Mustang vs. A Body

[loiq]

So I'm working on my Valiant and I realize the rear frame rails are a lot beefier than the ones in my wife's 1970 Mustang. So I took a tape measure and measured the Valiant and they were 4.5x2.5-inches (I think that's what they were) and the Mustangs were 3.5x1.5 inches. The Mopar seems thicker, too.

Overall, I think the Mustang is a cheap, poorly built car. I've worked on a lot of Mopars and they are built much better than the Mustang.

Just an observation for you guys.

[moparrr07]

also, my car has very thick glass

[Jim_Lusk]

I've always thought the same thing. The Mustangs just seem flimsier.

[St.Louis-Dart]

i wouldnt crawl under one of them butt-stanes    to dangerous

[fasttcars]

common we all know how much better the old mopar's are then any other car in every aspect.[early to early compare]

[DartKnight]

They also tend to rattle and shake like hell. The parts are ridiculously cheap, though; you can practically build one from a catalog. Same thing with Novas...

[signet]

up front it's even worse!

[guzzimike]

Yeah, yeah...but those early Mustangs sure are pretty..


(my High School car was a 1965 Mustang Fastback)

[ksdartguy]

I put a 5.0 in my daughters 66 coupe,formerly 6 cyl. car.
They are flimsey. Guess thats why they only weigh about 2600-2700.
Even with V8s.

[b569rr]

Go to car shows and notice the body tears on the '65 - '66 behind the rear side window.

A buddy on mine is building a stoked 427 cammer in his '69 convertible. I'll send picks when he twists it up. 

Tom

[268darts]

I've been told by the Mustang boys that the big block Stangs almost always crack or twist the inner fenderwells if you beat on them a little. I've seen the Cougars do the same thing.

[Ace]

I've had 4 late model Mustangs, and I havn't left any of them alone.  Sub-frame connectors are a MUST for any kind of racing, which is what I did.  On that note, my last one ran 10.80's and I could drive it 30 miles each way to work every day. 

[NYrr496]

I put Edelbrock cylinder heads and a cam in my boss's 70 convertible. When I got under the car to connect the headers, I almost died when I saw the front suspension. What a heap. I drove it back to his house and it was all over the road. I told him to get one of those aftermarker front ends with all the spherical rod ends and whatnot. I didn't want to go fast in that thing ever.

[b569rr]

One thing my Ford loving buddy says. Apparently the shock towers have a tendency to crack on the '69 and '70's. Take a good look at the towers.

Tom

[DartKnight]

One thing my Ford loving buddy says. Apparently the shock towers have a tendency to crack on the '69 and '70's. Take a good look at the towers.

Tom

That's true. Though a good thing about them is that they are set high enough to use a strut brace; I have a friend who has the triangular-shaped setup on his and it stiffens up the front quite a bit.

[g-cuda67]

    I always wonder about fords front end set ups , I get crap on a daily basis on how mopar has poor front ends with torsion bars .  Funny enough it's from a die hard ford guy with mustang .
Is there an advantage to torsion bars  versus coil springs ? other then fitment issues or weight ?

[b569rr]

    I always wonder about fords front end set ups , I get crap on a daily basis on how mopar has poor front ends with torsion bars .  Funny enough it's from a die hard ford guy with mustang .
 Is there an advantage to torsion bars  versus coil springs ? other then fitment issues or weight ?

Tell your Ford buddy that our tie rod ends are bigger. I have the O.E. 9/16".

Tom

[loiq]

    I always wonder about fords front end set ups , I get crap on a daily basis on how mopar has poor front ends with torsion bars .  Funny enough it's from a die hard ford guy with mustang .
 Is there an advantage to torsion bars  versus coil springs ? other then fitment issues or weight ?

Older 'Stangs have the coil spring placed on top of the upper control arm so they have to run higher spring rates which means everything gets more extreme as far as suspension tuning. Most of the aftermarket kits use coilovers and mount them on the lower control arm so you can run a softer, more progressive spring rate. once you do that the front end is pretty nice. Stock setup sucks as far as I'm concerned, though. I'm putting a Mustang II setup in the wife's car, partly for ride quality and partly because it gets rid of the shock towers which will give us more room for the 429.

I'm not sure about torsion bars, but the mopar front is way more heavy duty than the Mustang front - most don't even have a crossmember and just use the engine as a stressed member. Here's the front on my wife's '70 Mach 1 with just the round bar as a crossmember:



Not to mention most get holes torched into the shock towers by a mechanic at some point (like ours) so they can grease the upper control arms. I love the looks of the car and the fact that it's all spot welded together makes it easy to work on, but man, they're so cheap. From the numbers I've seen the fastbacks aren't that light, either. I think the number for the '70 was like 3500 pounds, but the early coupes are really light, about 2800 pounds and early fastbacks were around 3000.

[g-cuda67]

  Guys , That front end does look wimpy with out your crossmember   By the way loiq I like your work and it's looking good 

[Detroit Iron]

My friends '64 Galaxie has an "S" bracket that's simply rivited to the frame rail to hold the shackle.  You all know Chrysler's shackle design bolts right through the frame rail.  How'd you like to be driving a twisted mountain road with the family in that loaf?  No thanks!

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[loiq]

The rear suspension in the 'Stang is pretty nice, aside from the smallish frame rails. They have a front eye mount with a torque box and the rear shackle goes through the frame like a Mopar with the psrings relocated.

On the other hand, I think GMs are comparable in build quality to Mopars (if you can get past all the different shims in the front end).

[72swinger440]

I had a 70 Mach 1 and the rear shock upper mount cracked bad enough that the shocks started to pertrude throught the metal  Cheap fix, welded on some washers and sold that pile.

[jyrki]

Looking at a mid sixties chevrolet nova, I thought the subframe was borrowed from a Toyota corolla. It's rediculous compared to an A-body mopar of the same era, and the front end geometry sucks big time.

[abqdart]

Whats funny is, you take any car from that era and hit somthing at 30 MPH and your probably still gonna drive it away.....todays cars, they just cumple....I will take any manufacturer from the days gone by over any car today....I loved my 1959 Fairlane.

[fasttcars]

Whats funny is, you take any car from that era and hit somthing at 30 MPH and your probably still gonna drive it away.....todays cars, they just cumple....I will take any manufacturer from the days gone by over any car today....I loved my 1959 Fairlane.

well true at 30 but at 80 the new cars are designed to crumble and take the shock,but the old cars its going to be your body that takes the shock[nothing that a cage can't fix]

[BIGFISH]

up front it's even worse!

Ditto. Why do you think they got Shelby to wave his magic wand over the shitstangs to make them handle. Ever see the strut/shock tower girdle the roadrace mustangs run just to keep the chassis from flexing around?

[DustMan]

My ex's dad has a Fox Body Mustang that was originally a V6 car. He bought from some joker that did a home-made fab job on engine compartment to drop in a 351 Cleveland and some kind of 5 speed, but the real issue was the motor and tranny were rigged in there with all of the stock V6 chassis parts and the stock rearend.

I went for a ride in the piece of s*%t. The car felt like it was shaking apart went he started beating on it and I had my feet on the dash in fear for my life after he tore the rear u-joints and the driveline popped and started dragging on the ground.     

I was too young at the time to tell that the car was a piece of crap or I would have never gotten in it.

He is an a-hole because he sold his b-body with a rusted passenger rear quarter panel because he thought it would be too much work, then took the money to buy that death-trap.