Ford Mustang: odometer readings on brand new cars???

It could have been a dealer demo, it could also have been a car Ford
pulled out of their shipping lot and test drove to make sure the quality
was what it should be. Ford randomly picks a car out of their shipping
lot every day and puts a few miles on it to do just that. I'll bet that
it was a demo, or that they drove it from one dealership to another in
order to save on the frieght/towing charges.............


Bill S.



GT-Vert-03 wrote:
 

My 03 GT 5spd purchased 1 month ago had 280 miles. It was the only one I
could find with the right color. Sometimes dealers will get a vehicle from
another and just drive it there plus a few test drives will add up. It seems
to function okay when I test drove it and I get the warranty, so I'm not to
concerned. I got 23mpg in mixed driving, better than I expected and I was
expecting 19-21. Heck, I get 24-25 mpg in my 90hp 89 Escort with auto in
mixed driving. It too is getting within spec (but at the lower end). Who'd
of thunk it, a car weighing 1,200 lbs more with a V8 getting within 1 or 2
mpg of an escort.

John


"GT-Vert-03" <net> wrote in message
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It is rare that a new car will have only a few miles on it. Most are demo'ed
at some point to potential buyers; few will purchase without driving the car
first.

It's very possible that someone raced the piss out of it before your jeans hit
the bucket. My '98 GT had been driven 65 miles before I test drove it. The
dealer thought it odd that I drove it so gently. Some still respect the
property of others, but most don't.

These cars are designed to be driven briskly, and they do not require a
break-in period. Dealers would never tolerate outright abuse, but they must
allow buyers to 'let the horses run' in order to make a sale. It is highly
doubtful that anything was damaged. My GT still runs like new after 45,000
miles, and the shifter and rear-end are still just as quiet and tight as the
day I took delivery. These modular V-8's can take a LOT of abuse without any
problems at all.

-JD

I work for a Ford dealer and I do the dealer trades. We have 5 stores in our
dealership and it is not uncommon for me to drive a car between stores
several times. Ask your salesperson what it is all about. In the state of Pa
we try to keep it below 500 miles before a sale but if the customer agrees I
will travel as much as 1000 miles one way to get it. Hope this helped.

Bill
"GT-Vert-03" <net> wrote in message
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: Hi.... I just went to inspect my new Stang tonight... they just brought it
: in from another lot about 40 miles away. The car is a 2003 and is being
: purchased as "brand new". Upon my very first inspection of the car, I
: noticed that it has 100 miles on the odo. This seems like a lot to me.
: Other new cars I have seen being purchased brand new have had only 20 or
30
: miles on them... this makes more sense. Is there a standard for this? I
: know my car was driven about 40 miles to get it to the lot where I bought
: it... ok, fine... but how did the other 60 miles get on it??? I of course
: questioned the sales crew, and nobody could give me a satisfactory answer.
: One did admit that the car may have been used a few times for potential
: customers to try out. All dealers do this, and I think this is a TERRIBLE
: practice!!! For all I know, some punk kid was ripping down the road at
: 6,000 rpm in my car when it had only 20 miles on it. Well, this goes for
: almost any dealership, whether the car has 20 miles or 100 miles on it.
: Gee, one Ford dealer I went to (different dealer than where I bought my
car)
: showed me a new `04 GT... car had 17 miles on it... he started the engine
: and started racing the hell out of the engine in neutral to impress me...
: not something that I'd want someone to do to my own car so early in its
: life... does anyone at all respect the "break-in" period??? Anyway,
: finally, I am just curious as to how many miles were on people's cars when
: bought new... I'd love to hear some feedback. My guess is that everyone's
: response will be under 100 miles. I'd reject this car, but it was hard to
: find a 2003 silver GT vert with auto tranny in my area... I wanted to take
: advantage of the $2500 incentive for the `03... I had already called about
: 10 dealers just to find this car... not too many `03's left, poor
: selection... if I reject it now, I my never find another one and will then
: need to pay top dollar for an `04. So, one way I look at it is I am
taking
: a car with 100 miles on it, but I am also saving $2500 in the process...
or
: I can get a car with 30 miles on it and pay $2500 more.... and the 30 mile
: car may have been abused by a test driver or salesman anyway... so... I
: guess I'll just take this car. I suppose you can never really know what
was
: done to a car before you buy it, unless you tear the engine down and do a
: full internal inspection. Comments? Thanks.
:
:

GT-Vert-03 wrote: 
the car has been sitting on the lot for about one year... 52 weeks so it
was driven about 2 miles per week.. if that much....
you did drive the car before you bought it and saw the mileage on it?

I thought that as long as the car is not titled it can be sold as new. Of
course you'd expect a few bucks off if it had a couple thousand miles.
Having dug through the documents the ranger had 37 miles on the odometer and
mustang had a whopping 3. Of course the truck was a dealer swap. The car was
ordered and I waited 6 months for it. What I would suspect happened is they
probably had some interested parties or even the salesfolks themselves took
it out. That really isn't that bad if you think about it. Now if you really
want to hear something bad, the first test drive the salesman rode along (
stock GT). When a black bullitt came in he threw me the keys and was going
to let me go by myself but I waited for him to finish his paperwork and we
went for a little ride.


"GT-Vert-03" <net> wrote in message
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We leased a 'new' '99 Expedition that had 340 miles on. I didn't
notice until we were signing the paperwork. Salesman admitted the car
was 'sold' on a Friday but Monday the financing didn't work out so
they had to return it. Since it was never titled they said it could be
sold as new.

What a lemon it turned out to be. It must have been driven hard for
the weekend. Driveshaft, rear axle seals and brake pads replaced under
warranty in the first two months. They could never (after 3 tries) get
the vibration out of the driveline. We never pursued the lemon law.
Traded it on a new '02 Explorer.

Hank
Phoenix



On Wed, 03 Sep 2003 01:19:47 GMT, "jriegle" <net> wrote:
 

My stang had about 13 miles on it before I took delivery of it ...Here's
what happened, the dealer had the exact color, package, options, etc that I
wanted but the dealership has one sales lot and two storage lots, so the
salesmans couldnt show me the car that night, so we took another coupe for a
ride...I test drove that for about 10 miles or so, after I decided that I
liked the Mustang, he told me to give him a day to locate the car, so I came
back the next day and we took a GT to go to the other lot...I believe my car
had about 3 or 4 miles, I test drove it for a few mins and decided that I
wanted it...We parked it back at the storage lot, so noone else would test
drive it...LOL...It was getting really late and the car still had the
plastic on it, so we put off doing the paper work for another day. I went
and picked it up the next day with 13 or so miles on it...The salesman put
about 1.5 miles on the car bringing it from the storage lot to the gas
station to the dealership lot...All in all I was quite happy...

I wouldn't think that 100 miles was alot...That to me would seem within
reason...

Shane



"GT-Vert-03" <net> wrote in message
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