1977 Mustang II, Factory 302, with a C4. My Dad bought the car unbeknownst to me, from a wreck sale with 77,000 miles and very slight front and rear damage. I'll never forget that Sunday morning on the way to church with the family, Dad stops by a relatives house,(they own a body shop). He drives around back of the house, and wheels up beside this little Mustang II. I say, "what are you doing?" He says " how you like this car?" I say, I don't !!! Everybody knew my favorite Mustang was a 1970 MACH 1, so I didn't really give it a second thought. At the time we farmed, and my Dad had told me as long as I did a good job of working and helping him out, he'd buy me a car for my 16th birthday. I was a really good helper that Summer !! My birthday is Dec. 22nd, as the months drew near, I began hearing rumors from my cousin that he knew what kind of car I was getting. After a lot of hounding, he kind of mentioned it wasn't a 70 MACH, or any other classic Mustang that I was longing for. Suddenly, I start having flashbacks of the ugly Mustang II, he'd shown me, and thinking no way. Weeks before my B-day, I found out he was spending time at the body shop, working on my car, so that it'd be finished in time. He took me to get my driver license in his pick up, after we got home, I remember riding my bike to my best friends house to show him my big accomplishment. I came back home and my Dad said " lets go get some steaks and we'll grill em for supper after your Mom gets home from work". So we've only got about a 5 mile ride to the store, about a half mile before the store, is the said body shop. He starts slowing down earlier than he should, almost comes to a stop and turns the truck to the left and shines the headlights directly on that newly painted to look like a Cobra II with spoilers and says . . . . Happy Birthday son. I thought it was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. That's a memory that I'll never forget !!!
I learned SO much working on and hot rodding that little Mustang, eventually swapped the 302 for a 351W and whoa what a difference there weren't many bolts on that car, that I didn't touch. The guy I sold it to, still has it, now it's got a 427W AFR heads big roller and on and on. Wish I had it back.
My first car i actually worked on with my own two hands was a 84 Mustang GT, learned to do many things on it, i was 16. The furthest i've done anything to was my 68 Camaro, which i sold last year. Did so much to it, hurt selling it, but i replaced it with my 92 Mustang GT, and i couldn't be happier to have my first car back. Feels like i'm 16 again.
I just wrenched on it.
