I may have found it.

[NOMARQUIS]

Thanks for the replies to my ebay rant. After nearly 1 year of looking I may have found my replacement Marauder. It's an early production 300a 7/02. Super clean in, out, underneath. Only 13000 documented 1 owner miles. It has all paper work, service records (only a few oil changes and 2 warranty issues in 13k.) No stories. All stock. Only one flaw on the body I saw is a 2" long scratch on the driver's fender. Probably won't buff out, but I'll touch it up. This car has no options (cd changer). It's as close to new as I've seen.

Can somebody tell me on these early builds if I should be worried about engine trouble? I heard some of the early 300a's had problems.

What is a good price? I know what he wants- sounds reasonable.

It still has the chalk markings on the underside and original tires and battery. It drives better than any other one I've looked at. I think I'm in love. :)

[Bradley G]

Congrats on your new Marauder.
You know what it's worth.

[TAKEDOWN]

YAy, good luck!!!!!

[NOMARQUIS]

Offer made. Hopefully will pick up Monday!

[J D]

Congrats on the find, reminds me of me about 11 months ago. Hope you PMed RoyLPita the vin so he can check it for ya.

[Paul]

Early builds (like this, I think) had a common issue with soft rear axles wearing out prematurely - there was a TSB on it. Also, they were prone to ticks in the driver's head - I would definitely recommend adding the rear engine cooling mod to help prevent trouble with that - DR's original design or the evenflow design.

[Marauder2005]

My first Marauder I bought back in 2004 had a simalar build date

to yours. It had many issues for a new car. These were the major

three I had.

1. Loud drivers head tick when car was warm

2. Over heating

3. Large puffs of blue smoke on start up (just in the mornings)

4. Poor paint quality. (Really thin clear coat)

My consesus is your car is just fine, mine just happen to get a

large amount of the concerns from the early cars.

[justbob]

Besides crappy clear coat causing endless hours of love my early 03 has seen nothing but a drivers window switch, 52,000 miles and driven hard.

[Local Boy]

Get it...You'll love it!!!

Mine is running Awesome....

ALOHA

[twin03]

300a's are the best, but you have to stay on top of the maint...

[NOMARQUIS]

How hard is it to install this cooling mod? I haggled an ESP (Ford extended warranty) into the price of the car. Will this cooling mod ruin the warranty coverage? As for the axles, will they do a TSB free? If not, my Premium Care should cover it. Of course I didn't hear any noise or see any smoke. I have looked at ones that smoke blue on startup. My ESP is good for 3/36, so in 36k my car will only have 49,000 miles on it. I doubt these items will fail in such short time. I'll be fussy about maintenance. Even though it has only 13k on it, I want the trans serviced, coolant flushed rear axle fluid changed since it is 5 years old. I'll know if the clear coat is crappy when I apply the first coat of Zaino. If it is, I guess I'll have to deal with it since the ESP doesn't cover the body.

[justbob]

My Right rear axle is just now starting to have rubbing/howling sounds with 52,000 on the clock and many burnouts. Its so quiet that all windows have to be up, no talking, no radio to hear it. Looks like i have a winter project. Even if i could sneek it thru warranty i'd rather have a real shop not carmax rebuild the rear.

[fordman]

I've owned both an 03 and 04. Let me tell you, people can bad mouth the 300A's all they want, but my 03 300A runs much smoother than my 04 did. My 04 had half the miles also.

Don't pay attention to year in my opinion. Just look for the common areas of wear and tear to see if the previous owner beat the piss out of it. A true Marauder fan would know just were to look.

[fordman]

BTW,

My 04 belched blue smoke out the pipes at every start up. My 03 has NEVER done it once.

[twin03]

^^^^^^^^^^^+2

[NOMARQUIS]

I took 4 hours to look this one over. I'm one fussy SOB. It still has the original tires. Let me tell you. I sold my first MM at 6k and the rear tires were much worse than these tires were. I had them put it on a lift. It's clean, no leaks, rust, or rock/ rubber marks on the quarters or wheel wells. It still has chalk markings on the suspension and on the under carriage. It looks like the previous owner waxed it several times, the "MARAUDER" letters on the rear cover have wax in them as do all the nooks and crannys. I'll be spending time cleaning it the right way.

No smoke. They started it cold for me and I watched the exhaust. Even the inside of the pipes were relatively clean. As for the interior, Wow. No stains, all the mats looked like new. I've not seen one this nice in a while.

[Ms. Denmark]

Congratulations! Sounds like a great find.:) It's nice when these cars go to someone who will appreciate what they have.