Problem questions and answers

A gentleman posted a question as a comment on something and I did not notice it for a few weeks. It's not that I just blew him off or anything, it's just that I didn't see it. Sorry about that Sean, by the way. So, if you have a question about something that your car seems to be doing, or not doing, post it here, and I promise that I will check this at least once a day and try to help you out if I can.

1965 and 1966 Mustang emergency flashers

Here's how this stuff is supposed to work. The two yellow arrows in the picture indicate where the flasher pot plugs into the harness. The emergency flashers have their own flasher pot, also part number 552, which is not the flasher pot that operates the turn signals. The middle picture shows you the two plug connectors that interupt the turn signal plug-in connector towards the base of the steering column. You just unplug the turn signal switch, and then plug the two connectors from the emergency flashers into the two connectors that you just unplugged. It isn't possible to plug them in the wrong way, there's only one way that they will all go together. The first picture shows a red arrow, which is pointing at the wire that plugs into the back of the cigarette lighter, and a green arrow that is pointing at the wire that plugs into a blue wire with a white stripe that is coming out of the fuse box. Nothing to it.

Torque Specifications

Here are the torque specifications for your 65/66 car. At the bottom is the general guide for bolts of various sizes. One should always proceed with caution when dealing with 40+ year old components. This will not be their first rodeo. You have decades worth of metal fatigue due to wide variations in temperature, along with the simple march of time, slightly distorted threads from previous repairs, slightly looser threads from the metal loss due to rust, etc.. to contend with. And, metalurgy in the 60s wasn't anything close to what it is today. There was a much greater degree of variation in the strength and consistency of the seemingly identical components. By now, each and every component has it's own distinctly unique set of characteristics. You will need to be much more cautious and pay a lot more attention to what you're doing than you would if you were just slapping together brand new stuff.

VIN decoder for 1965 and 1966 Mustangs

I just realized that I haven't gotten around to putting this up yet. Oh, well.Here's what the VIN on your 65/66 car means.
The first digit is the year model, as in 5 means 1965 and 6 means 1966

The second digit is the code for the plant at which your car was built. F is Dearborn, MI, R is San Jose, CA and T is Metuchan, NJ. Those were the only three plants that were building Mustangs then.

The third and fourth digits represent the body style. 07 is a coupe, 08 is a convertible and 09 is a fastback.

The fifth digit is the engine code.
U is a 170 cid six cylinder with a 1 bbl carb
T is a 200 cid six cylinder with a 1 bbl carb
F is 260 cid V8 with a 2 bbl carb
C is a 289 cid V8 with a 2bbl carb
D is a 289 cid V8 with a 480 cfm 4 bbl carb
A is a 289 cid V8 with a 480 cfm 4 bbl carb
K is a 289 cid V8 with a 600 cfm 4 bbl carb ( along with some other cool stuff)

The last six digits are the sequential production, or 'serial' number.

The picture indicates the location of the three VIN stampings on a 65/66 car. If you open the hood, you should be able to see the front one on the driver's side. To see the other two you have to remove the fenders.

How much is my 65/66 Mustang worth?

A question that is frequently asked is ' I have a 65 Mustang. How much is it worth?', and then the process of trying to coax a little more information out of the person begins, which often seems like pulling teeth. The simple truth of the matter is this. There is absolutely no way to accurately appraise the value of a forty+ year old vehicle based on a couple of emails and a phone conversation. The market variables are sometimes far too subtle and complicated for someone to stick a price tag on the car based on such vague information. The statement of ' I have a 65 Mustang' does not narrow it down at all. There is a world of difference between a rust-bucket 6 cyl coupe, a 98 pt. trailered concours factory GT K code convertible, and an R model GT-350. There are a few things that are the kiss of death for a 65/66 Mustang's value.



The motor that the car came with originally is what the car is. What is physically present in the car at the moment means almost nothing. If your car came originally with a 6 cyl, you have a 6 cyl car. " But it now has a supercharged 427 SOHC motor in it." You have a 6 cyl car that has a very expensive motor in it, and that motor would be worth even more if it didn't have that pesky 6 cyl Mustang wrapped around it. The car is actually bringing down the value of the motor. Here is how that heirarchy works. The fifth digit of the vin tells you what motor/carb the car came with originally. The value, from top to bottom, would be K, A, D, C, F, T, U, with the K code at the top of the list and the humble U code as the low man on the totem pole.



The body style matters. With everything else being equal, a fastback is worth more than a convertible, and they are both worth more than a coupe. People like the fastbacks, and Ford built about 5 times as many coupes as they did fastbacks, so, rarity+desireability= more expensive. Same deal with convertibles. People like convertibles, Ford didn't build very many compared to the coupes, and a convertible is far more prone to rusting away to nothing, so more of them are lost or parted out every year. The totem pole of body styles would be fastback, convertible then coupe.

Then there is the condition of the body. Each and every car is in it's own unique condition. Many of these cars have been wrecked, some on more than one occassion, with the following repairs being done with various levels of skill and quality. Sometimes the repairs were done very well, but the method is slip-shod by it's very nature. A car gets hit real hard in the rear. Rather than do all of the work needed to fix what's there, it was not uncommon to just take another car that had crashed into something, crushing the front of it, saw both cars in half and weld the two good ends together. This is called being 'clipped', and you have to get underneath the car to see if this has been done. There is not supposed to be a raggedy seam going all the way across the middle of the car. A car can be drop-dead gorgeous in pictures, but have the entire cowl area or the rear frame rails be rotten from rust, rendering the car unsafe to drive. You have to look at the car very carefully and know exactly what's supposed to be there.

