New Owner, saved one from part-out.

Hello everyone!  I'm not sure how active the forum is or how active I'll be, but I'm sure I'll be doing plenty of searching around on this forum.

I've wanted a wagon for quite a while, despite knowing nothing about them.  I happened to see a post on FB Marketplace for a 1994 RMW with a bad trans and non-running engine being parted out.  The car appeared to be in great shape (with regards to damage and rust) and felt it was too nice to be parted out. It was still the 1st or 2nd day the ad was posted, so I messaged the seller asking if he would sell it whole.  He agreed, and so I showed up with my trailer and pulled it home.

A quick test with the multimeter showed it was a bad Opti.  I replaced it with a cheap one to test (no plans for the car yet) and it fired up.  I was able to confirm the car will go into drive, but there is no reverse.  The trans will eventually be rebuilt.

Back to the knowing nothing part, there are many small issues I'm sure I will be searching quite some time about.  I have only spent about an hour with the car and these are the small obvious things I've noticed so far.

The engine wiring harness is not original, it was replaced at some point and isn't fully secured in original location
Vac hoses that aren't connected which I assume go to missing evap?
Speakers don't work
D pillar lights don't work with the gate
2nd row seat lock/release is missing
Rear wiper missing
Power antenna is broken
A/C doesn't work,  i assume "A/C" is turned on/off via the headunit itself automatically

I realize these are small issues, but I haven't run the engine longer than a minute or two, and its only moved about 2 feet total.  I look forward to hopefully restoring the car to a daily driver condition in the future.

Welcome aboard and congrats on saving one.

To answer your questions:

The engine wiring harness is not original, it was replaced at some point and isn't fully secured in original location - It's possible, but not that usual, but I'm not there to look at it so will assume it is so (I did sell the one from my wreck...)

Vac hoses that aren't connected which I assume go to missing evap? - where are the hoses on the engine.

Speakers don't work - easy enough to remedy/check

D pillar lights don't work with the gate - they only go on if you open it like a door, if you drop like a tailgate they do not. (I didn't design it lol). I think someone on here may have wired it up to do so...

2nd row seat lock/release is missing - 2nd row button in on passenger side next to the C pillar on top of the seat. weird it'd be missing.

Rear wiper missing - Normal
Power antenna is broken - Normal, Fred on here does repair them if it's just the cable inside.

A/C doesn't work,  i assume "A/C" is turned on/off via the headunit itself automatically - may be low on 'freon' you can jump the safety switch. if the blower isn't working the blower motor resistors are a know wear item on the cars too (under the glove box, easy to remove with 2 screws).

Welcome, I'm new here too. Nice save.
I never worked on car with a computer or fuel injection before I got my '92 Custom Cruiser. I had to get the factory service manual/instructions to figure things out. There are a lot of hoses and wires and things you have to do with those electronics to work on them, I'd be lost without it. I'm vintage and like hard copies over digital stuff, dog-eared and greasy pages are no problem, get that way anyway. The parts and illustration catalog has lots of good info, lists all the pieces-parts numbers and shows most of them.

Welcome to the forum. Nice to see another wagon being saved.

nice!

looks like a pretty good starting point.

AMH_92 wrote:

Welcome, I'm new here too. Nice save.
I never worked on car with a computer or fuel injection before I got my '92 Custom Cruiser. I had to get the factory service manual/instructions to figure things out. There are a lot of hoses and wires and things you have to do with those electronics to work on them,  I'd be lost without it. I'm vintage and like hard copies over digital stuff, dog-eared and greasy pages are no problem, get that way anyway. The parts and illustration catalog has lots of good info, lists all the pieces-parts numbers and shows most of them.

agreed, picking up a Factory Service manual is a great idea. make sure to get your year as they changed a little each year. ebay is a good source.

First wash! It cleans up pretty well. I also drove it for the first time just from my shop to the driveway and confirmed no reverse.




It cleans up pretty well. And it's almost as if rear seats were never used. (The dealer plastic is still on the carpet)

When my wife got her wagon, it had been sitting for about 14 years! The first wash looked similar!

Good on y'all for saving another RMW. You sure have a long row to hoe. Just for the future, I have a
few parts I just might let go. Cheers, David R

No reverse on the '94-95 4L60E transmissions was a design defect corrected by GM in the 96 model year. Forward gears are unaffected. You can drive as long as you wish like this. Any good rebuilder will know how to fix it when they rebuild.

Cool.
If it was closer I would have been on it like white on rice. 
Park it on the street, pull through spots in parking lots, or buy a house with a turnaround driveway and you don't need no stinkin' reverse. It's way overrated anyway, airplanes don't go backwards and they do okay.

I replaced the 4 plastic "footballs" in the rear window tracks so now those work again. Decided to swap all the interior lights to white LEDs too. I know its a small detail, but its nice knowing the windows stay up now

Thanks for the tip about reverse! I was worried to drive it at all but I think I will actually try to drive it around the block and see how it goes.

I swapped out all the interior/ cargo handles lights in my 93 RMW. It sure made a huge difference lighting wise. Altogether different type of lighting, much brighter. I like it.  

Looks like it’s going well, my own 93 was probably on its way out when I found it too. It’s been a good companion now for more than a decade. Glad you saved one too.

Does anyone mind if I continue to post in this thread?  

The easy update is that I replaced the rear 6x9s and now I have rear sound again.

In tougher news, I found that the previous owner or mechanic used a deep pan filter in a shallow pan, Or so it seems.  





The trans is pretty bad, and will be getting a basic rebuild.