New gas saver/DD - new territory for me (Neon content)

So I'm trying to save some money on fuel. My DD Chevy 3/4 ton is not good at that. So I asked some questions on here about Neons. And I bought this one. Really clean. Needs some trouble shooting and some cheap fixes, but I think it will fit the bill nicely. 1998 EX, DOHC, 5 spd. No frills. No AC/PW/PL etc. Just what the doctor ordered!

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I think I did OK @ $700. Hopefully I'll have it on the road in a week or so.

Looks pretty good to me. How many miles and do you have proof of timing belt/water pump being changed?

I will be doing the timing belt. PO has no idea when it was last done. It has 236,000 kms on it.

Nice score.

Want a parts car? Rusty body but lots of good parts, 14 wheels and tires.

But in all seriousness, killer find.

So I have some parts ordered, (starter etc) but just to see how it drives I rolled it down my driveway and popped the clutch. Started right up. Drove it around the block a few times.

Speedo doesn't work. Well it works intermittently. Sticks, works, drops to zero, hangs up, works, drops to zero etc.

Good chance that it's just the cluster or is a speed sensor/sender the most likely culprit? There's no tach in this car. I understand the tach clusters are plug n play? Do I need a specific year or range of years?

There is some sort of cluster soldering trick out there that might be the solution. I've never had to do it myself, so i never really paid attention, but I have heard folks talking about it.

You should be able to put in a cluster from any 95-99 Neon. There are a few that move through the classifieds on neons.org. Get one with a tach and it'll be a good direct replacement for yours.

Also, spend the $20 or so on a fresh set of Booger Bushings and it'll probably feel like a brand new car.

Ok, thanks. I already ordered booger bushings, a new front mount, some poly mount inserts and a new beefy bobble strut already. After I put some miles on it and determine what else it needs it will likely get new control arm bushings and some sort of spring/damper combo. Feels pretty mushy right now.

I guess I'll be on the lookout for a cluster with tach.

For the money, a set of KYB GR2s with the stock springs will make the car surprisingly nice. Add in a rear swaybar and the difference is amazing. Koni yellows are getting hard to find and very spendy, but I've heard good things about the oranges (STR-T or something like that). There are a couple coilover system choices, but for DD use GR2s, maybe going to an ACR front spring (all the rears are the same), a rear bar, and poly bushings will get you a very responsive car without dropping a fortune.

Where did you get the mount inserts? Got link? I probably want some..

www.neons.org/faq - tons of info for you, especially about parts interchangeability.

The intermittent speedo is probably the speed sensor. Never had one on my Neons bite it, but the one on my '92 Caravan went bad 2 or 3 times. Easy cheap replacement.

http://www.modernperformance.com is where I got the mount inserts, booger bushings, and bobble strut. I haven't got them yet though. I get all my stuff shipped to the US/Canada border then go pick it up. It's way cheaper than getting it shipped to my house.

With regard to the rear sway bar: It seems like the hardware to mount it on my car is pretty elusive. Junkyards around me are poor and the models that actually had the rear swaybar are scarce anyway. What's the best option for that? I could likely even fab something up if I could get a good picture of how the swaybar mounts under the car.

I just did the boogers on my new to me ACR and the difference was amazing. I was actually missing one of the bushes under the hood.

doc_speeder wrote: With regard to the rear sway bar: It seems like the hardware to mount it on my car is pretty elusive. Junkyards around me are poor and the models that actually had the rear swaybar are scarce anyway. What's the best option for that? I could likely even fab something up if I could get a good picture of how the swaybar mounts under the car.

Sways seem to go up on the .org every so often -- I think there's an ACR set on there right now, but I haven't been watching that closely. Almost every car has the threads/captive nuts for the body brackets and the end links attach to a set of brackets that bolt onto the rear strut pinch bolts. my advice would be to get the correct size tap and some cutting oil and clean the threads out several times before trying to mount the frame brackets. Also, get new bolts as the ones that you will remove from the parts car (when you find it!) will probably be broken or bent and will definitely be nasty.

