car condition

[dwhite]

ive been wondering if you guys take these car on mountain roads? cause where i live im pretty much completely surrounded by them and i don't know if i can trust the engine in my car to get me up.
so what i want is to know what you set your car against and the condition of the engine in it. mine is stock engine and stock transmission as far as i can tell.

[Twistiva]

ive been wondering if you guys take these car on mountain roads? cause where i live im pretty much completely surrounded by them and i don't know if i can trust the engine in my car to get me up.
so what i want is to know what you set your car against and the condition of the engine in it. mine is stock engine and stock transmission as far as i can tell.

Well, your answer is, "it depends".....

How steep of an incline are the mountains you intend to drive on, how fast do you want/need to drive them and for how many miles?

How many miles on your Festiva? How hard has it been driven?

I don't live in mountainous terrain but I've been through/up/over them many times before and while you're not going to win any races in a stock Festy, it will get you where you want to go without having to flog it. I've got 188,000+ and 25 yrs on the original engine and never had to take the head off the block or do any major engine work yet.

[Team Lightning]

Never had any trouble with mine in the mountains. Other than the upset Mustangs I used to leave in the curves. I love driving mine in the Smokey Mountains between Cherokee,NC and Pigeon Forge ,TN. It's a blast

[dwhite]

well the incline is different depending on routes one goes from 6% to a 10% the others is a firm 6% but i feel that is wrong and the last is a 18%.
all i know about my festiva is that it has 164,000-+ 22 year old engine. it has been with salted roads and the engine has light rust but is being protected by oil sludge. its been owned by another teen and i have it and i know i drive it a little hard but i also do regular maintenance on this car and its in so much better condition then it was in a half a year ago. no major work on it just little stuff sparkplug, wire, rotor, fuel pump all the lil normal stuff that people take for granted.

[Team Lightning]

As long as you have little or no rust on the underside you should be ok in the mountains. Have you looked at the bottom for rust? These cars are prone to have rust in the areas where the rear axle mounts to the body, if they have been in the north around the snow. The salt on the roads hurts the rear mount area from what I've heard on here. (I live in the North Georgia area.)

[dwhite]

most of it is rust free but i have rust on the drum breaks my e brake is useless with rust, and the fat bar the goes across( is splotches of light rust. i dont think ive look at the mounts themselves ill do that.

[Team Lightning]

As long as the bottom of the body is good and it's running/braking good, I see no issues with driving it in the mountains.

[Charlie1717]

most of it is rust free but i have rust on the drum breaks my e brake is useless with rust, and the fat bar the goes across( is splotches of light rust. i dont think ive look at the mounts themselves ill do that.

I'd probably like to have an ebrake while driving in the mountains. You know..... just in case.

[sketchman]

I've only had one Festiva with an ebrake that worked (2 now counting ol blue) and it was never an issue. You get used to it. Oh, and I've done much off-roading with mine. Old gas well roads, 4wheeler trails, etc. They were all stock too.

[Damkid]

Just take it for a drive and see what happens, I bet you'll be happy with how your festiva does.... although stock engines don't have much power, you should still be able to climb mountains

[F3BZ]

from personal experience, my festiva with ATX trans is a MAJOR PIA on long uphill mountainous grades. you are constantly losing speed and when kicked down into 2nd and flooring the accelerator it's are redlining it at highway speeds. now my 5 spd festiva is like a totally different car. i've been able to maintain 80MPH uphill in 4th gear and floored through WV mountain interstates. the 1.6 should've been standard in an ATX car.

[sketchman]

Didn't even click that he's talking about asphalt till now.

I drove ol blue without issue over mountainy interstate getting it home. It would fluctuate between 80 and 70 in 5th going up the hills. I didn't floor it, and it has low tread 155/80/13 tires on it.

[hotfordcat]

I have a 93GL with 240,000+ miles and I drive it though the Big Horn Mountains in Montana. Had up and over 9,000 feet. Don't think you'll find anything that high in TN, GA, NC, SC, or FL.

[Aaronbrook37]

Took a stock B3 with 300,000 miles on it and half-decent compression over the Rocky Mountains from Victoria to Calgary in one day once. Had to shift down into second for some of the steepest grades. Otherwise, she did pretty well!

[blueoval]

hey I enjoy driving mine through the Smokey Mountains too, really seems to out handle most cars on the rd I live in tn about 35 to 45 minutes from gatlinburg