It figures! Crappy timing in car repair

I've had the car for almost 2 years now, and it's been a good car. Very reliable, always starts when the key is turned. The only repairs it's needed were on the suspension and body. Kris has been keeping up with doing preventative repairs so that there have only been one or two times that we got stuck, unable to drive the car. Even during the 7 months he was in prison, it only needed one part replaced.

Kris has worked a lot on the body. When I first got the car, there were some minors dents. Kris repaired some of the body parts and found replacements at the junk yard for others. By the time he went to prison the dents were gone and it just needed some paint.

Then, while he was gone, I had a stupid little accident. I drove right into a pole in a parking lot and put a large dent in the bumper. I undid all the work he had done! And bent some more parts too. Then one day I got on the freeway, and the hood (which couldn't close all the way because of the crash) flew off! So it was looking pretty pathetic.

We were able to find good used replacement body parts, and Kris replaced, unbent and adjusted everything back to the way they should be. The only thing he couldn't fix was the frame, which needed a little straightening out. We decided to take it to a body shop to have it fixed on a special frame machine. So that cost some money, but now the car will be safer in case of any more crashes.

Finally about 2 weeks ago the final adjustments and replacements were complete, and the body was looking good. Well, aside from the fact that it looked a bit like a patchwork quilt. We'll just save up for a paint job....

Last week, the knock that had been coming from the engine for the last few weeks started getting worse. The car stalled and then overheated. We had a shop look at it and they said it was the engine rods, and the whole engine would probably have to be replaced or rebuilt. I drove it the next day a few miles to work, and the next day, the knock was way out of control. We quarantined the car to the garage and started researching engine options.

Because the car is fairly old already, replacing or rebuilding the engine may not be worth it. It will probably run us close to $1000 to do it, that money might be better spent on another used car. But we just put money and work into this car. And we both really like our lil Celica.

So our options are:

Buy a used engine for about $650 (plus the cost for some other replacement parts). The used engines are tested to make sure they work just fine, but they are pretty old, who knows what condition they're really in.

Buy a rebuilt engine for about $1200. A rebuilt engine is like a brand new engine, everything's been taken apart and cleaned and fixed or replaced.

Rebuild our own engine. This is an option even if we buy a replacement because then we can sell it. Kris can do most of the work. We would have to pay for some work to be done in a machine shop, and for some replacement parts, but Kris' brother (who works at a repair shop) might be able to get discounts on those costs. Not too sure yet what these costs would add up to.

Kris' brother got a lead on an engine that kinda sounds too good to be true. For $1000 we can get a used engine with 2000 miles on it. Supposedly it was on display at the parts store, and now they are done displaying it. The store is in California (the price includes shipping it here) and it is part of a chain of stores called LKQ which seems to be pretty reputable. They test the engines and offer a 6 month warranty. 2000 miles sounds odd, but it's quite a deal if it's true. I know that you can't be sure with the mileage because the odometer can be reset or adjusted. But for one, we would be able to tell upon seeing it if it was really a 100,000 mile engine versus a 2,000 mile one. And, they gave us the VIN number, which only has 1 record according to Carfax. Our car had 20 records. The first was that it was shipped from the manufacturer to the dealership! So it seems like the car this engine came from was never even sold!

I think we're going to go with this engine, but right now we don't have all the money. Hopefully we can come up with the funds before someone else buys it!