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Help with Camry purchace decision.

I am looking at buying a 1997 Camry CE. 130,000 mi., $1400 obo It was driven by a teenager who says the motor is blown up. He said it would run but it sounded like a marching band under the hood. When I inspected the car, I tried to start it myself. I couldn't get it to stay running but it would run for a split second and die. The noise was like a loud clatter and it sounded like it was coming fron the top end. Then when the motor died it would make a ringing noise like a bell. The ringing noise reminded me of an unbelted idler pulley on my S-10 truck that I accidentally tapped with a wrench. The boy also told me that the car quit on him all of a sudden on the road. He only noticed the noise when he started it to move it in his driveway. From my limited experience it sounds like it may be a timing issue, but i thought I would ask your opinions.

Thanks, Stephen

Reply to
Stephen Kelley
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there are plenty of other used cars out there that run good...find one

Reply to
justinm930

Why pay for a piece of junk, im sure the trans is crap to. Sure you might get lucky but I dought it.

Reply to
m Ransley

Try

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Reply to
onehappymadman

First guess would be a timing belt that slipped a few teeth. Unless you're a fairly accomplished mechanic yourself, you'd probably be a lot better looking for one of the very many Camrys that have received good care and regular documented maintenance so you know the condition of the car is good overall.

Reply to
Daniel

Might be a $200 fix, or could be $2000. Not a gamble I'd take at the asking price.

Reply to
Alex

Even if you could get it to work, would you still want to drive it? Put it this way - a lot of us have older cars with more miles on them, working better than this car. Do you want to take the gamble that this teenager took good care of his car? Do you want to wrestle with transmission repairs, sludged engine from not changing oil, etc?

Well if you insist, have it towed to a mechanic, who can give you a detailed list of what needs to be done. Then decide if it's still worth buying, once you add in the cost of repairs.

Reply to
onehappymadman

It is worth scrap value, if you feel like a gamble offer scrap price, here it is maybe zero now, but it could take 5000 or more to fix it right. The last car I had scrapped I got nothing for it.

Reply to
m Ransley

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