Tales from the boneyard

[jps4jeep]

Well, My $200 beater has finally failed on me, well sort of. I knew the alternator was on it's last leg. I kinda just let the problem go till it hopefully got warmer. well this weekend was that last straw. Car just stalled as I pulled into the driveway due to a lack of voltage.

SO.. off to Napa. I picked up a new Belt for the hefty price of $9 but they wanted $220 for a alternator! Oh ya the car is a 88 dodge omni. So I went ot Autozone, $35 more like it. get to work on the car (this is tuesday afternoon) nice brisk 25 degree's out get the old alternator out and come to find out the internal bearings are shot, and the water pump pully is bent a little, which leads me to believe that the water pump bearings are in rough shape. All this is due to the Vibration Isolator that is in-between the Alternator and the tension assembly was completely destroyed Got everything out, had to head to work. Yesturday (wed) on my way home from Job #1 I headed to the Salvage Yard and there was only one omni in the yard. same year same motor, and it had a complete engine!! Yippy

So I pulled the water pump, alternator tension assembly and vibration isolator that I needed ($8), headed home and got to work. Water pump goes in no problem. go to put the tension assembly and Vib Iso in and it doesn't fit. Not even close. Turns out the engine i pulled this unit off had a 120 amp alternator and mine is a 90 amp unit, for some reason, completly different assemblies. So Now I had to go back to the Salvage Yard, could not find the part any where. checked all other plymouths and dodges, all were different. spent about 2 hours in the salvage yard until I took a risk and looked under the hood os a old Mitsubishi eclipse, there is my part, struggle to get it out, get it out, but this one is beat worse than mine. So I gave up, walked back to my jeep to head to the stealership, and would you believe it, there on the ground, a random motor, and there is my part!! so I take off the motor, got it for free cause the bone yard owner felt bad for my pathetic a$$ spent the better half of the evening getting everything all buttoned up. Runs like a Gem.

Woke up this morning, ya I have a soar throat and feel miserable. go figure.

Just needed to vent a little!

Thanks for reading the pointless rambles of a sick jeeper!

 

[redrooster]

That Omni is Phat. Probably one of the few Dodge/Chrysler cars of that era that remains running. This morning, on the way to work, I passed a Shelby edition Aries K. I couldn't believe it was still running. What's harder to believe is that Carol Shelby would let them put his name on a K-Car.

 

[jps4jeep]

84-86 Dodge and shelby made Shelby Omni ghx. They looked just like mine but had a scoop on the hood for the intercoolers for the twin turbo's. Those cars were tested to be in the mid 13's. Only problem is parts are impossible to find and they only made 500 a year which equals only 1500 ever produced.

 

[beachjeep]

Good job on the cheap fix, Gotta say 88 was a good year for Dodge, I bought an 88 Dodge colt 3 years old in 91 (just finished High School) with 28k for 3100.00 - what a deal! got 2500 for my d50 pickup that was totalled so it cost 600.00 - all I ever did was change the alternator once, maybe 3 sets of tires at 100 a set and changed oil (maybe every 8k), that car got me through college and to my first job(by the way that took 7 years hehehe) with NEVER breaking down. almost cried when I sold it for $600.00. anyways, point of the story 88 was a good year for DODGE. hold on to that thing.

 

[laneiac]

My first car was a 79 plymouth champ with 43k on it that never ran very well after i wrecked it. the champ was kind of a sign of things to come in the colt/omni industry. I feel your frustration.

 

[Snitty]

Re: I Just Ordered My Lift Today!!!

are you serious about that omni shelby deal

 

[TwistedCU]

I thought they were the GLH (Go Like Hell) models? The Shelby was the GLHS. Maybe it was a different hopped up Omni, but I knew some guys who owned a few of them, some were turbos and actually had some serious giddy-up. Handled pretty tight, too. Yes I'm serious.

 

[jps4jeep]

Wheel backspacing

You are right, It was GLHS. and they were super quick. kinda the predisessor to the import craze. I got the car form an uncle who had it since new. it only has 227,000 on the Odometer, so plenty of life left.

Mine is a bone stocker with no options, but the 15,000 miles I have put on it since I got it is worth every penny, thats 15,000 miles not put on my jeep. (price of tires is killer)

All said, I still am in for the car less than $500.

 

[judge09]

I had an 87 Omni that I regret selling to this day. I bought it off my neighbor in 97 and it only had 36,000 miles on it. It was his 3rd car he bought new. Only cost $1000. I spent another $400 on paint and a fixing a few rust spots and it was a killer car. I put 12,000 miles on her and sold her two years later for $1500. should have never sold it.

 

[jps4jeep]

That picture up there was taken in August. the rust has gotten a lot worse, and the passenger side is in pretty bad shape, Looks like someone drove into a jersey barrier. (Do they call them Jersey Barriers cause they don't want people to escape New Jersey?) The rear hatch has had all the paint stripped and is a nice ferous-oxide color!

 

[Bounty__Hunter]

We used to bash the hell out of my buddy's parents ole Omni in high school, and it kept coming back for more.

The 2.2 Shelby Charger was a bad little car, screamin turbos.

I too can't believe the Shelby name was ever on a K-car :roll:

 

[Snitty]

I too can't believe the Shelby name was ever on a K-car

HAHA... i agree... but... as i'm learning now... they were surprisingly zippy and would be a street racing hustler's key to success

 

[Junkpile]

Carrol Shelby is a whore. He'll put his name on anything if they throw some money his way. What he has tried to do to the kit car industry is a bunch of crap, even more so when you consider that the Shelby Cobra wasn't even designed by Shelby.....it was a british A/C roadster with a Ford engine. He is/was a better salesman and advertising guy than he ever was a car builder. His "legend" is BS.


The turbo 2.2l? and 2.5l are mean little engines. It takes VERY little to put any car they ever came in into the 12 second range. Very impressive. I've been outrun by one, and not in my Jeep it was in my Camaro

Ceck out this Caravan
http://pages.cthome.net/gus/mini.html

 

[Snitty]

which 2.5l are you speaking of? 12 seconds is not an easy mark to reach

 

[Junkpile]

I don't know much about them. I think the hot little turbo fours from Chrysler were 2.2l and 2.5l. I may be wrong about the sizes.

I got outrun by a little black omni one night. As far as I could tell and all he admitted to was a pumped up turbo boost and an exhaust. I expected a nitrous system. My Camaro was a 80 Z-28, 355, 041X heads, edelbrock performer rpm, headers, 290 degree camshaft, 2800rpm stall, 3.73:1 gears......I KNOW it ran a 13.4 on street tires. I had cheater slicks on when he took me.

 

[Snitty]

i gotta say.. that's one nice car you had/have

 

[Junkpile]

Yeah, I enjoyed that car. I got rid of it a while back. Low-Mid 13s in the quarter isn't exactly breakneck fast or anything, but those 78-81 Z/28s ran like a 16.50 factory so I guess mine was quick for what it was. Heavy cars, I think my Z weighed about 3600#.

 

[jps4jeep]

I have seen that mini-van race up at new england drag way, but not in the past couple years. The Omni had the 2.2L turbo, the regular omni (which I am blessed with) is also a 2.2L but the entire motor except the A/C compressor is different.

Thats a sweet camaro Junk! But Only in the mid 13's with those mods? Sounds like it should be a little lower? Was the car on a weight loss program, or pretty much stock?

 

[Junkpile]

It was pretty much stock except for the drivetrain. Those cars are hard to set up.

 

[BakedAlaskan]

If your Omni is the base model it should have the Volkswagen Rabbit engine in it. So if you ever need parts again look for those too.