Patrick_R
Grand Master
Gents,
After arriving at the Hertz desk at Tullamarine early Monday morning, I expected the usual run of the mill cars.
My status allows me 2 levels of upgrade, and at Tullamarine they have a small roped off area where I can pick any car that takes my fancy.
I’ve had a couple of Audi, and Kluger when I have some work mates traveling with me so a big car is advantageous.
However this time there was only one college with me.
As we arrived, I spotted this.
Upon asking the Hertz Staff if this was available my answer was “of course it is”
Sweet, hand it over I thought.
As many of you chaps have discussed and shared some observatuions regarding Mustangs I thought I would give this one a full review, and share with all of you.
The first thing I noticed after handed the key, which was a fairly large fob type electronic key, was that there are no push buttons on the door handle we are used to on later cars. The key fob contains 4 buttons, and all are different to the feel, so even in the dark, (after you are used to it) the top button is the door unlock, which needs to be pushed twice to unlock both doors, a lock button is in the middle, which is chrome, the 3rd button is for the boot which has a x2 symbol on it (2 pushes will open the boot) lastly the bottom button will sound the horn to frighten anyone who may be drooling on your lovely Mustang.
Or, as the lady said, just grab the door handle and it will unlock, which it did, my work mate grabbed his door handle and his unlocked after mine.
Nice touch.
To lock the car, you can just stand near the car as you close the door, and then as you walk away, the car will lock by itself, or push the lock button on the fob.
Upon opening the door this lights your way, and is called a puddle light, of course a little different to the Rolls-Royce puddle lamps I am used to.
We now had to load our luggage in the boot, which comprised two cabin bags, and two pull alongs.
These fitted very easily in the quite spacious boot.
We were both impressed with the depth of the boot and the very generous length to the back seat.
This would easily hold 2 large suitcases, and a few soft carry bags.
Upon getting in and seeing the red illuminated start button, which only allows the car to start once you put your foot on the brake, which then illuminates a green light in the start button.
Be prepared for one of the most glorious sounding start cycles I’ve ever heard. The beautiful 5 litre Coyote engine cranks for about 2 seconds, and then this amazing bark of the engine firing, hits your ears, it’s is just fantastic.
Not at all to loud, but certainly let’s you know it means business.
Fantastic.
Upon hitting the Mustang horse logo (FYI, there are no Ford logos anywhere on a Mustang) on the steering wheel controls, you find a large array of electronic adjustment, or customisations you can do.
One was quite interesting, which allowed the car to start “quiet” or “loud”
The settings are quite amazing to listen to. The quiet setting let’s the car start almost silently.
Here are some other settings you can find regarding the exhaust, all have a dramatic effect.
This was the first of many surprises I found in this “out of the box standard” GT Mustang.
These features and many others discovered over 3 days, shows what great value, and the amount of standard kit included in a pretty affordable price for a very nice sports car.
This example had just over 42k on the clock.
Everything in the car feels very solid, and well built, a quality feel is abundant throughout the whole vehicle.
Once on the road, the car feels very solid, very well built, handles & steers with laser precision, while being very quiet inside the cabin.
Very noticeable is the quite good vision all round, and almost no blind spots at all from the quite bright and airy feel the large glass area, even for a short arse like me.
Of course that beautiful exhaust note does enter the cabin at just the right volume.
The steering, even has its own electronic adjustment through one of the centre stack mounted switches. These are normal, sport & track. Also on the centre stack are switches for drive mode, which are normal, winter & sports plus.
Traction control on or off, and hazard lights.
*please note the start switch with green light as mentioned above.
The “Shaker” logo on the console refers to the high powered sound system with boot mounted sub woofer.
The 5 litre engine is very powerful, and when using the throttle, you know she means business, the tachometer works like a fly swatter, the engine reacts extremely quick.
Is is coupled to a 10 speed transmission, which when driven in “normal” mode, is quite good to change up, and is quite happy to get to 10th, fairly quick, if driven sedately.
Why I mention “good” in the upchange, is because it was quite bad on the downshift.
When driving in top gear, and then accelerating mildly, she will drop immediately to 8th, with a quite dramatic thump.
I could replicate this anytime I wanted, so it wasn’t just that particular down shift.
This is the only negative I had with the whole driving experience of this car.
In sports plus mode, well she hang onto gear quite dramatically even when throttling off to give some very impressive engine braking.
However, she wouldn’t drop into top until I was doing well over the 110kph speed limit.
