thewheelman

My son is active duty military and looking at an 06 GT automatic with 41k on the clock. He's planning on test driving it one day this week. Since he's 1000's of miles from me I can give it "dad's once over" and wondering if there are particular things to look for in this car. It's an automatic vert. Doesn't appear to have been dogged or abused. What does he look for? Crisp trans shifts? Play in rear end? I hope you know what I'm looking for.......trouble spots? I have an 08 GT 500 with zero issues and feel most of these cars are the same. Just wanting to give him some inspection points.....if yo know what I mean.

Thanks in advance!

rocket237

I have nothing o6 specific, However Being a muxcle car with poor handling in the wet, I would inspect the underside for off road use. Not to mention ripples in the roof, I saw one that had this ,very subtle, ya gotta really look hard too see imperfections due too accidents. Mechanically as a whole I've read these are pretty good cars.

ski

Just a few things to be aware of.

Check the front passenger's footwell for dampness and mildew from an external water leak in that area. Also check the passenger compartment for an overall mildew smell.

Check the trunk for water, especially in the spare tire well. Also, check for rust.

Check the parking brake for proper operation.

Drive it at highway speeds for at least 20 miles, and accelerate from a stop after exiting. If it hesitates, then the fuel pump needs replacing.

rocket237

are these the most common ski? Glad I subscribed, I'll check on this when I get her.

madmann26

Ask when the last time the sparkplugs were changed.

Nuke

Get familiar with the list of TSB's posted in the stickies in the "2005 - 2012 Mustangs" main forum. Since the S197 was introduced in '05, the '05's and '06's were most prone to problems; the water leak (a biggie), fuel pump, front end clunk being 3 of the more problematic ones of the bunch. There are plenty of other annoying issues in that list of TSB's.

Other than being a mass produced money maker, it's not a BAD car if you keep in mind it's for performance and not comfort. Also, if you can keep your foot out of it the engine gets very good fuel mileage for a performance V8.

Rylay

my control arms were messed up and caused a crunching popping sound while cornering. i have an o6 and it was in a tsb and covered under warranty.

also check the tsb's

ski

They're among the most common problems according to the posts I've read from S197 GT owners on numerous Stang forums.
Another one I forgot is the multi-CD player skipping on the Shaker 500 & Shaker 1000 audio systems.

808muscle

The water leak is a common issue that you want to avoid. Fortunately my 06 did not have it. But I did develop the front end clunk at about 20k miles. Lot of verts were rental cars.....I wouldn't go there at all.

rocket237

What was the clunking noise associated with, ball joints? rack and pinion?