My experience in ford land....
08-28-2007, 09:05 PM
#1
Le Mans Master
Thread Starter
My experience in ford land....
If you're considering a Mustang GT, here is my experience on the other side of the fence. It's a little long but I am waiting patiently for my new C6 to show up at the dealer tomorrow so I thought I would pass the time. Read this if you are bored with nothing better to do or are considering a Mustang GT. An obligatory vid is at the end.
Yes...I confess...I ventured there. Fact was I needed something with back seats that was sporty and two door. The only choices were a GTO or F...F...F....Ford...
I went to go look at a used GTO that happened to be at a Ford dealership. It didn't take long to realize that the car had been wrecked and carfax confirmed my susupicions. On the way out the guy asked if there was anything else I was interested in. I said "Well...if you had a black/black 5 spd mustang GT, I might consider it.". This being that I really liked the new body style, even for a Ford. Just so happened, he had one. Of the 52 vehicles that I have owned at that time, only one other had been a Ford and it was a Grenada with a straight 6, and no back brakes. Made great smoke shows and lasted for about 1 week. That was over 20 years ago. Before I knew it, I left in a 2006 Ford Mustang GT.
I liked the car so much that I wondered what could be done to it to improve it. Fact is, Ford did an awesome job on it. It was fun, ran well, and looked pretty good too. One day at an intersection a car identical to mine but in convertible form went though and intersection near me. Wife in the passenger side and 2 kids in the back, I knew that that is what I needed. Never had a vert, don't really want a vert in Vette land, so this was the perfect thing to do. So after just three weeks owning the coupe, I had my dealer look for a vert.
Finding a triple black convertible Mustang GT with a manual trans proved to be a chore and a half. Seems they don't make very many of them. In fact, there was only 1 in the entire state of NC. 1 in SC, and 2 in GA. It took what seemed to be an act of God himself but I finally got the car and I was riding in style. I figured at the very least, as hard as this car was to get, I should have no problem getting rid of it if something changed.
As mentioned they did a great job with this car. I wasn't alive back when GM really came to be some competition to Ford but I am old enough to know that they originally suceeded in becoming competition by offereing things that Ford didn't. Ford is a much more practical and basic car than GM is and that is still obvious to me even today. It's because of this that the car is so much more affordable. You get less features which keeps the price down...and because of that, there are so many more of them on the road.
A lot of the little add-on things that someone from GM land would be used to aren't readily available in Ford land, again keeping the price down. For example, there's no automatic on headlights, no memory seats, heads up display? Forget it. And power...well...you get what you pay for. If I was a die hard Ford fan I would be real pissed at the lack of a real engine readily available. It ran good, but regular ol' camaro's and TA's would spank Mustangs all day long stock for stock. Also, the fact that there are so many available, it's just a Mustang. You get no looks from people wishing they had that car like you do in the Vette. There's no exclusivity to them. Fact is, the new car excitement wore off real quick and it became just a regular car. I even lost any initial desire to mod it in any way because regardless, it was still a Mustang. I never could get over the "sleeping with the enemy" feeling. I resented GM for not making something with back seats in the price range with a decent V8 in it that looked good.
The people that are Ford people are very much a different breed. In my personal experience, the majority of the Mustang drivers are not nearly a "car person" like what you find in Corvette world. It's not as fun and there isn't as much love for their car as you find in Corvette world on a fair scale. It's still just a Mustang.
Even the world of tuning in Ford world is different. The tuner manufacturers make it much more difficult (read expensive) to hobby tune. They want you to have to go to their network of authorized dealers.
One thing that Ford did do right is to make this car sound good. real good. I don't quite know how they do it but they are able to make that car sound excellent on the outside without and drone on the inside. Even when I went to an aftermarket setup, it sounded awesome with no drone. Very, very cool.
The convertible factor was fine and dandy however let me tell you, when you have that hot son blaring down on you in the middle of summer and the wife and kids are complaining about it being so hot, the convertible factor gets old REAL quick and you realize you spent all that extra money for nothing. Great experience, but that's the last vert I will be buying.
The absolute worst thing I came to learn about a Ford is they by far have the absolute WORST resale value of any of the cars I have ever owned. I couldn't give this car away to a private buyer for real trade value offered at my dealership. Didn't matter how hard it was for me to get it and how rare it really was in it's combination, no one wanted it. It was just a Mustang. So I took the biggest trade *** whipping of my life to get rid of it for the sake of my C6. A lesson that I will not soon forget. I put it on ebay and out of roughly 1600 cars, it was the ONLY one like it and still no one wanted it. Those of you who bitch about a Corvette resale value have no idea how good life is in Vette world until you have owned a Ford.
Bottom line is this would be a good car for a daily driver but don't expect a Mustang to be anything more than just another car. There's nothing really special about it and it becomes apparent in a very short period of time. Do NOT buy one new. Find a used one and get the deal of a lifetime after the original owner takes a major bath in it. I have a truck that I need for a daily driver and I can't afford two toy cars so this one had to go. Of course it took a large part of my wallet with it, but at least I can talk smack about Mustangs because I actually owned one.
Here's the video I promised. This is just after I got my new exhaust. This is best listened to with headphones or a good speaker system with a subwoofer.
Right click and Save Target As
See ya in C6 Land!
Yes...I confess...I ventured there. Fact was I needed something with back seats that was sporty and two door. The only choices were a GTO or F...F...F....Ford...
