Rust. Basically everywhere. If you have to ask, you’ll struggle. Find someone to help you.

Chassis cracks. Look around the front shock towers (bits welded on where the front shocks and upper control arms mount). And where the lower control arm mounts are welded to the chassis, mainly behind the rear mount. HZ chassis steel is thinner than HQ-HX and doesn’t crack as bad but they do crack especially if it has had lowered springs and very stiff shocks fitted.

Chassis rust. Hard to see but they do rust on the top where the 4 front cabin mounts are.

If the panels are badly rusted make sure you pay less for the car, none of them are cheap any more. Good doors will cost near $750 each today.

Mechanicals are your least concern. The ideal fixer-upperer would have a great body and panels and need a mechanical rebuild.

Make sure most of it is there. Nothing is cheap any more. And you can’t just go to the wreckers and get screws, brackets, plastics etc like you could 10 years ago.

Almost forgot. Add the costs up. Be realistic. If you can’t fix rust, dents and paint you’ll be up over $15,000 for even a cheap-ass job today. Allow $2500 for rubbers, clips, window winder repairs and all that “put back together” stuff. $4000+ by the time you pay for mechanical repairs from engine through to rear axle, and that is doing most of it yourself. Shocks, rubbers, bushes, rotors, drums, wheel cylinders, master cyl, fuel tank clean, radiator, hoses. It all adds up.
Then compare those sums to a car basically ready to use. Like this for example:
https://www.gumtree.com....tivity.copytopasteboard
This HX could be a piece of junk too, but may also be good. Just using it to show you what I mean.

Edited by user Wednesday, 21 July 2021 8:08:39 PM(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified