I do want to buy a used car

[jtr1962]

My partner swears up and down my headlights are dim beyond rational comprehension. If she's driving my car, the brights are on and she STILL thinks my headlights are dim. I'm used to it, but I do see a lot of cars now with far brighter lights. I've cleaned my lights a couple times like Youtube told me, but I see a lot of conflicting advice or when or if it's OK to replace the ones I have. Amazon seems to want to sell me lights that are anything up to 15x as bright as what my car is supposed to have. If I stick even the most modest LED bulb I can find in my car, they're 4x as bright as what's there now. Shouldn't that rate a talk with a cop or is this just what people do now?

You have to be very careful here. Strictly speaking, most of the LED retrofits are illegal. The issue is that the optics in your headlights are designed to work with the very specific light pattern emitted by the OEM halogen bulb. Most LED retrofits can't mimic this enough to meet specs. The end result is throwing light where it can do harm, like in the eyes of drivers going the opposite direction. Sure, you'll get more light on the road where you want it also, but the problem is light going where you don't want it. That said, some of the LED retrofits are approved for street legal use.

The fact we're talking yellowish light from the halogens, versus white light on a lot of the newer vehicles with LEDs, may affect your partner's perception. All other things being equal, we perceive whiter light of the same intensity as brighter than yellowish light.

 

[LunarMist]

I assumed the whole fixture was being replaced. Putting in some random bulb from the Amazon and not testing the alignment is not the best idea.

I'm not convinced that LEDs are so great. I have a bit older vehicle that has the OEM HID headlights with a very nice coverage, and good color temperature and CRI. The newer version of the same vehicle had LEDs that are dimmer, had a worse pattern (more of a drop in the middle), and were bluer in color. I suppose LEDs are cheap to make and the silly new designers care more about making the headlights very small and stylish than seeing road hazards.

 

[sedrosken]

Merc, are the lenses your headlights shine through cloudy or yellowing? That might rate a visit with a polishing kit and a buffer, some sealant afterward. That'll help immensely right there. I'm told there are kits to black out the reflective surfaces on the inside of your fixtures for LED retrofit purposes, and kits designed for your vehicle will have the lights pointed in the correct direction so as not to blind oncoming traffic, but it is probably safer to just keep using halogens or whatever your fixtures are meant for and just polish the front lens. It made a world of difference on my old Maxima.

 

[Will Rickards]

After nearly a decade, I'd consider replacing the headlight housing itself. Yes you can "resurface" them but most people aren't sealing them properly after so it just hazes up fairly quickly again.

I'd first try changing the lightbulbs with oem bulbs from like autozone or similar.
They are relatively cheap and generally idiot proof installs.
Wear gloves when you do it, your skin oil on it can cause them to have hot spots and fail early.
You may also want to have a mechanic align the headlights properly. You can do it yourself as there are screws you adjust while the lights are on and a certain distance from say a garage door.
As to LEDs, there are good and bad and certain ones do better in certain housings. If you have projector type like mine, the orientation of the LED really matters. The model I bought was AUXITO 9012 HIR2 LED Bulbs. But I needed to ensure the leds pointed left and right for my situation.

 

[ddrueding]

There are illegal things on the market, but "reasonable" is just fine, IMO. If the bulb can be changed then you don't need to realign, as that is part of the main light body that you aren't messing with. Just be sure to not get anything that is blue or otherwise annoying, and if you are worried about the alignment, you can have a pro make sure all this extra light isn't going into the faces of oncoming traffic.

 

[Mercutio]

I did some poking around and apparently weak headlights are a very common complaint with my car in particular. The housings do not look bad and they are clean, but my bulbs are original to my car. I'm going to try well-reviewed-by-other-Element-owners front and rear LEDs since my roommate is offering to at least cover the costs of the bulbs.

I don't really mess with my car but at least bulb replacements are trivial. My old Volvo was a massive PITA for that.

 

[ddrueding]

There is a special type of satisfaction that comes from messing with complex machinery and it working again afterwards. I wish you luck

 

[LunarMist]

Working on a dirty old vehicle is not my idea of satisfaction, unless it is a 60s-early 70s classic being restored.
IME if you have a low-value daily driver, then finding a good, honest, local shop that will work at decent rates is really useful.

 

[Mercutio]

I don't have access to a garage of my own and I've never thought of a car as anything but an annoying, costly tool, but after checking the wisdom of youtube, this is something I can definitely do myself. Or rather, I will do, if Amazon ever brings me my package.

