Southern Gorilla

I'm at a bit of a crossroads at the moment. The AOD in my '92 Supercab 2WD just disintegrated. I've been quoted 1,900-2,200 to rebuild it. If I rebuild it, I'll have a shiny new transmission in a truck that still doesn't have AC, a working passenger window, a functional gauge cluster, a dash bezel... basically thousands of things still wrong. And it will still be an automatic and still be lousy for my 30+ mile daily commute.

Right now, I am looking to spend that money on something that will be a better commuter since that is my priority. But the question is, what to do with the truck? As I see it, I have three options;

1) Sell it as-is to try and recoup some of the expense of buying something else. This leaves me without a truck unless I eventually spend more money to buy another or to get my F-350 shipped out from my folks' place back east. But how much could I really expect to get for a truck with a blown transmission and a host of other problems? Enough to be worth the hassle?

2) Scrap the truck. There are plenty of "we buy junk cars" places that might give me $100 for the corpse. But that seems a bit like putting down the family dog because he got worms.

3) Go "bionic man" on it... we have the technology... we can rebuild it better than before. I have 8-9 months before the inspection is due again. I could easily pull the engine, rebuild it, bolt a T-5 behind it, and at least have a running truck with no engine or tranny troubles. The remaining problems would be less annoying then. Funny how not worrying about breaking down on the way to work makes a stuck window seem trivial.

I know I'll get responses in favor of each option. I'm just curious to see if one option is heavily favored over the others. I'm also curious to see what angle others have on the question that I have overlooked. I've owned some thirty cars over the years because my solution in cases like this has always been to just throw it away and move on to the next shiny thing. This time, I'd like to get outside opinions on whether that would be the right way to go.

92f150xl

If it were me I'd sell it as is and get out of it. But If flakey people off Craig's list got annoying I'd take just scrap it.
Sure everything's fixable but for the cost, headache and time commitment it sometimes just isn't worth it

David Young

I voted to, sell it. Someone might need a parts truck or something

Energized

Two grand might be better spent on a newer truck ?

Chris_1

iTrader: (1)

Or if you find another truck just like it you could sell yourself the parts.
Assuming in Texas the body isn't rusty.
Or sometimes you can get real lucky with a used transmission.

lowercasee

I would sell it and probably get a 4 cylinder Ranger. Unless you need the extra size / power of the F-series, with that kind of commute, the Ranger would seem much more suited.

Slowbrick

You would be hard pressed to find another decent and reliable vehicle for 2 grand. I would rebuild the transmission and roll with it until you are ready for another truck. You will get a lot more for a running truck than one that isn't.


You could swap in a manual transmission for a lot less, I would think. This would take some parts searching and some of your time. My guess is that it could be done for $600-$800 if you are resourceful.


Selling on craigslist without a working transmission and other parts will net a parts truck price.

Southern Gorilla

Yeah, selling it looks like the way I'm going. I already spent $1,500 on a replacement vehicle. I honestly don't need a pickup at all, much less a fullsize. So repairing it just wouldn't net me anything. Especially since I found quite a few trucks in better condition for roughly the same as it would cost to repair this one.

The manual conversion was the second option, but not worth the hassle and time involved. I can't wait a few weeks to get all the parts and do the work. And I could still get a better truck with a manual already in it for not much more than it would cost to convert this one.

But the big kicker on deciding to sell is that if I do find myself wanting another pickup I always have the option of shipping my F-350 from my folks' place in SC. It needs work to be useable, but it's a big-block, longbed, 5-spd dually... so it would be more worth the effort than this thing.

Steve83

$1900 for an AOD??? Cheese! Did that price include removal, installation, testing, a 1000mi/1yr warranty, & some Vaseline? I could get an E4OD built for less than that. I've shipped a rebuilt AOD cross-country for under a grand. (No, I don't have another.) I'd shop around - there has to be another trans shop in the greater DFW area that would beat that price & do decent work.

If you're considering a stick, I'd take a good look at the M5OD-R2. It's a stock trans for that year, so you can get all the parts at JYs or mail-order. And it's a lightweight OD, so it'd be more fuel-efficient than an older stick. But the AOD isn't a bad trans, if it's maintained.

Your description of the truck doesn't make it sound very appealing as-is (and you didn't even say what engine it has, or much else about it), so I'd guess it's worth ~$400 at most. But with a decent JY trans (~$200) installed (by you), it could be a $1K truck.

raski

Too many other issues with truck to sink money into, I vote to sell.