The dash display can also be altered in many different ways, it has many customisable gauges & other items of interest to display on its high resolution full colour LCD.
The above image is the sports plus dash, however all of the round gauges in the middle can be customised from 6 selections.
One thing I found interesting, was the volt meter would drop as I accelerated.
When I backed off, it went backed off.
I guess when the engine is working hard, even at higher alternator speed, the current draw for ignition, cam timing ect ect must be quite demanding.
Another impressive thing about this sports car, which is quite unlike any other, is that it has a very good ride, even on its low profile tyres.
Another good thing is it has great ground clearance, not once did I scrape anything, and you can park up to a gutter and the front splitter does not hit it, remarkable.
The rear end is also quite high, and cleared anything I backed up to when parking.
This is great for a daily driver.
The dash and console also have a very high quality feel and all switch gear feels very solid and not cheap in any way shape or form.
I was very impressed with all of this, plus the interior fit and finish was first rate.
Standard is full leather interior, seat heating and seat cooling, dual zone climate controlled air conditioning, auto up and down on both windows, and a very good sat nav. The high resolution LCD screen is quite large, about 8 inches I would say, and the reverse camera is very high Quality indeed, with reverse sensors. The Mustang also sports, adaptive cruise control, lane keep management, and autonomous braking or AEB.
If I have to mention one small niggle, the steering wheel buttons exceed 20, and is a little busy.
It did take me the whole 3 days to be fully comfortable and familiar with them.
The seats are extremely comfortable and very supportive as a sports car should be.
They have electric fore and aft slide adjustment, electronically adjustable bolsters and lumber, and a manual seat back tilt adjustment.
The leather and stitching have a quality feel to them, and the leather is quite soft and supple adding to the luxury feel and comfort.
Rear seats are x 2 if you are short like me, and have the seat moved forward, the rear seat leg room is “just acceptable” my work mate had his seat back, and his seat back was touching the rear seat base, so zero leg room.
As mentioned the engine is the heart and soul of this vehicle.
And for ford to build this fantastic package around it, I think is quite a good result.
All in all I enjoyed my days in the Mustang, I averaged 12L/100k, which wasn’t bad considering the bit of a flogging I gave it
Would I buy one?
Yes, in a heartbeat.
After arriving at the Hertz desk at Tullamarine early Monday morning, I expected the usual run of the mill cars.
My status allows me 2 levels of upgrade, and at Tullamarine they have a small roped off area where I can pick any car that takes my fancy.
I’ve had a couple of Audi, and Kluger when I have some work mates traveling with me so a big car is advantageous.
However this time there was only one college with me.
As we arrived, I spotted this.
Upon asking the Hertz Staff if this was available my answer was “of course it is”
Sweet, hand it over I thought.
As many of you chaps have discussed and shared some observatuions regarding Mustangs I thought I would give this one a full review, and share with all of you.
The first thing I noticed after handed the key, which was a fairly large fob type electronic key, was that there are no push buttons on the door handle we are used to on later cars. The key fob contains 4 buttons, and all are different to the feel, so even in the dark, (after you are used to it) the top button is the door unlock, which needs to be pushed twice to unlock both doors, a lock button is in the middle, which is chrome, the 3rd button is for the boot which has a x2 symbol on it (2 pushes will open the boot) lastly the bottom button will sound the horn to frighten anyone who may be drooling on your lovely Mustang.
Or, as the lady said, just grab the door handle and it will unlock, which it did, my work mate grabbed his door handle and his unlocked after mine.
Nice touch.
To lock the car, you can just stand near the car as you close the door, and then as you walk away, the car will lock by itself, or push the lock button on the fob.
Upon opening the door this lights your way, and is called a puddle light, of course a little different to the Rolls-Royce puddle lamps I am used to.
We now had to load our luggage in the boot, which comprised two cabin bags, and two pull alongs.
These fitted very easily in the quite spacious boot.
We were both impressed with the depth of the boot and the very generous length to the back seat.
This would easily hold 2 large suitcases, and a few soft carry bags.
Upon getting in and seeing the red illuminated start button, which only allows the car to start once you put your foot on the brake, which then illuminates a green light in the start button.
Be prepared for one of the most glorious sounding start cycles I’ve ever heard. The beautiful 5 litre Coyote engine cranks for about 2 seconds, and then this amazing bark of the engine firing, hits your ears, it’s is just fantastic.
Not at all to loud, but certainly let’s you know it means business.