If you can find an ACR or an R/T, you'll be able to snag a 16mm bar and brackets. I'm not sure what the Canadian market had, though, as there is an "Export" suspension out there that was basically all the R/T goodies. Never had to worry about those cars, so I can't help with identification there.

I was able to pick up my rear sway from a local yard for about $20 with the mounting tabs, end links, and frame brackets. I see them go on the .org for up to $100 for a stock ACR or RT and up to $250 for a bigger aftermarket one. If you can't find a bar with brackets attached, there's a guy that makes a more stout replacement at neongoodies.com. I'm pretty sure that on neons.org they frown on selling rear sways without the brackets since they're NLA, so pretty much wherever you go to pick up a sway, you should be able to get the brackets at the same time.

ccrelan wrote: I just did the boogers on my new to me ACR and the difference was amazing. I was actually missing one of the bushes under the hood.

When I picked up my parts car to do my ATX to MTX swap, I found that one of the previous owners had use a bit of coat hanger to (sort of) attach the bushing-less shift cables to the transmission arms. Not exactly a real firm shift feel like that...

doc_speeder wrote: With regard to the rear sway bar: It seems like the hardware to mount it on my car is pretty elusive.

Are they NLA? All the necessary bits used to be available over the parts counter, and not even very expensive. The suspension package will be either SDE ( '95-'96 Sport Coupe or all R/T) or SDK (all ACR). Rear swaybars are all 16mm and fit coupe or sedan interchangeably. Front swaybars on non-SDE and non-SDK cars are 20mm. It's worth stepping up to the 22mm piece as well if you run across one.

Sweet! I bought a 99 DOHC Neon coupe a few months ago and it has been awesome. I love the wheels on yours - I have been trying to find a set of those for months and have come up empty handed.

I used the 22mm "Mopar Performance" rear sway, and loved it. I also used mopar "high rate" springs all the way around. I'm not sure if these are still available at dealers.

that is a sharp looking neon, good buy!

cluster is solder joints.

acr springs and rear sway bar tabs are availible. from my storage building.....

ac is addable. i did it to my acr. not fun, but SOOOO worth it. in the south at least.....

Rear swaybar bushings

So are these and the tabs on the Neon goodies site that I think are for attaching endlinks to the rear struts all I'd need to run a 22mm rear bar? Or is there something else needed that these bushings mount in. They look like a complete setup.

In reply to failboat:

Thank you, I think it looks pretty good actually (for a neon...lol)

+1 on speed sensor. Years back on my first neon a heater hose blew out and soaked the VSS. After that it was intermittent but when it went out the fuel system would randomly cut out at speed.

As far as the factory rear bar, I had to pull mine when one of the inner mounts got mangled up, I could never find a replacement. I still have it in my basement, along with other spares.

So I did some work on the Neon today. Put in the new starter, front motor mount and insert, the new semi-solid bobble strut, and the booger bushings.

A few thoughts on the Neon as this is my first exposure to them...

-the air intake was obviously just a place to put "DOHC" on. What a stupid convoluted design

-what a sweet easy car to work on so far

-there's an easy 5lb weight loss to be had by removing the piece of cast iron that hangs under the front motor mount. I'm assuming this is for NVH purposes? I guess with my new poly mounts I can't be too concerned about that...

-the speedo issue is just a solder joint in the cluster. A solid whack on the dash brings it back to life

-it feels slow for what they call 150 bhp. Maybe a tune up will help

-it shifts really nice and the clutch is nice and light

Can't wait to start driving it. I'll let my buddy take a look at the remote start/clutch switch issue this week then I can get it safetied and start driving it!

doc_speeder wrote: -there's an easy 5lb weight loss to be had by removing the piece of cast iron that hangs under the front motor mount. I'm assuming this is for NVH purposes? I guess with my new poly mounts I can't be too concerned about that...

I thought I read something that I remember going blah blah, damper harmonic vibration, blah blah, prevent cracking of the something or other, blah blah blah.

I saw that giant hunk of metal and couldn't pull it off of there fast enough. I'm sure they had a good reason to put that on there, but I suspect it involved working on the car design on drinking Thursdays....