topbliss

If I wanted one I would buy one..

you guys are funny!!!

frank s

Translation:

"OW! OWW! OWWW!"

topbliss

happy thanksgiving! gobble gobble!!

topbliss

relax Frank. I like CS's.. They are beautiful.. as are all Mustangs.

frank s

heh*...

2&2

Calstang. Was your fanblades on your car when you seen it at the dealer? Or did you request them.

PTRocks

I believe that was the prototype that showed up at the Long Beach Champ Car race in April 2006.

CalStang'07

Hey 2&2: Have not heard from you in a old dog's age there Mr. Local Mustang Man!! How you and the Mrs. doing lately? Any luck yet on finding that right new Stang for her yet?

The answer is no to your fanblades question. Our GT/CS was a leftover 2007 Mustang 5-speed that someone had ordered for their wife. But she then changed her mind and picked out a convertible/auto instead. Our greatest lucky find. Was the exact GT/CS we were going to order. Even the Performance White color too!

We saw it on the dealer's website inventory the night it was posted! Drove out there early the very next morning to have a look. Test drove it and just fell in love!!! But. They had already sold the 18" Bullitts off of it to a Stang guy with some very deep pockets. I told them without the correct wheels we did not really want the car and would probably just order a new 2008 GT/CS!

They said the so called 18" Shelby wheels were very had to get. And perhaps there was other Mustang or even an aftermarket wheels we might like? Told them that we liked the fanblades that we had seen on all the GT/CS prototype pictures.

They promised us those exact wheels delivered in three days and then dropped the price a ton, if we would buy the "California Special" today (the last day of the month). We both agreed, signed and then got this wonderful 5-speed GT/CS gem for cheap as compared to today's prices.

Really enjoy the fanblades! They look a bit like stainless and are very easy to keep looking nice! We really love this GT/CS! And have both been smiling pretty hard at the car show/displays for a couple of years now.

I remember now that you had said you liked the look of those wheels on ours when we talked at the Mustang show about your very cherry 1st. Gen. white fastback. Sweet Ride!! Enclosed just for you, find some new pix that we just took of the CalStang.. "RC"

P.S. Today was the very last nice one! Put in 8 gallons "BP"-91 in the tank with Sea Foam. Took a 50 mile I-29 cruise and did an oil change. Then all washed, polished, detailed and back onto the jackstands in the shop with the battery tender and car cover. This for the coming winter cold blast arriving here tonight.

Happy Holidays Bro and also to all our fellow TMS members out there.

07gtcs

LMAO...well put.

2&2

CalStang, I have that promo picture with the fanblades also. Funny how they change when they actually come out. Kind of like the black 2007 Shelby GT that the promo's show with chrome wheels. You actually orderd one from using those pictures, but then it came in with black bullits. What a shock that would have been.
Hey since the 401K came back up, I am starting to look again. Still really wanting that Vista Blue 2008 Shelby GT. I seen an awesome white 2008 Vert CS/GT auto that my wife liked for sale. It had a tan top and parchment interior. It was what we would have ordered but did not get it because of my wanting a Shelbt GT. Can not wait to see the 2011 CS/GT. If the price is right and it looks as good as your, I may think about buying one.

jlmounce

Don't get me wrong, I love my GT/CS as much as the next guy, but realistically, it IS only a styling package. Many cars have styling packages from the factory. Some are called something different, some just have an order code associated with them.

Here's the scoop. These cars (S196 mustangs PERIOD) will never be collectors. They made way too many of them and they simply don't have the staying power of the muscle era cars.

Anybody that purchases one of these "limited edition" cars under the guise that it will one day be a collector car is reaching pretty badly.

One of the first rules of thumb for "collector" items is that they don't say anywhere "collector" or "limited edition" or are even numbered for that matter.

Probably the newest modern day collector is the notch-back fox coupes. There's absolutely nothing special about those cars. Most of them are stripped down LX cars with zero options. They weren't limited in production, they weren't numbered in any way, yet nowadays it's hard to find a quality example and if you do...you pay for it.

For a car to become a collector it has to fill a niche that will pay a premium to have it. In the case of the aforementioned notch-back...it's the drag racing community.

The GT/CS isn't differentiated enough from it's brethren to have it's own niche outside of the people that already own one and want to think it's something other than a mass-produced mustang for the masses.

And that's all I'm gonna say about that.

CalStang'07

J: Interesting theories and beliefs here on (S-197) GT/CS's. All we know is that we have been showing our CalStang for over two years now and the car culture public just loves it! There is always a crowd around the GT/CS taking pictures and the car folks (including the Stang guys) all discussing it too. I have even had two people at the shows tell me if we ever decide to sell it to please call them first! Ha! Yeah it's just another Mass-Mustang.