I went to go look at a used GTO that happened to be at a Ford dealership. It didn't take long to realize that the car had been wrecked and carfax confirmed my susupicions. On the way out the guy asked if there was anything else I was interested in. I said "Well...if you had a black/black 5 spd mustang GT, I might consider it.". This being that I really liked the new body style, even for a Ford. Just so happened, he had one. Of the 52 vehicles that I have owned at that time, only one other had been a Ford and it was a Grenada with a straight 6, and no back brakes. Made great smoke shows and lasted for about 1 week. That was over 20 years ago. Before I knew it, I left in a 2006 Ford Mustang GT.
I liked the car so much that I wondered what could be done to it to improve it. Fact is, Ford did an awesome job on it. It was fun, ran well, and looked pretty good too. One day at an intersection a car identical to mine but in convertible form went though and intersection near me. Wife in the passenger side and 2 kids in the back, I knew that that is what I needed. Never had a vert, don't really want a vert in Vette land, so this was the perfect thing to do. So after just three weeks owning the coupe, I had my dealer look for a vert.
Finding a triple black convertible Mustang GT with a manual trans proved to be a chore and a half. Seems they don't make very many of them. In fact, there was only 1 in the entire state of NC. 1 in SC, and 2 in GA. It took what seemed to be an act of God himself but I finally got the car and I was riding in style. I figured at the very least, as hard as this car was to get, I should have no problem getting rid of it if something changed.
As mentioned they did a great job with this car. I wasn't alive back when GM really came to be some competition to Ford but I am old enough to know that they originally suceeded in becoming competition by offereing things that Ford didn't. Ford is a much more practical and basic car than GM is and that is still obvious to me even today. It's because of this that the car is so much more affordable. You get less features which keeps the price down...and because of that, there are so many more of them on the road.
A lot of the little add-on things that someone from GM land would be used to aren't readily available in Ford land, again keeping the price down. For example, there's no automatic on headlights, no memory seats, heads up display? Forget it. And power...well...you get what you pay for. If I was a die hard Ford fan I would be real pissed at the lack of a real engine readily available. It ran good, but regular ol' camaro's and TA's would spank Mustangs all day long stock for stock. Also, the fact that there are so many available, it's just a Mustang. You get no looks from people wishing they had that car like you do in the Vette. There's no exclusivity to them. Fact is, the new car excitement wore off real quick and it became just a regular car. I even lost any initial desire to mod it in any way because regardless, it was still a Mustang. I never could get over the "sleeping with the enemy" feeling. I resented GM for not making something with back seats in the price range with a decent V8 in it that looked good.
The people that are Ford people are very much a different breed. In my personal experience, the majority of the Mustang drivers are not nearly a "car person" like what you find in Corvette world. It's not as fun and there isn't as much love for their car as you find in Corvette world on a fair scale. It's still just a Mustang.
Even the world of tuning in Ford world is different. The tuner manufacturers make it much more difficult (read expensive) to hobby tune. They want you to have to go to their network of authorized dealers.
One thing that Ford did do right is to make this car sound good. real good. I don't quite know how they do it but they are able to make that car sound excellent on the outside without and drone on the inside. Even when I went to an aftermarket setup, it sounded awesome with no drone. Very, very cool.
The convertible factor was fine and dandy however let me tell you, when you have that hot son blaring down on you in the middle of summer and the wife and kids are complaining about it being so hot, the convertible factor gets old REAL quick and you realize you spent all that extra money for nothing. Great experience, but that's the last vert I will be buying.
The absolute worst thing I came to learn about a Ford is they by far have the absolute WORST resale value of any of the cars I have ever owned. I couldn't give this car away to a private buyer for real trade value offered at my dealership. Didn't matter how hard it was for me to get it and how rare it really was in it's combination, no one wanted it. It was just a Mustang. So I took the biggest trade *** whipping of my life to get rid of it for the sake of my C6. A lesson that I will not soon forget. I put it on ebay and out of roughly 1600 cars, it was the ONLY one like it and still no one wanted it. Those of you who bitch about a Corvette resale value have no idea how good life is in Vette world until you have owned a Ford.
Bottom line is this would be a good car for a daily driver but don't expect a Mustang to be anything more than just another car. There's nothing really special about it and it becomes apparent in a very short period of time. Do NOT buy one new. Find a used one and get the deal of a lifetime after the original owner takes a major bath in it. I have a truck that I need for a daily driver and I can't afford two toy cars so this one had to go. Of course it took a large part of my wallet with it, but at least I can talk smack about Mustangs because I actually owned one.
Here's the video I promised. This is just after I got my new exhaust. This is best listened to with headphones or a good speaker system with a subwoofer.
Right click and Save Target As
See ya in C6 Land!
Last edited by cerino2000; 08-28-2007 at 09:18 PM.
08-29-2007, 08:09 AM
#2
Team Owner
On the plus side for the Mustang, they are built with better quality than the Corvette. I have three Mustangs, a 1998 convertible, a 2001 Bullitt GT, and a 2007 coupe. I've owned four Corvettes, and they all have had warrantee isues. None of my Mustangs have ever been back to the dealer for anything. I do wish I could say that for my Corvettes. A mustang and a Corvette are not even close to being in the same league. How can you even compare them?
08-29-2007, 08:20 AM
#3
Le Mans Master
Thread Starter
There is one other thing I forgot to mention and that was with the Mustang, I didn't fear parking it near other cars in parking lots or taking it in to the dealer and worrying about what problem they are going to cause in it by the time it gets out. The mechanics were in better touch with their cars than the GM mechanics with Corvette's.