1973 Mach 1 Interior Seat Material Oddity?

[jeff8877]

Steve,

I don't have any info on this. I took pics of some cars with white interior at one point when I was trying to figure out why they looked different than my original. May still be info out there on the net if you do a search.

Try mustangattitude.com and look through their pics...lots of cars.

Jeff

 

[OMS]

Steve I had a 73 Mach 1 parts car a couple of years ago with Ginger interior like that

I though someone had it made at an upholstery shop - so I may have tossed or sold them for cores.

I'll check the used seats and see if any of it is still there.

 

[Steve73QMach1]

Steve I had a 73 Mach 1 parts car a couple of years ago with Ginger interior like that

I though someone had it made at an upholstery shop - so I may have tossed or sold them for cores.

I'll check the used seats and see if any of it is still there.

Ok Don - that would be great if you have one left - if it still has the seat back attached it could be one of the Pinto D42B parts! It appears that the D42B seat backs went with these odd ball seats.

 

[OMS]

Steve I had a 73 Mach 1 parts car a couple of years ago with Ginger interior like that

I though someone had it made at an upholstery shop - so I may have tossed or sold them for cores.

I'll check the used seats and see if any of it is still there.

Ok Don - that would be great if you have one left - if it still has the seat back attached it could be one of the Pinto D42B parts! It appears that the D42B seat backs went with these odd ball seats.

Steve , only had 1 maybe 2 with the odd seat material

Have had LOTS of the D4 seat backs - I think if you went and bought replacement seatbacks from the dealer they would have been the D4 version

 

[hyena429]

At the end of a model year, there was a process known as 'balance out' that means what it says. As Ford is winding down the production line, they don't want a lot of extra parts and materials. Substitution became a lot more common. If they ran out of black paint, they might actually not paint a car black. You can't paint with what you don't have. If there were 20 cars left and they only had 14 radios, the other six cars would be built without radios, even if they were ordered with radios. This idea applies to upholstery, dash pads, bumper guards, etc.

From the Marti auto works site..Could explain dif materials and pannels and such...Still got to stop buy and ask the guy we got it from 20ish years ago if it had weave or?..He lives down the street...See him once and a while still...He tore the original white interior out and replaced it with black weave...He gave me all the original white trim he replaced just a few years ago when i ran into him.

 

[Kit Sullivan]

Yes, but you are ignoring the fact that the "part" that line workers grab while on the assembly line, in this particular instance, is an upholstery set...manufactured by a different vendor before-hand in a different location.

It would then have to be the upholstery vendor that "ran out" of the confortweave material and randomly substituted the smooth vinyl in its place.

That makes no sense to me considering that comfortweave was subsequently used on other Ford products, so they clearly were not "out" of it.

The only thing I think makes sense is that Ford may have intentionally changed the specs from comfortweave to smooth vinyl in an attempt to save some money on the last few vehicles from a "lame duck" car line.

 

[Steve73QMach1]

I was browsing through the Marti report forum looking for late production 73 Mach 1's to see if there were any other Mach 1 sports interiors that were non-comfortweave. I found member HighOctane whose car was built on 7/3/73. He has the ginger Mach 1 interior - and not surprisingly it appears to be all vinyl:

In his photo album he states that his interior is unrestored also:

http://www.7173mustangs.com/ezgallery.php?action=view&id=1173

Hey HighOctane - could you post a photo of your rear seat as well?

 

[hyena429]

Yes, but you are ignoring the fact that the "part" that line workers grab while on the assembly line, in this particular instance, is an upholstery set...manufactured by a different vendor before-hand in a different location.

It would then have to be the upholstery vendor that "ran out" of the confortweave material and randomly substituted the smooth vinyl in its place.

That makes no sense to me considering that comfortweave was subsequently used on other Ford products, so they clearly were not "out" of it.

The only thing I think makes sense is that Ford may have intentionally changed the specs from comfortweave to smooth vinyl in an attempt to save some money on the last few vehicles from a "lame duck" car line.

We have no idea if Ford ran out of comfortweave or not at that time. ..Sence none of us worked for them at the time..Most 74 cars from Ford seem to just have vinyl...My 1974 mustang 2 mach 1..Has original seats and are black vinyl.....How do we know if other 73 Ford model cars did not get replaced with vinyl too?..And not tring to start a fight..We are all grabbing at straws here.

Ford put it on the grand torinos in 73 as a nicer higher quality leather like seat.... The Gran Torino Brougham featured the finest upholsteries in the Torino line-up, including "leather like" vinyl....Alot 73 Mercs seem to get the same vinyl too as the late stangs....Start of this thread most was douting these seats where original at all..And with evidence and more questions we kinda figured out something did happen...either it was with vendor or they ran out for a short period or decided to change...But i dout it would be that much cheaper for them to change it up at the end and tell the vendor to stop using comfort weave only on last stangs...And if Ford had plenty of comfort weave..Why on earth would they change it ? I dout it costed much more than regular vinyl...Let alone having to figure out a new pattern...Too me it shows a sign that they ran out..Could be wrong..But im happy if some one has the truth and knows for sure.

 

[Steve73QMach1]

Steve,

Here is a pic of front but not 100% sure if from the same car...

Jeff,

I just realized this is a photo of member jbojo's Mach 1. His is a late June car (6/28/73) and looks like an all vinyl Mach 1 interior. Based on his build thread, he is the original owner. I will PM him to see if those seats are original.

