Prices are on the rise......

[Lorne34]

I have to say that I don't envy your position. The used car market as a whole is really priced up. If you could find a private owner who has one for sale and is looking to get out of it for some reason other than mechanical issues with the car that might be your best bet. The forums classified section might be helpful. It's almost like buying a house right now. My daughter and son in law were getting outbid on several realtor listed homes by 10k+... it's insane and the realtors themselves are just grinning with delight while throwing bait and blood in the water. They ended up finding a home through a family member who knew of a neighbor who was selling and wanted it to be a quicker process. Just a thought.
Regarding the Mach I, yeah I agree with you, the hood stripe is all wrong and it's one of those cars that the modern design just doesn't do justice to the old school look. At least they designed a new front fascia to get rid of that ridiculous Darth Vader inspired fish face look.

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[svttim]

Yea, nothing there to disagree with. I'm still in the contemplative stage of the purchase I suppose- I'm moving to Oklahoma for a new job soonish, and that's when I'll have disposable income. I'm not sure with cars like the GT350/500 if the dealer will let you test drive, but my guess is probably not. I'll try and reach out via here/facebook groups to see if I can't find any local owners who will let me ride along.

Right now, I've been dailying a manual MX-5 for the past 5 years and adore it. But life changes, and now I have a toddler and my wife complains that I can't pick him up if she is busy and has her crossover at work. So I was hoping to pick up a GT350 as a fun third car for both me and the kid. I'm attracted to the GT350 because I've read the manual transmission is sublime compared to the regular GT, and the engine just sounds amazing. Plus it would be fun to have a more limited edition vehicle that won't depreciate as hard (with low mileage) as a plane jane GT.

I don't really have too much interest in the GT500, it's more frustration looking at used car prices and thinking the GT500 would retain value better over the long run. But you're right, I really need to drive or at least ride in them to better figure out what would be more enjoyable.

Seeing your flair, any thoughts on a "best" MY for the GT350 from a value perspective?

As someone already said, there is not reason to discount the 15 or 16. Although the 15 will likely be unobtainable. The Tech pak cars are great street cars, just not track days cars unless you upgrade the coolers

 

[PP0001]

Yea, nothing there to disagree with. I'm still in the contemplative stage of the purchase I suppose- I'm moving to Oklahoma for a new job soonish, and that's when I'll have disposable income. I'm not sure with cars like the GT350/500 if the dealer will let you test drive, but my guess is probably not. I'll try and reach out via here/facebook groups to see if I can't find any local owners who will let me ride along.

Right now, I've been dailying a manual MX-5 for the past 5 years and adore it. But life changes, and now I have a toddler and my wife complains that I can't pick him up if she is busy and has her crossover at work. So I was hoping to pick up a GT350 as a fun third car for both me and the kid. I'm attracted to the GT350 because I've read the manual transmission is sublime compared to the regular GT, and the engine just sounds amazing. Plus it would be fun to have a more limited edition vehicle that won't depreciate as hard (with low mileage) as a plane jane GT.

I don't really have too much interest in the GT500, it's more frustration looking at used car prices and thinking the GT500 would retain value better over the long run. But you're right, I really need to drive or at least ride in them to better figure out what would be more enjoyable.

Seeing your flair, any thoughts on a "best" MY for the GT350 from a value perspective?

PM sent.

 

[passwords]

BaT is a good auction site. It used to be a great place to find cool deals on quirky old project cars (hence the name), but it has ballooned into a pretty premium mix. There are a few critical differences between BaT and Ebay:
1) There is no "sniping." Any bid in the last 2 minutes of the auction adds 2 minutes to the auction clock. So the buyers have to be on the site, bidding in real time. No software bots throwing in bids with a second left. This is a huge deal.

2) The cars are NOT vetted by BaT, but the commentary gets a lot of good info surfaced from the community. On most auctions, a local person goes and looks at the car and will comment on what they see. People with model-specific knowledge often chime in with praise or criticism or questions. Example, on a recent Cayenne Turbo S auction, sharp viewers noted the sound of piston slap in a video and called attention to it. An uneducated bidder might have missed that.

3) There is a 5% fee paid to BaT by the auction winner, capped at $5K (i.e., no incremental fee over $100K vehicle sale price). This makes it much cheaper than other premium auction houses, but more than Ebay.

