89 MJ

It feels good bring that close to having it driveable.

Good thinking again. I’ll have to do some more looking.

I will be staying on campus, but I will likely be working off campus. The family doesn’t have a budget for me to buy vehicles. My budget for buying vehicles is going to depend on how much money I get worth of grand and scholarships. My issue is finding something that is actually reliable though. I’m not going to buy a vehicle where I am now, so I’m not going to have a way to make sure that it is reliable. There are plenty of cars that are reliable on paper, but that doesn’t mean that each example is reliable. Fuel savings aren’t really a huge concern, for the exact reasoning that you are talking about. Good thinking on the security.

That is my main plan, but I will probably work off campus and I do have to get home once in a while.

That’s another good idea. Thank you.

The school in TN I am looking at is Vanderbilt. I have all of the things that they recommend for test scores and high school classes, plus they are a top school in the US for mechanical engineering and I like the Nashville area.

The door dings and bumps are what I am worried about too. But because the Eagle is two tone, it has rubber paint dividers and it is taller than my MJ and has a bunch of plastic cladding, so I should be alright. If I found a cheap beater down there, I definitely would pick one up though, just in case. My other dilemma is that I am not going to bring a northern car down south. I hate dealing with rust which is why both of my current vehicles are from the south. That is what I am thinking right now too, at this point.

That’s a good one.

A minivan isn’t completely out of the cards either.

Thank you. The Eagle has been off of the road for many years, but at this point we’ve replaced many of the wear parts and it seems like it was better taken care of that my MJ. My concern with the MJ is it getting hailed on or damaged in a storm and I don’t want to drive it 11 hours without cruise control.

I’d go new for that price point. Plus, you will get the warranty and know everything that’s been done to it.

Thank you! I never really thought about the truck part. Good call. I will be driving the Eagle this winter, which will pretty much make the decision for me at that point as to whether or not I could bring any sort of carbed car. The Eagle was added to the fleet to be my cheap transportation, rather than just for the unique factor. I also like your advice on a manual. It’s like cheap insurance. Ok. Those two have a good reputation to be reliable. My grandma has a 14 CRV and she loves it. Out of curiosity, did you buy your CRV new? My concern with a 10+ year old vehicle is that it’s issues will start showing. Not going to lie, we use a minivan for truck stuff at work, they do have an impressive amount of room. My budget will depend on how much money I can get worth of scholarships and grants. After what I posted in my Eagle build thread today? I could never! Seriously though, that is a pretty solid option.

Ok. I’ll add a clean older Camry to the list of cars to consider. I do like what you said though about being the person that people would call to tow them out.

My vehicle would probably just be a weekend driver and then be used to go back and forth to home. It sounds like I would be living very similarly to how you did. The Eagle does have cruise control, which will be nice. That is where I am at. I truthfully haven’t had the best luck with buying reliable vehicles. And the Eagle has enough quirks that I can get by with not loaning it. That is impressive. I’m sure a lot of that is how you treated the professor as well. But living in the dorm, I would be able to ride my bike where I need to go most of the time.

If you want to swap a 4.0 into an 86, you will also have to massage the firewall. Personally, I would do an aftermarket fuel injection (Megasquirt) and an HEI distributor/MSD ignition if I were doing that swap.

That’s also where I am at on it. I would think that it should be fine. I still have time to decide, but I wanted to make sure I wasn’t missing anything big.

My first thought after the Eagle was getting a cheap beater, but I don’t know if that makes the most sense either. Not only is it an untested car, but is also one that I know nothing about. Same as above on the Corolla and TDI. I do think a TDI would probably be pretty good though.

I’ve been around cars since I was born. Not half as long as some on here, but still many years. I grew up around SBCs for the most part. I’m not worried about not having overdrive for the wear on the engine, but rather for a fuel economy factor. I said it would be fine because I would drive that route very few times, and really, fuel mileage isn’t a huge concern, but for an 11 hour trip, it is in the back of my mind. The way I look at it, if overdrive didn’t help increase fuel economy, they wouldn’t have kept it around. But that is not my real concern. I agree that EFI isn’t very advantageous, but it would be handy in the sense that I wouldn’t have to fight with getting it started. The Eagle already starts quicker than my MJ and we still have some fine tuning to do with the carb. We also got rid of the computer controlled carb that this has when we swapped to a Motorcraft 2BBL.

@Minuit, have any knowledge on this?

I have a feeling that I wouldn’t need snow tires for the 6” of snow the area gets on average per year. That’s just your normal vehicle recommendation, isn’t it? I would love an MJ for college, but that puts me further back than bringing the Eagle, IMHO. I would have to start from scratch then on replacing 30+ year old parts. The only advantage that I would have would be fuel injection.

I am looking at going to college several hours from my home. (I’m actually looking at schools in TN). I would be about 11 hours from home and that brought up the vehicle topic. I don’t want to bring the Comanche that far because I probably won’t have a place indoors to park it. I am skeptical of bringing the Eagle because I don’t know how reliable it will or won’t be by that time (less than 1 year) and 11 hours is a long way to drive without overdrive, but it would be fine. If I bought a vehicle when I got down there though, there is no telling how reliable that would be either though. What are your thoughts? Would you bring the Eagle or buy something down there? This is only a plan for the first year when I will be staying in the dorms. Years 2-4 I would hope to buy a house to live in with a garage and I could bring the MJ down and have the Eagle down. Edit: I would also bring a bicycle that would likely be a primary source of around town transportation. Another edit: If I got something else, it would probably be a 2003-2007 GM pickup/Suburban/Tahoe because that is the only late model vehicle that I know enough about that I would buy in addition to the Eagle and MJ. Another vehicle I would consider would be a 2015+ Colorado because they seem like a fairly reliable vehicle so far, but the MJ would probably have to go away to get one of those.

I’d bet a diesel XJ or MJ guy would pay good money for that.

I really wish they would have kept AMC too. I do get why they axed it though. The Eagle would have needed a major refresh and they probably would have wrecked it anyways.

Some Eagle funnies.

But, it will have to wait until next summer when I paint the car.