My First Car!
 

The Beginning
So as a kid I always wanted to get a Mustang, and I swore to everyone that I would, eventually. Back in November I decided it was time to get one since I was turning 18 soon and would be getting my license. I had saved up money and worked hard for the past few years, and it was time for me to finally buy a car. Early November I met with a private owner I found through Craigslist. The shop we took it to said it needed new tires, rotors, and a new U joint. They estimated $700 or so to get all that done, but I knew I could get it cheaper because I have a family friend at the local Ford dealership who does car service for my whole family for really cheap.

Purchased!
Horray! Its November 5th and the car is bought!

Year/Make/Model: 1998 Ford Mustang 2 DR Coupe

Mileage: 127,000 on body / 52,000 on engine

Known Mods: Tinted Windows (Let me know if anything else you see is non-stock)


The Repair
It turns out the shop was wrong (Later I found out the shop did not even put the car on a damn lift to actually check it out, either). A couple weeks after I received my car, I took it to get work done on it. My trusted mechanic found many problems with it that the shop did not see. Finally I got the car back yesterday (Yes, it took that long, because the person working on my car was doing it in his spare time, since he only charged me for a couple hours of labor).

Finally Repaired
The bill came to $1260.70; Labor: $218.45, Parts 968.89, Tax: 71.36.

The bill included the following (All of it was new parts):

"Job #1 Maint/Light Repair"
-4 Valve Stem
-4 Wheel WTS
-4 TireDisposal
-1 Pad 733560 (Break Pad)
-4 P205/65 727995 (Good-Year Tires)
-1 Kit - U 153283 (U-Joint)

"Job #2 Brake/ABS Repair"
-2 Rotor A 528135
-2 Rotor A 528137
-1 Bracket 096458
-1 Bracket 096458
-2 Bolt 097700
-1 Caliper 493717
-1 Battery 910021
-2 Kit - B 887468
-2 Break Cleaner
-1 Bootkit

"Job #3-5" Various Inspections
-Perform PA State Inspection - New Sticker Expires January '10
-Emission Inspection - Exempt
-Perform Multi-point Inspection

Some of those thing I'm not exactly sure what they are, but I know I had 4 tires replaced (They were pretty damn raw), a new U-Joint, new rotors, and some of the rest of the self explanatory items. You might be wondering why there are brackets on that list. I'm not in any way familiar with the technicalities when it comes to automotive repair, but the way it was explained to me, something was wrong with the break pad and/or caliper, which screwed up something or other. He told me that instead of buying an entire larger part that was not needed, he got the smaller part that he needed after shopping around. Lastly, the battery was old and crappy so it had to be replaced (In fact, I had to jump it before taking it to the mechanic). My aunt worked at car dealerships for almost 20 years and she said I got a killer deal since he charged me for only 2 of the 15 hours of work, and got all the parts through the part manager so that they were cheaper for me.

Post- Repair
So now that the repairs are done, I will be working on installing the new parts that I purchased while I was waiting the several weeks for my car to be done. Here are the things that I got:

Installed:
OEM Style Chrome Metal License Plate Frame
Mustang Logo Chrome Tire Stem Valve Cap
New Sun Visors (The old ones had broken mirrors)
Polished Billet A/C AC Knobs
Billet Door Lock Pin Set
Black Console Lid (Old one was flimsy and broken)
Black Floor Mats (If you call this installing)
Double Billet Headlight Knob
Silver Faced A/C Panel Insert

Uninstalled:
Mustang Logo Chrome License Plate Screw Covers
Head Unit (Sony)
Black Tail Lights
Black Headlights with Corner Lights
Pioneer 4-Way Speakers (Pair)
Billet Grille
Cold Air Intake Kit

Now as you can see, the things I installed (Between yesterday evening and today) are really easy jobs. As I said before, I'm not familiar with the car repair business, so I'm sure it will be very hard for me to install some of the above items. I tried going for the taillights today, but I could not even get the damn carpeting up; it looks like a have a long way to go! And I was also stupid last night and forgot to put the screws through the washer type things for the license plate, so I installed the license plate without the covers, then went inside because its very cold out and it was dark and late. I think I will get someone to professionally install at least the audio components as well as the CAI, since I am especially afraid to screw those things up.

Pictures - Finally!
Please bear with me on this one guys, the car is really dirty from staying at the car dealership for the past couple months, and its twenty degrees out so I am waiting until Sunday to clean the exterior when it will be around fifty degrees.

Lets start with a few general profile pictures:

Attachment 20038
Attachment 20039
Attachment 20040

Now we will move onto some of the other important components (Engine, Wheel):

Attachment 20041

Attachment 20042

Here is the interior (Includes A/C Knobs, Billet Stuff, etc):

Attachment 20043

Attachment 20044

Attachment 20045

Attachment 20046

Attachment 20047

Attachment 20048


That's all for those pictures, lets move on.


Current Problems

There still is work to be done! It seems the previous owner did not give a crap about the car, so there are some imperfections which I will describe below.

1.) The paint job is not very good. There are plenty of scratches on the car, and some paint is chipping on the back and front bumpers. I am borderline OCD with my car (I picked each and every leaf off of it every morning in the fall), and the paint is going to kill me.

