os16

I am very interested in buying a mustang and the mach 1 screams out to me. So on craigslist I found a 2003 Azure Blue mach 1 with 115,000 miles, blue custom painted interior accents and blue custom painted wheels with 4k miles on them. The only mods to this car is a short throw shifter with a pistol grip (but he's throwing in the original ****) and the engine has been flash tuned and he is including the tuner.

my only issues with the car are the 115,000 miles and the price he is asking for it: $11,500 OBO. He says that 70% of the miles put on were highway miles, he puts it in a garage during winter so no salt rust, and he claims that the car needs no additional work. I have not had a chance to go and look at the car in person yet but I will take it to a mechanic just to be safe.

I would be using this car as a daily driver and I would like to make it last at least 5 years/50,000 more miles

what problems should I be looking for on a car with this many miles and what is a good asking price for this car? I was thinking $10,000 would be my limit. any thoughts?

os16

bump.

Sonic Mustang

That looks like a well worn Mach 1. I'd keep looking. Besides,those blue wheels and interior paint scream "my owner's an idiot."

jthorn9

You never know till you go check it out, any car more than 10 years old is gonna have wear. There isn't any one thing to look for just look the car over really well and make a decision on rather or not it's worth it.

DocSnickers

Got any Mustang shops in your area that could do an inspection or even have it inspected at the dealership first. But my god that interior looks like Baskin and Robins threw up inside. I mean it's not even a matching color.

Sonic Mustang

Actually, there is one specific thing to check on a 2003 Mach 1. With the engine fully warmed up, park the car next to a wall, roll down the windowsl and listen for a ticking sound coming from the engine compartment at idle. (Parking next to a wall helps you hear - the sound bounces back in your direction.)

You can search this and other forums for "head tick."

DocSnickers

Very good tip, what might also work to help with that which is what I did with my 72 Mach1 is take a pvc pipe or some kind of tube stick it up to your ear and put the other end on the engine block. I have used that method to listen for ticks and seal leaks. Picked that one up from an old Ford guy.

TomKat

id offer him lower than 10,000 thats for sure. i agree its probably been driven hard

os16

So it seems that this particular mach 1 is a huge miss among mustang owners.. Does anyone think I will be able to find a decent mach 1 for less than/around $10,000? Should I just get a GT or something?

DRAGUL

This Mach might not be a bad car, it's just the owners choice in painting parts is questionable. I think any Mach 1 you find for 10K or less is going to be high mileage. There are plenty of GT's out there with much less mileage for under 10k. Being that the car is going to be your daily for the next 5 years, I would look for something with less miles. And if you have a long commute you might want to look at something better on gas. The mach one will take premium fuel.