The Car鈥檚 A Great Find For Sure

The Car鈥檚 A Great Find For Sure

A rare 1970 Ford Mustang Mach 1 recently made its way onto eBay, but the car is not exactly as it seems. The car鈥檚 a great find for sure, but don鈥檛 be fooled by its looks. The owner says he covered it in a patina- and rust-covered wrap to give the car a barn-fresh look, finishing the ensemble with some rusty steel wheels. The car may have been parked in a barn briefly at some point, but underneath the wrap, it鈥檚 in pretty solid shape. The seller first owned the car in high school and sold it in 1984 but tracked it down a few years ago and re-purchased it. The Mustang鈥檚 actual paint job is bright yellow with black accents. It came with the original 351-cubic-inch Cleveland V-8, an Edelbrock air cleaner, and an automatic transmission, which replaced the factory three-speed manual. The original gearbox is still with the car and was included in the sale. Ford added the Mach 1 package to the Mustang lineup for the 1969 model year, which included a 351 Windsor V-8 (replaced by a Cleveland V-8 the next year), a three-speed manual, and the now-familiar fastback roof. The cars carried upgraded suspension and an optional 鈥淪haker hood,鈥?which our pseudo-ratty Mustang has. The Mach 1 stuck around until 1978, even through the less-than-great Mustang II years. The name made a comeback 25 years later with the 2003 Mustang until phasing out again just a year later.

The 1982 Ford Mustang launched on the strength of momentum that had been building since 1979. Now the pace was accelerating, and the 1982-1986 design generation would show America that Mustang could once again furnish real power to the people. Looking back, the Fox family of Mustang that made its debut for 1979 was a happy turn of events for fans of Ford's sportiest car. Its predecessor, the Mustang II, was timely and popular, but it was not a genuine pony car, even if it served the noble purpose of keeping the Mustang spirit alive through the dark and difficult Seventies. Mustang again listed several roof options for 1982, including a flip-up sunroof and this T-bar roof with twin liftoff glass panels. By the 1980s, however, Detroit had pretty much come to terms with with government-mandated emissions limits, crash-performance standards, even Corporate Average Fuel Economy. This meant they could literally afford to return to more interesting things, like head-turning style and truly vivid performance. The "New Breed" Mustang reflected this by offering many qualities of the '65 original in a more sophisticated package appropriate for challenging new times.

Actually, pony cars shouldn't have survived to the Eighties in any form -- and most didn't. Mustang's Mercury sibling, the Cougar, was puffed up into a personal-luxury midsize after 1973, while the Plymouth Barracuda, Dodge Challenger, and AMC Javelin were all dumped after '74. But against all odds, the Chevrolet Camaro and Pontiac Firebird managed to hold on to decade's end -- and with surprisingly few changes after 1970. They even enjoyed a strong sales resurgence. The main reason, of course, was that after the first energy crisis, they were about the only American cars (other than Chevy's Corvette) offering anything like Sixties-style performance. The fact that their hottest models, the Z28 and Trans Am, also became the hottest sellers didn't go unnoticed in Dearborn. Ford Motor Company needed to be on its toes, because its financial situation by 1980 was almost as dire as Chrysler Corporation's. Echoing the late Forties, Ford faced another change of leadership at a time its future looked anything but rosy. Chairman Henry Ford II resigned, leaving many to wonder if his successors could turn things around. Inspiration in the executive ranks was sorely needed.

Though Ford had enjoyed good sales in recent years, its bottom line was hurt by the high costs of a product overhaul, begun with the '78 Fairmont/Zephyr and the '79 Mustang. When the economy and the car market tanked with "Energy Crisis II" in mid-1979, Ford suddenly found itself facing a major cash crisis. Stockholders needn't have worried, because 1980 ushered in two experienced go-getters: Philip A. Caldwell as chairman and, to replace him as president, Donald E. Petersen. A bit later, Eugene Bordinat retired after some 20 years as design vice-president, replaced by Donald Kopka, whose tastes closely mirrored those of North American design chief Jack Telnack. It was also in this period that a younger generation of Fords began to take a hand. Among them was Edsel B. Ford II, son of the departed chairman and a Mustang fan, who managed Ford Division market planning. Other rising talents included Harold A. "Red" Poling, executive v-p of North American Operations.

A late-August 1980 comparison of the rare and racy '81 McLaren Mustang (left)and two workouts for the production '82 GT with rejected hood-scoop and lower-valence ideas. All of this would prove good for Ford, but the press took particular note of Petersen's promotion. He was an avid, knowledgeable "car guy" (having served in product planning for years). And he had definite ideas about Ford's future, particularly in design and performance. Petersen's enthusiasm would soon be evident in a dramatic new fleet of Ford vehicles. Meantime, he put his stylists and engineers to work on imbuing existing models with some of the old "Total Performance" flair that had worked sales magic in the Sixties. As a direct descendant of those times, the Mustang was one of the first Fords to benefit. Donald Petersen was shaking things up at Ford, and the Mustang line was no exception. The first benefit of the changes at Ford headquarters, in particular the new focus on performance, appeared with the 1982 Ford Mustang GT. The revised car packed the most potent small-block V-8 in recent Ford history.