I bought a 1988 Plymouth Colt E in late August 1998.
The Colt was not in a very good cosmetic condition : spots of rust in many places. However, the engine looked and sounded good and had a very low mileage.
- September 98 -
I've not done much with it other than removing some of the rust spots and paint them over.
- October 98 -
I've been using the Colt as a daily driver since a 1.5L engine consumes less than the V6 of the Z24, but lately the car has been sitting around without three wheel studs : I had broken them while trying to rotate tires.
Fortunately, I managed to remove the hub and knuckle and have sent them to a machine shop to get new wheel studs fitted in. The cost, a huge $142! They changed the bearings and also grinded the brake rotor.
Since I had passenger side of the car all stripped out, I decided to change the drive axle too. It cost $80 at Auto Parts Club, about $20 cheaper than at Kragen.
Of course while I was removing the hub, I tore the tie rod end and ball join dust covers. Fortunately, I found universal replacements and they seem to work well. At least they were cheaper than the $24 that Kragen wanted for a replacement tie rod end!
- November 98 -
I had some other problems with the car : overheating and transmission leak.
The overheating problem was due to a bad thermostat. Lesson learnt : if the car overheats, change the thermostat before changing anything else. I made the expensive mistake of first changing the thermo-sensor that controls the fan.
The transmission leak came from where I had inserted the new drive axle. So I stripped the car again and changed the oil seal. Instead of using a seal driver (available from JC Whitney) to drive in the new seal, I used the leftover wheel bearings.
I also wanted to take advantage of the situation to change the ball joint on the lower control arm. Apparently, you cannot just do that on a 1985-1988 Colt. You have to change the entire control arm. Unfortunately, I could not remove some of the bolts that held the lower control arm to the car body, so I left it at that. Perhaps I will get an impact wrench next year and try again. Interestingly, I could still get a ball joint at the local parts store. Since the ball joint dust cover was torn, I bought a ball joint and use the dust cover supplied on the old ball joint.
Finally, one other thing I did with the car was to remove the back seats. This reduces some of the weight and makes the car a two-seater. I plan to get some carpeting to cover up the painted metal and also to fix a rear strut bar to the hooks that used to hold the top of the rear seat back.
- December 98 -
I removed the muffler and put in a glasspack muffler I ordered from JCWhitney.
The result is pretty good : at highway speeds, the engine doesn't sound like it is struggling.
Also, the glasspack muffler is not as noisy as I thought it would be. So it's really a good investment : total cost $50.
- May 98 -
I changed the timing belt! It is not difficult but you need the service manual and know a couple of tricks.
The first trick is how to remove the water pump pulley. You have to use a very long screw driver to block at least two of the bolts on the pulley. Then try to unbolt one of the other two bolts.
The second trick to how to unbolt the big crankshaft bolt so that you can remove the crankshaft pulley. Without removing the pulley, you cannot remove the timing belt.
The solution to that is to lower the car to the ground, and put the transmission to 4th gear (assuming manual transmission). In this way, the weight of the car holds everything in place and prevents the crankshaft from turning. Then you can unbolt the crankshaft pulley bolt.
In the meantime, transmission fluid is still leaking from the axle. I think it's the remanufactured axle that is causing the problem. So I will fork out $255 to get the genuine Mitubishi/Plymouth axle and see if I can fix the problem.
Plymouth/Dodge Colt Service Manuals can be obtained at:
Dyment Distribution Services at 1-800-890-4038, Mon-Fri 8AM - 4:30PM EST.
Be prepared to give them the year and model and have your credit card ready.
I paid $54 for my copy. Believe me, it's worth every cent.
True to my Internet leanings, I also started a mailing list for Colts (including Mitsubishi/Hyundai vehicles that use similar components e.g. the 1.5L engine).
To subscribe to the mailing list, go to http://www.onelist.com/subscribe.cgi/colt
Here're interesting links for the Colt:
http://www.allpar.com/model/champ.html
http://www.mtcnet.net/~mossnj/hiper/colt/