There tends to be a "BaT tax" in that it is now well-known and there are a lot of buyers with deep pockets, but there is some incremental value in the cars being scrutinized by hundreds or thousands of eyes.

BaT is still a very strong market for older Euro cars. There are no more "good deals" on air-cooled 911s there, for example. And it's becoming a very good place to sell vintage American iron, too. For most newer cars, it is not the best venue and there have been a number of relatively soft GT350/ GT350R sales there. However now that they are out of production, that is changing and the last few BaT GT350R auctions have been pretty strong.

This is tbest summary of BaT I’ve seen. It’s a source for me to find the cars I didn’t know I needed, but they have not been up to speed on the 6gen GT350/GT350Rs. The P-cars are universally loved on that site.

 

[passwords]

Congratulations on having owned some very cool cars with some of them being the best of the best at the time and still are to this day.

No question that the L71 Corvettes back in the day were very cool but to have an L89 optioned L71 Corvette was super rare with less than 400 of those cars built for the 1969 MY.

I distinctly remember when the 1967 L88's launched early that year with the biggest hold up for the launch of the '67 L88 Corvette being that Chevrolet was waiting for the L89 aluminum heads to be finally designed and completed.

Once Chevrolet finally had the L89 aluminum heads in their hands (~January, 1967) the rare L88's (just 20 cars) were off and running to every road track and drag strip that they could find.

With myself being a long time Ford enthusiast your '65 GT350 and chassis "SFM5028" is obviously very interesting to me.

I could be wrong but suggest that your GT350 is the 4th last car to not have a "Street" or "Race" designation in the VIN for your car.

Starting with car #32 the GT350 VIN's then started to indicate an "S" or an "R" in the VIN with the first street car being "SFM5S032" with the first competition car sold to the public being "SFM5R094".

As far as the number of Z28's in 1969 your point is well taken as Chevrolet built 20,302 Z28's for the 1969 MY which was the last year for the 1st generation Z28's and take note of the last 3 production numbers which just happen to be "302". Suggest that was not a fluke and happened by design.

The total production numbers for our 2nd generation GT350's should be ~25,000 therefore not very far off of the '69 Z28 numbers as you mentioned earlier.

Around the time that you were doing much of the above I was doing much the same as I had the 5th built 1969 1/2 A12 Road Runner in my garage and at the same time I also owned an AMC 1969 1/2 SC/Rambler and kept that car for some ~24 years and then sold it to a nice fellow in Minnesota.

As you are probably aware Chrysler's A12 Road Runner engine namely the "440 6 BBL" was the answer to the Chevrolet's L71 427 tri-power big block set up and it took two years for Plymouth and Dodge to answer with the M code Road Runner and Super Bee's in March of 1969.

Like you I hope that my rambling on is not too long or boring for some of our members!

I’m sure I’m not the only one thinking this, but man I love your posts! The details on production statistics, the cars you’ve owned, etc.

Before I decided to pull the trigger on my ‘19 GT350R I had been looking for an A12 Super Bee that checked all the boxes for me. After several years of looking my wife ultimately talked me into buying something newer and while I WILL own an A12 car one day, I couldn’t be happier with the R!

One of the things that bugs me when I see 6gen GT350R owners who put black lug nuts on their cars is that what I consider one of the first factory race (drag) cars you could buy from the factory came with black painted wheels and chrome lug nuts. The expectation at the time was, obviously, that the buyer would put light weight magnesium wheels on the car to go racing, and they wouldn’t have to buy new lug nuts. Every time I look at the wheels in my car it reminds me of the look of the H-code wheel package on the A12s.

 

[nmp1]

I’m sure I’m not the only one thinking this, but man I love your posts! The details on production statistics, the cars you’ve owned, etc.

Before I decided to pull the trigger on my ‘19 GT350R I had been looking for an A12 Super Bee that checked all the boxes for me. After several years of looking my wife ultimately talked me into buying something newer and while I WILL own an A12 car one day, I couldn’t be happier with the R!

One of the things that bugs me when I see 6gen GT350R owners who put black lug nuts on their cars is that what I consider one of the first factory race (drag) cars you could buy from the factory came with black painted wheels and chrome lug nuts. The expectation at the time was, obviously, that the buyer would put light weight magnesium wheels on the car to go racing, and they wouldn’t have to buy new lug nuts. Every time I look at the wheels in my car it reminds me of the look of the H-code wheel package on the A12s.

