1973 Mach 1 Interior Seat Material Oddity?

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Seems a little odd..But not that odd nor impossible....Cause april, june kinda little late for 73 production...And i bet they was getting ready for 74 pinto which was a hot market at the time... pinto was in full swing sence 71 and was not going to end till 80..Im bet they was well stocked in Pinto parts compared too 71-73 parts by the end...And 1974 was the biggest production year for pinto.. "1974 saw the most Pintos produced in a single model year with 544,209 units"..Could mean alot of spares..lol

Im having a hard time finding a pinto back seat pannel to compare...Picture or anything..Seems to be rarer than our stang seats pannels..lol

 
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Seems a little odd..But not that odd nor impossible....Cause april, june kinda little late for 73 production...And i bet they was getting ready for 74 pinto which was a hot market at the time... pinto was in full swing sence 71 and was not going to end till 80..Im bet they was well stocked in Pinto parts compared too 71-73 parts by the end...And 1974 was the biggest production year for pinto.. "1974 saw the most Pintos produced in a single model year with 544,209 units"..Could mean alot of spares..lol

Im having a hard time finding a pinto back seat pannel to compare...Picture or anything..Seems to be rarer than our stang seats pannels..lol
Here is a photo I found of a '74 Pinto avocado interior. You can't see all of the seatback but they do look like the ones used in the Mustang.

14e2rgy.jpg


here is the brochure for the 74 Pinto - the seats are nothing like a Mustang.

http://www.cookieboystoys.com/vintage%20pinto/1974%20Pinto%20Brochure.htm

 
Yup...Back pannels i can only get little glimps shots of...Like this one..hehe...Never can see the whole pannel or atleast the bottom...I cannot find one for sale on ebay either....Hopefully John will get his seats out of storage soon so we can see what pannel his come with...John being a original stang owner with funky seats..I want to see what pannel his come with..Cause he knows for a fact his was never replaced....Could be replacement parts used, I'm am a bit curious thou...If a few stangs got pinto ..Why not other year of pinto's seat pannels on stangs? Or was only the 74 compatible?

 
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Seems a little odd..But not that odd nor impossible....Cause april, june kinda little late for 73 production...And i bet they was getting ready for 74 pinto which was a hot market at the time... pinto was in full swing sence 71 and was not going to end till 80..Im bet they was well stocked in Pinto parts compared too 71-73 parts by the end...And 1974 was the biggest production year for pinto.. "1974 saw the most Pintos produced in a single model year with 544,209 units"..Could mean alot of spares..lol

Im having a hard time finding a pinto back seat pannel to compare...Picture or anything..Seems to be rarer than our stang seats pannels..lol
You don't have to find anything

Your seat back has part number

D42B-xxxxxxxx-xx some have D$2B as they held the shift button

D42B = Pinto

D3ZZ = Mustang

 
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Seems a little odd..But not that odd nor impossible....Cause april, june kinda little late for 73 production...And i bet they was getting ready for 74 pinto which was a hot market at the time... pinto was in full swing sence 71 and was not going to end till 80..Im bet they was well stocked in Pinto parts compared too 71-73 parts by the end...And 1974 was the biggest production year for pinto.. "1974 saw the most Pintos produced in a single model year with 544,209 units"..Could mean alot of spares..lol

Im having a hard time finding a pinto back seat pannel to compare...Picture or anything..Seems to be rarer than our stang seats pannels..lol
You don't have to find anything

Your seat back has part number

D42P-xxxxxxxx-xx some have D$2P as they held the shift button

D42P = Pinto

D3ZZ = Mustang
Nope...Mine are D42B B= ?...

I think Steve with black seats with dif vinyl has same numbers...D42B on his seats too.

seats2.jpg

 
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Seems a little odd..But not that odd nor impossible....Cause april, june kinda little late for 73 production...And i bet they was getting ready for 74 pinto which was a hot market at the time... pinto was in full swing sence 71 and was not going to end till 80..Im bet they was well stocked in Pinto parts compared too 71-73 parts by the end...And 1974 was the biggest production year for pinto.. "1974 saw the most Pintos produced in a single model year with 544,209 units"..Could mean alot of spares..lol

Im having a hard time finding a pinto back seat pannel to compare...Picture or anything..Seems to be rarer than our stang seats pannels..lol
You don't have to find anything

Your seat back has part number

D42P-xxxxxxxx-xx some have D$2P as they held the shift button

D42P = Pinto

D3ZZ = Mustang
Nope...Mine are D42B B= ?
Wher you Been?

 
My car was produced on July 3, 1973. These are the original seats according to the original owner. I am the second owner. We may never know the correct answer but no harm in digging for the truth.

Back Seat 001.jpg

Back Seat 002.jpg

Front Seat.jpg

Front Seat Bottom.jpg

 
After Speaking with my uncle that used to work in the Ford plant in Lorain Ohio, he stated that , "if the line ran out of a part/parts, they would substitute the closest matching part the plant had on hand to get the car out, until they had the correct part back in stock, or not build any new cars until that parts were re stocked, but finish off what was already on the line, Parts were approved by the engineers and not the production line people."

he said this was very common un till he retired in the 90's from the Louisville Kentucky plant making trucks.

I know the Back seat lever of the Maverick and Pinto are the same as the Mustang. but different part numbers on them.

 
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My car was produced on July 3, 1973. These are the original seats according to the original owner. I am the second owner. We may never know the correct answer but no harm in digging for the truth.
That is the exact same seat I got from OMS (color too BTW)to replace my seat bottom frame.

