Don,
Yep! I know what you mean. My old Scout was a Michigan truck, and there was more black duct tape than metal on the outside.
The structural integrity was actually compromised (removable hard top; when the top was off the truck actually started to slowly collapse, over a period of weeks, right behind the driver's door, so that the holes on the windshield frame didn't line up to the top when we re-installed it)...I made a mistake in buying it, but I never had a problem with the drivetrain (thank GOD it was a diesel!) in the year and a half I owned it 'till the engine cracked a piston...it's scrap metal now (the body condition made it not worthwhile to fix the engine; sold it to a guy for $900 and he parted it out).
I like what you're saying on the self-maintenance...obviously, I'll have to find a good manual on these...but I'll wait 'till I get the car.
I'm willing to wait some, as long as it happens in the end...I'm not looking to spend too much more than $3K (that's what my van should sell for), and have been lookin' idly around eBay and AutoTrader.com...seen a couple good buys; too bad I couldn't act on them immediately...
What it sounds like I
really need to do is either find a dealer, a private seller, or a nice guy who happens to own a 300D and/or a 300SD and test-drive one...I can fit in a VW Bug (in fact, for the 2 months before it blew up on the I-5 in Firebaugh, that was my first car), so a 300D oughtta be okay spacewise, although if all else is equal, a larger car is more than fine by me...I still like the extra passenger capacity of the 300TD (for cargo, I've still got my pickup truck), but, again, I'm not holding my breath on one...