Maurader fs in NH 'parts car' 2500

[BoulevardRide]

I don't know the guy, never saw the car, just keep seeing the ad come up on 'nearby search' for marquis.
Seems like kind of a strange ad 'possible bent frame'??, has a different motor, 146k on the clock... don't know if this is a good deal or not..
https://nh.craigslist.org/cto/d/2003...475883239.html
and of course the "don't waste your time with lowball offers" and won't part out even tho he says it's a parts car:?

[Kodachrome Wolf]

Looks like the guy barely knows the car himself.

The Aviator engine is a DOHC 4.6, so the same as the Marauder. As stated, rust is an issue, so you got to wonder how bad it really is. If you look at it, approach it with caution. Even at that price, it would be a hard split if its worth it or not to fix depending on how bad it really is.

Personally, if I were looking for one and had the money, I'd try to find a nicer, well kept example.

[Tiggie]

I’d have to go look at that if it were close.

[Mr Bean]

Seeing what the engine bay looks like I bet it's a rust bucket but could also be a good car to flip. I doubled my money a few years ago when I bought a car in similar shape.

[Mainemantom]

I would believe the car to be parts only. Due to previous experience with buying used in NH, expect that used vehicles are parts cars. Be pleased with anything more than that.
NH has no buyer protections on used cars from private parties.

[79lincolnlover]

Run away screaming...

[BoulevardRide]

Seeing what the engine bay looks like I bet it's a rust bucket but could also be a good car to flip. I doubled my money a few years ago when I bought a car in similar shape.

Somehow i don't have the flipping gene. pretty sure i've lost money on every car i've owned, even if just in new parts. nobody changes fluids where i live so auto zone makes a mint off me every time i buy a car.

I would believe the car to be parts only. Due to previous experience with buying used in NH, expect that used vehicles are parts cars. Be pleased with anything more than that.
NH has no buyer protections on used cars from private parties.

Bangor, i'm not too far away. I started asking nh and ma sellers for underside pics before driving down, saves me a lot of hassle. Even with no rust showing on the body a lot of them have it bad underneath. My last few cars came from down south then got maine plates & inspection, feel pretty lucky there, i hate a rust bucket.

Run away screaming...

Nice sig! holy crap! i'm famous lol

[DerekTheGreat]

Somehow i don't have the flipping gene. pretty sure i've lost money on every car i've owned, even if just in new parts. nobody changes fluids where i live so auto zone makes a mint off me every time i buy a car.

LoL same here. I just buy them to drive them and wrench on them for entertainment. I'm positive I haven't made money on ANYTHING I've sold. At best I felt like I broke even. Especially if you put a price on the labor you invested into a particular car, many don't do that. I also drain every single fluid a vehicle has when I get one, I assume nothing has ever been changed & even if it has, it was changed using parts store brand gick.

With galvanized body panels & zinc phosphate pretreatment & ecoat plus a proper primer sealer bc/cc paint system the bodies of these things tend to look nice for awhile, certainly much better than the underside does. So when you see rust on the body, expect the frame/structure to be much worse. Like you I ask for pics of the underside if it means a 2 hour drive or more.

[BoulevardRide]

With galvanized body panels & zinc phosphate pretreatment & ecoat plus a proper primer sealer bc/cc paint system the bodies of these things tend to look nice for awhile, certainly much better than the underside does.

That explains a lot. I'm learning something every day here.
I'm really diggin my 88, it spent a lot of winters in florida and i had it oil undercoated first thing. I have this habit of searching the want ads for that perfect panther tho, maybe as psychological backup in case mine craps out, who knows.
I've been noticing recently that m.y. 2000 are being sold cheap with rusted out frames, where my 88 and a previous 95 florida vic are still pretty clean underneath.
I've personally passed on a 2002 and most recently an 06 where the whole underside was shit scale brown and the gas tank was rusted so thin i watched my finger push dents into it while brown chunks of that former chemical coating stuff dropped to the ground. This was at a used car lot i drove 2 hours to see with cash in hand, the factory paint up top was new-car clean, the guy on the phone said it was clean underneath, but i never saw such a new car looking so miserable underneath...

[DerekTheGreat]

Yeah, seems everyone wants to wheel & deal, especially those used car lots. I've stayed away from them after working for one. We once had a 300k mile box Town Car that came in. Owner said we were listing it as 200k. Working in the detail shop all they ever did was take disgusting cars, have us clean them up, the PDR guy come, us polish them & spit shine the engine bay and sell them as well maintained vehicles. With a hefty mark-up of course.

To me, a clean underbody is essential. If I'm buying something local I have a tolerance for it, like the floor pans must be solid as any body mounts or things of a structural nature. Since I work in the anti corrosion biz it's still tough because all paint systems I've tested exhibit the same pattern: Once you see the rust, the coating system has essentially failed. Which is why it blows up in just a few years after you see "some rust" as most sellers claim. Humidity & salt water rapidly degrade a coating's ability to protect the substrate. Frames & floor pans often get little to no protection. Even if they're painted it's not like the substrates were cleaned as effectively as say the body panels, which are "class A" finishes and have their own requirements. Cleanliness is everything. Even crappy old rustoleum will perform better if properly cleaned as opposed to just wiping the surface with a paper towel.. Also, weld slag & scale is hard to clean so that's why typically those areas rot first, just look at all the GM FWD cars with engines falling out of the cradles due to weld failures..