Spring is in the air as well as thoughts of Mustangs, milestones and meets

Every year around this time when there are some hints that the warm weather is coming, I really start to miss my car. It’s not that I don’t have access to it as it is just out in the garage. It’s just that I’m really eager to get back behind the wheel.

With my car being in storage, I let its “birthday” slip past without realizing it. March 10, 1993 was the build date of my feature car. It’s now 13 years old. All of the other 1993s are turning 13 as well over the next few months. And, the 1992’s are turning 14. Wow. There are plenty of milestone year marks ahead to look forward to. At 15 we might be able to adequately protect the value of our cars with insurance since that seems to be a milestone point in regard to auto value. Also, at least in my area, many of the general car shows (non-Mustang specific) restrict cars by age with 15 years being the youngest I have seen. After that 20 and 25 should be highlights, too.
It’s hard to think about whether we’ll have our cars that far out. I really hope so., although, they change hands ever day.

Speaking of the future, I’m thinking 2007 (the 15 year anniversary of the 1992 feature car) would make a cool time to have a “meet” of feature car owners. I don’t think anything like this has ever been done. It seems like now is the time to start planning it. It would probably be best to piggy back on another major Mustang event. I am going to start thinking about this.

For now, I’m just looking ahead to the good weather and taking my “old” car out for a spin.

Digital TV and March Madness – the dynamic duo

Typically, Christmas and the Superbowl are thought of as the strongest TV buying seasons. I had been seriously thinking about moving up to HDTV for the last six months or so seeing that the sets have dropped into my target price area. I skipped the hype and sales of the aforementioned TV buying events and finally made my purchase in February. I thought it would be good to have for the NCAA tournament and the timing worked out but I never realized just how great it would be.

I’m currently using an antenna to pick up the digital signals which works pretty well since I am close to a “city”. My local CBS affiliate is broadcasting four distinct signals (the standard analog, one digital HD and two more, usually grainy, digital SD channels). Admittedly, the same game is often being broadcast on two or more of these (especially when a close game gets down to the final minutes) but at one point last night there were four different games on! Also, when my local went to the 6 o’clock news, I could still watch a game on one of the other channels while everyone else was stuck watching the news. Now, that’s cool and really shows the benefits of digital TV!

I don’t think the NCAA tournament is used as a strong selling point for new TVs as it could be. The reason to move up is not just picture quality but the additional content that becomes available. Also, if you have one of these sets with a tuner, check out what you can get with an antenna. Some, but not all, cable systems in my area are carrying these additional channels. Your area might be the same.

1987 – 1993 Mustang Parts List

In my quest to find out ever more about feature car part numbers I acquired, through ebay, a parts list for 87-93 Mustangs. I wasn’t sure exactly the content of what I was buying as it was simply listed as a “parts list with prices” but the price was right. It turned out to be pages (originals, not copies) from some sort of repair manual. It looks like the type of information that a body shop would use as it contains part numbers, costs and labor times for replacement and refinishing. I am not sure if the book it comes from is a Ford specific publication or if it covers all makes and models.

Part List Page 113
Parts List Zoomed

The pages I have total 15 are only for the Mustang. It seems that the guy selling these has many of these books that he breaks up and sells for specific model/year combinations. This sounds like a pretty profitable endeavor to me. The list does cover the 1993 Cobra parts but does not have any specifics on the feature car parts. Not all is lost, though. I think I can use information from it along with the part numbers I do know to extrapolate the numbers I don’t know. This is because, in many cases, part numbers for the feature cars are predictable variations of the comparable non-feature car part. I will do updates to the FAQ section as I work through it.