Ouch! That reminds me of my own engine mount nightmare on a Nissan Sentra some 20-odd years ago. I was pretty broke, so could not afford expensive car repairs. Apparently, a transmission fluid leak was slowly destroying first one, and then two of my four engine mount gaskets. For reasons I still can't understand, my mechanic decided to interpret my "I can't afford expensive car repairs so whatever can wait should" statement to mean these, also. But he also didn't tell me about the problem! I discovered it when I moved to Northern California, got a new mechanic, and asked why there was this vibration at 65 mph. It was pricey to repair, but sure made a difference.
Hey, Dave, you really has a V8 Corvair? How on earth does a V8 engine fit into a Corvair engine compartment. My first car was a Corvair, and it had a tiny engine compartment. I loved that little car, but it certainly had a handful of its own problems.
The Station Wagon ran smoother with good engine mounts too.
Yeah, it was a "big engine" by many of today's automobile standards, but not near as big as some of the V8s in that era. The 1964 Vista Cruiser Station Wagon I was driving had the high-performance 330 cid Cutlass Rocket V8 . . . not near as big as the 385 hp 425 cid (predecessor to the 455 cid) V8 in my Dad's 4600# Toronado.
Ironically with lower gearing and 3600# weight, that 1964 station wagon was actually quicker than the Toronado, or my 1995 Cobra Mustang. (But it was not near as quick as my 3000# 327cid SB Chevy V8 powered Corvair.) It's worth noting, with it's higher-compression engine (10.25:1) using 97 octane premium, the station wagon got as high as 24 mpg on the highway with a fresh tune-up and keeping my foot out of the 4 barrel carburator.
This story brings to mind my father's 1970 Olds Delta 88. He got the smaller engine, a 350 V8. It had an automatic and all the other power options. I drove a 1969 Austin Healey, a 1969 MG B and a 1973 Triumph 750. All very small engines. When all of those were down, I would borrow the Olds (which by then was my parent's third car). My father offered to sell it to me for $25, but I declined. Whenever I borrowed it I would run out of cash. I was used to getting at least 25 MPG in the city and the Olds got 10.
Well, being used to manual transmissions I was at a light and wanted to rev the engine to impress someone. So, i put it in neutral and revved it. It didn't run well for a week after that. We had to do a complete tune-up.
We never had the engine mount fail, but I did burn out a wheel bearing trying to get out of a snowy parking lot once. The weight distribution was just terrible for that.
This article is very timely for me because just yesterday,Ihad to take my daughter's '02 Dodge Neon in to my mechanic for a similar issue. My daughter told me a loud squealing had abruptly started 2 days ago.Examining the belts, I could see that they were (over-)due to be replaced. It's good that I let her drive my car to school and take hers into the shop, because I soon discovered the problem went significantly deeper.The belts were shot because the pulley tensioner had frozen and was no longer turning. The Serpentine was dragging over the tensioner, causing extreme friction and now, a catastrophic failure. The heat destroyed the tensioner pulley which had literally melted off its shaft bushing.
All of this happened because about 12 months ago, he (my long-time trusted mechanic) had advised that the center engine mount was broken, and needed replacement. Since it was estimated to cost several hundred dollars to replace due to the transverse mounted orientation, I asked if she could continue to drive it without risk. His professional response, was "Yes, but the engine torque will eventually cause other, seemingly un-related complications at any time". I had forgotten about the advice until yesterday.Today, My daughter has a new tensioner, new serpentine, and a new center engine mount, and the car runs smoother than it ever has. And the cost to replace the mount was "parts" only, since the major labor cost was already incurred in the tensioner repair.
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