Hey there. Thanks for the info. Sorry about posting the following book, but I wanted to answer you thoroughly.
As you said, when you buy a $600 car, you probably shouldn't expect a whole lot. Personally, if I were going to buy a $600 car (and I wouldn't anymore), I probably would be tempted to put just enough money into it to make it legal and to make it drive well. But what's good is that you seem to be pretty handy with moderately difficult repairs, and it's probably cheaper to you than buying a $3000 car in better shape that's had tons of dealer service.
On the other hand. When you hear people come out and say "Ford sucks" or "Taurus sucks," there is this disturbing trend that most of these people drive with a lead foot and do virtually no maintenance, namely, transmission services, coolant changes, and oil changess. When you talk to people who are very happy with their cars, and you ask them, "What kind of work have you done on your car?" they'll often say, "Oh, nothing. But I changed the oil every 3k-5k and had the transmission fluid and coolant changed every 30k." And these people who care enough to have maintenance done tend to care more about the quality and longevity of their vehicles, and therefore often don't drive them super-hard, are less accident-prone, and keep their cars cleaner.
For $600, even if it's only a '92, I bet your Taurus has a TON of miles on it. I would suspect that if you continue on your current track doing all this great maintenance, so long as the engine and transmission don't (unpreventably due to age) blow up on you, you will probably still get quite a few more miles out of this car. And you'll have spent a lot less money than most people with newer cars. Good luck!
Since you asked... I have driven 4 cars in my short driving lifetime:
1. Ford Escort 5 spd. (1985): $500
2. Ford Thunderbird (1987) auto.: $3400
3. Ford Escort LX (1998) 5 spd.: $3600
4. Ford Taurus SES (2002) auto.: $8000
You might notice that each of these vehicles is a Ford. I will add, to be fair, that I sold each of these cars before they hit 100,000 miles.
Still, not once has one of these cars ever left me stranded on the side of the road or failed to start, even at -20 degrees in the winter. The only shop work I've ever had to pay someone else to do was thanks to rust damage from the abundance of salt they dump on the icy roads of Vermont, and, this weekend, the Taurus will be going into a dealer to have its first transmission service. I'll be doing my own oil and coolant changes.
YES, Ford vehicles have all had their little quirks. Some have had real, legitimate, recurring problems. The thing to recognize is that this has been the case for virtually *every* manufacturer. Bit, usually, the newer the car, the fewer recurring problems it will have. That's why I would shy away from a '92 in favor of, say, a '98-'00, even for the extra money--it's well-known that the '91 Taurus/Sable had major transmission issues, and many people just aren't going to prevent those kinds of problems, even by doing all the recommended maintenance.
The general truth is, though--and most of us already know this--if you take good care of your car, you stand a very good chance that it will take good care of you.
Good luck!