I bought an Aspire for it's engine, however......

[Eaglefreek]

So, I bought a 97 Aspire this morning for it's engine. It has 137k miles and needs a new 5 speed transmission. It was rather dirty when I picked it up due to the PO having a dirt driveway that was a 1/4 mile long. The engine runs extremely smooth and quiet and the trans is rather noisy. He said it had a leak and ran low on fluid. The brakes are mushy an it's also an A/C car. The a/c kicked on but the compressor or clutch made a little bit of a racket and I didn't run it long enough to see if it got cold. Here's my dilemma, after washing it, it's in rather decent shape. The interior needs to be cleaned and could use smaller 15" tires, but otherwise I don't know if I can bring myself to tear it apart.









After a quick shower with a pressure washer

[jbibb1]

That car is in great shape! As far as the tires go, I run 195/50/15s on mine, and with the right backspacing, there are absolutely no rubbing issues. I'd put a new trans in it and drive it

[mikemounlio]

Looks to good to pull apart unless you just really want a built festy. I would daily this while you find a new swap for the festy.

[White92]

she cleaned up nice. white is my favorite color

[FestYboy]

Throw a trans in that thing! Or pull the engine and give the shell to me

[Eaglefreek]

That car is in great shape! As far as the tires go, I run 195/50/15s on mine, and with the right backspacing, there are absolutely no rubbing issues. I'd put a new trans in it and drive it

The thing is, I've tried the Aspire thing before and realize I'm a Festiva guy. I feel cramped in an Aspire. It seems good used Aspire trans are hard to come by since they seem to have more issues than the Festiva transmissions.

Looks to good to pull apart unless you just really want a built festy. I would daily this while you find a new swap for the festy.

I just want a Festiva with a stick good running engine. I don't need any more HP.

she cleaned up nice. white is my favorite color

White is one of my least favorite colors on a vehicle. It's like a blank piece of paper.

Throw a trans in that thing! Or pull the engine and give the shell to me

If I do pull the engine, I planned on parting it out and making most of my money back, but if someone wanted to buy it complete sans engine, I could do that, too. I'm a nice guy, but I'm not giving it away. It does appear to be 100% rust free.

[harpon]

Are all those new festy short blocks gone that someone posted last Fall?

Maybe the tranny problem is more shifter related. Happened here.. Maybe sinking and ready to fall through the floorboard- it seems like syncro rings then...

[Studebaker]

Parts car. Alot of work to get it nice and road worthy

[TominMO]

I have a good Festy short block and two Aspire heads. Will sell 'em to you, but you gotta pick 'em up, or have someone coming to Lakestiva (on May 20) do a relay for you. Relay guy must have cash in hand for the purchase.

One Aspire head has the Dickmeyer MPG cam, which does not play nice with Aspire EFI (same with Festy EFI I'm guessing), so you would want to swap the cam out; and also the valve train, if you are using a Festy cam. It has good valve stem seals.

The other head is all stock Aspire, but needs new stem seals, which I have and will throw in. You could just put this head's stock cam into the other head too.

Neither head is on the Festy block, so you would need a new HG.

[Eaglefreek]

Are all those new festy short blocks gone that someone posted last Fall?

Maybe the tranny problem is more shifter related. Happened here.. Maybe sinking and ready to fall through the floorboard- it seems like syncro rings then...

I should have went that route before I bought a used turd of an engine, but I don't want to go through that expense and then to also have to buy a rebuilt head and associated gaskets.
It's definitely inside the trans and not the shifter.

Parts car. Alot of work to get it nice and road worthy

:thumbs_up:

I have a good Festy short block and two Aspire heads. Will sell 'em to you, but you gotta pick 'em up, or have someone coming to Lakestiva (on May 20) do a relay for you. Relay guy must have cash in hand for the purchase.

One Aspire head has the Dickmeyer MPG cam, which does not play nice with Aspire EFI (same with Festy EFI I'm guessing), so you would want to swap the cam out; and also the valve train, if you are using a Festy cam. It has good valve stem seals.

The other head is all stock Aspire, but needs new stem seals, which I have and will throw in. You could just put this head's stock cam into the other head too.

Neither head is on the Festy block, so you would need a new HG.

