Lucy's New Shoes (Part 2)

Short one tonight. Here are some pictures of the CS67s all loaded up on my pony. A little information is useful here. The front wheels are 18 x 8.5, which means 18 inches in diameter and 8.5 inches in width. The back wheels are 18 x 9.5. This gives the car what's called a "staggered" look, with the back tires looking heftier and more aggressive.

The fronts are wrapped in Toyo Proxes T1 Rs size 255/45/18. The back rubber is meatier, measuring 285/40/18 (these numbers signify the height/diameter of the tire, in mm, followed by the width of the tire as a percentage of the height, followed by the diameter of the open area of the tire; so 285/40/18 is 285 mm high, 40% of that (114 mm) wide, and fits on 18" wheels). The Toyos are basically a performance street tire, much softer rubber than typical tires, with a tread pattern optimized for grip, but not as soft as drag radials, which would wear too quickly on a daily driver. As it is, the Toyos are rated for a shorter life than, for example, the stock Pirelli tires (which are 235/55/17, by the way).

Enough of the mumbo jumbo. First, a few of what the movie professionals call "establishing shots."

This is one of the fronts next to the stock Bullits.

A comparison of the width of the new rubber to the stock tires. Big difference!

Even bigger difference on the rears. These are crazy wide!

Ok, now for the important stuff! Here's a before picture in my driveway...

And with her new shoes!

Couple pics from different angles now.

This picture shows how big the rear tires are (the better to grip with!). Compare it to the stock tires below.

That's it for now, except for a quick note: one of the bothersome things about these S197s is that they come jacked up like a 4 x 4. Nothing shows that better than a night picture, because the flash fills the wheel well, whereas during the day you just see shadows and it doesn't look as bad. So here's a picture doing double duty.

The wheel wells are definitely too big, or at least too high. I'm having the car lowered over the long weekend, which will make the stance a lot cleaner, the way it really should look. I'll post more pics then.

Lucy's New Shoes (Part 1)

"I did not have three thousand pairs of shoes, I had one thousand and sixty."

- Imelda Marcos

Application of the scientific method (formulate hypothesis, experiment, analyze data, draw conclusions, subject to replication and peer review) has conclusively proven that women are crazy. I have personal experience with this phenomenon in part because I'm married to one. Like all women, my lovely and otherwise rational wife gets weak in the knees at the sight of a pair of "cute" sandals, or boots that look to me somehow like they once belonged to pirates. But I'm no expert.

Luckily for me, Lucy (the Mustang, folks) is pretty low-key when it comes to being fancy. She has happily trod upon her stock 17" Bullits for almost four years now, never complaining or revealing herself to be jealous of her sister Stangs sporting showy, chromed, 20-inch kicks. She and I would be happy to continue riding on her stockers were this project not in the works, but since it is, it was time for an upgrade. Yes, friends, Lucy has new wheels!

Like everything about this project, I chose the wheels to give the best combination of a retro cue (specifically to the 1967 Shelby G.T. 350, of course) while still looking good on the S197 body. In 1967, the standard wheel that came with the Shelbys was steel-rimmed with a Ford/Shelby cover. More popular, though, were the Kelsey-Hayes wheels and the 10-spoke Shelby wheels. Both wheels are definitely cool (and the raised white lettering on tires in the 60s can't be beat for that classic muscle car look), but making the decision in my case was easy. Although there was a wheel sort-of similar to the 5-spoke Kelsey-Hayes version, it wasn't really a design modeled after that. On the other hand, Carol Shelby himself has come out with a line of vintage wheels that are modern takes on classic designs--including the 10-spoke Shelby GT wheels! They're called CS67s, and they're hot!

(for a much larger version that shows a lot more detail, CLICK HERE)

I won't be the first Mustang enthusiast running these beauties. A couple guys at some of the Mustang forums I frequent have put them on, with great results (I hope they don't mind me borrowing some of their pictures...) All-in-all, though, they're a pretty rare sight, which I think is cool. Below are some pictures of the 10-spokes on 1967 G.T. 350s, then the CS67s on some S197s. I think you'll see what a wonderful recreation Carol Shelby has done.

