I brought my SSB coupe home yesterday. My wife was driving behind me all the way home and when we got out of the cars in our driveway, her comment was "it looks really nice from the rear". For her to notice any car is unusual. To elicit a comment like that is truly rare. Mind you, she never gave even a shrug for my Alfa's, XR4Ti, Vette's, Supra, GTO, or S2000. She's actually excited about owning the Crossfire because it's an automatic that she can drive.

So, I'll be driving my S2000 until May 9th when the lease ends. That gives me roughly 5 weeks to do routine maintenance on the SRT6. To recap, the car is a mint condition SSB SRT6 with 17,500 miles on it. It was put in service in early 2006 as a Chrysler corporate exec's vehicle for about 18 months and 11,000 miles. Then, it ended up in the hands of a local Chrysler dealer and was sold in mid 2007 as a CPO car to the owner I bought it from. He put another 6,500 miles on the car over approx three years. The total mileage is 17,500.

Here's the stuff I've noticed or have planned.

• Paint - flawless not a scratch or chip to work on.
• Wheels - flawless except driver's front wheel has residue from a wheel weight. I'll clean that up.
• Interior - Driver's seat has a small scuff mark on the left side bolster like something rubbed against it. I'll dye match it and give it a coat of leather conditioner.
• Tires - Original OEM all season Conti's. They have some life left but at 5 years old, I'm not comfortable with them on a performance car. And I'd rather have a summer performance tire anyway. I've narrowed down the replacements to Dunlop SP Sport Maxx TT's or Conti Extreme Contact DW's. I'm leaning toward the Dunlops but the Conti's are supposed to be quieter and give a better ride.
• Oil - The oil is clear, not even dirty but with only 6,000 miles in the past three years it's a safe bet that the oil may be aged. So, an initial oil swap is on my list.
• Coolant - Again the car is 5-6 years old, right about the time I usually do a complete coolant flush and replacement in my cars. Not sure what Chrysler recommends though. I'll do some research. Better safe than allowing any corrosion to start.
• Interior - Stink. I think the car has spent so much time in storage that it's picked up a feint musty garage stench. It's very slight but I can notice it. I'l scrub all the carpeted areas with Resolve multi fabric cleaner and alternate with time outside opened up in sunlight and closed up time in the garage with trays of charcoal and baking soda to eliminate the stinkies.
• Brakes - Plenty of wear left front and rear. No action required.
• Transmission - Check fluid but otherwise leave it alone for now.
• Grease fittings - Hit all the fittings just in case it hasn't been greased in 5 years.
• Headlights - All bulbs working and lenses are clear and free of chips. I was intending to start with fresh bulbs but now, I think I'll just wait for the OEM bulbs to fail.
• Wipers - It's a safe bet that the blades are 5-6 years old. Time for a set of Bosch Icon floppy blades.
• Air Filter/Engine - Will be checked and replaced if dirty.
• Air Filter Cabin - Will be checked and replaced if dirty.

Anything else that I should be considering on an SRT6 of this age and mileage? I assume the fuel filter is probably in fine shape. The diff is clean. I'll check fluid level but don't plan on a change.

 

brake fluid fush every 2 yrs. as the oil is synthetic it will out live you age doesn't apply

i would do a coolant flush and diff flush just to know the fluids are clean

 

Congrats It's good to see SRT's going to those who care about the "vintage".
But, to get to my point.
Storage yes but your treating this situaton as though you have uncovered the pyramids. Maybe the action could be compared to the dicovery of the first Air Box Corvette found in a barn where it had sat for 40 plus years. Mobile 1 oil that is clean could be as freash as the bottles on the shelves of a small town auto store. I asure you it has been red lined in the last few years.
I am trying to hold on to keeping my SRT in what is prooving to be Americas hardest times economicly speaking. How I would love to have your "Old" tires. Make me an offer I would love to place them on mine.
Mike

 

Congrats on the nice find. If the brake pads are OEM, you will find that you will be eager to replace them in short order. The OEM pads will leave your front wheels covered in brake dust in just a day or 2 of easy driving. I don't think I have ever owned a car that was as bad as these are. The good news is that a set of Akebono ceramic pads will solve the problem.

 

Congratulations on your purchase!

Your story reminds me exactly of mine... CPO car used first as exec car. Significant other was very impressed with how it looks, and she doesn't notice cars much.

May I ask what you bought it for?

I'm selling mine which has 17,000 miles as well.

 

so true. the factory pads are great, they just leave a little gift for you each time out.

 

You already mentioned the cabin air filter. The stink may not go away until you change it. Mine smelled of vanilla popourri and leaving the windows down for three weeks didn't help. Changing the air filter did the trick. Regardless of age, that charcoal is doing its job until it can't take any more.

I bought a Mann filter (AutohausAZ) but it was not a charcoal filter. It lacked the heavy plastic frame of the filter I removed. Next filter will be a charcoal filter. They are as cheap from AutohausAZ. Haven't had time to find other good sources.

Congrats!

