J697

I bought a 1998 E430 for $700 yesterday in Dallas. It has terrible body damage and the steering barely works as it was crashed. The man said it needs a new steering rack but I'm not really confident in his assessment. As the body is beyond repair I was more than likely just planning to keep the engine and transmission for another E430.

It's the 4.3L V8 and it sounds pretty good (minus rattling catalytic converter). There were no bubbles from the coolant and it didn't go too far above 80 so I was confident the headgasket was alright.

Today I went ahead and tested the compression and here is the results in psi.
215-208
200-210
203-208
200-215

This was my first time performing this test on any engine and I have conflicting info from google. The odometer says ~224K miles, is this engine on it's way out or here to stay with good maintenance?

kajtek1

Compression test aside, whatever you planning to do with the parts, will pay you about $2/hr.
You might want to keep your day job.

ItalianJoe1

Comp test numbers are fine, you look for a 10-15% variance between the highest and lowest cyls. You're fine.

The car, is only worth about $700 in great condition though. So if you're happy then great, but was it a great deal? I don't think so.

J697

Thanks for the response guys, I know this was a newbie question for sure. I see a couple better examples in my area listed for about 2K-3K. I knew it wasn't a great deal but I would've hoped I could get my moneys worth out of the ride!

My plan was to buy this car (check), and then buy the same model that doesn't run but has a good body/suspension. What I wanted to do is obvious after this. Would I've been better off not doing all this work?

I figured this car at $700, a good body roller at ~$1200, and just the basic maintenance parts (oil, filters, etc). So that leaves me between 2K and 3K. Let me know if my estimations are off... haha.

fabbrisd1

Frankly - to me interesting project but based on labor time - not worth it..

kajtek1

I know such project are popular in my native Poland.
People there still work for $4/hr while mechanics will deal with high end issues for $10/hr.
That makes economical sense for them.
Not knowing TS expectation, maybe that makes sense for him too.