 

[Handruin]

In regards to resurfacing headlights, I've used this kit from Sylvania which comes with UV blocking clear coat that you add on as the final step to protect them from yellowing/fogging right away. It was also reviewed on Project Farm.

 

[Mercutio]

New lights definitely work as advertised. MUCH brighter. I'm not having people flash their brights at me, so they must not be TOO bright, but normal operating headlights are brighter than my old brights were. I'm going to say that's well worth the $60 I spent.

 

[sedrosken]

Nice!

I meant to change out my rotors, brake pads and oil today, but either there's something wrong with my jack or it just can't lift high enough to move my car. I'm going to need to get another one before I can do the work.

 

[LunarMist]

Are you having trouble getting the vehicle onto the jack stands or what exactly?

 

[Mercutio]

Nice!

I meant to change out my rotors, brake pads and oil today, but either there's something wrong with my jack or it just can't lift high enough to move my car. I'm going to need to get another one before I can do the work.

A few years ago, I had my car in for a new set of tires. It was the last appointment of a work day for the tire place, but I had an appointment. All the bays were full when I got there, so a couple of the morons decided to go out in the parking lot and manually lift my car with jacks to do the tire swap instead of waiting to use a lift like I'm sure they were trained to.

They put one of the jacks in the wrong place and crushed part of my exhaust system. They did not TELL me they did that, but I definitely realized as soon as I was shown.

Of course, they did this in mid-December. For the warm-climate members, in the winter months and in cold places, there's kind of a lingering scent of car exhaust that sort of hangs in the air for a minute or two after you start your car, so driving home, I didn't think anything was abnormal. The next day, I could actually see the miasma in my car. I drove the ~4 blocks to my mechanic and discovered that the dipshits from the night before had crunched my car. This led to a small claim over the cost of the repair, which was ultimately rejected because I didn't give the tire store the opportunity to address my exhaust problem, on a car that I'd planned to drive about 600 miles that same day.

Long story short, I don't trust anyone doing anything on a jack, ever. Tow my car somewhere there's a lift.

 

[sedrosken]

Are you having trouble getting the vehicle onto the jack stands or what exactly?

Just trying to get it high enough to put a stand under it, yeah, but something's wrong with my jack. I'm going to borrow one from a coworker over this weekend so I can get the work done. It's past time.

 

[Handruin]

I ended up getting a hydraulic jack for my car and one of those hockey puck-like rubber pad things to go around the pinch weld. I swap my wheels over each season so I've gotten used to doing it all these years. However, I only recently learned that when they built my car, they actually embossed little arrows into the lower runner boards to indicate where to jack up the car. I've had this car almost 9 years and only now noticed this neat little feature.

 

[LunarMist]

A few years ago, I had my car in for a new set of tires. It was the last appointment of a work day for the tire place, but I had an appointment. All the bays were full when I got there, so a couple of the morons decided to go out in the parking lot and manually lift my car with jacks to do the tire swap instead of waiting to use a lift like I'm sure they were trained to.

They put one of the jacks in the wrong place and crushed part of my exhaust system. They did not TELL me they did that, but I definitely realized as soon as I was shown.

Of course, they did this in mid-December. For the warm-climate members, in the winter months and in cold places, there's kind of a lingering scent of car exhaust that sort of hangs in the air for a minute or two after you start your car, so driving home, I didn't think anything was abnormal. The next day, I could actually see the miasma in my car. I drove the ~4 blocks to my mechanic and discovered that the dipshits from the night before had crunched my car. This led to a small claim over the cost of the repair, which was ultimately rejected because I didn't give the tire store the opportunity to address my exhaust problem, on a car that I'd planned to drive about 600 miles that same day.

Long story short, I don't trust anyone doing anything on a jack, ever. Tow my car somewhere there's a lift.

Of course you don't work on a jack, but you need to jack the car onto the jack stands if you don't have a lift or inspection pit.
You drove 600 miles with a damaged exhaust? The car place should still pay for negligence.

 

[Mercutio]

I got it fixed same day. I tried to give them the bill for it and that started a whole stupid conflict.

 

[LunarMist]

Of course they won't pay afterwards if they didn't pre-authorize it.
Decades ago a car with no driver rolled downhill and out of a low-grade body shop (like MAAKO is today) and impacted me in my vehicle (I was trapped at a light and could not move). Of course they offered to fix the dent and repaint the area, but I did not trust them.

 

[Mercutio]

Circumstances being what they were, I didn't really have a choice but to get the car fixed. A cabin full of car exhaust is a great way to get rid of excess brain cells, and December in the Midwest is not really a time to try driving with windows down.