Michael

 

It was advertised at $16,500 beginning in early March. After seeing the car I simply asked "what about the price" and the owner immediately dropped $700 to $15,800. The guy was 70 years old and was selling the car because he had open heart surgery 4 weeks prior. Given the research I'd done, that seemed a very good price for a mint condition SRT6. So, I didn't press him and his wife any further. They seemed like genuinely nice people. I wasn't about to screw them out of a few bucks if he was in a bind for money. They left their insurance and registration in place so that I could get the car home legally. I'm mailing their plates, registration, and insurance back to them tomorrow.

 

Good point. I think I'll pull the filters while it's sitting in my garage. No sense waiting for the new ones.

 

Mike you'd be welcome to them. I'm not gonna keep em around as I don't want to store them and they're 5-6 years old. But it would probably cost more than they're worth to ship them from CT to Big Sky Country. The rears are not quite on the wear bars. The fronts seem to have barely any wear. The tread is pretty deep still. At any rate, they won't get changed out until probably the first week of May when the car is put on the road.

And yeah, I'm like this with all our cars. I'm a fanatic about maintenance and safety gear. All my cars are dealer maintained per the manufacturer's schedule. I won't take chances with my wife and kid's lives or my own. No Walmart brake jobs. No bald tires. I can't afford the down time so I pay to make sure the cars are in as good shape as they can be.

 

I played with the Nav system today. Now I know why a lot of SRT6's don't have the Nav system. Not as bad to program as I thought but, slooooow to load routing info and no map display. I would not have ordered this when new if it were more than $50. But better than nothing in a pinch.

 

wow. i've been justifying this position over the past three years. taking short cuts with this car, good luck...

 

what you will quickly find out about the crossfire is that most of the chrysler dealers don't have a clue how to fix these cars because its more mercedes than mopper. without star ads they are clueless. to add insult to injury most m/b dealers wont touch them because they aren't a mercedes car.
so find a quality indy mechanic or get ready to get greasy! most on here find doing it yourself is the best way to maintain these cars

 

Already got the dealer with the SRT certified mechanic or I wouldn't have bought the car. About 15 minutes from my house. Backup dealer is an hour away in Hartford, CT. That's who's sold the car as a CPO and serviced it for the past three years. I know them well. Both these dealerships survived the Chrysler dealer restructuring during bankruptcy. I'm lucky in that I'm in the NY Metro area. Lots of large Chrysler dealerships in my area and people here wouldn't have blinked at the $50K price tag on a Crossfire when new. Lot's of SRT cars on the road here so dealers have SRT certified techs on staff.

But, I must admit that Crossfires are a rarer sight than Ferrari's here. It was snowing/sleeting/raining last Thursday morning and I saw a guy on the way to work in a dark gray 599GTB. He was doing OK on the slick roads. I'll probably see one Ferrari per week along with Bentley's, Aston's, Jags, Lambo's, and lowly AMG's or M3's out the wazoo. There's a Lotus dealer down the street from my office so I see Exige / Elise all the time around Stamford. There's even a guy with a Ford GT that brings it to the office once in a while. But, I remember seeing only two SRT6's in the last 5 years. We may not drive a super car but we do drive a rare car. And a damn good looking one too!

 

uh, that's mopar. i neglected to say i purchased one of my srt-6's from a "5*dealer" in my last post. they treat the black one i purchased from a fellow chrysler dealer in pennsylvania as one of their own. that's one of the primary reasons i keep these cars stock (aside from a likely uptick in collectability a few years down the road). one of the things i *like* about my 5-star dealer is that i can talk saleen challengers with the service manager and know that my most expensive chrysler in 2005 is being treated as such. knowledge is power; you've got to be knowledgeable about these cars. anyone who is fastidious about their cars as spud is very smart in cultivating positive, detail-oriented relationships with their dealer.

 

Congrats on your find. My SSB SRT6 was just delivered 2 weeks ago. 6500 miles and I'm really excited. I've been meaning to post an update, but have been swamped. Will take pics very soon.

 

Here's a few shots. I wanted to get some side by side shots of both cars while I still have the S2000 and they are both washed and waxed. It was a cool sunny day so I got out the camera. Unfortunately, it's very early spring here in southern New England. Everything still looks dead so the backgrounds are sorta blah with the naked trees and quasi green lawns.

 

Nice and such a big difference between the no torque S2000 to the more than enough torque from your SRT6. Besides, you don't have to wait for the Vtech to kick in anymore. Enjoy the great find and love the color!

 

Awww, VTEC was like a turbo and supercharger combined. It is a Honda driver's secret weapon. Actually it did work well in the s2000's F22C engine. But, I was always amused at the number of people on the S2Ki forum who had no idea what VTEC actually was or the technical details behind it. They spoke of VTEC in reverent terms like it was some mysterious deity. Which I suppose is what people do when they don't understand something. I'd bet they don't really understand forced induction either. Too bad for them.

 

Don't use leather conditioner (creme) on the seats. Search the detailing thread for proper cleaning and care. Scuff mark probably due to previous owners sliding in. It's best to plant your butt in the center of the seat and swivel, to prevent damage and wear to the bolster. Definitely replace at least the front brake pads with ceramic or low dust -- it will save a lot of aggravation. Then...just enjoy.