It was my parents, they bought it new, nearly fully loaded (didn't want leather I guess). It's the fabled minivan with hundreds of thousands of miles on it, somewhere between 50k-100k are undocumented as the speed sensor wiring broke at one point and it never got fixed for like 3 years or something.
The bad:
Lost all keys. So I bought a new ignition lock cylinder to replace the one it has - yeah, can't do that without the original key. Going to pull a door cylinder and have a locksmith make a key to match probably, in the meantime I get to tear down the steering column and figure out what exactly I broke to get it on the trailer - either the lock cylinder or the housing it locks into (to be honest, as easily as it turned, it was probably worn out really bad to begin with).
Trans (4t65e-HD swapped) needs a partial rebuild. It would go into gear and drive for about 5 seconds before dropping into neutral. That's what went wrong last time it was parked.
Engine is gutless.
Rockers are gone from rust. It was undercoated when it was new, aside from some broken clips and what I'd image are rusty brake and fuel lines, the underbody should be in better shape than most of my projects..
radiator lower support rotted.
Interior, while not abused, smells from sitting.
misc. broken bits.
Drivers side rocker and underbody:
Passenger side:
Rear end:
Looking top down at the radiator bottom support:
The spot, where it wasn't even a year old, when it got dinged by a door in a parking lot and never fixed:
The plan:
First thing, I'm going to get underneath it and find out exactly how bad it is, and what metal is still available to fix the rockers. For the most part, on the trailer, it looks like it's only the rockers. But I've done enough of these to know what to look for and where I'm going to draw the line. If this one is too far gone it will become the parts donor for another one.
If it works out, then it's getting stripped down. Carpet, seats, pillar trim, etc. Everything has to get cleaned, the key situation fixed, nothing too extreme. While it's apart, I might just replace the sliding door with the rust spot (they are plentiful in the local u-pulls), and rebuild the door motor while I'm at it. The rear window motors need rebuilt, the rear wiper motor and hatch latch need rebuilt, etc. Just a bunch of little things that have worn out over the years.
Of course, all new brake lines and fuel lines, new brakes and hardware, shocks and struts, and check if anything else has worn out. For the most part, it's straight up going to be a repair all things broken and clean it up, make it look nice again.
But it wouldn't be one of my projects without a little something extra. First is going to be a 3800 swap. I happen to have an entire working drivetrain just sitting here that I was trying to sell, might as well use it. And of course I'll be top swapping it - a little wiggle room here is that if I don't have to use this van as a parts donor for another, I can get a W-body donor and use the L67 motor and get all the mounts and stuff in one go. But we'll see how that goes.
Another possibility is to pull a rear and diff for the AWD system. I need to look at the wiring, but the only electronic control of it is to disable it. The obvious benefit here is that it's the easiest way to get rear disc brakes. Depending on the budget, it will also get the F-body front brakes - or whatever else the W-body peeps used for dual piston front calipers with a 12" rotor.
Wheels and tires - this will be taking over for the STS in terms of winter driving, Plan is to use the 17" Aztek wheels I have with the snow tires on it. We'll probably end up using this for long road trips as well, so I'll likely end up putting all-season tires on the '97 LeSabre for winter and switch them over when I part the Lesabre for the fair-weather drivers.
There's some surface rust in the seat latches, but that should be simple to clean up.
