Any Dodge/Plymouth Colt Vista owners (mine's an '86) here?

[seattle smitty]

Any of you real gear-heads ever have and work on one of these?  Pretty neat little cars IF, repeat, IF you fix the mechanical quirks that took these cars off the roads, and they seem to be all fixable for any rodder or restorer with some ability.  I'm currently about to rebuild the K182 5-speed manual trans (the one with the 2/4WD transfer case) which got itself stuck in Reverse.  If there are other owners, I've learned some things about Colt Vistas and am interested to hear anyone elses' tips, and the only decent Colt Vista websites are long-gone, so .  .  .  .

Edited November 15, 2019 by seattle smitty

[Crashtd420]

I'm not gonna be much help but the topic brings back some memories....

I had a mid 80s dodge colt as my second car at the end of high school...

[datzenmike]

I had an '82 Omni.

[Chuck Most]

2 hours ago, datzenmike said:

I had an '82 Omni.

That was Simca based. 

[seattleColtVista]

Hi there, I registered specifically for this thread!  I have an '87 Dodge Colt Vista wagon that is in GREAT shape, but I can't find anyone that can help me work on the transmission which is dying.  I love this car and I know it can run a long time with a fresh transmission rebuild, it only has 143k on the odo and runs strong.

I know this thread is a few years old, but I'll try PMing you, if anyone sees this and knows where I could get this worked on anywhere in WA, please let me know!

Thanks!

[ggzilla]

Welcome!

 

How is your transmission dying, what are the symptoms? A normal rebuild is called for if the transmission is leaking, grinding or whining. It consists of new gaskets and seals, new bearings and new synchros. If it's not grinding, it doesn't need new sychros. If it's not leaking, it doesn't need new seals. If it's not whining, it doesn't need new bearings

 

* The most common problem is leaking out the back shaft. Which is fixed by a sleeve and new seal. No need for a rebuild

* whining is most commonly caused by the throwout bearing, and not the transmission itself

* grinding gears could mean the clutch needs adjusting. Or that the clutch is worn down. They usually last 100,000 miles or less

[seattleColtVista]

5 minutes ago, ggzilla said:

Welcome!

 

How is your transmission dying, what are the symptoms? A normal rebuild is called for if the transmission is leaking, grinding or whining. It consists of new gaskets and seals, new bearings and new synchros. If it's not grinding, it doesn't need new sychros. If it's not leaking, it doesn't need new seals. If it's not whining, it doesn't need new bearings

 

* The most common problem is leaking out the back shaft. Which is fixed by a sleeve and new seal. No need for a rebuild

* whining is most commonly caused by the throwout bearing, and not the transmission itself

* grinding gears could mean the clutch needs adjusting. Or that the clutch is worn down. They usually last 100,000 miles or less

Thanks!  My symptoms are:

1st and 2nd work well (but I can tell my clutch is well used for sure)
3rd makes no power and the worst "rocks rattling around in a trash can sound ever)
4th works good
5th doesn't work (I haven't tried it because I was told 5th didn't work when I bought it and I don't want to experiment on the freeway)

There is nothing I would describe as whining.  I called and there is a used transmission at a junk yard driving distance from me, which I am willing to give it a try but there's a high likelyhood the car is there because the transmission is just as bad or worse than mine...

 

3rd making the horrible noise is a new problem, I was driving normally except not using 5th for a few months (which sucks to have to use 4th at freeway speeds)-I'm scared to drive the car at the moment because I don't know when it will strand me.  I can't find anyone who will take my money to fix it 😞

[ggzilla]

 

No power is an engine problem. And the rattling sound could be an engine pre-detonation (bad pinging). It's not going to be a bearing problem because 3rd gear uses the same bearings as 2nd and 4th gear. It could be a chipped 3rd gear, which means a normal transmission rebuild won't fix it, instead 3rd gear and the counter gear would have to be replaced

 

 

10 minutes ago, seattleColtVista said:

3rd makes no power and the worst "rocks rattling around in a trash can sound ever)

 

[ggzilla]

The good news is this is not usually the case, most cars are in the junkyard because people get tired of the car, or engine don't run right, or it got in accident. The Colt Vista is not known to have fragile 5-speed, most problems are shifter problems. It was built my Mitsubishi and is a quality 5-speed. The biggest problem with the Colt (was) the price of new parts. I used to work on my friend's Vista but later he got tired of dealer parts prices and junked the car

 

Is this a 4WD Vista? Has any mechanic test driven your car? They will be able to tell if it's an engine "rocks in a can" problem or a gearbox "rocks in a can" problem

 

In the meantime, you can rev it up in 2nd gear (normal RPM range goes up to 6000 rpm if i recall correctly) and skip 3rd, go directly to 4th gear. There is no problem running it on the freeway @60mph in 4th gear. 5th gear is there to increase fuel economy

 

17 minutes ago, seattleColtVista said:

there's a high likelyhood the car is there because the transmission is just as bad or worse than mine...