I've been lusting after these for a while, and Friday I came across a 2005 Sport Edition on Autotrader in Bentonville, AR. V8, 4WD, and 53,000 miles. (That's not a typo). Called up there and talked to the salesman, then asked some family in the area to go check it out. They couldn't find anything wrong with it, so I grabbed my road trip buddy and headed out early Saturday morning.
It was in fantastic shape. One owner, and that owner was the service manager's father. It had receipts for every single appointment, including a new battery a two years ago, and a timing belt replacement at 45,000. The timing belt was done just because it was old, not because it had reached the mileage point. I'd never heard of that before.
Looks to have a reasonable amount of room in the engine bay, which I was concerned about. It got 19 mpg on the way home, which is much better than the F-150 I traded for it. Not to mention the comfortable ride, which ohmygawd is so much nicer than the old truck. It's got that X-REAS cross-linked dampers setup, which may be part of the reason.
Of course, I took care of the important stuff when I got it back to Texas.
The one downside is that it still smells slightly of pipe tobacco, but given that it's going to be used as a dog hauler, I'm not too concerned with how it smells at the moment. That won't last long.
So far, I haven't figured out how to get a good auxiliary input to listen to music. It's got the nice JBL speakers, and I can't take advantage of them. Seems like the only way will be to replace the head unit, which could be pretty expensive if I get something worth having. I'd like to get something with navigation, since I intend on taking this thing well outside of cell phone reception territory.
It's probably going to lose the running boards and visors pretty soon, but other than that and the radio I don't see too many modifications in its future. (Famous last words, I know.)
