Need some Tuning Advice on 03 Cobra I'm looking to possibly buy

[2005LS2Goat]

Looking to possibly buy a local car. Mods are posi port. 2.76 upper with JLT intake. KB BAP. Stock injectors. Stock MAF. O/R X Pipe. No cats. The owner bought it about 4 years ago from a dealership who had lost/stolen the handheld tuner. I was able to track down the original owner and found a dyno video and the tuner who tuned the car, Lee Blankenship in Kentucky. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMF938jbF2g
The car made 487 HP/469 Torque on a mustang dyno. The trouble is that the car was tuned on 93 octane with 11.3-11.8 AFR/ max boost of 12.9 and timing of 21-22 degrees. The current owner has ran 91 octane for 4 years of ownership and 14k miles because he didn't know what the car was tuned for and they don't have 93 octane where he lives. (neither do I except for 1 outrageously expensive station). Lee said that he could resend the original tune with some pulled timing so I could run it on 91. If a compression check/borescope comes back good, is there some other damage that could have occurred since it was run on 91 and not 93? Or would this car be ok to buy and just have some timing pulled or just run the crazy expensive 93? I don't know if I can datalog the car since there's no handheld tuner that comes with it. Lee said he lost the datalogs but he could look at them if I datalogged the car and sent it to him. Problem is I don't have a handheld tuner and the car doesn't have an AFR gauge. Is it even worth looking at this car since it was run so long on 91? Thanks in advance.

 

[01yellercobra]

I'd have it inspected. Compression test and leak down. Did the previous owner beat on it all the time? If it pinged hopefully he got out of it. I wouldn't write or off just yet. Not without a good looking over. You can always buy another hand held if you buy the car.

 

[R.D.P.]

21-22 is stout timing for 93. Assuming a stock motor I wonder if it was possibly even tuned with Torco. I don't think Lee typically will go that high on 93. On 91 you can almost guarantee it's at least seen some serious knock, I bet the top of the pistons and the valve seats won't look so great. I would personally walk unless it was one hell of a deal.

 

[2005LS2Goat]

21-22 is stout timing for 93. Assuming a stock motor I wonder if it was possibly even tuned with Torco. I don't think Lee typically will go that high on 93. On 91 you can almost guarantee it's at least seen some serious knock, I bet the top of the pistons and the valve seats won't look so great. I would personally walk unless it was one hell of a deal.

He told me 93 octane and 21-22 degrees and said there was some safety margin in there. I know of one person who's car had almost the exact mods/tune and it was tuned on 91 octane by HPP. That's the only reason I'm at least looking into it. You're probably right and I will more than likely walk away. It's a good deal but probably not worth risking a $10k motor. That's why I hate dealership cars. They probably put 87 octane in it when they were trying to sell it.

 

[2005LS2Goat]

I'd have it inspected. Compression test and leak down. Did the previous owner beat on it all the time? If it pinged hopefully he got out of it. I wouldn't write or off just yet. Not without a good looking over. You can always buy another hand held if you buy the car.

He said he's never heard detonation but he is trying to sell the car so I can't take much faith in what he says.

 

[2005LS2Goat]

I'm not going to buy the car. Thanks for the input. I'd probably worry about it even if the tests results came back good. It was zinc yellow anyways so it wasn't the best looking car.