My Chrysler minivan got a little rusty over the winter. This vehicle is too old to be worth much, but still practical and useful. It is a great vehicle to make the weekly dump run, go to Home Depot and to run errands with. It is also fantastic in the snow with the all-wheel drive system. With these duties, and with two teenage boys in the house it makes sense to keep it, and I can’t justify replacing it.
The lift gate is really too rusty to feasibly repair. A new lift gate is unjustifiably expensive. At the salvage yard I was told a decent used lift gate would be $275, and unless I got lucky and found a silver one, I would still have to paint it.
I found a van with a totally rust free lift gate, but it had a large dent in it. I asked how much they wanted for this one and was given a price of $50.
I had to buy paint to fix the rocker panels, one quarter panel and the front fender anyway. With a couple hours of work, the dent was removed and the lift gate is ready for paint. A couple hours of work saved me over $200.
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