Time for a new car?

[swordfish45]

Mine's a 1998 EJ25, manual trans, 132,000 miles.
She's got a slightly blown head gasket and it's time for a new clutch. Lived in the salt belt all its life, so a bit of body/frame rust, need new exhaust.

I've been debating with myself what to do with it. I'm a student, and I don't have a lot of resources to do the above work myself. Not interested in shelling out 2-3K for the job if it's near the end of its life anyway. I'm thinking I might as well trade it in while its still running, and get a few bucks for down payment to a newer outback.

What do you guys think?

[Daboo]

There's a trade-off you always make when investing a lot of money on an older car. If you put in say $5K on a car that's only worth $2-3K, then if you get in an accident, it'll probably be totaled...and you'll only get the $2-3K that the KBB would say is the value. The extra $$ you put in are counted as simply owner maintenance.

[subiesailor]

Originally Posted by swordfish45

Mine's a 1998 EJ25, manual trans, 132,000 miles.
She's got a slightly blown head gasket and it's time for a new clutch. Lived in the salt belt all its life, so a bit of body/frame rust, need new exhaust.

I've been debating with myself what to do with it. I'm a student, and I don't have a lot of resources to do the above work myself. Not interested in shelling out 2-3K for the job if it's near the end of its life anyway. I'm thinking I might as well trade it in while its still running, and get a few bucks for down payment to a newer outback.

What do you guys think?

Might be a silly question but do you need a car? Many of the top students and friends in college didn't even have a car - it never really caused an issue. Several of them worked also.

Just asking?

[ETC]

Depends on how much you can afford for the car payments, potentially higher Insurance, Registration etc vs how much you pay now.

Also, how much newer Outback are we talking ? . Even if you buy a newer one, there is no guarantee that it will not need a clutch or blow a headgasket unless you can verify that they've been addressed. Clutches pretty much go by use and mileage so ... even if you got a 2005 with 100k on it, it would still need a new clutch fairly soon.

Not sure how bad the body rot is, that's something to think of .. especially suspension/engine mounting points.

Then there is "do you like the car you have" ? other than the stated known issues, has it been a decent car ?

132K on a car that has been maintained decently is not near the end of it's life as far as the drivetrain is concerned.

On the plus side, the motor needs to come out for the head gaskets and the clutch so, doing them both at once eliminates some labor. If you know of a decent indy shop, they may let you supply the parts and save you some money. If they've got the motor out to do the head gaskets, they shouldn't charge you much to change out the clutch ... getting at it is about 90% of the labor involved.