William Johnston's 2005 Roush Mustang
Cranking out customized Mustangs has become pretty easy to do these days. There are a good assortment of body kits, lots of go-fast parts and, apparently, plenty of people to buy up the results. Still, there are some names that have been associated with the Mustang industry for a long time and ROUSH Performance is one of those. The 2005 Screaming Yellow beauty you see in these pages got a warming over even before it was delivered into William Johnson's possession.
Now, William is ... ahhh, there's no kind way to put this ... a car nut. By his own count, since he took possession of his first car in 1956, he has had 289 cars and trucks pass over his driveway. William had just taken delivery of a 2007 Cadillac Escalade on the weekend before we spoke with him. That addition put the current driveway occupancy up to nine vehicles, including a BMW M5, Corvette Z06, Ford GT, assorted others and this Roush Mustang. As it happens, he'd ordered the Mustang as a companion to the Ford GT and both cars share the same color scheme - Screaming Yellow with black stripes.
Stage 1
At the time, though, Roush was still only building Stage 1 cars, so that is what was delivered. William was quite taken with the styling of the car, but he knew that some more work was going to be needed. "I don't care to drive anything with less than 400 horsepower," he told us. In fact, that same preference had previously led William to discover Fastlane Motorsports, in Benson, NC. At the time, he'd been looking for someone to 'top up' the power in a newly acquired F250 Harley Davidson pickup truck. That work had been successfully completed at Fastlane so, when it came time to look after his most recent vehicle, he had no qualms about calling Melvin Skinner again.
As delivered in February of 2005, this Mustang had received a full Roush body kit along with the optional leather interior upgrades. Although the Roush wheel package for the car was on hold, William wasn't prepared to wait any longer and had it shipped "as is." The wheels would follow in due course. Beyond this, the car was a blank canvas when the Skinner family got their hands on it. An overall plan was developed that included a power adder, but first there was suspension and chassis work to accomplish.
The car was dropped using a set of Steeda Sport springs and a Steeda rear sway bar replaced the original. The lower rear control arms were replaced with Steeda billet versions to help with traction tasks that were looming on the horizon. Their strut tower brace was also called up for duty. Since William enjoys 'spirited' driving, but is long past the days of street antics, this was enough suspension work for the time being. When they arrived and were fitted, the Roush 18 x 10-inch forged aluminum wheels, wrapped with 275/40-18 BF Goodrich g-Force KD tires were up to any road task that William had in mind. He did join the club at Virginia International Raceway and goes there with the Ford GT whenever the his need for speed does get hopping.