Mustang II GT H.O

I was watching "The American Muscle Car" on Speed Channel. The shows are always the same. The Muscle car in question started out as a pathetic economy car in the early sixties. The big three or four? sprinkled on more stripes and horse power until 1970. In 1970 all hell broke loose and fill in the blank________ car company had the most scoops, spoilers, flashy colors and a grossly underated horsepower big block. In 1971 it varies a little bit some had power, some did not. Usually 1972-1973 is the end of the world. 1974 is always the last nail in the coffin. And depending on the muscle car they do a little segment on the 80's 90' or 2000 name sake. Well I just watched the Mach 1 episode. It was like a bad "B" movie I just had to see how it ended. I almost thought that the nail in the coffin would be the 1973 Mustang and they would forget all about the 74-78 and 2004. Unfortunatly they didn't...... They reported that there was a Mach 1 from 74-78 and a H.O and a GT! The GT and H.O must be the the most rare Mustang II's of all I guess the guys that were driving Muscle cars in the sixties were raising families and working hard during the 70's 80's and 90's. Now that they are near retirement they seem up to spec on the new muscle car wars. They just lost 25 years of car knowledge in between? They can now buy their Retro Mustang or Holden Mondaro-had sex with a Grand Am "GTO" and re-live the glory years. I will do the same in my red neck convertable Mach 1!

What about the charger who had sex with the station wagon...

Unsafe six.

Just a quick question: What is a Mondaro???

A Mondaro is a car I created well on a rant. A Mondeo is a european Ford Contour (I love touring car racing) scatter brain?! . A Holden Monaro as you know GTO boy, is the General Motors of Australia car that our new"GTO" is based on I have a poster of a new GTO on my wall. I am not a hater! It is what it is. I wish that GM would have started with a clean sheet of paper and created something more fitting to take on the GTO name plate is all. A Monaro in it's own right is a kool car. Side note Australia as many cool cars. They still have V8 rearwheel drive Falcon's too.

:OT:
http://www.holden.com.au/www-holden/action/modeloverview?modelid=12001

I figured in the rant there was a typo. You're right, Oz has a lot of cool cars that we cannot get!

I am one of the guys who drove nothing but Muscle Cars in my early years of driving. I bought my last newer Muscle Car in 1972. I was not ever raising a family or working too hard to ever get away from the desire to have Muscle Cars in my life. Most years since I have had some sort of Muscle Car from the 60's and 70's and patiently waited and waited and waited for the USA to build them again. They did nothing that ever came close to those cars during most of the years I waited.

I really don't know what point you are trying to make, because if a Muscle Car is not made then you can't buy it. I never lost any car knowledge along the way, I kept up with every so called performance car made since the real Muscle Car days and I found very few cars being produced during that time that was worth gaining any knowledge on.

Fast forward to the late 90's and now, Finally, something is being produced by the USA that does indeed satisify my need for speed and in 1999 I sold my last 60's Muscle Car and went with today's Muscle Cars! Oh yeah, the wait was long, but it is finally here! I can't say the wait was worth it though because I would have liked to have never had to see the likes of the time from the mid 70's through the late 90's happening to the American Car industry and it's enthusiasts. I am thankful that they are back though because I like being able to buy and maintaining them from new. It was getting tough and very expensive to keep up the 'ol hotrod's from yesteryear!

Before I start in on my next rant, let me state that I love Muscle cars. Besides for the ultra rare Boss 429, LS6 Chevelle, and a handfull of other ultra rare muscle cars, in reality muscle cars were pretty slow. The majority of "Muscle" cars ran 15 to mid 14 second quarter miles. In Comparison my Friend's 2004 Caviler (stock) ran a 15.45! That would take the majority of muscle cars! I will agree the the 70's and early 80's were a bad time for performance cars. In my opinion if you de-trim a 70's car it looks much like a 60's car. Most 70's cars have light year advancements in suspension and braking technology also. The 80's again have huge advancements in braking and suspension technology and as a bonus they are generally much lighter then anything that came before. Todays performance parts make 60's muscle car performance parts obsolete. Put a modern performance engine in a 1970's or 80's car and you will have a car that out-performs a 60's muscle car. Now if you stick on a set of rose colored glasses the 60's were a really cool time for cars. The big 3 1/2 were building cars with flat black hoods, hood scoops, hood pins, spoilers, racing stripes, ralley wheels, and big blocks.

