As advised by the world's greatest team of Crossfire experts, I fearlessly ventured forth to clear debris from under the wiper panel. Here was my biggest surprise... a gaping opening to the HVAC blower. No wonder the cabin filter must be changed every 18K. How much would it have cost to cover this opening with a wire mesh? Wire mesh must cost significantly more than I thought.

I've never met a car that was perfect from the factory; that couldn't be improved upon in at least some small way. I don't mean style or color wise, because those things drive your decision to buy or not. I'm talking functionality like mushy brakes after disuse or leaky breather covers. If you look closely enough at anything--a car, person, place or thing--you will always find some kind of flaw. That's an acceptable practice if you're negotiating over something like a used vehicle, perhaps, but once the deal is done and you find yourself loving the car, person, or thing, do those little imperfections still matter? Are they a real problem or just part of the thing's character?

I'm currently (slowly) working down my Crossfire's "to-do" list. In honesty all any "to-do" list is, is a list of things we're unhappy about. But once I set my eyes upon that gorgeous hunk of metal & leather in my garage, and better still, drive it; I find it's benefits are such that my complaints no longer matter at all. I'm going through an attitudinal transformation as I age. Instead of always trying to point out or eliminate flaws I try to embrace them, and I'm enjoying everything in my personal life a lot more because of it. Don't get me wrong. I still make a "to-do" list. But I'm able to enjoy the car despite the fact the list exists. I love driving it, improving it and knowing that once again someone else took the depreciation hit besides me. It may not be perfect, but it makes me happy. Isn't that a kind of perfection?

 

Have you noticed yet that the grommet around the driver's side wiper stalk is missing ?
Some German engineer had a late night out and on his CAD the next morning did a bit of a boo-boo.
It wasn't caught and 70,000 + of the cowls were ordered from the supplier and shipped.
What to do ? What to do ? I know, let's just ignore it and no one will notice.
There is a DIY here somewhere that remedies this .......
Found it ! :
https://www.crossfireforum.org/forum...r-grommet.html

 

I like post #10 in your link. Sounds like a winner. Otherwise the only shortcoming is once everything is tidied-up the need for "Back-To-Black" becomes achingly apparent. Walmart it is then, because whilst O'reilly has Back-To-Black I'm pretty sure they don't have "large kitchen trash bags"... lists dictate my life. I have a 3-product process to restoring rubber seals to like-new in most cases. The secret product is used in between the other two. It is AT-205 Reseal. Spread it until the rubber is wet and within an hour or so it will be absorbed by the rubber which becomes plumped-up like new. I used this process on the 4/5-feet long rubber seals at the base of the windshield and atop the cowl.

 

The trouble with that fix is that the result still looks off centre.