#neon

I don’t normally do the “consumer awareness” stuff here on TTAC — we have plenty of very competent contributors for that — but I thought I would share a recent experience with all of you and perhaps save one or two of you a few bucks in doing so.

What did you do this morning? I spent $101.78 at the local Pick-N’-Pull, using a completely inadequate set of hand tools to remove the last twincam Neon head to be found in any Columbus, Ohio – area junkyard. I removed the power steering reservoir by beating it to pieces with a crankshaft damper from a Chrysler LHS. I imagine Adrian Newey is doing something similar right now on the Red Bull RB6.

The reason for this outrageous expenditure is simple: NASA (the race sanction, not the folks who no longer build rockets) has partially come to its senses. In previous years, the minimum weight for doublecam Neons was 2650 pounds, while the twincam Sentras and single-cam Neons were both 2450. Needless to say, our single-cam Neon has never successfully beaten a Sentra in a Performance Touring race unless it was raining (I’m the Jenson Button of club racing, including pre-trophy-ceremony makeouts) or the aforementioned Sentra has made a major mistake.

This year, two interesting things have happened. First, NASA dropped doublecams to 2550 and raised the Sentra to 2525. Now we have a fighting chance. Second, the fellow who owns the other half of my race team acquired his racing license last week. Finally, I have a teammate! So we need a new name, and I’m taking suggestions.

Thinking about a Dodge Neon racking up 500k miles is a bit like imagining Britney Spears celebrating a golden wedding anniversary. Dodge Neons just don’t come to mind when thinking about hi-mileage cars. But with a bit of dedication and understanding, cars with a rep seem to run forever for the right owner. Here’s a 1998 Dodge Neon R/T (no less) with 446,000 miles on it, and that was last July. And that’s with the original engine, no less, in case you were wondering. OK, there is a bit of a secret to the owners’ success: it’s their sixth Neon, so they’re familiar with all their hidden warts.

TTAC Commentator Robstar writes:

My wife has a 2000 Neon we bought used with 125k. It just passed 50k miles in the 4 years we drove it. We have had no issues with this car so far, although the first owner (we are the third) replaced the tranny at 70k.

At about 35mph the engine starts making a loud “ooooooooo” sound (kind of like a deep throated turbo or a vacuum cleaner). There is no “windup” to this sound — it’s either on or off. It does not matter if you are accelerating hard or not. Since we do mostly highway driving, this sounds tends to blend into road noise once we are up to highway speeds. The engine is not short of oil (although it does need 1/2 qt every 1500 or so). We have driven the car for ~ 3k miles with no issues….but I’m getting nervous.

It’s heartbreaking. To see a major company that literally carried a healthy portion of America’s heartland go up in Euro-flames. I remember the beauty of it. The 1990’s minivans that completely obliterated their competition. LH sedans that were state of the art for their time. Cloud cars that had more power and road feel than their American brethren. Neons that were so good that even Toyota was jealous. Believe it or not, I still think the talent base of Chrysler is there. But to get it out…