Now for some pictures of the CS67s. This first Mustang belongs to a forum member by the name of Graypny. He's done an excellent job with his car, also doing a '67 tribute, and its a big inspiration to me. More pictures of his beauty (also, larger, more detailed versions; I'm limited to a certain size here, but its worth checking out the full size) can be found HERE.

Next up is a beautiful Vista Blue 2006 GT owned by a guy who goes by 05fordGT. I had to do a couple of his pics here. Just like the Mineral Gray Mustang above, this car has a lot of the same details and look I'm going after, and I've been admiring it for a while. Great inspiration. Again, full-size versions (and additional pictures) can be found HERE.

Love this picture, with the fighter jets!

Finally, here is an image I found using Google (I don't actually know who the car belongs to) that shows what the wheels look like at speed. Pretty cool, I like the "deep dish" kind of look they give (sort of like the spokes are recessed around a deep lip).

So the big news is, Lucy got her new shoes tonight after work. The bad news is that night pictures just don't come out well, at least not using a relatively simple point-n-click digital camera with no manual shutter lag adjustment. So it would do neither you nor I any good to post the pictures I took tonight, and wouldn't give justice to Lucy or the CS67s. So, I will take pictures tomorrow in the light and do some comparison shots and whatnot. So "Lucy's New Shoes (Part 2)" should be right around the corner.

Ok, I'll give you a teaser... btw, check out the meaty rubber wrapping these things!! More on that next time too...

The Muse

If in a few months you happen to be driving on a California highway and see a blur of red and silver and pure sex reeking of burnt rubber and snorting like an angry boar, and at a glance you happen to catch the above vanity plate even while it rapidly shrinks ahead of you, well, that'll be me. Its official: I am committed to this project, because this plate - which is now working its way through the California Department of Vehicles system, no doubt soon to be the pride of an industrious felon - will make no sense if I don't follow through with the project.

The Mustangs Of The 60s

In April 1964, on the heels of the end of WWII, Ford released the first production Mustang, which became an instant hit and established all kinds of sales records. The Mustang was the first so-called "pony car," an affordable, compact, sporty or performance-oriented auto usually characterized by a relatively long hood. The release of the Mustang ushered in the first era of the muscle car race, which saw the release over an 8-year period of such classics as the Pontiac GTO, Chevy Camaro, Dodge Challenger, and Plymouth Roadrunner, in addition to, of course, a variety of Mustangs.

Nearly fifty years later, it's a different world, and the relationships we have with our cars has changed. I'm a child of the 70s - almost the 80s - and so I can't pretend to know what it was like dreaming of buying, much less owning, a classic 60s muscle car. What I can do is appreciate what it might have been like to live at a time when there was "no replacement for displacement," horsepower was as American as apple pie, and no one was interested in impressing the anonymous masses with overpriced import luxury cars or ugly inefficient bubbles marketed as the answer to our modern environmental guilt.

To this end, I get a real kick out of Mustang advertisements of the '60s. They speak of a pure and innocent pride of ownership somehow devoid of the modern materiality inherent in today's high-end but utterly uninteresting "luxury" cars. I mean, does it get any better than "The Mustang Pledge"?:

I Will Not...

I will not sell tickets to all the people who want to ride in my '67 Mustang.

I will not keep the neighbors up all night by playing my Mustang's stereo tape player.

I will not yawn when people talk about the performance of other cars.

I Will...

I will tell the truth about my Mustang's low price and not let people think I payed extra for bucket seats, vinyl interior, plush carpeting and all those other no-cost extras.

I will love, honor and obey the Convenience Control Panel when the lights tell me to fasten seat belts and release the parking brake.

I will stick to my diet even though my Mustang's Tilt-Away steering wheel is so adjustable.

[And my personal favorite...]

I will keep the "helpless female" look by shifting manually only when I'm driving alone. All other times I will let the SelectShift work automatically.

The 1967 Shelby G.T. 350

Starting in 1965, racing and Mustang legend Caroll Shelby, working in conjunction with Ford, began modifying production Mustangs and selling them under the Shelby G.T. name. Starting in 1968, the word "Cobra" was added to the moniker, but the 1965-1967 Shelbys were simply known as "Shelby G.T." Most significantly, Shelbys received tweaked "Hi-Po" engines putting out significantly more power than their production-level counterparts.

