Amazing how some things work out...

Fla02LS

Fla02LS

Dedicated LVC Member
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Last week my LS was diagnosed with a failing transmission. I needed to make it till this friday to be able to afford the work, was unsure when i left the house yesterday morning whether the car would make it back or not.

I got about 15-20 minutes into my drive and a guy in a mustang plowed into the back of me. I dont know what the hell he was doing as i was sitting dead stopped at a light. We were able to pull off to the side where the guy started babbling and saying how he just got back in into the country and didnt have insurance...blah blah blah. He asked if we could work something out with cash. NOPE! As soon as the cop got there he approached the guy and said he ran his tag and its showing suspended. I got to hear his sob story a second time as he tried to explain to the cop why he didnt have a valid license, tag or insurance. Scumbag. Anyway thats why i have uninsured coverage because there are waaaay to many people driving around with zero insurance.

So the silver lining to this incident is that i drove right to the lincoln dealer to get the claim going, now the LS is in the shop with rear end damage and i am driving a really nice 2012 Explorer Limited. Thing is totally loaded.... panoramic sunroof, rear camera, sony sound system, voice activated everything sync. The controls and displays in this thing are amazing. My first few minutes in it i couldnt figure out how to adjust the a/c or radio. Oh, and its got that nice fresh brand new leather smell. Mmmm. Never been a big fan of suv's but this new explorer is really nice. Dont know what engine it has in it but it drives really smooth and comfortable. Thumbs up Ford!
 
So you're gonna drive a 2012 Explorer for a week or two, and then get your LS back, which still has a failing transmission?
 
andy.peterson01 said:
So you're gonna drive a 2012 Explorer for a week or two, and then get your LS back, which still has a failing transmission?
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Depends on the damage. A good solid hit in the rear could total one of these cars.

Silver lining is that maybe your car will get totaled. Downside is that because he doesn't have insurance, it's up to your insurance to take care of paying for the damages which could result in higher premiums for you.
 
car insurance is such a scam man , they find any way they can to :q:q:q:q out of every dollar you have and they don't wanna cover anything...
 
andy.peterson01 said:
So you're gonna drive a 2012 Explorer for a week or two, and then get your LS back, which still has a failing transmission?
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Fla02LS said:
I needed to make it till this friday
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nelliott500 said:
Depends on the damage. A good solid hit in the rear could total one of these cars.

Silver lining is that maybe your car will get totaled. Downside is that because he doesn't have insurance, it's up to your insurance to take care of paying for the damages which could result in higher premiums for you.
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+1 on both

2002_lincolnLS said:
car insurance is such a scam man , they find any way they can to :q:q:q:q out of every dollar you have and they don't wanna cover anything...
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Unforntunately true. Not much you can do about it though. My father had a car totalled State Farm offered about $5000. After lots of phone calls getting no where he threatened to go to the state insurance dept and it jumped to over $13000.
 
Fla02LS said:
So the silver lining to this incident is that i drove right to the lincoln dealer to get the claim going, now the LS is in the shop with rear end damage and i am driving a really nice 2012 Explorer Limited. Thing is totally loaded.... panoramic sunroof, rear camera, sony sound system, voice activated everything sync. The controls and displays in this thing are amazing. My first few minutes in it i couldnt figure out how to adjust the a/c or radio. Oh, and its got that nice fresh brand new leather smell. Mmmm. Never been a big fan of suv's but this new explorer is really nice. Dont know what engine it has in it but it drives really smooth and comfortable. Thumbs up Ford!
Click to expand...

Agreed that the new Exploders are a major move upmarket for Ford. I like them. My only complaint is that the rear capacity seems small compared to similar GM (Enclave / Acadia) or Acura (MDX) offerings. They are very competitive in every other way once you get up to higher trim levels.
 
nelliott500 said:
Depends on the damage. A good solid hit in the rear could total one of these cars.

Silver lining is that maybe your car will get totaled. Downside is that because he doesn't have insurance, it's up to your insurance to take care of paying for the damages which could result in higher premiums for you.
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Yeah I read the original post wrong, I thought he meant the LS was already getting it's rear end fixed.

I wouldn't be surprised if your insurance company tried to tell you your car is worth like 2k less than it should be since your tranny is going out. (if it's totaled)
 
Start digging for any receipts to prove how well you serviced the LS. No need to get lowballed even further if you can prove it was a well taken care of car. It may not make much of a difference but an extra $200 counts toward a check if it is indeed a total
 
andy.peterson01 said:
I wouldn't be surprised if your insurance company tried to tell you your car is worth like 2k less than it should be since your tranny is going out. (if it's totaled)
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Insurance company doesn't check any of that stuff. They're just looking for physical damage.
 
andy.peterson01 said:
So they wouldn't even bother with checking it when they need to figure out how much the car is worth to figure out whether or not it is totaled? Seems fishy.
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They (insurance company) assume the car is mechanically sound. They don't go to the expense of trying to find and prove any problems that it might have had.

Example:
You have a car, and it's working fine. Car is wrecked and totaled. You expect the insurance to pay you fair market value for the car. The insurance says that your transmission was about to fail, and will only pay you half. You get upset. You sue because to you the car was fine and you think the insurance company is trying to get out of paying you. It's not worth it to the insurance company to fight it.
This is one reason they don't check. The other is the money they waste when they don't find anything wrong (most of the time).
 