I did that to my car. the chrome lug nuts on the super bee work, as with most cars from that era, because they tie into the car with the chrome bumper, chrome window trim, chrome headlight trim, chrome hood pins. chrome doesn't work as well on modern cars especially the GT350 as it has virtually none and it just looks out of place. Ford just sticks the same lugs on all their vehicles as a cost saving measure as opposed to having it mean something special. either way its a very simple and inexpensive thing to change.

 

[PP0001]

I’m sure I’m not the only one thinking this, but man I love your posts! The details on production statistics, the cars you’ve owned, etc.

Before I decided to pull the trigger on my ‘19 GT350R I had been looking for an A12 Super Bee that checked all the boxes for me. After several years of looking my wife ultimately talked me into buying something newer and while I WILL own an A12 car one day, I couldn’t be happier with the R!

One of the things that bugs me when I see 6gen GT350R owners who put black lug nuts on their cars is that what I consider one of the first factory race (drag) cars you could buy from the factory came with black painted wheels and chrome lug nuts. The expectation at the time was, obviously, that the buyer would put light weight magnesium wheels on the car to go racing, and they wouldn’t have to buy new lug nuts. Every time I look at the wheels in my car it reminds me of the look of the H-code wheel package on the A12s.

Colin, appreciate the kind comments but most importantly congratulations on owning a 2019 R model as what an incredible machine and hope that you are enjoying your R model immensely!

What color and stripe options did you go with?

With respect to your other passion namely being an A12 car I certainly get and comprehend what you are saying with respect to a cool tire and wheel package and really no different than when the 2015 GT350R models were launched back in July 2015 with the cool OEM CF wheel and Michelin Cup 2 tire package and in both cases each manufacturer was well ahead of the game compared to their competitors in this area.

Not many people are aware of this but the '69 1/2 A12 Road Runner/Super Bee came standard with a tire that was actually larger than the Hemi cars of the day with the Hemi cars coming with a F70 X 15 tire when in fact the A12 cars came with a G70 X 15 tire.

With respect to the Canadian built "H" code steel wheels it took me 2 years to locate a complete set (5) of correct date coded "H" coded wheels and also correct date coded G70 X 15 Goodyear Polyglas Redline tires that were mounted on 15 X 6 painted Police Wheels and obviously these call came at a considerable expense.

I ended up with the attached wheels and tires by purchasing existing spares out of old A12 Road Runner/Super Bee cars from all over America with Pennsylvania coming through with the most wheels and tires.

In a way the 2015 R's and the 1969 1/2 A12 cars have a number of similarities when it comes to unique launch packages (lift off fiberglass hoods, CF wheels, tri-power, FPC engines, etc.) therefore pretty cool in my opinion.

If you ever get an opportunity to secure an A12 Super Bee please reach out to me as I should be able to provide you with some very rare and cool launch publication from the Lynch Road Assembly Plant with respect to the "Master Special Car Order" dated 2/21/69 for the first 100 A12 cars allocated/built starting 3/29 and then the next 200 A12 cars allocated/built starting 4/26.

Good luck with your 2019 R model and safe travels!!

 

[passwords]

I did that to my car. the chrome lug nuts on the super bee work, as with most cars from that era, because they tie into the car with the chrome bumper, chrome window trim, chrome headlight trim, chrome hood pins. chrome doesn't work as well on modern cars especially the GT350 as it has virtually none and it just looks out of place. Ford just sticks the same lugs on all their vehicles as a cost saving measure as apposed to having it mean something special. either way its a very simple and inexpensive thing to change.

Yeah, I could probably have been a bit more tactful in that post. I didn’t mean to take away from the people who are bothered by the $5 chrome lug nuts keeping $5k-ish (each) wheels on the car. It is natural that most people look at the chrome lug nuts on the black painted wheels and see an unnecessary contrast.

I really meant to highlight how it speaks to me personally, based entirely on something that I am almost certain the Ford Performance folks never considered (really, why would they?). I’m a huge fan of, specifically, the A12 Super Bees, and that factory look was more practical for what the factory expected its customers to do with those cars at that time in history. The Chrysler engineers and marketing folks expected the cheap steel wheels to end up in the trash shortly after selling the car, with magnesium (or chrome for the non-racers) wheels quickly replacing the stock steel wheels. So chrome lug nuts made sense for those cars at the time.

