Ghetto-car-noises? Anyone else experience this?

Hey maezee, I have a 98 nissan 200 sx was was when purchased used was already super modified so nothing works as it should under the hood..lol. My car was used mainly for racing...so thinks like an egr valve and cadalic converter we just straight missing from my car and since it is so old...I had to take it to a machine shop and get an egr valve made because one could not be found in our local junk yards. So needless to say she makes some noises now and then like sputtering and cranking but I have been assured by my mechanic uncle that it is not problematic....My car is super ghettoly modified is what I like to tell people...LOL

Aside from my car, I also have a 1999 Dodge Caravan, which I use to carpool kids to school. I've already been having problems with it. For one, coolant seems to be overheating every 2 or 3 months, and then the heater is not working. And just last week some funny noises started. It sounded like squirrels running around under the hood. So, I had to bring it to the mechanics this weekend. They fixed the first two problems, but they couldn't determine what the noises were. And they said that when they drove the van, the sound was not there anymore.

All the cars I've had have been older cars, including the one I have now. It's 10 years old. But it doesn't make any strange sounds (knock on wood). It sounds more like a new car than it does an old one. Now, let's see. With my husband's last work truck, that thing was making all kinds of sounds before it finally croaked. But the grinding was the worst. It got so bad I thought for sure something was going to fall off! And with our last car, after the engine went out it sputtered and shook. Another car we had several years back the belt was worn out so it would screech like an owl whenever we'd step on the gas. Some were problematic and others were just because they were old. But they still got us around to where we wanted to go. Most of them anyway... Happy mylotting!