"Ugly Pony" Drift car project

I've had a 71 Mustang Grande for roughly 6 Years and it has sat dormant in my driveway for about the last 3 years. I have finally gotten to the point I want to see it do something cool and go from it's last legs of life to burning rubber and hitting serious angle. I have a full overhaul of the suspension steering and engine in line for the car.

At the moment all I've gotten done is removed the grill, chrome trim around the vinyl roof, hubcaps, and other various trim pieces. I have also pretty much finished its rattle can makeover from white to satin black.

In the coming year or two I will be doing coilovers, rack and pinion steering, rear lowering springs+slapperbars, 17x10 volk te37v's on toyo R888's, full disc brake upgrade, higher rear end gearing(Haven't decided yet), full cage seats and harnesses, extreme angle steering upgrades, heads, cam, tunnel ram intake, dual quad barrel carbs, sequential transmission, hydraulic e-brake, full custom dash and probably more that I haven't decided just yet.

That sound like an interesting and cool plan. Can't say that I've seen a older stang s a drifter....would be an awesome sight!!!

The problem with these cars is that they don't steer far enough for drifting and require lots of modifications in order to get enough wheel angle to properly drift them. It's way cheaper and easier to make a newer car do that which is why you don't see vintage cars as drift cars.

This is gonna be interesting.

Hey Mike,

Unless you are Ken Block:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGvKjk_VrHE

I heard Ken was inspired by your video!

...Mickus

That sound like an interesting and cool plan. Can't say that I've seen a older stang s a drifter....would be an awesome sight!!!

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The only other time I have seen a drift car like this is the Hoonicorn but that thing is only 1% of the original car considering that the whole thing is a tube frame with an early mustang coupe body welded on

The problem with these cars is that they don't steer far enough for drifting and require lots of modifications in order to get enough wheel angle to properly drift them. It's way cheaper and easier to make a newer car do that which is why you don't see vintage cars as drift cars.

This is gonna be interesting.

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That's a part of the reason why I am converting to rack and pinion. I am also going to have to shorten the steering arms on the knuckles to make them get more angle. Not to mention all the cutting for clearance at full lock.

BTW I like the video of your mustang, it's really well done and looks great.

That sounds like a cool and different project, looking forward to updates.

Thanks for the kind comments on the video, guys!

I'm interested in what your plans are to strengthen the integrity of the infamous flexible flyer. Overall rigidity ,steering angle sharpness and adjustability to suspension characteristics like stiffness & Ackerman angles are of most importance. I would think that rebuilding everything from the firewall forward will be in order. Power and a locking axle are certainly not a challenge to the mustang but the aforementioned will surely be difficult to accomplish and require extensive modification , Good luck sounds like it will be awesome if you can pull it off. Lots of pics would be great. Looking forward to it.

Oh, on a related topic: I hope you're doing this just for fun. Don't expect to be competitive with your car or it will definitely be cheaper if you just burn your paycheck every month.

Since big money started to take over cars with less than 750-800 hp are no longer competitive. And that number goes up every year.

Certified information from an insider.

Oh, on a related topic: I hope you're doing this just for fun. Don't expect to be competitive with your car or it will definitely be cheaper if you just burn your paycheck every month.

Since big money started to take over cars with less than 750-800 hp are no longer competitive. And that number goes up every year.

Certified information from an insider.

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Yeah it's a more of for fun and the laughs the car will generate as they see me trolling down the street lol. That's why I got on this forum, as I don't know a lot about this age of mustang. I know what a drift car needs and how to achieve it but I don't know the little "quirks" about these cars I guess you could say.

I'm interested in what your plans are to strengthen the integrity of the infamous flexible flyer. Overall rigidity ,steering angle sharpness and adjustability to suspension characteristics like stiffness & Ackerman angles are of most importance. I would think that rebuilding everything from the firewall forward will be in order. Power and a locking axle are certainly not a challenge to the mustang but the aforementioned will surely be difficult to accomplish and require extensive modification , Good luck sounds like it will be awesome if you can pull it off. Lots of pics would be great. Looking forward to it.

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I am going to do some sort of full tube frame and upgrade in the front. I am gonna go with big disc and probably 4 or 6 piston calipers as well as a steering rack and fully custom knuckles to allow for more angle and 0 ackerman. I will hopefully start seriously building it in the next month or so depending on what happens with my truck that I am in the process of replacing the turbo on.

I have officially named the car in what seemed to me to be the most fitting way possible. . .

By spray painting it across the naturally rusty hood of course!



The build won't really start until I finish putting my trucks turbo back on but hopefully it won't be too long before I get to start this thing for real.

Hey man, how's it going? Any new updates on your build? By the way, I apologize if i'm reviving this thread after years of inactivity but I have a question since you mentioned the tires you're using. I was browsing 4WheelOnline and saw that specific toyo proxes. Is it worth buying? Is it true that the R888 have the same compound with Nitto NT01? I've read in one forum that they have the same compound on a different carcass.