Hey guys
I joined here a few years back when looking at a different 84 for sale and was searching for info, ended up passing on that one and bought a really nice 88 Turbo Coupe instead. However the last 10 years or so I seem to have automotive ADD, and haven't become too attached to any of my hobby cars in that timeframe, so I'll drive them for a few years then sell to try something different. The TC went to a new home last spring, and then I also sold the modded 07 Mustang GT that was my track day toy later in the year. In the meantime I picked up a nice 95 Jaguar XJR as a cruiser, but still had a hankering for neat Fox car. Back in the day I had bought new an 87 LX 5.0L hatchback that became a Solo I competition car then a wheel-to-wheel racer in the local Showroom Stock class (my home track is Mosport). I'll also mention that I've been a Ford dealer parts guy since the late 1980s except for a few years where I was working at a local performance shop chain.
So on a Canadian Mustang forum around Xmas time last year a new person to the forum advertised an 84 for sale. He'd owned it since 1986, it had just under 70,000 km which is about 45,000 miles, and said it was a Comp Prep car. I went for a look and it was a decent survivor car with a few dings and scratches and evidence of a repaint on the right side door before his ownership. Turned out to be an option delete car since it had an AM/FM radio, but nothing else. It had never been driven in the snow, basically just a summer toy for him. He was getting older and not driving it so much, and his son was not interested in taking over ownership of it. For that time of year in southern Ontario it was a decent day for weather when I looked at it so I did have the opportunity to take it for a short drive, and I was very impressed with how tight and solid the car felt, not a worn out turd like many Foxes are these days. The seller realized that it wasn't a good time to trying to move along a hobby car in our climate, and I took a gamble and said that I'd check back with him in the spring to see if it was still available.
Spring came around finally so I emailed him to inquire about coming for a better look at it if still for sale. He responded that it was, however while having it at a shop to get a section of the exhaust repaired it was noticed that the turbo had a small oil leak. The seller is a fairly competent "backyard mechanic" so he decided to tackle the repair in his garage at home. To shorten the story, between being very thorough to source out the rebuild parts, and a vacation to Europe with his wife interrupting things, he only just got it put back together last weekend. So today I went down for a good look with my best friend of 35 years who has also been a Fox owner many times over. We took a dealer plate and a wad of cash in case a deal could be made. On the test drive again the car impressed, the Konis make the car so much nicer than the crap shocks that came in the 5.0 cars back in the day. Red Konis were one of the 1st mods I made to to my old 87, and I still remember how much they transformed the ride and handling.
To sum up, I ended up driving home in a nice silver 84 that just rolled over 70,000 km while we were out on the test drive. I'll post some pics when I get some and figure out where to upload them since Photobucket went full retard a few weeks back. In the meantime you guys have all seen enough original paint silver 84s that you can imagine what it looks like! Selling price was $5750 CAN, which I think is fair considering the overall condition of the car and the relatively low mileage. Tomorrow there is a fairly large annual Mustang club show on the west side of the greater Toronto area that I'll "debut" it at for my local Mustang friends. Plans are to lower it a bit (I have some late SN95 front control arms and Mach I springs hanging around), get some of the very simple non-through floor subframe connectors installed, and maybe a set of BBS RS mesh style wheels put on. Not looking to do anything that changes the character of the car or can't be easily undone. Another friend who's been playing with 2.3Ts for a long time has the later injectors and VAM kicking around, I'd just have to come up with a later EEC module to match. Thanks to the people here who've posted good threads and answered others' questions that came up when I did a search on various topics while digging for more info on these special cars. Being a Ford parts guy back to that era I pretty familiar with everything that was different and unique on these, but it's also nice to see what issues and fixes people have come up with over the years as these cars age long past their intended time on the road as Ford produced them.
cheers
Ed Nicholson
Caledon Ontario Canada
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Originally Posted by fast Ed