Fantastic.
Upon hitting the Mustang horse logo (FYI, there are no Ford logos anywhere on a Mustang) on the steering wheel controls, you find a large array of electronic adjustment, or customisations you can do.
One was quite interesting, which allowed the car to start “quiet” or “loud”
The settings are quite amazing to listen to. The quiet setting let’s the car start almost silently.
Here are some other settings you can find regarding the exhaust, all have a dramatic effect.
This was the first of many surprises I found in this “out of the box standard” GT Mustang.
These features and many others discovered over 3 days, shows what great value, and the amount of standard kit included in a pretty affordable price for a very nice sports car.
This example had just over 42k on the clock.
Everything in the car feels very solid, and well built, a quality feel is abundant throughout the whole vehicle.
Once on the road, the car feels very solid, very well built, handles & steers with laser precision, while being very quiet inside the cabin.
Very noticeable is the quite good vision all round, and almost no blind spots at all from the quite bright and airy feel the large glass area, even for a short arse like me.
Of course that beautiful exhaust note does enter the cabin at just the right volume.
The steering, even has its own electronic adjustment through one of the centre stack mounted switches. These are normal, sport & track. Also on the centre stack are switches for drive mode, which are normal, winter & sports plus.
Traction control on or off, and hazard lights.
*please note the start switch with green light as mentioned above.
The “Shaker” logo on the console refers to the high powered sound system with boot mounted sub woofer.
The 5 litre engine is very powerful, and when using the throttle, you know she means business, the tachometer works like a fly swatter, the engine reacts extremely quick.
Is is coupled to a 10 speed transmission, which when driven in “normal” mode, is quite good to change up, and is quite happy to get to 10th, fairly quick, if driven sedately.
Why I mention “good” in the upchange, is because it was quite bad on the downshift.
When driving in top gear, and then accelerating mildly, she will drop immediately to 8th, with a quite dramatic thump.
I could replicate this anytime I wanted, so it wasn’t just that particular down shift.
This is the only negative I had with the whole driving experience of this car.
In sports plus mode, well she hang onto gear quite dramatically even when throttling off to give some very impressive engine braking.
However, she wouldn’t drop into top until I was doing well over the 110kph speed limit.
The dash display can also be altered in many different ways, it has many customisable gauges & other items of interest to display on its high resolution full colour LCD.
The above image is the sports plus dash, however all of the round gauges in the middle can be customised from 6 selections.
One thing I found interesting, was the volt meter would drop as I accelerated.
When I backed off, it went backed off.
I guess when the engine is working hard, even at higher alternator speed, the current draw for ignition, cam timing ect ect must be quite demanding.
Another impressive thing about this sports car, which is quite unlike any other, is that it has a very good ride, even on its low profile tyres.
Another good thing is it has great ground clearance, not once did I scrape anything, and you can park up to a gutter and the front splitter does not hit it, remarkable.
The rear end is also quite high, and cleared anything I backed up to when parking.
This is great for a daily driver.
The dash and console also have a very high quality feel and all switch gear feels very solid and not cheap in any way shape or form.
I was very impressed with all of this, plus the interior fit and finish was first rate.
Standard is full leather interior, seat heating and seat cooling, dual zone climate controlled air conditioning, auto up and down on both windows, and a very good sat nav. The high resolution LCD screen is quite large, about 8 inches I would say, and the reverse camera is very high Quality indeed, with reverse sensors. The Mustang also sports, adaptive cruise control, lane keep management, and autonomous braking or AEB.
If I have to mention one small niggle, the steering wheel buttons exceed 20, and is a little busy.
It did take me the whole 3 days to be fully comfortable and familiar with them.
The seats are extremely comfortable and very supportive as a sports car should be.
They have electric fore and aft slide adjustment, electronically adjustable bolsters and lumber, and a manual seat back tilt adjustment.
The leather and stitching have a quality feel to them, and the leather is quite soft and supple adding to the luxury feel and comfort.
Rear seats are x 2 if you are short like me, and have the seat moved forward, the rear seat leg room is “just acceptable” my work mate had his seat back, and his seat back was touching the rear seat base, so zero leg room.
As mentioned the engine is the heart and soul of this vehicle.
And for ford to build this fantastic package around it, I think is quite a good result.
All in all I enjoyed my days in the Mustang, I averaged 12L/100k, which wasn’t bad considering the bit of a flogging I gave it
Would I buy one?
Yes, in a heartbeat.
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