Hello All,
I stopped by the Newbies section and said hello with a post and these pictures of my Cavalier. As pointed out to me by a friend (not a member here) who stopped to look and said,"Um, you know they have a forum section for pictures to be posted in right?" Ooops...probably not the best place to put up pics since someone would probably be expecting them here in the "Photos" section instead. Oh well, it usually takes me until about the third match till I learn about getting burned.
Sooo...Thought I'd put them up here in case anyone would like to see a low mileage Cav that's completely original (as far as I can remember from over the years). A warped head a couple years back was the worst. Most of it's life has been in the North East region of the US and it's done very well against the winter rust. I take it to the car wash a couple times in the winter to use a high power hose to blast the underneath of it.
Reason I found this forum was from having to do some airbag work on the car a couple weeks back and I came across some posts here from Google.
Probably when you hear me mention "airbags" you think the car was seriously damaged, but actually in this case it was something of a perfect accident to set off the bags, but not really do anything serious otherwise. Unfortunately the passenger side airbag dash cover blew out the windshield so that had to be fixed. That was the only part I didn't do...simply cause I didn't feel like the hassle of pulling one from a yard and installing it. It wasn't worth the effort when someone else could do it in about 20 minutes for not too much,
The top of the front bumper cover was smudged a bit when the car squatted from hitting the brakes (went under the other bumper), but that buffed out. However, the paint was not able to flex as much as the bumper so I do have some spiderweb cracks in the bumper now. From flexing down it cracked some of the cross pieces in the grill but that's not too obvious to the casual view. Eventually I'll get a replacement bumper over to make it look nice again. Even though the hood flexed enough for the airbag sensor to be set off, there's no damage to it. Even the sensor looks physically undamaged (I did change it out anyways when I replaced the airbags). I had to send the airbag computer module (DERM) that's under the passengers seat away to get reset as dealerships won't do that service, besides I think it was cheaper to do that even if they would've been wiling to do so.
Last bit of damage is something not too easy to fix cosmetically. When the airbag cover plate blew out on the passenger side, in addition to breaking the windshield, it also made a rather large hole in the cowl section directly under the windshield. And since this is part of entire dash it's not easily swappable. I know there's a company out there that makes a replacement section you can doubletape over that but I'm not going that route. The light blue interior seems to be an uncommon color,so I was actually surprised when I found one at a pull n pay. It has a tiny crack in the cowl area but I'm going to swap dashes and work on fixing my original in one format or another. Part of the reason I'm not leaving the replacement dash in is the small crack, but also because it's not in quite as good shape....that's one of the problems with used cosmetic parts from junkyards anymore....these cars have usually been beaten pretty hard by the time they go to the yard.
Anyways...that was more than I meant to get into on this post. So here's my 97 Cavalier. It's a base model and no exotic options etc. As I said in my post in the Newbie section, wish I could get you all excited about this being some rare Cavalier but..it's not. Just low mileage that's been taken pretty decent care of. It's treated my family well over the years with only a couple little problems and I'd have to say pretty dependable over all.
Excuse me if I repeat (or expand) some of the comments I made on these pictures in my other thread. If anyone would like more information on my Cavs history, or condition of anything or what's up with the low miles just ask.
Keep in mind that all these pictures are from after the airbags blowing: Bags replaced (and bag system reset), windshield replaced, bumper buffed, etc....no bodywork,no polishing otherwise (just a quick wash)
1997 Cavalier (built 9/96) ; 88,000 miles; base model; 15" wheels
2.2L engine; automatic transmission; Someplace around here in a file cabinet I still have the window sticker
Before anyone comments, my wife has problems with curbs...so wheel covers (used from the yard) are cheaper than bent custom rims. Plus, this is what came from the factory
This is still the original paint on the car. Couple small paint chips in the hood area but not large enough to be noticed normally
You can see the original muffler, and original exhaust. I had to change out the muffler strap hanger a couple years back but that's it.
Manual windows and locks (but power mirrors). Has cruise,intermittent wipers and tilt. Oh, the radio was changed out at least ten years ago. I still have the original someplace in a box around here.
If you look at the dash you can see the hole caused by the airbag plate flying up. I'll try an idea to fix that once it's out of the car.
The carpet is a bit dirty, sorry bout that! The hump where your left foot rests just can't be kept clean. These are the original floormats. I normally keep larger aftermarket mats over top of them. I also pulled back part of the seatcover so you can see the pattern of the material. I've had covers on the seats since I bought the car so they're in about the shape they were when new.
Backseat area is in good condition too...there seems to be two different materials that were used for the light blue interiors in 97..the one I pulled the dash out of at the yard seems to be a "slicker" or tighter weave than mine, which is a pity as I would've taken the seats just for spares considering how hard a time I have finding light blue interior anything
So that's the show. Hope this brings a bit of a "Wow, so that's what they looked like back then grandpa" feeling if nothing else.
And if you still don't like it just let me know and I'll take my markers and go home.