 
Seems a little odd..But not that odd nor impossible....Cause april, june kinda little late for 73 production...And i bet they was getting ready for 74 pinto which was a hot market at the time... pinto was in full swing sence 71 and was not going to end till 80..Im bet they was well stocked in Pinto parts compared too 71-73 parts by the end...And 1974 was the biggest production year for pinto.. "1974 saw the most Pintos produced in a single model year with 544,209 units"..Could mean alot of spares..lol

Im having a hard time finding a pinto back seat pannel to compare...Picture or anything..Seems to be rarer than our stang seats pannels..lol
You don't have to find anything

Your seat back has part number

D42P-xxxxxxxx-xx some have D$2P as they held the shift button

D42P = Pinto

D3ZZ = Mustang
Nope...Mine are D42B B= ?...

I think Steve with black seats with dif vinyl has same numbers...D42B on his seats too.
Just goggle D42B it is a PINTO designation

 
After Speaking with my uncle that used to work in the Ford plant in Lorain Ohio, he stated that , "if the line ran out of a part/parts, they would substitute the closest matching part the plant had on hand to get the car out, until they had the correct part back in stock, or not build any new cars until that parts were re stocked, but finish off what was already on the line, Parts were approved by the engineers and not the production line people."

he said this was very common un till he retired in the 90's from the Louisville Kentucky plant making trucks.

I know the Back seat lever of the Maverick and Pinto are the same as the Mustang. but different part numbers on them.
{thumbs up} And from a guy who worked there...I don't know why it is so hard for some to believe this could of happend at Ford....I think the Pinto backseat pannels and vinyl seats was a last ditch effort to finish the last stangs so they could move on to mustang 2....Yes i could be wrong..But i was not wrong in thinking this could happen at the factory.

 
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Yup...Back pannels i can only get little glimps shots of...Like this one..hehe...Never can see the whole pannel or atleast the bottom...I cannot find one for sale on ebay either....Hopefully John will get his seats out of storage soon so we can see what pannel his come with...John being a original stang owner with funky seats..I want to see what pannel his come with..Cause he knows for a fact his was never replaced....Could be replacement parts used, I'm am a bit curious thou...If a few stangs got pinto ..Why not other year of pinto's seat pannels on stangs? Or was only the 74 compatible?
I'll try to get to storage and pull one of the front seats this week. Work has been keeping me busy.

-jbojo

 
So, I sent an inquiry to Ford about this a couple of weeks ago. I got the response via e-mail today. This should resolve the issue.

Here is the entire response from Ford:

Thank you for your recent contact with the Customer Relationship Center. I have looked into your request for your 1973 Ford Mustang Mach I and found out some further details that may help you. Our archives department has contacted Marti Auto Works and spoke with Kevin Marti. He has replied to your request and stated:

“The car could come that way. See pages 86 and 87 of my Mustang and Cougar Tagbook where this trim deviation is mentioned. What happened was the manufacturer ran out of the Comfortweave material. They advised Ford of when they would be getting their next mill run. It was too late for most of the tail end of 1973 production for any Mustang that used this material (which means it also applied to Mach Is that had the deluxe interior). Ford told them to substitute the plain vinyl in its place and Ford added the letter “A” to the trim code on their door data plate so their vehicle would have a three digit trim code.”

If you were to obtain a copy of Kevin’s Mustang book and the judges should certainly take that as accurate information.

I hope this information helps you!

Description: cid:[email protected]

Karen Brown

Research Unit Representative

North American Customer Relationship Center

 
Way to go jb73Mach!!!

Awesome to be able to get to the bottom of something that happened 40+ years ago.

I will be real curious to hear if the guys with this trim have the 3 digit interior codes?

Jeff

 
So, I sent an inquiry to Ford about this a couple of weeks ago. I got the response via e-mail today. This should resolve the issue.

Here is the entire response from Ford:

Thank you for your recent contact with the Customer Relationship Center. I have looked into your request for your 1973 Ford Mustang Mach I and found out some further details that may help you. Our archives department has contacted Marti Auto Works and spoke with Kevin Marti. He has replied to your request and stated:

“The car could come that way. See pages 86 and 87 of my Mustang and Cougar Tagbook where this trim deviation is mentioned. What happened was the manufacturer ran out of the Comfortweave material. They advised Ford of when they would be getting their next mill run. It was too late for most of the tail end of 1973 production for any Mustang that used this material (which means it also applied to Mach Is that had the deluxe interior). Ford told them to substitute the plain vinyl in its place and Ford added the letter “A” to the trim code on their door data plate so their vehicle would have a three digit trim code.”

If you were to obtain a copy of Kevin’s Mustang book and the judges should certainly take that as accurate information.

I hope this information helps you!

Description: cid:[email protected]

Karen Brown

Research Unit Representative

North American Customer Relationship Center
Here is the data plate on my door. Trim code is "GW". I'll take close up pics of the seat when I go to the storage unit.

-jbojo

IMG_2038.JPG

 
I just went and took a look at my 65-73 Mustang Restoration book and sure enough there are three digit trim codes with the extra A on some of them. The extra letter only appears with convertibles, fastbacks and Machs...no Hardtops or Grandes got the three digit trim code.

Jeff

 
Mine is also two digit GA (black). The build sheet does have an A in position 26 of Row A (at least as far as I can tell because the sheet is in very bad condition). Maybe that was the only indication?.

 
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