Black plastic ball inside right front fender?

KMT

Registered User
My '90 Anny took a hit from a 2008 Scion tc in the right front today :( Looking thru the shattered fender liner there is a black plastic ball dangling on a vacuum (?) line - it used to be attached somewhere, and it's not the charcoal canister or the air intake - anyone know what it's for?
 
Ouch! Sorry to hear that

Its a vacuum reserve canister to keep things like the EGR (if equipped) and the climate blend door from running out of vac under extended heavy engine loads. There should be a check valve on the tee near the ball to keep vacuum from equalizing with the plenum under boost. Older Fords had a similar setup but the canister was made out of what resembled a large black soup can.

I believe its held with two barbed push clips, to the inner fender apron.
 
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Ah, good, thanks. Yes, looks like two mounting ears. No EGR.

I thought that was all on the driver's side w/cruise control, but based on it's design, I'm sure you're right. I remember the soup cans. Hate to think what else got trashed up in there...

So far I can see it will need:
- black anny wheel - tire?
- fender
- wheelwell liner
- antenna bezel
- clear corner
- cornerning lamp
- vacuum canister
- bumper cover damaged

Been running a dashcam for more than two years, and this is the first battle action it captured. First time this car has been hit ever.
 
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Sorry to hear, Ken. That's something that I've always been worried about when driving mine around. If you need the corner lamp, clear corner and antenna bezel, you can have them for free off of mine if you pay the shipping. How difficult is it to get to the vacuum canister? If it doesn't require lots of work, I could probably get that for you, too.
 
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Sorry to hear, Ken. That's something that I've always been worried about when driving mine around. If you need the corner lamp, clear corner and antenna bezel, you can have them for free off of mine if you pay the shipping. How difficult is it to get to the vacuum canister? If it doesn't require lots of work, I could probably get that for you, too.

Pull the inner fender, and it's reachable. Pull the OUTER fender, and it's obvious *grins*

RwP
 
My '90 Anny took a hit from a 2008 Scion tc in the right front today :( Looking thru the shattered fender liner there is a black plastic ball dangling on a vacuum (?) line - it used to be attached somewhere, and it's not the charcoal canister or the air intake - anyone know what it's for?

Sounds like your damage is similar to the accident damage I had on my '89.

I can tell you with that canister disconnected when you get into boost or higher rpms the AC will blow out the defrost area and then lower RPMs out the front vents. Mine also broke and I capped it off thinking it was for just EGR..since that is deleted on my car I figured it wasn't needed.

If memory serves me its attached to the fender well with a 8mm (maybe a 10mm) selftapping screw also. You can see it in front of the wheel for those trying to help pull it.

attachment.php




-Tim
 
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Sounds like your damage is similar to the accident damage I had on my '89.

-Tim

I suspect so. Thanks for that image...very helpful!

I took it to a local body shop that is on the ins. company's 'approved' list. The first time the guy doing the estimate wrote it up, he missed half the 10 issues I found, mainly the broken header, so he had to make another inspection.

Short story is the estimate came to $3k - he then explained how his shop actually can't touch it, given the age and how parts would have to be sourced from 'unapproved' vendors and they can't warranty parts that are sourced out of channel. He did say that despite it's age, my Anny is in excellent shape. He got onto the topic of how it might be a total on paper. He suggested a local custom shop that does restorations, which I contacted. Both shops said for me to push back on the ins. company to have a field agent do an assessment. I'd be willing to cash out and go my own way, but I don't want the title branded as salvaged, so...now the fun begins.

SCAnnyDamage01.jpg
Ken
 
I suspect so. Thanks for that image...very helpful!

I took it to a local body shop that is on the ins. company's 'approved' list. The first time the guy doing the estimate wrote it up, he missed half the 10 issues I found, mainly the broken header, so he had to make another inspection.

Short story is the estimate came to $3k - he then explained how his shop actually can't touch it, given the age and how parts would have to be sourced from 'unapproved' vendors and they can't warranty parts that are sourced out of channel. He did say that despite it's age, my Anny is in excellent shape.

View attachment 66236
Ken



Good evening KMT


Sorry to read and see the damage to the car. For what it's worth your responses from the body shops is the standard answers I've run into. Funny. If the car was a 69' Ford Torino or 91' SHO it would be no real issue. I don't know if you noticed the shop facial expression when you pointed out the damaged areas. I took the look as how dare you bring this "thing" to my shop. The problem as I see is the body shop has to work hard to find the parts. "Approved parts" that the insurance company and the body shop will accept. Can't forget the >4K re-paint.

Like you stated make the insurance company do a complete inspection and if necessary show them OEM, or insurance approved parts are still available.


Good Luck
 
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You're probably right, Sam. In many cases, the parts are more difficult to find than need be, and the shops may not be as enthusiastic to work on these types of cars. In my experience, the problem becomes that the autobody shop may have difficulty finding used parts that are in excellent shape.......the insurance companies want things to be fixed to new condition, but on older cars, that's a problem because the money really adds up. So then new OEM parts (even an unpainted new bumper) costs some pretty big $$. Off the top of my head, when I was doing some research to keep costs down on my accident last year, I believe that the best price that I could find on an OEM (unpainted) bumper was $600. There were some online that were in very good shape, but they still had some anomalies and cracks and dings in them, and most of them were $250-$300 ish. Then the issue becomes that the insurance company doesn't want parts that need to be worked on, since the cost of working on them to get them up to new standards might cost more than it should.

When my '84 Cutlass had got into an accident many years ago, the problem was the same......sourcing top notch used parts, that weren't rusted and trashed.

The best thing to do, is go in with all your receipts, and get a specialty assessment guy to come out and assess it. I had got a favourable review from one last year, and he said "that's the most receipts I've ever seen for a car that I've looked at!". Best case scenario is that they repair it. Less favourable scenario is that they write it off and you buy it back and take the writeoff money and apply that to your own repair and try to do it cheaper than usual......maybe you find a used bumper with a couple of miniscule dings in it that can be painted over to look almost new, and that your parts and repairs are maybe 98 percent of the way to being perfect and maybe it's something that you can overlook it not being totally perfect, in lieu of getting it back on the road for a cost effective price. Worst case scenario is that they write it off with a parts only status......can't see that happening, as yours is in such good condition. I believe that they reserve the total loss stuff for older vehicles that were already in rough shape before the accident (heavy rust, etc).
 
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Is that OEM corner light or Clear ( I have a spare clear for that side)

Ken, you do need to find a small local shop, the ones that advertise only want to deal in the stuff <10yrs old--and their prices will reflect it. When my 93 was hit in parking lot opposite side of your came to ~$2k. The only new part I needed was cornering light, which was an issue but once they saw OEM wasn't right I gave them the info and no problems.
 
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