Thats certainly not the case with the modern GT350Rs with light weight carbon fiber wheels, but I like to link the look of the chrome lug nuts on black painted wheels to those old factory (Chrysler) race cars. I like the look, but only because it reminds me of the M-code A12 cars.

 

[Kermut]

If you’re moving to Oklahoma soon, where do you live now?
We like to share our cars with others that are interested.

I'm In Minnesota at the moment, thanks for the implied offer!

I have to say that I don't envy your position. The used car market as a whole is really priced up. If you could find a private owner who has one for sale and is looking to get out of it for some reason other than mechanical issues with the car that might be your best bet. The forums classified section might be helpful. It's almost like buying a house right now. My daughter and son in law were getting outbid on several realtor listed homes by 10k+... it's insane and the realtors themselves are just grinning with delight while throwing bait and blood in the water. They ended up finding a home through a family member who knew of a neighbor who was selling and wanted it to be a quicker process. Just a thought.
Regarding the Mach I, yeah I agree with you, the hood stripe is all wrong and it's one of those cars that the modern design just doesn't do justice to the old school look. At least they designed a new front fascia to get rid of that ridiculous Darth Vader inspired fish face look.

I'm glad someone else agrees with me on the Mach 1. I think if the GT350 didn't exist the Mach 1 would be much more appealing, but as is....I can't honestly fathom why anyone would prefer to buy the Mach new over a GT350. If I can get a used, low-mileage, clean GT350 for around the same price as a new Mach 1 I'll be very happy.

I'm also in the process of buying a home in OK, so I'm getting double hit hah. Yea the home market is just wild right now. I'm buying on the low end of our price range because I'm scared this could be another 2009 in the making. My consolation is I'm selling an existing home, so I get to at least benefit on that end.

 

[passwords]

Colin, appreciate the kind comments but most importantly congratulations on owning a 2019 R model as what an incredible machine and hope that you are enjoying your R model immensely!

What color and stripe options did you go with?

With respect to your other passion namely being an A12 car I certainly get and comprehend what you are saying with respect to a cool tire and wheel package and really no different than when the 2015 GT350R models were launched back in July 2015 with the cool OEM CF wheel and Michelin Cup 2 tire package and in both cases each manufacturer was well ahead of the game compared to their competitors in this area.

Not many people are aware of this but the '69 1/2 A12 Road Runner/Super Bee came standard with a tire that was actually larger than the Hemi cars of the day with the Hemi cars coming with a F70 X 15 tire when in fact the A12 cars came with a G70 X 15 tire.

With respect to the Canadian built "H" code steel wheels it took me 2 years to locate a complete set (5) of correct date coded "H" coded wheels and also correct date coded G70 X 15 Goodyear Polyglas Redline tires that were mounted on 15 X 6 painted Police Wheels and obviously these call came at a considerable expense.

I ended up with the attached wheels and tires by purchasing existing spares out of old A12 Road Runner/Super Bee cars from all over America with Pennsylvania coming through with the most wheels and tires.

In a way the 2015 R's and the 1969 1/2 A12 cars have a number of similarities when it comes to unique launch packages (lift off fiberglass hoods, CF wheels, tri-power, FPC engines, etc.) therefore pretty cool in my opinion.

If you ever get an opportunity to secure an A12 Super Bee please reach out to me as I should be able to provide you with some very rare and cool launch publication from the Lynch Road Assembly Plant with respect to the "Master Special Car Order" dated 2/21/69 for the first 100 A12 cars allocated/built starting 3/29 and then the next 200 A12 cars allocated/built starting 4/26.

Good luck with your 2019 R model and safe travels!!

I ended up with Shadow Black with white OTT stripes, and all options except the car cover which I purchased separately.

All the stars aligned at the right time for me to pick up this car. I had been shopping all the local Ford dealerships for about a year and had repeatedly been told to go away, they had established customers who would get first crack at their R allocations, if they were going to consider allowing me to buy one I would have to pay at least $20k ADM, they wouldn’t even consider taking a deposit, etc. It was a very off putting experience to say the least.

