Ugh... well I finally made it by to look at the truck..

The interior was pretty rough, but workable. There were a few other issues that will keep me from buying it..

The steering was horrible.. Under braking, the thing would wander from lane to lane on its own. It was scary to drive in traffic. The guy said 'yeah, it just needs ball joints. $17 a piece and you'll be fixed up...' My response to that is "if it's so cheap & easy you should really get it done before you let anyone else test drive it. There's no way you're going to sell it like this.."

There was a pretty bad exhaust leak and the turbo didn't sound very smooth..

In spite of the steering I got on the freeway.. The pedal was almost to the floor and it would only do about 66-69..

This one was the classic example of the old "500k engine in a 100k truck.." saying. Oh well, it was just a deal that I stumbled across. I really appreciate all of the insight & help you guys have given, and hopefully I'll join your ranks one day..

 

Sorry to hear about that. Keep looking

 

thats a bummer to hear. I saw the 94 i just bought at a local place and thought the exact thing would happen that happened to you, it had 191k on it. But i took it for a test drive and the steering and braking felt almost as good as my new 04.5 and while it didnt have the power of my 04.5 i thought it did **** good for only having 160hp, it pulled a 6% grade at 70-75 no problem. The previous owner of this truck took great care of it. Dont give up on your search, there are plenty of good trucks out there.. I paid $7500 for mine and while similar trucks are going for the $6-7k range around here i know i got a good deal because this truck has been taken care of. I just filled it up and it just under 20mpg and half the driving was in the city!!! i expect it to get 22mpg highway only driving, cant beat that

Sean

 

wdj,

Did you happen to look under the front end of that truck? I wonder if it's had a major front-end collision. Once it does, it will never really steer right again. As for ball joints, it's about $6-700 in this area for all four, mine is getting close to needing them, but it's not affecting steering!

Like someone else has said, first on this truck is only for when you have 10k behind you, starting up a hill at a stoplight. I get used to starting in second, although sometimes the 3-4 shift is a bit too wide of a gap. Oh for an NV 5400 next time!

Check autotrader.com, I saw several in Texas for under $8k on there recently. Good luck!