the shop guy. I have the owners number and will call this weekend. I'll let you all know what I find out from him. Joe H