When I was having some service done at the Ford dealership, a couple of fellow customers were asking me a lot of questions about it and commenting how very hot it looked!! Yeah the 1968 GT/CS was just another mass produced Mustang too, but just try to buy one today!

Fifteen years from now when my little grandson is driving this Cal around, I'm thinking he will be thankful that Grandpa thought it was a great enough Mustang to consider it a collector! IMO: It's not about the money value! It's about the love of all things Mustang! CalStang

denlem

Yup, just another stock Mustang. So common that in the past 2 years, i've only passed one other one on the road. So common that at shows i've been in, there is only one other one there besides me. So common that my STOCK GT/CS can win 1st place in my class up against other stock GT's and stock Corvettes in a Vette vs Stangs challenge run by a Vette club.

jlmounce

I agree with you guys. The GT/CS is a very nice car and has some heritage to it. I too get compliments from passer-byes and service personal etc.

It doesn't change that the car is still a mass produced mustang with a factory body kit though.

Denlem, great stuff on winning first place, but that doesn't disprove my point. I've won car shows with a Ford Focus and a run of the mill 2002 GT in the past as well. It's certainly a nice novelty and a conversation piece (and certainly feels really good) but it doesn't change the collector status of a car. It just means it's a nice car.

awakeinAZ

CalStang- you have the infamous "Long Beach" sneak photo of Pre-Production GT/CS vert! That one picture caused me to order and purchase one in early 06 when the order banks opened. Limited production or not something is inspiring in these cars.

I would still have excpet for the upgraded noted below.

825LTRGT

The difference between the 60's - 70's cars and now is that everyone beat the 60's etc cars into the ground. Few low mileage cars are left. So you pay.

MANY "collectors" now buy one and put it away. These are neither rare or exclusive. Too many are looking for the next $500k Shelby at Barrett-Jackson. The days of the 1 of 5 Hemi Cuda convertable are gone.

Even if we all drive the wheels off of our cars there will be many low mileage examples to choose from 20 years down the road.

FWIW, why does everone want stripo Fox Coupes? They were bought to drive the wheels off of and people did. Now everyone wants to build a race car.

denlem

What's that have to do with it? It's a special edition. It's supposed to have a factory body kit. In reality, don't ALL cars have a factory body kit? Some body kits are standard, some are optional.

Collectable? Who knows. A car or any item doesn't need a "Collectible" sticker placed on it to be collectible. The market will decide that in the future. All people can do now is speculate. There may be many available, and if there are, they can still be collectibles, they will just command a lower price.

825LTRGT

Mass produced - every car is "mass produced"

Just a Body kit - that is what separates the run of the mill "mass produced" car from the others.

It really doesn't matter what anyone thinks about the "body kit." Many people say now much they like my car as opposed to the "regular" GT.

And I don't care what anyone else thinks..I like it. Twenty years down the road if it's collectable, I'll smile and remember how fun it was beating it into the ground.

frank s

I owned a black 2006 V6 convertible for two and a half years. I learned a great deal about S197s and the modding culture rampant within the population of owners. One of the things I learned was "rare" isn't necessarily connected with "attractive" or "desirable".

I eventually learned that I liked the GT/CS front and rear treatments better than any GT or aftermarket efforts. (Lightbulb symbol goes here) I bought a white GT/CS coupe and in one convenient swoop came up with about 80% of all the mods I'd have likely done. A good deal less expensive than item-by-item, to boot. "Collectible" didn't enter into it.

I can't say that about the second GT/CS; when The Governator threatened to bar sales of dark-colored cars from California, based on their requiring more energy to cool than light-colored cars, I used that to justify a second purchase, this one a black (nose-thumbing symbol goes here) convertible. It'll be no more collectible than any other GT/CS, except it was delivered on the actual 45th anniversary of the 1964 introduction of the original Mustang. Build-dated within a couple days of the 40th anniversary of the 1968 introduction of the original CT/CS. Nice stories, but probably not worth much on the collectibles market.

Any road, by now pretty much everyone knows the difference between "collectible" and "worthwhile distinction", and the next guy who comes along and thinks he's going to instruct any owners about the collectible-ness status of their cars is clearly just trying to establish the superiority of his thinking, in some way.

There are collectible-car owners who put them in plastic bags, never to be driven; others drive them as they were built to be used. Within that community, they are both kind of freakish, each in a different way. What's freakish here is being concerned about the collectbility of a car you are driving at all. If it's collectible, don't drive it; if it's not, drive it and enjoy its worthwhile distinctiveness.

CalStang'07

Have to agree with everything that Mr. Frank just said!!! I'm just still wishing my grandpa would have kept a 1965 GT 2+2 fastback for me years ago!! CalStang