After its release, the Mustang's design stayed the same for three years, until 1967, when Ford tweaked its look to create a beefier and more aggressive style. The Shelbys, too, got a makeover. Besides a different look, Caroll Shelby introduced for the first time the Shelby G.T. 500, to go alongside the G.T. 350 he had been producing the previous two years.

The G.T 500 had a monstrous 428 cid 4-valve V8 engine putting out a mind-blowing (especially for the time) 400 rear wheel horsepower (Ford conservatively rated the engine at 355, but dynometer tests show otherwise), and featured a padded roll bar and racing harness. It was truly a race-inspired car. The G.T. 350 was more gentile, rated at 271 horsepower made by a 289 cid 4V V8. The exterior of the two models was identical except for the substitution of "500" for "350" on the badges and rocker panel stripe.

Like with the production Mustangs, ads for the Shelbys highlighted the excitement of owning a high-performance vehicle.

(Click on any of these to see a larger version)

Why I'm Paying Tribute To The 350 Instead Of The 500

If the G.T. 500 was "the nuts" of '67 Mustangs, you might wonder why I'm choosing to pay tribute to the "lesser" 350 model. The answer is pretty simple: its a matter of respect. My 2005 Mustang GT is a 289 cid, 3-valve V8, so the engine is a lot closer to the 350 than it is to the 500's engine. And the 4.6L S197 engine is currently putting out 300 HP at the crank, about 265 at the rear wheels (after some light modifications, my Mustang actually makes about 300 HP at the rear wheels today), which is, again, a lot closer to the 350 than it is to the 500. Moreover, in 2007, Shelby built a new G.T. 500, which you may occasionally see on the road today (it shares the S197 body, albeit with some modifications).

Since my Mustang is not a Shelby at all, it may seem a little silly to draw this distinction, but to me it makes sense. In a way, the Shelby 350 is a more "direct" ancestor of my S197; if I were lucky enough to own a current-model GT 500 and were doing a tribute project, I would, of course, be paying tribute to the remarkable Shelby G.T. 500.

As a side note here, you'll probably notice a theme as I progress with this. I want to be very careful not to identify my car as something its not. My goal is to pay tribute to the G.T. 350, not to pretend that my car is one. People have different feelings about this, but I'm of the school that says you don't stick Cobra emblems on a GT, or GT emblems on a V6, or "Supercharged" stickers on a naturally-aspirated engine, etc. There's a joke performance-car guys make about those civics and such you see with a billion stickers all over them, like "NOS" (Nitrous Oxide) - "every sticker adds 5 horsepower!" Heh.

In sum, I want to avoid being a "poser" of any sort. I want to ensure that I'm giving a nod to a vehicle and era I admire, rather than pretending to have a modern version of the same thing. Thus, for example, I've made the decision not to use any of the Shelby emblems on my vehicle, instead using standard Mustang emblems that describe my car, but placing them in appropriate locations to evoke the Shelby's emblems, if that makes sense.

For example, the Shelbys had this kick-ass emblem on the front fenders. They had similar emblems on the front grille and faux gas cap on the rear of the car. As cool as these emblems are, I'm not going to use them because my car is not a Shelby G.T. 350.

Instead, I'm going to use this Running Horse Logo. The fenders will be the "4.6" version, which accurately describes my car's engine (since I will be removing the "GT" badges, except for on the faux gas cap on the rear, I want to be sure to make it easy to tell its a V8 GT, rather than the V6, 4.0 Liter version).

Anyway, you'll see this same theme in some other choices I'm making.

The 1967 Shelby G.T. 350: Photos

OK, so you've read enough, time to get to the pictures. For this entry, I'm just going to post some of my favorite pictures showing some of the various features of the G.T. 350. The next several entries will each focus on a single particular feature, giving information about the feature when appropriate or interesting, and demonstrating how I intend to mimic the feature on my Mustang. I will show you the choices I'm making and give you my thought process behind each choice. The first example of this, of course, I've already done, describing the Proglass Mystery 7 hood in "The Idea (Part 2)."

Enjoy!

