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PANTERA CONSOLIDATED MAINTENANCE
CHECKLIST EXPLANATION
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In September 2001, I posted a message to
the Pantera Internet email (DeTomaso) listserver asking if
anyone had a good maintenance checklist for the Pantera. I
drive mine daily, and was interested in doing a lot of
preventative maintenance on it to keep it out of the shop
and on the road as much as possible, rather than waiting for something
to break or start acting up. Also, since I plan to keep
driving it as long as I am able to drive, I wanted to ensure
it would stay in good condition for many years and not die of old age. Although there are
maintenance checklists in the owners manual, and the Ford
Technical Information Articles, none of them seemed to be
completely comprehensive. No one replied as having such a
list, but several were interested in the idea (and one even
started such a project awhile back but never finished it),
so I spent several months (off and on) developing one.
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To create this checklist, I reviewed the
all the pertinent Pantera reference documents I could find,
and some stuff from off the Web and the Pantera email
listserver and POCA and Pantera International
magazines/newsletters. I also included some stuff that
wasn't in any reference, but that I thought is a good idea
(e.g. UV protection of the interior vinyl, checking the fire
extinguisher in the trunk); or was car
related but not specifically on the car (e.g., garage
related stuff). The checklist turned out to be fairly long -
every source I reviewed had items that other sources didn't,
and I consolidated them all. I plan to
eventually review some more stuff, like the Ford Car Shop
Manuals from 1973, etc., but I feel it has most of what it
should eventually contain since those other sources likely
don't have much maintenance related info that's new or
different from what the sources I've already reviewed have.
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I wrote this Pantera Consolidated
Maintenance Checklist for me and my specific car, but 95% of
it should be generic to any Pantera, and the checklist
should be able to easily be marked up or edited (Word
document) for other Pantera owners use if desired. While
some of the notes and entries on this checklist would only
apply to me or my specific car (such as a reminder to check
my currently leaking front passenger shock absorber,
notations about certain modifications I made to my car that
need to be factored in when performing the maintenance item,
info on stuff I added/changed on my car like a Viper Burglar
alarm and Holly carb, etc), they should give other Pantera
owners an idea of the potential ways they could customize
their own checklist. This type of stuff is indicated via it
being in GREEN text.
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Please note that there are some imbedded
documents in the checklist - a
modifications listing and previous owner info near the
beginning, and some source documents (attachments at the end
of the checklist) that are referenced within the list - you
can view/print them simply by double clicking on them.
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The checklist was intended to be something
not only to remind me when to do stuff, but to be something
I could hand to my mechanic and tell him to do all the 5000
miles stuff or whatever, to ensure everything that needs to
be done gets done (as well as including easy reference to information on how to do it if it wasn't something the
mechanic was familiar with or had some Pantera unique
aspects to it). The first column on the checklist is to
indicate who does the item (e.g., me or mechanic etc.) with whomever does the item putting a check
in the box when done to be sure no items are missed (or at
least not missed unintentionally).
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Note that for the mileage intervals I chose
to do stuff at I normally rounded the recommended mileage
intervals given in the references UP to the nearest multiple
of 5000. Also, for those maintenance intervals where the
recommendation is X miles OR X months, the checklist uses
the miles interval since I drive the car daily and am likely to
hit the mileage intervals before the monthly intervals. Of
course, other Pantera owners are free to change the
checklist's sections indicated mileage/months intervals to the "recommended"
intervals or whatever they're comfortable with, or from
miles to months if they don't drive their car as much as I
do (the references recommended intervals for each
maintenance item are listed directly below my personal ones,
which are identified by my initials "[PBN]" as the
source).
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Some of the stuff in the "Notes"
(last) column is just notes to myself about mechanical
questions I had when creating the checklist so I wouldn't
wonder about it in the future. I'm not a backyard mechanic,
and I'm sure they're stupid looking notes to anyone
mechanically minded -other Pantera owners will probably want
to delete them if they use this to create their own
checklist. Although, as I noted, I'm not a backyard
mechanic, the information on this checklist should still be
valid/factually correct as I only directly copied/quoted and
organized it from valid sources (such as the Ford Pantera
related publications), not wrote the info myself (except
where identified by my "[PBN]" initials as the source).
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I plan to continually update this list as I
come across new info on the Web or the Pantera email
listserver or in Pantera magazines etc. Since I am not a
backyard mechanic type, this might be the only useful
information I can give back to the Pantera community that
has helped me so much since I got my car. I would very much
appreciate any suggestions on ways to improve this
checklist, or things to add/correct, etc. Note that any
stuff in RED text on the checklist are notes to myself of things I still need to do to finish the checklist, or other
loose ends/questions I still need to resolve about things on
the checklist. If you know the answers to some of the red
stuff, I'd appreciate an email reply with the info (I'm sure most of it is stuff any
competent Pantera backyard mechanic would know). Even if its
a long time from when this checklist was created, I'd still
like to hear about it, as it will only help me to keep my car in good shape :-). I would also
appreciate a thorough review of the checklist by a competent Pantera
mechanic. Since I'm not a mechanic there were some things I
didn't really understand so I may have some stuff in it
that's really a "repair/overhaul" and not a
routine "maintenance" type item and thus needs to
be taken out of the checklist, or some items might could be combined that are
related but I didn't realize it because of different
terminology used in different sources, or maybe some items
split up because they're really separate maintenance items,
etc, and whatever other tips a real mechanic might have to improve it.
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Finally, there are two versions of this
checklist. One is the normal (full) checklist, and the other
is a specially edited version where some information and
attachments have been removed in order to make it
suitable for "publication" (i.e, for it to be
posted on a website or other mass printing/distribution
method). The editing involves removing attachments that
contain copyrighted info, some sensitive/personal info,
and notes to myself of things to do for future revisions of
the checklist. If you would like to have a copy of the
"full" checklist (i.e., with all the
attachments/information/notes, except still minus the sensitive personal info), email me and I'll send one.
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I hope this checklist will be of some
benefit to other Pantera owners. |
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Footnotes.
Bruce Nardoci
(Pantera #5749)
Phone: (704) 598-9286
Email
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