 

[hyena429]

Ohh.need to see if he has original back seat covers too...Would be wild if they was 74 ones like we got

 

[Steve73QMach1]

Ohh.need to see if he has original back seat covers too...Would be wild if they was 74 ones like we got

I bet they are!

 

[Kit Sullivan]

The comfortweave was notoriously fragile, especially on a car left baking in the hot sun every day. Many owners had thier seats repaired with smooth vinyl inserts after only a few years of ownership. Thd cracked door panels on the white interior above suggest this car may be an example of that.

I am still of the opinion that these smooth-vinyl oddities were modified after initial delivery.

 

[Steve73QMach1]

Here is a summary of the Mach 1's I have found so far on this forum that have the all vinyl Mach 1 sports interiors:

jb73mach - black interior, build date 7/5/73


HighOctane - ginger interior, build date 7/3/73


jbojo - white interior, build date 6/28/73 (original owner)


Steve73QMach1 - black interior, build date 7/5/73


Steve 73QMach1 - black interior, build date 6/29/73

jbojo indicated in a PM to me that his seats were all vinyl when he purchased the car in 1973. That correlates to the comments from the original owner of my 4 speed car that the seats were all vinyl when he took delivery of it in 1973. I'm continuing to sift through the Marti reports posted here for 73 Mach 1's to see if I can arrive at an effectivity date for the use of the all vinyl interiors in the Mach 1 sports interior option. Right now, it appears that it started during the last few days of June 1973.

Kit - I know you don't buy any of this, but the facts are indicating that these Mach 1's left the factory with these interiors. I have faith in the comments of the original owners. I think they would remember if they had their seats re-covered.

 

[hyena429]

Jbojo "John" got his late model mustang new off the lot in 1973...With these type of seats installed....Tring figure out what date this started to happen ...Seems most people with a mustang build date of around june'ish having these odd seats..To me that is a sign too..I could understand them being replace if these were early "72'73" stangs ... really dout the interiors would be destroyed new on lot before even being used..If that was the fact Ford would of stopped using Confortweave all together before production even started in 73...Sence they used it on plenty of other years of stangs....I'm going to pop over today and chat with John a bit and see how he getting along with his project...And maybe take a look at his original seat pannels too..See what code is on the pannels..There mite be a correlation with the odd seat pannels and these vinyl seats.

 

[Kit Sullivan]

It isn't that I don't accept that these could have come from Ford this way...I may even be leaning towards agreeing with that maybe.

My disbelief is that Ford "ran out" of comfortweave and randomly substituted smooth vinyl. I absolutely do not believe that happened fkr that reason.

A more logical explanation is probably the cause if these are actually OEM seats.

 

[hyena429]

It isn't that I don't accept that these could have come from Ford this way...I may even be leaning towards agreeing with that maybe.

My disbelief is that Ford "ran out" of comfortweave and randomly substituted smooth vinyl. I absolutely do not believe that happened fkr that reason.

A more logical explanation is probably the cause if these are actually OEM seats.

Ford vendors run out of other things...Why is it hard too believe that they "mite" of ran out of material for the seats for a short time?....Only some one who worked at Ford at the time could say one way or another... If anyone has a late model stang with comfortweave seats original...And original owner...They can disprove it all or help with tring to pin down the time frame.....i will stick by what i said before...We do not know right now ,but by my opinion something did happen...And we should all work together to figure it out....If seats skins were replaced...Run out...Redesigned....Or whatever happend..lol..No better site for it than 71-73 stangs to try and bust this mystery...With all the Marti reports and such we should be able to get close to nailing it down.

 

[Steve73QMach1]

Kit - I understand what you are saying. Knowing what I know now, it doesn't seem like it would have been a case of them running out of the material. I can't imagine they would have run out of all colors at the same time. It seems like it was an intentional in line change order that took place for some unknown reason. It would be nice to know if the seats were upholstered at Ford or if they sub contracted them out. Like hyena said - something happened to the late Mach 1's and I believe it happened at Ford before the cars were shipped.

Hyena - let us know what John says about his car and what seat backs he has.

 

[hyena429]

Kit - I understand what you are saying. Knowing what I know now, it doesn't seem like it would have been a case of them running out of the material. I can't imagine they would have run out of all colors at the same time. It seems like it was an intentional in line change order that took place for some unknown reason. It would be nice to know if the seats were upholstered at Ford or if they sub contracted them out. Like hyena said - something happened to the late Mach 1's and I believe it happened at Ford before the cars were shipped.

Hyena - let us know what John says about his car and what seat backs he has.

I think he told me before..It was the same 74 ones like we got..But i will double check..lol

 

[Paul of MO]

Seems simple to me - the supplier ran out of a common comfort weave color or two at the very end of a discontinued body style production and a change was made. Maybe a few dozen or even a few hundred cars effected.

Happens early in a production run also - there are a handfull of very early 73's with chrome hood and fender mouldings. Maybe they had some left over from 72 or maybe the new supply of painted ones were not ready yet.

It may be that we will never know.

I agree that these seats came this way - the original owners are the original owners and know what they bought.

- Paul

 

[OMS]

there are a handfull of very early 73's with chrome hood and fender mouldings. Maybe they had some left over from 72 or maybe the new supply of painted ones were not ready yet.

Never heard of or saw any of these before ?

Can I ask what source the info came from

As for the seat material - that was factory - I have had it in a couple of parts cars - knew it was odd but now a bunch are showwing up.