I bought a gold 1993 ls400 Sunday, and today it broke down. So my relationship is already off to a rocky start. I was going down the freeway just fine, when out of nowhere I hear this clunk kind of noise and the car bucks a few times and loses power. I was able to get off the highway and when I came to a stop, I could smell a burning oil smell and something was smoking. The car will start for a couple seconds then bogs down and dies. Not a single warning light or anything. It's at a shop now, hopefully they can look at it tomorrow. I am very worried I bought a lemon that I'm going to be stuck with because that was all the money I had.

 

Lesson 1 and a bit of advice.
An old almost 25 year old car is not something you buy thinking it is going to be a dependable vehicle.
Yes an LS can be a good car. But it takes money to get it there especially if its an older version of LS.
Even if it looks nice that doesn't mean it doesn't have problems or at some point it will have them.
And old car is more for a hobbyist than for dependable transportation though they can be as long as they are maintained correctly. There is a huge list of problems that car can have, let us know what happened.

 

I didn't say I expected it to be trouble free, I was just telling where I'm at. Trust me I've driven old beaters my whole life, I'm just disappointed this one only lasted two days.

 

174k I hope it's something I can afford to fix, I do like the car.

 

Knowing my luck, it needs a new everything under the hood.

 

My experience tells me you should have someone change your TPS and adjust it properly.

 

Mechanic says it's a fuel pump and sending unit. The power steering pump and rack are leaking pretty good, and maybe tie rod ends. Not too bad for a 22 year old car.