I appreciate it, but I already went the route of messing around with an engine I didn't see or hear run and really don't want to go through the hassle again. If someone had a complete B3 or a first gen B6 they could somehow prove had lower miles and ran good and was interested in my "new" Aspire, I would consider some sort of trade + cash. But I don't want to have to go way out of my way to make the deal.

[Eaglefreek]

The thing is, I've tried the Aspire thing before and realize I'm a Festiva guy. I feel cramped in an Aspire. It seems good used Aspire trans are hard to come by since they seem to have more issues than the Festiva transmissions.


I just want a Festiva with a stick good running engine. I don't need any more HP

I have no idea where stick came from in that quote and I can't edit it.

[reddragon]

That white 2 door Aspire would look good with Initial D livery

[TominMO]

I appreciate it, but I already went the route of messing around with an engine I didn't see or hear run and really don't want to go through the hassle again. If someone had a complete B3 or a first gen B6 they could somehow prove had lower miles and ran good and was interested in my "new" Aspire, I would consider some sort of trade + cash. But I don't want to have to go way out of my way to make the deal.

Understood. The short block came out of Dickmeyer's car, and ran fine when I pulled the motor. The head went into my Aspire SE, sold to ThisVelologist. Both Aspire heads ran fine when on the Aspire (just leaky valve stems on one).

[harpon]

How's that Aspire coming?- just a thought on the tranny- Can you go about $25 for some good syncro-mesh fluid? That can work wonders. I had some hard shifting trouble last summer-and thought it the syncros When I checked the fluid in my '96- for the first time since I bought it in '03- I found that the fluid was down to about a half quart- instead of 2 1/2! So I put in new heavy gear oil- which helped obviously but the shifting problems continued. I figured there must be a "leak" but over the course of summer the level wasn't going down much, so I believe right now that it has a very very slow leak-

Anyway after a bit, and reading experiences here and on the Metro forum, I drained all the gear oil fluid and replaced with syncro-mesh- it would be best to do a quick flush- and you could use something cheaper- just oil for instance- but the syncro-mesh REALLY helped the situation as it was and I kept driving the car-
the problems got worse again and the shifter finally fell through the floorboard- at that point I figured the tranny was shot and was looking for a new one online

What I finally did was fix the falling shifter with window weld- you can find the threads here but not relevant perhaps

the point I'm making is that perhaps the tranny isn't as bad as you think- the level may have dropped over years and years and thee might be a lot of crap in it- and it may be worth the small investment and time to try the syncro-mesh- and even flush it with something else first (a lighter fluid is probably better for that)-

the fluid changes are about as hard as changing the oil- although the plug- under the speedo cable - is harder to access until you get the hang of it-

a tip here- leave the speedo cable attached to the top of the plug, and then you don't have to reattach the cable just to check or fill the level.

The "cramped" thing is something that you can get used to a bit- but as I went from a Festy into the Aspire I can relate- I'm 6 feet and it made the difference between being able to wear a pointy toboggan hat or not in the car- there's a couple inches less- and I personally always like the flat festy dash with no airbags- and you don't honk the horn accidently so much on a Festy as with an Aspire where the buttons stick out on the wheel further

I would add a couple of cans of PAG oil 46 first before any kind of refrigerat or other mixed refrigerant- to quiet that noisy compressor if I could-
some of the larger "all in one" cans aren't specifying that they in fact have oil in them these days- they just say something like- "all in one formula"- (Do you trust them if they're not Texaco?) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b1zxOTDHIBQ
but a 3 oz can or two- 2 oz refrigerant and 1 oz oil) is how it usually is I think- so its not that much oil- probably couldn't hurt and the cans are small so you probably won't overpressure on a neglected car that old.

Can you just tinker with it and see a bit?

[Eaglefreek]

I won't be able to touch for a few weeks. I've got to work at least a couple weeks straight and I'm also in the middle of a camshaft and carb change on my dad's Oldsmobile which I need to get done first. The transmission is definitely making a lot of noise. The guy said it had a leaky seal and he would add fluid frequently, but because of how it's a pain to do, he didn't add it as frequently as he should have and drove it a lot of miles for work. I took a look at it this morning and still don't think I be able to part it out. If someone thought they would want the whole thing minus engine to do their own engine swap, I would let it go fairly cheap.