Here we have a large scratch or something on the left part of the hood. It looks like a bear was pissed and took it out on my car or something:
Attachment 20049

Here are the two sides of the bumper, where you can see some paint chipping:

Attachment 20050

Attachment 20051

2.) The right side mirror is all busted up, and someone took a normal screw and put it in the hole just to keep the damn thing on.

Attachment 20052

3.) Lastly, the side panel on the drivers side door is busted in some way so that it is loose as a goose. I'm assuming the clip is busted up, but I have no idea how to fix it:

Attachment 20053



That's it!
Thank you for reading about my first car purchase. Any feedback is welcome and appreciated, and any questions you have for me I would love to answer. Now that I have my car back hopefully I can become a more active member and you will see me more often than before.

Welcome to the board. That mirror with a screw in it, is a first for me. Never seen someone do that before lol. I would start but getting a new mirror. As for the tab from the pic it looks like it is broken. You can see where it is torn. I would just use super glue and glue it back correctly and call it a day if it was me.

Otherwise welcome to the world of mustangs :)

Welcome. I feel like i know everything about you. haha impressive introduction

Welcome dude!

Welcome man. congrats on the stang

welcome to the place many of us call home lol. Nice base to start with for a first car, my stang was my first car too. Btw install the CAI yourself, it's the easiest thing ever and there are a few write ups on it. There is really no way to screw it up. Just get your hand dirty and it will make it so much better when you know you did it.

Dude. The CAI is the easiest install in the world.

I did a rear end in my garage (I had someone to GUIDE me, nothing else) (he also had this fancy tool called a HUGE screwdriver and a jack to do the crush bearing... I'll post a pic lol) with almost 0 mechanical experience...

And I'm a moron when it comes to anything mechanical.

It took me a week to remove a tranny and put a new clutch in, lol.

Welcome. That thing looks like it's going to be a handful of repairs and fix-ups.

best new member intro ever. Wish everyone who joined would do something like you did. Welcome aboard!!

Pretty cool. I remember getting my first Mustang. Yea, it obviously needs a little work, but that's all part of the fun. As mentioned, don't be afraid to get your hands dirty.

+1 on the mirror. I'd be afraid it would fall off and go through someones windshield or something.

dude...JUST FIXED MY MIRRORS TOO!

cost me 90 bucks for a pair the first time i broke them....this time i paid 90 bucks for one.
as for the intro....i think what must have been said, has been.
as for that drivers inside pannel....all it really is, is a clip on. make sure u get the bottem one first by the handle, then give a little shove to the one on the top....should pop right in.

and again
WELCOME to the boards.

man...my first mustang ever was a V6 this same year. better condition though. sold it in the same good condition. grats on your 'stang, i love the color. take care of her, and she will take care of you. :)

Thanks for the warm welcome, everyone. I'm a forum junkie so I'm sure I'll be on here a lot.

As far as the repairs and whatnot, I knew about most of the cosmetic stuff. I figured it would pay off in the end knowing what the car started as and where I'll be in the future months.

First, I think I will take care of the right hand side mirror. I'm afraid of it falling off as someone said :)

I bought some stuff that is supposed to help fix up scratches, so I'll give that a go this weekend and see how it works.

The door panel clips are broken so I guess I'm going to try some Gorilla glue or something. And maybe I'll try at the CAI if I get it in the mail tomorrow.

Again, thanks for the great welcome and I'm really glad you enjoyed my introduction.

Demetri

EDIT:
Hey guys, I'm looking online at mirror prices, and this is the one I'm looking to get, right? Its only $35 shipped which seems pretty good. Also, is this hard to install?

looks like the right one

Welcome to the boards, Demetri! I agree with everyone else when they say you did a great intro.

Hope you stick around. You seem like a nice and mellow dude. :)

if yours is the electrical mirror like this one is, its a 10 minute job to switch them out. 15 minutes if its cold out side. pop off those handles, undo the screwes from the buttens. you should then see 2 more screws holding the door pannel in place. once you remove those, theres one of those wacky ass things in the front bottem corner of the door by your feet. all it takes to pop that out is a flat head screw driver. lift your door pannel from the bottem and it should just kinda fall off. the rest of it is really kinda straight forward.

the pannel in the corner that hides all the mirror wires is just like that pop out thing with the flat head....just give it a gentle yank and it should come out easy. (pull straight out for both of em so ya dont snap it off)

Welcome to the Boards, sounds like you have a plan and your head is screwed on straight. The car looks to be a solid platform to build off of. Remember that Rome wasnt built in a day. Turn on your BULLSHIT filter and build the car the way you want it. Congrats and good luck.

welcome!!!

welcome to the fan club, its a diseaste, im the jackass btw, nice to meet you!

why is your dash spray paint black?

and get the smoked headlights and have dan detail the fuck out of your shit.

why 2 cd players?

I'm not exactly sure. When I put my new head unit in I'm planning on taking both of the stock ones out. The bottom one does not even seem to serve any particular purpose. The previous owner told me it would play burnt CDs, but I have no problem doing that on the top CD player.

Again, thank you everyone for the welcome, and feel free to check out my "Official Picture Thread."

I've got the mach system and it has a bottom cd player, and the top is the tape player/radio. so ya the bottom one should play burned cd's idk what that top one is from tho.