Well, I've had some bites on the P71 so it's time to go past casual browsing and into full-on research mode. I've found several very nice 94-95 Mustang GT's in my area/price range. For me, these look great and have the infinite mod-ability of a 5.0 and the fox-4 chassis. Unfortunately, as with all Mustangs, the noise-to-signal ration on teh interwebz is really bad.
So what say yea doth GRMers? Things to look for/avoid? Barking up the wrong tree? Should I even get another Ford?
oil pan oil pan oil pan...... buy a good oil pan 1st. I love mine. Lots of parts. Cheap parts.
The usual mustang things... VIN #'s in place on panels, doors line up right, torque boxes are in good shape, steering wheel has little or no play.
Don't forget about the sn95 cobras, prices are absolutely rock bottom, much to my dismay. You could get a 50k mile 1 or 2 owner, full service history car for around $7K...
$7K is twice my budget and twice what clean 100K 94-95 GT's run for. All for a different front bumper and $200 worth of brakes? Thanks, but no thanks.
I think Paul is talking about '96-'98 Cobras with the all-aluminum DOHC 4.6, not 5.0 Cobras with the GT40 heads and intake.
Just typical fox chassis stuff. You'll spend a lot of money to really make the suspension competent, but the motor is cheap to mod and easy to pull power out of. 5.0 SN95s still use a T5 if manual, autos are AOD-E. I'm pretty sure they still had 2.73s as stock gears (went to 3.27s when they went 4.6).
Yeah, you couldn't pay me to own pre-PI 4.6, DOHC or not. In fact the only mod motor cars I'll ever consider again are the 03-04 Mach 1 and Cobra, and maybe a Marauder. The Mark VIII was interesting, but ultimately not my style.
I'm OK with T-5's, even have a spare in the garage (with AMC bellhousing 
). Gears are cheap, so 3.55's are no problem-o. The SN95 has a lot wider track and shares more suspension with the 87-88 Turbo Coupe than the 79-93 fox 'Stang. I like the wider track, and man you can buy better stuff for every part on that car!
Style-wise, these are my favorite Mustangs...
If I were to get one, I'd get the same.
DOHC didn't have PI or non-PI, it was B-port vs C-port, and the there's nothing wrong with the b-port engines. Heads are better for boost, they all have the Teskid block (as opposed to that POS WAP block that replaced it), they spin to redline all day long, and make good power.
Only issue is that they don't make typical 'Merkin V8 torque down low (peak torque doesn't come on 'til 4800 rpm), so they're not real good for drag racing unless you put insano gears in 'em (4.56s are not uncommon).
