New guy with an Escort
 

Great site! I bought this car to save a few dollars. It's my $150 Ford Escort and the only new parts I've bought for it are oil and the exhaust manifold gasket.
$350 as she sits:
http://i285.photobucket.com/albums/l.../Escort004.jpg
http://i285.photobucket.com/albums/l.../Escort007.jpg

I bought it because we have to bring our kids to school this fall and it's 60 miles a day (30 miles round trip twice). It will get about twice the mileage of our V8 Explorer.
After 4 tanks of gas and fixing all sorts of things it's getting 30.8 combined mpg.

Welcome, that sounds like great savings

How did you find one in Michigan that didn't have a swiss cheese body? Has it been repaired/painted?

Regardless, sounds like a good move from an energy use point of view.

Welcome to the forum.

My thoughts exactly. If it is solid than you got an excellent deal. Looks like a little gem for Michigan.

Welcome to the site. Make sure to check out the 100+ Hypermiling tips. Thats your cheapest and best bet to improve mileage right now.

The body is in decent shape. There's one small rust spot on the drivers side rear wheel well and the bottom of the inside of the doors have surface rust. It must have been stored inside and washed frequently over the years. The interior is in nice shape too. The entire car needed an extreme cleaning.

It had 4 broken springs and what sounded like an open exhaust when I bought it. The windshield has a large crack across the bottom but I don't plan on fixing it right away.
I've used junkyard parts for just about all the repairs. It's great when cars arrive at the salvage yard with new parts on them!