The money pit.

So last November we finally decided to get rid of the venerable old purple PT Cruiser that Jessica had had the entire time that we had known each other.  It still ran OK engine wise but I had said the hell with it because despite all my efforts I could not repair a shimmy in the front end and I didn’t want to put any more money into it to pay someone else to do it for us when it wasn’t worth much of anything anyway.  We knew we wanted something with 4 wheel drive this time since we both have a bit of a commute to our jobs and things have gotten a bit scary trying to get back and forth to work after winter storms, especially when driving the Civic which is almost completely worthless in the winter.

After searching the various online ads Jessica came across a Jeep Liberty that she liked.  I thought it looked nice enough but felt it was way overpriced at the dealer.  She was on the phone with them inquiring about it when I pulled up all the Liberties on Craigslist and they were way cheaper and were comparable for the most part.  We found a red one that said it had a brand new engine in it and it looked to be in good shape.  I wasn’t expecting much but we went to look at it and I thought it looked pretty good.  It was owned by one of those “responsible dad” types who had meticulous maintenance records on it from the time it was first bought since they were the original owners and had taken it into a shop for EVERYTHING.  Apparently he didn’t work on cars at all because he paid a lot of money even for simple things that anyone could do at home.  He had the engine replaced the year earlier for $5500 after he let his daughter borrow it and she blew it up so the engine in it only had like 15,000 miles on it and still had a couple years of full warranty.  When do you ever have an engine warranty on an older used car?  Never!  I thought we should go for it, the engine would probably last the life of the vehicle even if there would probably be a lot more non engine related problems to keep on top of since the body had 145,000 miles on it.  We negotiated him down on price a bit and we were Jeep owners.

Right off the bat I knew there were a few little things that needed to be fixed on it, nothing big and the guy was completely honest about the things wrong with it so it wasn’t surprising.  Jessica got mad at me because I was doing stuff to it (oil and filters and stuff like that that were due), she thought that I might break it.  She wasn’t wrong to worry about that, I can follow instructions and fix things but I did just get done not fixing the PT Loser after spending a lot of time, work, energy, and money buying parts so I didn’t have the best track record in her recent memory.

I really do like the Jeep when it works.  It’s fun to drive, zippy, maneuverable, great in the snow, easy to park, etc.  Totally shit on gas mileage but hey, its not exactly aerodynamic.  It really has turned into the biggest money pit vehicle I have ever owned though.  In the roughly 8 months we have owned it here is the list of things I have done to it or repaired.

• Changed oil, oil filter, air filter
• Fixed rear power windows (switch wiring disconnected)
• Replaced leaking coolant reservoir, associated hoses and clamps (cracked tank)
• Replaced cracked license plate holder
• Replaced headlights and bulbs
• Replaced and rekeyed ignition switch
• Replaced ignition coils and plugs because of misfiring on cylinders 4 and 6 (my fault I slopped water on top of the engine while changing out the coolant tank which sits on top of the engine and the gaskets on the coils were rotted out and let water in down by the plugs, Jessica was quite angry at me that I had broken it because I said I wouldn’t and it took me a bit to figure out what was wrong)
• Added battery tender pigtail
• Replaced multifunction switch because headlights sometimes wouldn’t turn off.
• Repaired rattle in center console
• Repaired drivers seat by replacing recliner mechanism, side trim and recliner lever
• Replaced MAP sensor (this one was on the trip to Canada in the middle of nowhere, crazy weather conditions and the engine computer freaked out when the sensor said something it didn’t like, expensive tow)
• Replaced radiator, associated hoses, clamps and thermostat (COMMON DESIGN FLAW during the trip I noticed that the radiator was leaking, I was warned of this beforehand by another Liberty owner that it would fail “right there” which it did.)
• Replaced front driveshaft time #1 (COMMON DESIGN FLAW the CV joint pooped the bed and it sounded like I was dragging chains down the road, this part is quite expensive so I picked up a rebuilt ebay one with no warranty for half the cost)
• Changed oil and filters time #2
• Replaced blower fan resistor (low fan not working)
• Replaced front driveshaft time #2 (that ebay shaft with no warranty was not my best decision since it wasn’t balanced, spontaneously shat out all its grease, and grenaded itself within 2 months,  bought the one from the parts store with the warranty like I should have done to begin with and it works great)
• Diagnosed check engine light (most likely loose gas cap)
• Replaced plastic slider on both rear windows (COMMON DESIGN FLAW I guess this problem is super common in Liberties, a plastic slider piece snaps off and the window proceeds to fall down, Chrysler’s solution is to replace the entire window regulator with the same junk piece at $250 a pop plus labor, an ingenious fellow came up with a kit that permanently fixes it by replacing the plastic piece with a metal one and you can do all 4 windows for $17 a piece, it took me quite some time to do the first one which was broken since I didn’t know how to get everything apart, almost no time at all for the second one since I knew what to do, which revealed itself to be cracked and ready to break at any moment)

Well that’s it.  It’s all 100% fully operational again (for now).  I hope there are no more major issues for a while since I’ve fixed most all of the common design flaw items that I read about online.  I’ve done all the work myself except for replacing the sensor in North Dakota after it got towed.  I have to admit that it’s pretty satisfying and fun to repair this stuff and you get a lot faster at it once you are familiar with the area that you’re working on.  I still like the Liberty for the most part, although I am not likely to buy another Chrysler product when this one is gone ( I still am in the market for a real Jeep though since I’ve wanted one since I got denied one for my very first car by my dad who said that they “drive too rough”).  Might look into a CR-V since those are smaller 4x4s vehicles and I like the smaller footprint that the Liberty has yet want the Honda reliability.