The Idea (Part 2)

Having revived the performance of my car's engine, I decided I'd also do something about the CDC Aggressive Chin Splitter than had been sitting in my various apartments, in a box and unpainted, for about two and a half years. I always intended to get it painted and installed, but just hadn't bothered, in part because I had become somewhat apathetic about my car.

I found a place to do the work, brought it in, and $150 later had a restyled front end. Came out nice, huh? (The splitter is the pointy "chin" that sticks out in the front of the car, below the license plate.) Here are some closer-up pictures:

Anyway, as I went to get the chin painted, I considered picking up a hood scoop to get done at the same time. When I bought my car in 2005, they didn't come with hood scoops, and while some aftermarket ones came out that I liked ok, I never jumped on that wagon. However, I always had in the back of my mind that I kind of liked the look. In maybe 2007, Ford started putting on hood scoops as part of an optional appearance package, which I thought was kind of cool. One thing that bothers me about all of these scoops, though, is that they're "non-functional," i.e., they're pretty much either taped or screwed onto the hood, purely for aesthetic purposes.

To make a hood scoop at least minimally "functional," you typically need to drill a series of holes under the scoop, so that cool air that the scoop traps gets pulled into the engine bay to cool the engine and get cooler air into the intake. The cooler the air, the better and more powerfully the engine will perform. But even better than this crude method (the results of which are highly questionable anyway) is to find an aftermarket hood with a built-in scoop. Some of these feature something called "ram air," which basically takes in air through the scoop and funnels it through a tunnel to come out directly over the air intake. Some people still think this is still questionably "functional," but you have to think that, to the extent these things help by bringing cooler air into the engine, the versions that direct the air to the exact right place have to work better, right?

Keeping these principles in mind, I began searching for a hood that was both functional and aesthetically pleasing to me. My primary resource was this thread: "Lets see your aftermarket hood".

Let me say, there are tons of aftermarket hoods, and many I like pretty well on other peoples' mustangs, but as I looked around, I wasn't finding something that was really the perfect form and function for me. I wanted something aggressive, but a little more understated than a giant, hulking scoop. I wasn't finding anything - until I came across this beauty:

This Mustang belongs to a guy named Chris, who I have spoken to on the phone. The hood is called the Proglass Mystery 7, and is a 67-style hood, i.e., one modeled on the 1967 Shelby GTs, and there's a great story behind it.

The Proglass Mystery 7 Hood

The hood you are looking at above is 1 of only 2 that were ever made. There is a reason for this.

For a short while, there was a company making aftermarket mustang parts called Fang Performance. One thing they made was a hood they called the "Mystery 7," which was based on the style of the 1967 Shelby GT hoods.

As the Fang Performance guys began to design this hood, there was a division among some of the decision-makers and craftsmen. One guy wanted to make the hood with "notches" that were typical of the 1967 Shelby hoods. Some of the other guys thought that, even though this would more closely mimic the style of the 1967s, it simply didn't go well with the lines of the 2005+ Mustang (btw, this body style is called the "S197," so now you'll know that if I ever say that - easier to say than 2005+, or 2005-2009 Mustangs or whatever). Well, the pro-notch guy was the one in charge, and his opinion eventually prevailed, and Fang started making these hoods with the notches. They didn't sell very well, and Fang eventually went out of business, selling a lot of the mouldings for their parts to a new company called Aeroform.

Here is a series of pictures that demonstrates the issue well (pulled from the thread I linked to above):

1. This is the front-view of a 1967 Shelby G.T. 350:

2. This is the Fang hood with the notches:

3. Here's a photoshop of what Fang should have done instead:

4. Finally, here's a picture of Chris' hood from the front:

As you can see, the notch-lines really break up the flow of the car, and are distracting. It looks far better on the S197 with just the straight hood lines, like every other hood that goes on these cars. (BTW, if you're interested, here's a short video a guy who put the Fang Mystery 7 on his car made.)

Well, one of Fang's fiberglass workers, who's very well known for his fiberglass skills, a guy in Indianapolis named Terry DeLong, left Fang and struck out on his own (either forming, or working for an outfit called Proglass, I'm not exactly sure). I guess he felt passionate about the notchless hood, because he created a moulding for one, and ultimately fabricated two hoods, giving them (from what I understand, at a very fair/low price) to two guys he knew, Chris (the sonic blue mustang above), and another guy, Tom. Soon after that, Terry began doing other things with his life, took up other interests, and stopped working with fiberglass. So long story short, only 2 of these notchless hoods were ever made.

