1996 Dodge Neon 2.0 SOHC from North America - Comments

Electrical problems at the time of purchase.

Dash light outage at 36,000 miles.

Fuel indicator broke at 64,000 miles.

Oil leaking problems.

Head gasket blown right now at 75,000 miles.

When I bought the car, I noticed the stereo would stay on for a few seconds after you turned the car off. I just thought it was a feature, and it wasn't a bad one, I kinda liked it.

At 36,000 the dash lights went out. I was still under the manufacturers warranty I believe, if not then definitely on my extended (stupid move, shouldn't have bought it).

The fuel indicator broke on a trip home from Eureka, CA to my home in Santa Rosa... if you know that stretch of highway right before Ukiah on 101 through the mountains there, it's not pleasant to have your car stop going. I had AAA and I got a tow into Ukiah and they found out it was the fuel gauge. When my car lost power, and wouldn't accelerate anymore, it was at a quarter of a tank of gas, yet the verdict was that I was out of gas, and my fuel indicator was the culprit. This wasn't a nice thing to have to deal with on this fuel injected car.

Began to leak oil at 75,000 some odd miles and I didn't get it repaired immediately and was planning to for about a week, just feed it oil, to keep it going till I got a paycheck to have someone fix my leak. Subsequently, on about the fourth day into that week of light driving, maybe 2 miles a day, the head gasket blows. I look into my radiator and there's the creamy colored oil gathered in there that's a tell tale sign of a head gasket blow out.

I haven't had it looked at by a mechanic yet, but can anyone perhaps comment on the approximate price of such an operation?

Have 96 neon, everything was perfect until I notice a creamy substance in my radiator fluid, the main gasket blow, someone told me. So I put some of "stop leaking" stuff to the radiator and some other for the oil. It works. It significantly reduced the leak between these two main components of the motor, changing before the coolant fluid. However, I drive few miles, from home to school. This is giving me time to save some money to make it repair. The estimate was about the thousand dollars, because the gasket is in the middle of engine and they need to make a lot of work to get there.

Edgar.

The Head Gasket replacement will cost anywhere between $700 and $1000. Your best bet would be to take it to a Dodge dealer and tell them that this should be a recall, and that should save you some money. When I had mine replaced, I wrote a letter to Dodge, and I also went to the dealership and complained. So that saved me about $400, to cover the labor costs. Just a thought.