My points:

-People that pay 5 millon for a 1971 Hemi Cuda Convertable's are nuts. A 71 hemi Cuda is a mid 15 second car with crappy suspension and crappy brakes! My friend has a 71 Hemi Cuda Hemi (stock) he bought it because he loves Cuda's. He bought it before Muscle cars had any value. He bought it because he had a similar car ih high school. (same reasons I bought my II).

-The car hobby is stuck in a 60's Muscle car rut. From 1972-05 zillons of cool cars have been built. Restore or modify any one of them, please.

-People need realize that the engine in a 1975-1978 Mustang II is removeable. (all 70's and 80's cars have removeable engines). Since the car is 30 something years old it is likely time for a rebuild anyway. If you build a small block ford with mild modern performance parts and put it in a II, it will out run the lightning fast 1966 Shelby GT350 or 1969 Boss Mustang. (Both super cool looking 15 second quarter mile rides).

-The majority of Muscle car guys think Muscle cars were ultra quick. (they were not). Time for a reality check? The Mini Van you drive to work now, is quicker, safer, handles better then your 1965 Mustang 289 Hi-Po. Most muscle car guys no nothing about cars built after 1972.

-The car hobby needs to move on. I think Hot Rod and Car Craft need to start featuring cars from 1972-up.

-You can now buy a brand new re-pop 1969 Camaro body and a 1969 fast back Mustang will likely be along shortly. In my opinion there are already too many 1969 Camaro's in the world! There are so many cool cars why does everybody need a 1970 Chevelle red with black stripes????????

Yes, they may have ran those 1/4 mile times but it was because of the tires of the day . . . . did you ever try to put 350+ HP to the ground on 7.75 tires? I had bone stock Old's running mid 13's on F70-14 tires! Ha, those were the days to be able to do that. Slap on the slicks it was in the 12's. Also had a bone stock Camaro that ran 13.7's on those same F70-14 tires. The big one was a 375HP Factory bone stock Nova, first time to the drags, 15's sad it may seem but that was using only 2 and 3rd gear. It had so much power it would just sit there and spin in 1st so you had to take off in 2nd so spinning faster would get it going a little faster on those skinny E70-14 brick tires. It reved so high and made so much power it was barely even reving going through the traps still spinning the E70's in 3rd gear. Guess what? Slicks and a 4.56 gear put that same car with no other mods into the low 12's. Headers put it into the 11's. Sorry man, but those WERE the days! And just now are we getting them back. Nothing from then until now could be done that way without major mods and money spent to do it!

You never mentioned brakes and suspension so that has nothing to do with what I originaly answered. But since you brought it up, Camaro's could be had with 4-wheel discs in the late 60's, and suspension as good as any late 70's to early 90's car made. All the pony cars could be made to go and on crap tires too. The street tires of today are better than the slicks you could get back then. Anything can be made to go faster and better than it comes stock, and the 60's and 70's gave us way more reliable cars to work with straight from the Factory than what we had through the days from then up until now.

I can say, yes they are nuts for paying that much, no car to me is worth that! But, again that same Hemi Cuda of the day ran easy 13's bone stock with the right driver. Slap on the Slicks, gears and exhaust, it was right into the high 11's and low 12's. You need to do more research and stop watching the nerds from reality TV showing what they can do with other peoples 30 year old cars.

To me that is a good place to be stuck. You were not discussing restore and modify in your first post but if you must now, a lot of $$$ and time had to go into anything to get them anywhere near to what the original muscle cars offered. Most of the late 70's and 80's aftermarket stuff that was available to the general public was in the form of wheels and decals. It took a long time for the aftermarket to catch up with the hot rodders again.

You still have to dump a lot of $$$ into it to get anywheres near what the original Muscle Cars offered, dang, I'm starting to repeat myself, but I guess it still applies to your above statement. Repeating again, Nothing from then until now could be made to run like them without major mods done to it!

The Muscle Cars were quick, they slapped you in the seat so hard once you got rid of the tire spin it was very difficult to reach for the shifter if you didn't already have your hand on it. Reality check done . . . . I don't and never have driven a Mini Van but you must have one to be able to speak so highly of them . . .
You do know with Koni shocks and some good tires the 1965 Hi-Po 289 Mustang is still today cleaning up the track in vintage racing don't you?