 

[LunarMist]

I try to avoid that sort of thing entirely or rent a vehicle when necessary for longer drives. It's amusing when I go to Vegas for a week and put >2000 miles on the rental SUV without spending a night in the city. They would do a double take on the mileage.

 

[sedrosken]

It was a heroic battle, but I got my oil changed, tires rotated, and rotors/pads replaced without major incident on Friday afternoon. I borrowed a floor jack from a coworker since my trolley jack apparently has erectile dysfunction (the hydraulic doesn't seal anymore), and even that couldn't raise up high enough for the rear center jack point without a wood block. It no longer complains about maintenance and it also no longer sounds like a dying cat when I stop! Progress! I did have to jack it back up though, because I rotated the tires incorrectly the first time. Not that I think it matters since my tires aren't directional.

 

[Mercutio]

I think I got a death sentence for my Element today. I'm going to get a second opinion but my mechanic seems to think I need my rear differential replaced at a cost roughly on par with the value of my car. I am not sure what I want to do about it, but I haven't had a car payment in 10 years and I had hoped to keep it that way at least a few more.

There's nothing else on the road like an Element. They're relatively small, have a reconfigurable interior for up to 4'x6' of space, sit high like a truck but handle like a car. As far as I can tell, Crossover SUVs either have passenger focus or stupidly huge engines for no particular reason, or both.

Pour one out for the toaster.

 

[Will Rickards]

Value of the car is weird. Sure, you could by another one for that amount. But it sort of doesn't take into account no car payments. I like to take the price of the repair and divide it by the monthly payment of what car I would actually buy. Then determine whether that time frame is worth it. I'll end up putting something like 5K into my 2009 forester as it needed exhaust and subframe.

If you like the car, look for small car dealers that go to auctions and see if they can get you one. Auction prices are falling at the moment.

 

[ddrueding]

My recent project is making progress, 1998 BMW 528i Touring (wagon). Shocking about of space on the inside considering it is practically a "small" car by modern standards. $4k to buy and another $4k in suspension, brakes, rust repair, and a bit of electrical work. All that is left is recharging the A/C and getting the rest of the speakers to work.

And I agree with Will; if you have the car you want and feel you have a good idea of the costs to return it to service, it might be worth it to you over replacing it. At least with your current vehicle you know what's wrong with it.

 

[jtr1962]

I think I got a death sentence for my Element today. I'm going to get a second opinion but my mechanic seems to think I need my rear differential replaced at a cost roughly on par with the value of my car. I am not sure what I want to do about it, but I haven't had a car payment in 10 years and I had hoped to keep it that way at least a few more.

There's nothing else on the road like an Element. They're relatively small, have a reconfigurable interior for up to 4'x6' of space, sit high like a truck but handle like a car. As far as I can tell, Crossover SUVs either have passenger focus or stupidly huge engines for no particular reason, or both.

Pour one out for the toaster.

If you have a car you like and it can be repaired for a reasonable price it makes much more sense to do that, instead of getting a new one. The repair may cost roughly the book value of your vehicle, but then you'll have a working vehicle which matches your needs, instead of one which most likely won't. Not to mention consider your time car shopping. That's the equivalent of spending money.

My brother bought a 1997 Mark VIII used in the early 2000s. He did whatever he could to keep the car going until finally the frame started rusting out two years ago. It's still sitting in my driveway. Then he bought another one in very good condition last year so he could continue having the same car. He loves the car, has lots of repair parts for it, and knows every detail about fixing it. He would rather do this than waste a lot more money on a newer vehicle which would be an unknown.

If your Element ever reaches the point it can't be fixed for any price that makes sense, look for a good used one. You'll spend a fraction of what you would on a new vehicle, and you'll have a car you know suits you. For now though if I were you I would just do the repair. I know the common wisdom is to not do repairs when they match or exceed book value. I don't happen to agree with that, especially when most of what they're making these days is ugly garbage.

 

[Mercutio]

Well, I let a drive train specialist look at my car. His official diagnosis is that the people at my original mechanic's shop just encountered a sound they didn't want to look into and so wrote it off as someone else's problem. I still need work on my car, but it's basically all suspension issues owing to cheap replacement parts rusting out vs. OEM Honda originals.

There's a relief that no, I don't need $3000+ worth of work on a differential system to keep my car plus chasing good money with bad on a rusting car, but getting all the suspension parts in order is still an awful lot all at once. I've been exhorted to track down original parts, so I know what's being used in the repairs.

I'm still contemplating a different car, but at least it's not an emergency now. And I should probably find a different mechanic.