No, this is not an April Fool's joke, just poor timing for the post...

As a number of you still remember me (maybe 50%, considering all of the new members joining in and old ones moving away), the S was my winter beater during my 3 years in boston. Well, the ol' girl is payin' the price for it now, so I pass this info on to the rest of you as fair warning to do some preventative maintenance NOW, before it's too late.

Before Christmas, I replaced my aging (80k+ miles) stock shocks with some Buddy Club Racing Spec coilovers. This necessitated an alignment, which is where it all goes downhill.

The road salt rusted all four lower A-arms in place! This means the only real "suspension" that was rotating/working were the rubber bushings in the A-arms, and those don't move very far So, my "suspension" had a total travel of maybe 1"? Needless to say, it wasn't the stock suspension getting soft (although they definitely were), it was the fact that they weren't even part of the equation when it came time to hit a bump.

I was able to free one corner, but the remaining three had to be removed with a cutting torch. I also went through and lubed up all of the upper A-arms, as well as the swaybar links. Even with me getting parts cheap online, it still set me back $1,500 and a TON of time.

As it stands now, it's significantly better, but the car is still quite twitchy/nervous at highway speeds. I placed an order earlier today for 3 new swaybar links (one was replaced with a lower A-arm as they melted the link's ball joint plastic getting the A-arm off), another $135, not to mention the time it'll take me to replace them myself. Needless to say, I am NOT having fun!

So, consider this fair warning... if you drive in the winter, come summer weather you may want to consider removing all bolts one by one and lubing them up with some bearing grease. You'll spend half the day doing it, but it's better than half a weeks salary for new parts.

(Note to Glenn: Since your car has barely seen any road in several years, I think you can safely ignore this warning )

 

thanks for the advice, any other areas of the car that should get similar attention?

 

Suspension is hit the hardest, but keeping all of the rubber components (such as CV boots) touched up with silicone spray should help delay deterioration. Consider running some fresh water inside the doors to keep the weep holes clear of debris... once those start rusting, you might as well reskin the door.

One of my rear brakes seized several months back, so make sure the brake fluid stays clean (not really a winter tip, just all around good maintenance), and consider flushing the radiator every 50k miles. Just did my radiator last week at 90k+ miles and it was NASTY! Old stuff, dark green that passed virtually no light and some odd BB-shaped sediment precipitated out, new stuff fluorescent yellow.

 

Thanks Mac!

 

Shiet mine doesnt even see rain might as well snow

 

Same here

Just another reason to use the S the way it was meant to be used in NE...

as a Second car! and only for the top-down spring/summer weather

 

^ bah humbug!

 

Maybe it was all that high pressure car washing you were doing..........even up your exahust pipes if I remember correctly. No wonder why stuff seized up!

I at least 2x per year spray down all boots/joints and anything rubber or silicone on the car. Usually when I change over winter to summer tires and visa versa.

I forsee many many years of life out of my car without issue. 90K and no radiator fluid change? Sounds like Michelle has been severely neglected!

 

I usually drench the rubber boots, joints, bushings before putting her away for the winter with Sillicone spray.

 

High pressure water has never touched my car, but yes, some was sprayed up the exhaust for some fun It was simply a matter of stuff rusting... after removing some of the bolts by hand, you would be amazed by how little rust it takes to seize things up tight. I was using a 3' breaker bar to remove some of those bolts, putting enough weight into it to bend some Craftsman sockets, and the bolts had barely a dusting of rust on them. Surprised the hell out of me!