Right, they look at the cost of damage compared to the resale value of the car, if the damage is more than the re-sale value they will total the car.

I think it is BS they get to decide what is going on, I think if you have insurance they should have to pay what ever the cost is to repair when the damage was cited to someone else. Also you can take the guy who hit you to court and get him to pay out of pocket for the damages.

Problem is if he has no money then you won't get any... Pretty much everyone wants to :q:q:q:q you,
 
andy.peterson01 said:
So they wouldn't even bother with checking it when they need to figure out how much the car is worth to figure out whether or not it is totaled? Seems fishy.
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I totaled my old lincoln town car lately when some drunk ran a red and I T-boned him in the middle of an intersection. The adjustor my company came out and looked at the car. Now this was my first car so it was seriously beat to :q:q:q:q BEFORE the wreck; paint faded, tranny slipping, air suspension totally shot, etc. Now the difference in my situation was due to its age the adjustor pretty much knew it was going to be a total loss before seeing it and the other driver's insurance co. had to pay because he was so blatantly at fault. These things may have effected the way the adjustor handled things but he basically look at the front end damage, walked around it and told me total loss. The only prior damage he commented on was the air suspension because the car's ass was practically scraping the ground and I just said they blew during the accident.
 
2002_lincolnLS said:
Right, they look at the cost of damage compared to the resale value of the car, if the damage is more than the re-sale value they will total the car.
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Actually, this may depend on the insurance company or the state, but the damage only needs to be within a threshold (usually 75%) of the value of the car for it to be considered a total loss. The exception is frame damage which (I believe) is an automatic total loss.
 
nelliott500 said:
Actually, this may depend on the insurance company or the state, but the damage only needs to be within a threshold (usually 75%) of the value of the car for it to be considered a total loss. The exception is frame damage which (I believe) is an automatic total loss.
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Yeah I actually got MORE than the value of the car I totaled but again this was probably different because the other guy's insurance had to foot the bill.
 
believe it or not... I had this exact same thing happen to me on an old maxima i had... I accidentally neutral dropped it in an intersection.... and blew the tranny... had to creep home going a back way, i has 3 blocks from home when a lady in a minivan tried to shoot across all lanes of traffic... i t-boned her and totaled my car... Her insurance payed full value for mine + some go away money...
 
To back up claims for the value of the car, look at things like Edmunds.com and Autotrader.com. they have searchs that can be set for "miles" around your zip code. With this info you can back up your claim, if the insurance is trying to lowball you.

I had a 96 Impala SS that got totalled, frame damage from rear ending. Insurance was willing to give me $7,000. I sent them several adds from the local web area that showed that car was selling locally for $12-$15K, they settled for $13K. I got the LS with that money and a few weeks later I got rear ended AGAIN. jeez, can't win.

So back up your claim if you know they are lowballing.

Good Luck,

Jim Henderson
 
To clear something up, i had already planned to drop the car off thursday night at the dealer to get the tranny fixed friday and if needed saturday. I just needed the car to make it till then, mechanically speaking. The rental, via the accident, has allowed me worry free driving until the car gets fixed from the accident. At that time i will have the tranny fixed and hopefully have my car back to normal.

I havent heard anything yet as i'm sure the insurance co. is going to need the police report and figure out what they are going to do. I wont have to sue the guy myself, the insurance company would be the one bringing suit because they will end up covering the repair and will want to get their money back. With such a comfortable rental i told the body shop guy to take his time.

I have no idea what to expect as far as the damage goes. Bumper cover definately getting replaced, brace underneath, one muffler tip was bent down, the rear sensors will probably need replaced, possible other damage not visable due to how hard he hit me. There could be mechanical damage since i was hit while stopped with foot on brake. Who knows? Maybe i would be better off getting it totaled. I recently did a search on my exact year, model, options, and only came up with 13 matches nationwide. Only 2 within 75 miles. Would be kinda hard to nail down a good value, i would say min $8k & max $10-12k.
 
On the bright side if it does get totaled you may be able to get into an 06 but that was already a nice 05 LS...sorry for your loss.

And those explorers only come with a V6 now...no more V8. The LS is nice but its hard to compete with a car thats 7 years newer. The new V6 mustangs put our V8 to shame.
 
BlackLS06 said:
On the bright side if it does get totaled you may be able to get into an 06 but that was already a nice 05 LS...sorry for your loss.

And those explorers only come with a V6 now...no more V8. The LS is nice but its hard to compete with a car thats 7 years newer. The new V6 mustangs put our V8 to shame.
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With as much as i have spent fixing the LS over the years when its gone i'm done with the LS. I like the direction the new Ford/Lincoln's are going.

I had to look up the engine. Its the 3.5 V6, 290hp. If i'm not mistaken thats more hp than the old V8. Either way the Explorer feels huge when driving it, so it lends you to just cruise around. The engine is powerful enough to make it move effortlessly and the 6 speed transmission is very smooth. If your gentle with your foot you cant feel it shift from a stop all the way to 50 mph or so. Also has zero torque steer from being fwd. As much time as i spend behind the wheel this Explorer is very comfortable, but i think i've said that already.

Favorite options:
keyless entry/starting
panoramic roof
MyTouch/Sync
 
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