Thinking of buying another one

[Oren09]

There's one for sale in Ft Worth I am thinking about.
I haven't seen the car yet, but I've been emailing the owner.
She's not the smartest person, so it's taken me over a week to get info out of her, but, it's a 92 GL auto in aqua.
Its looks good in pics. Little to no damage. Paint has some shine. Alloy wheels and new tires.
Does not run. She says the timing belt jumped. If that's all it is, its a simple fix.
Her asking price is $650.
However... it's an AUTOMATIC. I don't want an auto. How hard would it be to swap in a manual transmission?

[georgeb]

You might like the auto. Get it!

[Oren09]

I'm going to look at the car tomorrow.

I have a quick question, though.
Can I safely flat tow an automatic Festiva?
It's in Azle, TX and I will be bringing it back to Midlothian. About 50~55 mi total.
I won't go faster than 55MPH anyway, but do I need to go a little slower?
All I have to tow with is a tow bar. I don't have access to a flatbed or any other trailers.

[Larry Hampton]

No, you'll burn the trans up.

A tow dolly would work better.

If you had a spare set of inner axle shafts you could pull the axles and put the inner shafts in, but that's a real pain.

I guess you could drive it a mile, walk back to your car, drive it two, and just keep leapfrogging it home.... Or get someone else to go with you. ;p

[Movin]

Stop towing and start your towed car every 5 miles, hit forward and reverse just to splash
things around then go again. Make sure ATF looks okay and is full. 55mph is faster than
you should spin things too, I think short distance was also supposed to be 35 max.

Best to tow with tranny not spinning, dolley or cv ends bolted in place of cv shafts.
You can leave shafts in tranny, but pull from hubs and put dummies in there.

[Oren09]

The car doesn't run.

[Movin]

All this stuff pictured below will be spinning with very little residual ATF and
without spinning the motor the oil pump does not pump. None of the spinning
parts are in oil, the oil is all in the pan and in the torque converter, a little
scattered elsewhere, but no oil will be splashed around. The bearings pictured
will go dry then start heating up. Bad things happen when one of them seizes.
If you get it borrow- trade - rent what ever for the use of a dolly or trailer.

[Oren09]

I didn't get it. I went and looked at it, but it was in worse condition than the pictures showed. The interior was nasty. It didn't have a battery. And the owner said the engine was making a noise before it died. I went up to $450 but they wouldn't go down from $500.
Just wasn't worth it.

[bhazard]

Couldn't you just run the engine and leave it in neutral and flat tow?

[georgeb]

Walk away.

[GenevaDirt]

Couldn't you just run the engine and leave it in neutral and flat tow?

he said the car does not run...but I know night crawler has towed numerous auto's by leaving them running without issue.

[Oren09]

If it ran, I'd have had someone drive it. Not a problem, haha.

[LoneManWolf]

Forgive the slight derailing and my ignorance but why can't you tow an automatic car without it being running if you just put it into neutral??? Sorry to hear it wasn't what you wanted though oren. I know the feeling... i've been trying to find a car for a few weeks for less than 1200... i am having very little to no luck... people want 1200-1500 for cars/trucks with trans problems or bad motors or other crap.

[Oren09]

Even though the tranny is in neutral, the internals are still spinning as both axles are being turned by the wheels. As explained above, the gears are all moving(at least the differential gears and some bearings), but the fluid isn't being circulated. The ATF pumps on most cars are driven by the engine, so turning the internals without the engine running can lead to overheating because they aren't getting lubed.

A few cars have the fluid pumps driven off the axles or transmission shafts and do pump fluid when the wheels are turned -engine on or off -but apparently Festiva transmissions are not of this design.

Manuals do not suffer from this as the lower gears and parts are essentially bathed in oil all the time and it is circulated further to other parts by them spinning.

[Oren09]

The seller contacted me again today. Apparently she hasn't found anyone else to buy it.
I've offered $300 because I'll have to rent a trailer and she finally accepted my offer.

I'm really thinking about getting it now. I fear the engine may be bad, but if it isn't, then I've got a cheap little backup car. I have another car I got earlier this month that could donate it's manual tranny if I really hate the auto.