Hi all. Quick sentence as a noob to say only just discovered Scotty & how amazing is his content! I particularly enjoy not only that he has so much experience that he shares for nicks, but that the delivery of his content is fun & employs humour a lot - what's the world without some laughter!
I watched a few, I think, videos on this topic already which are great like how many fingers between the car body & tyre, take it for a test drive & watch for drips after, hook up a computer, check when codes are cleared, get a mechanic to look. Great & yes, I want to limit how many cars I get checked because an inspection is expensive! So much is obvious.
Has Scotty done a video I haven't seen yet, or can people send links about, how to spot less obvious stuff if it's even possible? For example, if someone has stuck gasket sealer into the engine & that engine might hold together for 3 months before it blows on you? Are there tricks of things that can be put into transmission oils that'll hide a problem for a while but destroy it quickly (why does a story about ... banana skins ?? ... come to mind?? - clearly I'm bananas!). I'm assuming that a good mechanic would know any & all of these tricks when I do get it inspected, but they always (obviously) absolve themselves with "looks good, can't tell everything of course", so how far can I trust them? I mean obviously if a mechanic looks at you & says "no, unless you want to bring it to me to get rich fixing it for you!".
Sorry if this is an old question asked a billion times over & I didn't know how to search & find other posts.
Flakes or glitter in the coolant. Could be a head gasket sealer.
Kinda a weird one but a really old school thing I learned was smell and taste if the visual inspection fails you. LOL you can definitely tell if the engine runs rich or has gas in the oil can indicate a problem. A $20 code reader will tell you a lot on the computer even the cleared codes, I personally only like to look at cars with a mountain of paperwork to avoid having to banter too much. If they don't have any, I won't buy it. A common thing is you can't really see under the car without a proper inspection. But I always ask to see if I can drive the car up on ramps or jack up the car, that way you can spot if there are any glaring issues when checking out friends to be purchases perhaps. If they don't want you too, or if anything in a guys language indicates otherwise then they be hiding something.
i get a good/bad vibe from the seller
when someone says not sure or i dont know , throws up a flag
how long have you owned it is big for me
lying naturally produces anxiety and a person has to dissipate it in one way or another, usually through body language, breaking eye contact, touching their head
last truck that i bought, the guy talked to me for about an hour after the sale and didnt want to get out of my/his truck lol