When I came across Chris' posting, I thought, "I have to have that hood!" But given Chris' story and the fact that only 2 were ever made, I pretty much knew I was out of luck. Nevertheless, I wanted to do more research, so I googled "Proglass Mystery 7 hood," and found some other postings Chris had made on other websites. In one, I saw that he mentioned the 2nd hood was for sale (!!). However, I was looking at the end of November, 2008, and Chris' post had been from the previous August, so what were the chances it was still available?

Well, I send Chris a personal message over that mustang forum, and he told me he wasn't sure what the current status was, but suggested I contact Terry. He had posted some contact info for Terry, but I had tried it and found the numbers disconnected, and he had since left Proglass. After a little while of some deep searching, I found an email address for a Terry DeLong outside of Indianapolis that tracked to a machine shop. Hoping this was him, I shot him an email, and soon heard back from him, saying that the hood was, indeed, still for sale, and that a buddy of his, Tom, currently had the hood.

After our brief email exchange, I called Terry and talked to him on the phone. He told me that Tom had had to sell his Mustang, and had returned it to stock, and had a bunch of left-over pieces, including the hood. Tom had tried to sell the hood on ebay, but was unsuccessful. Terry told me Tom was actually considering just throwing or giving it away, but that Terry had admonished him just to hold onto it for a while and see what happened. Wow, good advice, Terry! He must be prescient.

Here are a couple pictures of the actual hood I've purchased. These pictures were taken by Chris, with the hood on Tom's Torch Red convertible (btw, I don't think this looks as good on the convertible as it does on the coupe for some reason). (Since my car is Redfire, I'll have to have it repainted, but that's no big deal.)

The second picture, btw, shows the functional "ram air" - it may be a little hard to make out, but there is actually a tunnel from the open "nostrils" of the scoop over to that cut-out square on the right, which, when the hood is closed, goes right over the air intake.

So Terry said he would contact Tom, ask what he wanted for the hood, and help out shipping it. He did that, came back to me shortly with a very fair price (several hundred dollars below typical aftermarket hoods), and I accepted. Shortly after that, I spoke with Tom on the phone, got information on how to paypal him, and did so. I'm currently waiting for the hood to be shipped.

Why I Like the Mystery 7

What I like about the Mystery 7 hood is that it has an aggressive look, but is still pretty subtle. The scoop is much lower profile than almost every other scoop out there. And, the hood extends 3 inches beyond the factory hood, kind of giving a "bite" to the front end, which you can see in the profile pictures of Chris' car below:

Because the hood extends, there are some additional pieces that go with the hood to make the exension look right, which you may have noticed, for instance over the headlight in the above picture (I call this the "eyebrow"). Here are some close-up pictures of those extensions.
From what I've heard from Chris, and from Terry himself, the fit and finish on this hood is impeccable, A+. This is important because aftermarket fiberglass hoods often need a lot of work to get them fit appropriately on a car. Without that work, they can be warped, leave large gaps, etc. Not good. So the fact that this hood was hand-made by a fiberglass craftsman who really knows his stuff, and has already been successfully installed on a Mustang, is all good news for me.
This is particularly key because there have been a few guys who have installed the notched Fang version on their cars and found the work to be very substandard.

Combine all these things with the fact this this hood is truly one-of-a-kind (ok, two of a kind!), and I'm really excited about it. I think its going to be a really special thing to have for my Mustang, and will help set it apart and make it unique again.

What This Has To Do With The Price of Tea in China

So what's the point of this story? Well, having come upon this great hood, styled after the 1967 Shelby GTs, it got me thinking about doing a full tribute project, whereby I would transform my car to look as much like a 1967 Shelby G.T. 350 as possible. These S197s were styled after the Mustangs of the 60s and 70s, and just beg for retro-styled mods. So deciding on this hood was the genesis of my tribute project idea.

This post is long enough, believe me, I know, so I'll forego the details now. In my next post, I'll tell you a little more about the '67 Shelbys, show you some cool pictures, and tell you all the elements that I plan to mimic in my tribute project.