Prospective 88 Accord Owner

Hello everyone,

Long story short I work at a car dealership and we had someone trade in a 1988 Accord LX-i Sedan (automatic sadly). The vehicle is one owner with 67,256 miles on the odometer. It has an oil leak from the bottom of the timing cover and one that appears to be coming from the distributer. The A/C is also non-op and is R12 so it would require being updated.

But other than those issues the car appears to have been garaged its entire life. The body is straight, no panels have been replaced and there are no accidents reported on it. The interior is also in like new condition as well.

Now I assume it will need new hoses, bushings, and other rubber bits throughout the rest of its lifetime. But is there any other glaring issues. With these accords that I should know about or something else that I would need to check on it?

The previous owner had the timing belt changed last October and I suspect the garage he brought it to didn’t put a gasket on properly or reused an old gasket when putting everything together. And the Takata seatbelt recall from 95 was never completed either.

This car is in like new shape and the price is so low I don’t really want to pass this up. I just wanted to see what experience people had with these cars before I pull the trigger.

The main purpose of this vehicle would be a secondary vehicle to keep at my house and it wouldn’t get too much mileage on it. Maybe 10 miles or so a week because I ride a train to and from work.

They're wonderful little cars and what you have already observed is about as bad as they get. The distributor oring to fix that leak might be $0.35 and take an hour to swap out. The timing cover will be more expensive because it's so much work to get to those seals, you do well to complete a major timing belt service at the time. Get all the seals and the water pump while you're at it. It's a major service, but you should do that on any new car you get, because there's no way to know when it was last done.

Get ready to fall in love with the snappy handling, the effortless steering, the nimble feel, the great visibility and the retro good looks. The auto trans is very good, very responsive and routinely lasts several hundred thousand miles. It's one of only two true driver's autos I've ever driven (the other being my '93 Accord). Buy it quick and post pics so we can celebrate with you.