We muscle car guys you speak of do know a lot about the cars built after 1972, I know if you took a bone stock car after then, put headers, gears, carbs, intakes, ignitions, cams, and slicks it was still very difficult to get any of them into the 14's! I tried doing it to several mid-70's cars and was barely able to get there.

Heck, bone stock mid 80's cars were barley making it to the low 16's without spending a fortune.

I don't take those magazines but the look around, the car hobby has moved on. I'm advancing the timing on Mustang without popping the hood or getting my hands dirty. I'm changing my speedometer to be perfect with the gears I put in and never crawling under the car. I'm adjusting my fuel mix and all of the above by just sitting in the drivers seat and pushing a few buttons. Look again, it has moved on . . . .

The cool cars you speak of are few, every manufacturer had cool cars in the day, do you consider a mid 70's early 80's car with those ugly extended park bench looking bumpers to be anywhere near as cool as a 64-72 Mustang? They had a look all their own but it was not as cool as the early years. Look hard to find it. Today's cars are looking better than ever, most late 1900's cars were all looking like the same boxes with a few details added to give them a different name. I know I never mistook a 60's Mercury Comet for a Ford Falcon or a Mustang, even though they were made on the same platform. Today I can hardly tell the difference between a BMW, Honda, Toyota, or whatever else bland design Chevy or Ford comes up with. Now, I will never mistake my '03 Mustang or the new Mustang for anything else but what it is.

The only reason muscle cars didnt run that quick at the track was due to the inadequate non-radial skinny tires they had back then. Big blocks would smoke the living hell out of the tires. If you check out the factory muscle cars with slicks installed, they run a lot quicker. (427 AC Cobras go from 12s on street tires to low 10s with drag slicks installed)

Most everything fast had high compression huge cubic inch mills back then, modern technology isnt what makes modern cars "just as quick", it's simply better tire quality.
Anyway, I'd rather drive a car that can go low 14s, smoking the original cheap tires the whole way, than a car that can go low 14s and barely squeek the tires at full throttle. Excessive power is fun as hell on the street, and those old muscle cars sounded awesome, too.
Another thing is, a lot of street races don't begin from a complete stop like they do at the strip. A BOSS 302 or BOSS 429 Mustang werent even intended for drag racing, so the real challenge would be racing against them from a rolling start.
I don't think too many modern performance cars could keep up with a 400hp 289 AC Cobra on a street race.
Also, the economic scale is way off between the 60s and now. The average person has a hell of a lot more free cash floating around nowadays. Today's cars are a lot more costly than the original muscle rides, because most people can afford it. (I'm not just talking about inflation, either) If you want to compare cars, you need to compare everything: HP per dollar spent, thrill per dollar, etc.
And old cars are easier and cheaper to build up. My II was built in '77, in it's current configuration, I have about $15,000 into it. There is absolutely no new car on the planet that will outperform my II for $15,000.

The sound of an old big block gives me wood, the sound of a race prepped 427 ... extacy, and I have to change underware.

Todays engines? Their sound annoys me.

Some of us really don't want to know, either. I have enough issues learning and adjusting to a lifestyle which is now based upon computers, technology, and things that didn't even exist in the 60's and 70's, to have it spoil the remaining fun of owning what's now a vintage car.... by turning that too into an electronic motherboard on wheels.
If I were to buy an '05 GT Mustang today, I wouldn't have the slightest inkling to make mods to it. To me, it would be quick enough transportation and no doubt fun to drive...but, really just another new car....one that I'd hope wouldn't be riddled with expensive high tech problems before I could pay it off or trade it in.

To me, owning and restoring/modifying older vehicles is to do so in the context of the time they built. In essence, to build them with the much of technology of that time. An exception to this thinking might be with cars built before 1955, many of which would then fall into the catagory of todays street rods, which are usually loaded with all the latest gadgets and hardware.
I like to see these high tech street rod replicas of the 30's cars that use todays latest performance parts... but I really appreciate seeing the ones that have been built to replicate the hot rods of the 50's and early 60's, using the kinds of vintage items that made them hot rods back then.

Your posts makes a few valid points, but reads like it's written from the perspective of someone that wasn't of driving age back in those great times. Todays cars are refined, to be sure...and with most making more power per cubic inch of displacement, than those of the 60's. But, that same refinement also masks much of what made the old cars such an experience to drive, back in the day.

