Our Suzuki Esteem station wagon has always been a bit of a lemon. Whether it is just this particular car or the whole line, I can't say. Even though it was relatively cheap to buy used with only 30,000 miles on it, we have had to pump more than the original purchase price into it in repairs to keep it running for the past seven or so years that we have had it. This despite the fact that it has been our secondary car for the past 1.5 year and doesn't get driven that much. Just a few months ago we had to pump another $1000 into it. Its up to 130,000 miles now. So last week when it went from just having no power on hills to running extremely rough with the check engine light flashing, we debated whether it was worth investing any more money for repairs.
Being that it was Christmas time and we had already spent quite a bit of money, we decided just to take it in for a diagnostic test and if it was another expensive repair we would either wait until after Christmas or just declare it a lost cause. We put off doing anything for a week, then Friday took it in. So when I got the call from the repair shop, it was with bated breath I awaited the verdict.
Then the repair guy said, it was just the spark plug wires, which they had replaced a year ago and while they were slightly past the warranty date, he would honor it anyway because they really should last longer than that, so the total cost was less than $60. I was so happy, it felt like an early Christmas gift.
So I guess JPD will be able to learn to drive on the wagon next month after all. (Which will doom the transmission of course, but its already on the way out, and I would rather he ruin it on an old car rather than a newer one. No way he is learning to drive using the minivan.)
