Please Help The Birthday Boy!

[Newbie425]

Hey Guys I'm currently Looking at purchasing a tc! I'm really excited as this will be my first major purchase however I need your expertise advise! Im Currently looking at this car 2006 Scion tC 3dr HB Manual (It's a 2006 tc with 62k on it. It says it has a greddy turbo kit on it.) I want to know If you guys think this is legitimate (being a greddy kit etc.) and that the car will not fail on me in the near or distant future (basically I want to know that all mods that are necessities to turbo the car and not ruin the engine or anything else were taken.) Another thing to look at would be the door panels on this car. I am completely confused on what they are. They say It has a clean carfax, but do you think this car was ever wrecked? Thank you for your help in advance as I look forward to hearing the news even if it's bad because you just saved my wallet!

[Newbie425]

Hey Guys I'm currently Looking at purchasing a tc! I'm really excited as this will be my first major purchase however I need your expertise advise! Im Currently looking at this car 2006 Scion tC 3dr HB Manual(It's a 2006 tc with 62k on it. It says it has a greddy turbo kit on it.) I want to know If you guys think this is legitimate (being a greddy kit etc.) and that the car will not fail on me in the near or distant future (basically I want to know that all mods that are necessities to turbo the car and not ruin the engine or anything else were taken.) Upon doing a little extra research I found out that this car used to be an Oregon car and was more than likely tracked/raced via this link 2006 Turbo Scion TC | Vehicles on the dyno at Portland Speed IndustriesIt says the car uses a 75%methanol/25%water mix...What does this mean?(Will I have do uses something better than premium gas at a gas station? Thank you for your help in advance as I look forward to hearing the news even if it's bad because you just saved my wallet!

[CadenceScion]

If it was me buying my first car or my first tC for that matter, I wouldn't buy one that is already modified. I would buy one bone stock and save up the money for the modifications I want. The modifications on the vehicle your looking to buy, you won't be able to take any credit for anyhow. A turbo is a great modification to have, but if its not installed right, you may end up spending more money on repairs. A turbo or supercharged application will require at minimum 89-91 octane. Its totally your decision, but before you buy it, make sure you have the vehicle looked over really well and get a CarFax Report, I would also buy an extended warranty.

[navylife59]

If it is that car in the link, are you willing to dole out the extra cash for that ride? If you are looking for car that is all setup, then this might be your ticket. As Cadence stated, if you have plans to do your own modding, then you will best be served by a near stocker. The problem with a car already built like that is you don't have the full picture of the how, what, when, where, and why of all the modifications. When things start to go wrong, who is going to know the ends and outs of addressing those problems.

For example, will you know how everything is installed and wired up? I used to install car alarms back in the day. My installs were so far out of the box for a normal installation, that only I knew how it worked and how to adjust it. I would have to write out my secret way of making things work so that the customer could have another shop work on it without spending a couple of days trying to figure it out. That is an extreme example used to make a point.

OK, so back to the car. 62K miles ain't nothing on a Scion. What you need to determine is at what mileage that all of the engine performance work was started. You need to find out about it's maintenance history, as well as, how the car was driven. If it was a show car queen, then there should not be too much to worry about. If it was tracked on a regular basis, then you have to start getting real personal with the car's history. Was the car over-boosted for racing, did it ever sustain any track damage, maintenance problems, etc.

[navylife59]

Your other thread has the answers so I am merging the two. The carfax only reports major repairs, wrecks, and dealer maintenance. It won't cover any aftermarket installs or race history.