It's nice to have A/C, every power accessory, computerized fuel injection, and every creature comfort under the sun, in the cars we use to make our daily commute. But, when I'm crusin' on those nice summer days, I want my no frills, (crank)windows down, low tech budget ride... that reminds me of those better times and days gone by.

I was a PC tech for awhile, so naturally, I now hate computers. Especially computers in cars. Argh.
I follow with what you're saying, and agree, with the exception of points distributors. I got sick of changing the damn dual points all the time on my mallory, so I went with the MSD box, and of course, I now hate that too. I need one of those HEI-style self contained distributors that can almost fool me into thinking it's sort of the same thing as points. (but without the hassle)

You can't compare new muscle cars to old muscle cars; they are just two different breeds. Each has it's pros and cons, it just depends on your point of view. Some guys want a 600hp car with A/C, and other guys are happy with no radio, drum brakes and a carpetless painted floor. Again, it's personal taste.

You can't discredit any factory muscle car. The cars of the 60s and 70s made gobs of power with huge cubic inches and high compression. You won't find that in today's world. Today's muscle cars make gobs of power using high flowing head, multiple cams, and power adders. And they do it with 2-3 times the gas mileage, and half the displacement as the "vintage" cars. But each version deserves respect in it's own right.

But when it comes down to the "evolution" of muscle cars, people need to face the fact that the modern cars are the top dog. The 05 Mustang is the most powerful GT version of the car in it's 40 year history. The 03-04 Cobra is one of the best performing Mustangs ever built. And not only will it destroy almost any "vintage" Mustang in a straight line, it will do it in the corners, in braking, and in every other performance department. And it will do it with the A/C on getting 20 mpg. You can't beat that.

Modern technology and computers ARE taking the muscle car to a whole new level. Like it or not, it's reality.

With that said, I still love to take a vintage crank window, no A/C, AM radio, bias bly tire, large cubic inch muscle car for a drive anyday. That's why I have a 427 Cobra, in the midst of all my "modern" muscle cars.

And its a good thing too. For the last few years body panels/ floor pans were available for 67-68 cars, the '69's were left out like our II's are, especially for the sister car(firebirds) the nose, and fenders of a 67/68 will bolt on the body, but only if you also used the doors from those years as well. Now I can finally kick my brother's but into gear to get more work done on his.

Both sides have valid points.

Many people seem to have fallen into the trap of thinking that EVERY Mustang, Chevelle, etc produced was a "muscle car", when in fact, most were garden-variety transportation with a small block, or often even a six.

The truly muscular versions were few, and expensive for the day. And that's what keeps them popular, I think. People remember the hi-po cars, and associate that with the more common ones. Why else would there be so many "clones" being built. I hate that terminology, BTW, especially in Chevelles where people throw on an aftermarket cowl hood, and a couple of SS emblems and call it a clone, paying no attention to the many other items that comprised a true SS car.

A few years back, Mustangs and Fords dynoed a supposedly built-to-stock 225hp 289 in an early stang. Their results were very disappointing, as testing showed considerably less than the target number. My sub ran out with that article, and I had already decided not to renew as they had made it clear they were not going to feature anything outside the "classic" mustangs (a position I understand has been altered since).

I was fortunate enough to be old enough to drive some of these cars. Not buy them new, but when they were only a few years old, and didn't cost an arm and six legs. And yes, raw big-block power is impressive, even with 90K miles on the clock.

Styling is highly subjective, as we all know from the coupe/hatchback arguments.

I'v said it befoe, and I'll say it again: build/drive what you like, and to hell with what anyone else thinks of your choice. I stopped caring about what the "mustang purists" thought of the II long ago. Believe me, it makes ownership much more enjoyable when you're not taking offense to every moron's opinion.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, no matter how wrong it is.

We'll see. I don't believe that the titling issue has yet been addressed.

There are really only going to be 3 options.

1) Body supplied with MSO. That means the car will be titled as a 2005 and would have to meet 2005 emissions. Not too likely.

2) Body supplied w/o any documentation. Swap VIN tag from donor car (driving up already ridiculous slomaro prices). Who wants to be first to go to the pokey?

3) Sold for off-road use only. How many folks will pay $12K for a body (plus all the other costs to finish) for a car they will never be able to drive legally on the street?

Unless there has been something recently developed, I'm a skeptic.

There was talk of selling turnkey cars, but see #1 above.

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