I was finally able to get the exact configuration I wanted at a fair price at a dealership 7 miles from my house. I got to take the car home right off the truck, and I did the PDI myself. The dealership even gave me a PDI sheet to use! It was an amazing experience.

Thank you for the offer regarding the Lynch Road launch publication material. I hope it won’t be that many years from now when I’ll be able to take you up on that offer. My biggest challenge now is garage space, and my wife and I started looking for a new house with a 4-car garage just as the housing market went crazy late last year. We will probably have to wait for the housing market to stabilize before we can get moved and add more cars to the collection.

That’s a great story about the wheels for your A12 Road Runner. I actually spent about 3 years searching on and off for real H-code wheels with the correct date codes with no success. I did find a few fakes with incorrect font and not clocked correctly in relation to the valve stem hole. It’s also amazing that you found the correct date coded G70-15 Goodyear redline tires, that’s an even more difficult feat! I finally gave up my active search about 4 years ago, but I still keep my eyes open when I have time to poke around the online classified adds.

I remember some time back you posted about an L78 ‘69 Camaro you owned? This may not be the right place for it, but I would love to hear more about that car.

 

[PP0001]

I ended up with Shadow Black with white OTT stripes, and all options except the car cover which I purchased separately.

All the stars aligned at the right time for me to pick up this car. I had been shopping all the local Ford dealerships for about a year and had repeatedly been told to go away, they had established customers who would get first crack at their R allocations, if they were going to consider allowing me to buy one I would have to pay at least $20k ADM, they wouldn’t even consider taking a deposit, etc. It was a very off putting experience to say the least.

I was finally able to get the exact configuration I wanted at a fair price at a dealership 7 miles from my house. I got to take the car home right off the truck, and I did the PDI myself. The dealership even gave me a PDI sheet to use! It was an amazing experience.

Thank you for the offer regarding the Lynch Road launch publication material. I hope it won’t be that many years from now when I’ll be able to take you up on that offer. My biggest challenge now is garage space, and my wife and I started looking for a new house with a 4-car garage just as the housing market went crazy late last year. We will probably have to wait for the housing market to stabilize before we can get moved and add more cars to the collection.

That’s a great story about the wheels for your A12 Road Runner. I actually spent about 3 years searching on and off for real H-code wheels with the correct date codes with no success. I did find a few fakes with incorrect font and not clocked correctly in relation to the valve stem hole. It’s also amazing that you found the correct date coded G70-15 Goodyear redline tires, that’s an even more difficult feat! I finally gave up my active search about 4 years ago, but I still keep my eyes open when I have time to poke around the online classified adds.

I remember some time back you posted about an L78 ‘69 Camaro you owned? This may not be the right place for it, but I would love to hear more about that car.

Really like the Shadow Black and White Stripe color combination on your R with the Red pin striping really setting off the White stripes.

Your car not only looks terrific but also is only 1 of 23 R examples that came out of the FRAP in that color/stripe combination!

Based on your response about the elusive "H" code wheels for the A12 cars you obviously know a great deal and probably also know that there was only one Motorwheel plant that produced these 15 X 6 "H" code wheels and that was Motorwheel plant #5 (M5) and was located in Southern Ontario.

If I recall correctly I believe it was located in Chatham but know for sure that the correct Motorwheel plant was located in Southern Ontario with the stamping being "M59" near the valve stem area along with the month, day and wheel size stamped into the rim.

My L78 Camaro was a 1968 RS/SS and one of the best vehicles that I have ever owned and will reserve that story for another time.

 

[DrumReaper]

For a spring science project, I petitioned Carvana and Vroom for a price offer on HEPR #178, and Carvana never responded but Vroom offered $67k (lol).

They say the offer is good for 5 days.... I say never. Lol

 

[rush0024]

https://bringatrailer.com/listing/2019-ford-mustang-shelby-gt350r-5/

Anybody gonna bid on this? 59k is a freaking steal and the auction is ending in 5 hours.

 

[key01]

Anybody gonna bid on this? 59k is a freaking steal and the auction is ending in 5 hours.

With 5 hours left to go it’s just getting started on BaT. The bidding continues indefinitely in the final stage. Plus there may be a reserve on this car. No one will be stealing it at $59K.

 

[stanglife]

Predict 72500 before fees.

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