Milo Bloom

Hi everyone,

I've had a '65 convertible for 11 years but have now ventured into the newer ones with the purchase of a 2007 deluxe convertible this morning. It'll primarily be my son's car when he gets his license later this year. It has 88,500 on the clock.

The car didn't have any service records with it, but I am going to try to track those down. I do have a pretty thorough Carfax report that indicates a transmission change, new clutch, new A/C condenser, and new tires and brakes all around just over 2000 miles ago.

Wondering everyone's thoughts on what I need to go through. I'm going to look at the brakes anyway... the car rides such that I feel every bump, and sounds kind of creaky, so my thought is the suspension could use some freshening up. I'm honestly not sure how these are supposed to feel when all gone through, and I have a Tacoma as my daily driver so I'm wondering if it's just a compare/contrast to that.

Also wondering if I should be using a high-mileage oil at this point or just stick with the regular stuff.

Thanks in advance.

JimC

Since you posted in the S197 V6 I assume you have the 4.0 engine. Good stout engine and will take a lot of abuse.

Check to see if the plastic thermostat housing is intact. That is the most common failure on the engine, and there is no common denominator as to how long one will last. To be safe, get the aluminum one off Amazon and replace it before it fails.

JimC

And 88,500 isn't really high mileage on a 2007 V6. I had 203,000 on mine when I sold it in June 2012 and it was running fine; after running nitrous on it for 2 racing seasons, then pulling the nitrous at 90,000 miles and putting the Xcharger supercharger on it. The guy I sold it to had no problems, took it on a tour of the Bourbon Trail, and he sold it with 250,000 on it, still running strong.

Milo Bloom

It's funny you mention this because after I posted my post, I was looking through the owners manual and I found an estimate for a repair of that housing (which the seller conveniently didn't mention) and it was quoted as a $500 repair, and the guy was charged $100 for that information. Which I sort of chuckled at. I didn't have a chance to actually look at it but it sounds like that will need to be done.

JimC

It's about a half hour job (unless you have the Xcharger Xtreme - takes a little longer because 2 bolts are trapped by the supercharger so I had to remove it first). Very easy to do - and $500, I hope that quote included a reach around!

Milo Bloom

Is $150 the right price for that? Worth the upgrade?

JimC

That's it, and well worth the upgrade. Some people have gone through multiple plastic housings within 50,000 miles. I was lucky and mine held together until 120,000 miles.

DubfromGA

How would you compare the headroom & legroom of the 2017 Mustang with your Tacoma ?


A 2017 Tacoma is my daily driver now. Want to add something sporty at some point.

Milo Bloom

I should clarify that I have an 07, not a 17. I must have put a typo in the headline.

I was actually quite surprised by the amount of headroom in the 07. Even though it's not power, the Deluxe model has a great deal of height adjustment capability in the driver's seat. When it's all the way down I have a good six inches of headroom, and even when it's up a bit there's still three to four.

I rented a 17 GT in August and it too had plenty of headroom. i can't recall exactly how much but it was more than a '97 BMW that I used to have.

JimC

I fixed your typo in the title.