Okay so I have to tell this story. I bought a brand new Mustang GT in 1984 (the only time I've strayed way from Ma Mopar). I was just riding around with a buddy of mine on a Saturday afternoon. I was going through a town near Pittsburgh called Wexford in my 1983 Plymouth turismo 2.2 and we were passing a Ford dealership. I said to my buddy, "hey let's see if we can get a test drive in one of those new Mustangs". So we went into the showroom and I said to my friend " let me do the talking".
We were looking at the cars in the showroom when a salesman came up to us and said " can I help you?" I said that we were over at the Chevy dealer across the street and that we had driven one of the Z28 Camaros. The salesman look at me and said "have you ever driven one of the Mustangs?" and I said "why no I haven't", to which the salesman replied "would you like to?" I said "SURE" and he walked away to get the keys. I looked at my buddy and said "BINGO".
I told the salesman that I wanted to drive a red one so we piled into a brand new shiney red Mustang, the salesman turned the key and instead of a beautiful 5.0 symphony, there was only silence. So we pile into a black car.....turn the key and....nothing. We try the white car, turned the key and......you guessed it NOTHING! Every one of these cars had a dead battery (should have know it was an omen). Well they jump start the red Mustang and the salesman drives it out of the lot and onto the street.
We're driving along and the salesman is driving like like my grandmother. Shifting at about 3000 RPM rrrrrrrrr.......putt putt putt putt rrrrrrr......putt putt putt putt. I'm thinking is this guy serious? I'm buying a performance car here! Hey looks at me and says "do you want to drive?" I said "sure" with an evil look in my eyes. My buddy is in the back seat and he's already bracing. I took it to 3000 RPMs and let the clutch fly, the car is sideways, I hit second gear errrrrrrr screech. The salesman is grabbing the dash saying " Ho Ho Ho you didn't buy it yet" I said "don't worry I will" and I did but I didn't buy that one LOL.
Well the first thing I noticed was that the key for the T tops only fit one side so I couldn't remove the passenger side panel. They switched the top with another car they had on the lot. This is where the Quality Is Job One slogan fell flat on it's face.
About 2 weeks into my ownership the flat black paint on the rockers just started to flake off. They repainted it for free. At about a year and a half I was going around a corner and the rear end started making horrendous noises. The spider gears had given up the ghost. I will admit that I wasn't easy on the car but I did buy a "performance car" and Ford in their infinate wisdom put a 7 1/4 rear end behind a V8 with a 5 speed manual! what did they THINK was going to happen? By comparison Ma Mopar only put a 7 1/4 behind a 6 cylinder automatic. Cost me $800.00 to get it repaired.
Not long after I had the rear end repaired I came out on a cold November morning, turned on the heat and I had Niagara Falls coming out from under my dash...New heater core required. Another $600.00.
The carb needed rebuilt not too long after and when the fuel pump started leaking I thought about letting it run until it caught fire LOL All of this happened within 2 years.
I ended my misery when I went back to Mopar and bought my 1987 Dodge Dakota Indy 500 pace truck replica. Anyway thats my opinion on Fords quality, I hope that you guys enjoyed the story.
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