I'm the guy protesting on E Riverside Dr in Loves Park Ill. We bought a used van from Napleton Auto Werks. The salesman asked us how much we had to spend, we told him $3400. They had nothing on the lot for us, the salesman took us to the other lot at 505 N Perryville Rd in Rockford, and showed us a 2002 Dodge Caravan. The list price was $5500, marked down to $4400. We test drove it back to the dealership on E Riverside Blvd. Everything seemed to work just fine. The salesman asked if we were interested in the van, we said we were, but could not afford $4400. They sold it to us for the $3400 we did have. We were happy, we thought we had gotten a good deal, from what we thought was an honest dealer, but boy were we wrong! The same day we brought it home, the power windows stopped working. It cost $150 in parts to repair. Within the next 2 days, the air-conditioning froze up and overflowed into the passenger side floor board. When I opened the cabin filter compartment, it had a rats nest made of chewed up cloth and seed shells instead of a filter! It took me 6 hours to clean it all out. The next week, the van started stalling. I had to use a socket to break off the rust from the spark plugs before I could even blow out around them to remove them. The tips were totally burned off 3 of them! Next we noticed a squeak from under the front wheel. I took off the tire to find that the axle was loose. NEXT, the transmission started to slip in reverse! We cannot afford a new transmission, a rebuilt one costs $1200, a new one can cost almost $2000. We called them several times about these issues. We asked if they would buy the van back or give us a rebuilt transmission (we'd put it in ourselves), they offered to look at the air conditioning! They had a similar van on the lot, but we would have to trade in our van AND pay them $1200 more! Yes, we mistakenly, bought the van AS IS, we know that there is no legal recourse. But this is just TOO much, this van is WORSE than a lemon! We both lost our jobs this last year, we had to save, and sell both of our cars to buy this van. We bought it because we have 4 grandchildren, and we needed an automobile to transport them all. So not only did we get a piece of crap dumped on us, we are driving our grandchildren around in it! Thank you Napleton.
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