Oh boy, someone's been shopping for cheap-ish cars again.
First candidate - a '95 NA Miata with repaired accident damage. I had been wondering how a big dent in the front fender in front of the wheel would write off a car, but that may have something to do with the rocker panel damage behind the wheel. That of course had me scratch my head how an accident that pushed in about 3-4" of the rocker panel and damaged the front of the fender didn't damage the suspension in the middle.
Not to mention that the aftermarket fender didn't fit to the front mask properly, the fender liner had gone AWOL, other bits and pieces like the interior rear view mirror were missing and I've never see the gauge hood glued in with what looked like that black bodywork adhesive/sealant.
Second candidate, an R53 Mini Cooper S. Funnily enough yet another small-time dealer advertising a car as a private seller[1]. Actually, it was the extremely rare special edition Coopr S, because whoever had stuck back the emblems after repairing the damage t the hatch and the rear bumper used the drunken monkey technique to line up the letters and forgot to put the 'e' back on. They got all the spacing right so it took me a few minutes to figure out why something seemed wrong. Other than that, seller kinda sorta hadn't applied for a new salvage title yet but "had all the paperwork to do it", the hood didn't fit right (odd with a car that had had a minor hit to the back), it needed a new windshield and the airbag light was on. IIRC some publication (may have been GRM mentioned in a buyers guide that the latter can get really expensive, something to do with the seat airbags or something). Oh, and when I had the seller fire up the engine it also had a nice line in death rattles and grinds coming from the passenger side end of the engine, which had me suspect camchain trouble.
Fer cryin' out loud, if you're a dealer why not do some research on the crap you sell, be honest about the vehicle instead of yet again trying to pull a fast one on Joe Q. Public and sully the previously untarnished reputation of used car salesweasels?
So I guess that fell under "total waste of a perfectly good Sunday".
[1] Yeah, I know they do it to save paying CL a couple of bucks. It's also a PITA because for me it skews the price - a car bought privately doesn't attract sales tax at the NV DMV if I register it, a car bought from a dealer does.
