Yay for new toys!

So… about 3 weeks ago I drove to my mom’s from Columbus. Theresa needed to take her GRE and I hadn’t been home in a while so I offered. About 45 minutes into the trip the car pulls to the right like I have a flat tire. Of course I pulled off immediately to change the tire… I got out and two of my tires were +3 psi. Confused, but having no explanation, I got back on the highway and kept going. Another half hour later it does the same thing only now the steering wheel is being jerked around like the only thing holding on to one of the tires is a ball joint. I stop, get out, same thing. I’m now close enough to home to just make a run for it so I did. When I got off the highway I noticed that when I took a left turn my car sounded something similar to bone in a blender. As fun as that was I went directly to NTB to get it looked at. They told me the strange driving and and wobbliness was because of a very loose tie-rod. On top of that, they told me the CV-halfshaft had to be replaced along with the bearings and tires. I had the tie-rod fixed under the understanding that if that actually broke I would die in a (likely) fiery ball of metal (leading to certain death)… I think I’m paraphrasing there but you get the idea. The drive back to Columbus went pretty well. The steering was a lot tighter and nothing funny happened. Well… over the next couple weeks the steering went funny again at least 4 times. Of course that couldn’t be the only problem… the check engine light came on. I had that checked and apparently cylinders 2,4 and 6 began to misfire… you can imagine my joy… and yet, I wasn’t fed up yet.

On the way home for spring break my car became virtually useless on the highway. At any speed 55+ it would make so much noise and vibrate to a point I had a migraine. The steering acted up twice and once actually made me worry a wheel was going to fall off and the right turns now sounded like the left turns started out sounding… the left turns were now considerably more disturbing. I looked around a bit for pricing on repairs for what I knew to be wrong. I HAD to get the CV-halfshaft and bolt replaced, the right bearings, at least 2 tires but preferably 4, and a full tune up including spark plugs and corresponding wires replaced. To add, in another few months I would likely have to replace both front struts. Clearly, this wasn’t the 12 days of Christmas. If you do the math, the repairs are frightening.

Well, most of you know that I’ve been looking, quite longingly, at new vehicles for a while. I started out doing a lot of math. If I had to spend a significant amount of money now, I might as well try to spend it on something worth while. I looked at all my savings, loans, and investments then looked at the cost of financing the vehicles I wanted and came up with an interesting solution. If I could get around $3000 (give or take) on top of my current savings I could comfortably afford a new vehicle until such a time when I can afford the payments. My mom said it was a nice idea, but I had to get some real numbers. My dad hit the roof and told me how poorly I had considered this… Well, the next day (which was last Tuesday) I went to an actual dealership for the vehicle I decided on (since I wasn’t going to buy something I didn’t like) and worked the best deal I could and got real numbers. The salesman sucked and hid a bunch of crap inside a factory rebate so I wasn’t very happy. I started searching online and found what really had to be too good to be true. The exact vehicle I wanted: right color, right trim, right drive train… only less one option I needed and one year old. The price was a bit high but I worked it to one that suited me wonderfully. Mechanically it is in near new condition despite the mileage and I was able to extend the factory warranty to the full length I could want to own it.

So… I give my new truck, a Nissan Xterra. Its not a pickup like I’ve wanted for years, but it is perfect for me for the next few years.

Edit: Pictures moved to gallery