And then there is always the question of whether or not the car that you are looking at really is who it says it is, especially on the K codes or the factory GTs. On the K codes, there is a little more to it than looking at the breather decal. The K codes came with a manual choke carburetor. This manual choke has a cable going from under the dash inside the car through the firewall and out to the carb. That cable went through a specific hole in a specific location and was of a specific size. The K codes were the only cars to have this. If that hole isn't in the firewall, something is very seriously wrong here, even though the vin is that of a K code. All K codes came with a 9 inch rear end and all other 65/66 Mustangs came with either an 8 inch or the integral carrier of the 6cyl cars. On a 9 inch rear end the snubber is mounted to a bracket that is attached to the rear end. All other 65/66 Mustangs have the snubber bolted to a piece that's spot welded to the floor of the car. That bracket should not be on the floor of the K code. To make things more interesting, there is a piece welded to the floor of the K code also, for the snubber to bump into instead of just sheet metal, and it is virtually impossible to describe them both in such a way for someone to be able to accurately identify what's on the car that they are looking at. The differences are very easy to tell if you know what the K code bumper plate looks like, though. If the car has the snubber mounting bracket instead of the bumper plate, again, we have a big problem.
A person could say that 'This K code has it's original, vin stamped motor' and technically be telling the truth, but the motor is missing nearly eight thousand dollars worth of parts, like the carb, fan, balancer, distributor, main bearing caps, etc... The 65 K codes had a unique set of motor mounts that don't look anything like the other 65 Mustang motor mounts, and they are very difficult to find, and extremely expensive when you do finally track down a set. And, just for fun, Ford made them very, very similar to the Fairlane motor mounts, but not identical, but it is extremely difficult to tell the K code mounts from the Fairlane mounts when they are bolted to the car, especially if they are all funky-looking and covered with dirt and grease and stuff.
The bottom line is that, in order to accurately determine the fair market value of a 65/66 Mustang, someone that is thoroughly familiar with 65/66 Mustangs is going to have to have a look at the car in person. When someone asks me what a car is worth that I have never seen and don't know anyone that has, the only thing I can do is ask them to email the car to me and let have a look at it.

On a high dollar car, like a K code or a GT, there is no way to tell what a particular car is worth without having someone that knows exactly what to look for go and inspect the car in person.

Why we call them 64 1/2 Mustangs

There has always been some discussion about this point among Mustang folks. The reason that there has always been discussion is because the point is a little more complicated than it might seem at a glance.On the one hand, you have the fact that all Mustangs built prior to the 66 model year have 1965 vins, and on the title it says 1965 Ford Mustang.One would think that this would pretty much exhaust the matter. But, on the other hand, you have a mountain of evidence to the contrary.First off, you have dozens, if not hundreds, of parts on a 65/66 Mustang carrying a part number that goes C4Z something or another. If you check with your handy Ford part number decoder you will see that C4Z means 1964 Mustang. Fortunately, I have a pretty extensive collection of original Ford publications from that era. The first picture is the cover of a Ford publication that they put out in aug of 1963 in preparation for the 64 model year. It is not a copy or a reprodution, it is a 44 year old, original brochure of about 16 pages. On the cover you see several 64 model cars with license plates that say '1964'. On the top is a Mustang, but they have it turned sideways. The next couple of pictures are of a trim and upholstery guide. Each Ford dealership was given a couple of these every year in preparation for the new model year to help people see what their new car would look like with a particular trim, upholstery and paint scheme. And in it we have the Mustang section. You will also notice the absence of the fastback body style. Those were not available during the 64 model year, but the coupe and convertible were, even though this car that was built in march or april of 64 had a 65 title. Clearly, Ford was building and selling Mustangs during the 64 model year and these cars have numerous distinct differences from the cars built and sold for the regular 65 model year, and the differences between a 64 1/2 and a 65 are far more numerous and significant than the differences between a 65 and a 66. That's why folks keep arguing about it. There is no clear-cut right or wrong answer. It just depends on how heavily you weight 'this' aginst 'that'.

Since I was 8 or 9 I have been wondering about why Ford gave the Mustangs that we call 64 1/2s 65 VINs. They started building them in like feb. of 64. There isn't a single part anywhere on the car with a 65 part number. If you see a part with the number starting out C5Z and going on, that part has been replaced. Ford quit using 5-bolt, generator charged motors at the end of the 64 model year. All 65s had 6-bolt, alternator charged motors, etc... Everything about the cars say that they are 64 model cars, with the exception of the VIN. Why did they do that? Someone had to make that decision, and the decision was made before they ever built the first Mustang. What was the rationale behind it? They started out by building about 25,000 Mustangs to start selling on April 17 of 64. They felt like that would be enough to carry them through until the 65 model year began. However, they sold every one of those cars, plus took orders for about 15,000 more on the april 17 of 64. They also introduced several other pretty cool things in 64, like the factory lightweight T-bolts and some K code Falcons and stuff to hedge their bet on the Mustangs. They had no idea if these cars would sell or not, and just in case they still had 20,000 of those first 25,000 Mustangs in aug. of 64, they could still sell them as brand new 65 model cars. They didn't know. Maybe those Mustangs will do the same thing that some other seemingly good ideas on car design did, namely, they couldn't give them away. They didn't do it to confuse and bewilder as yet unborn enthusiasts at all. It was one more way to hedge the bet.

I have actually pondered this question on a regular basis and have come up with nothing for a really long time. It just made no sense to me. Everything about it is a 1964 model car, and yet, someone made the decision to title these things as 65 model cars in the winter of 63/64, They weren't building any other 65 model cars. They weren't even making any parts for 65 model cars yet. They were advertising them right beside other 64 model cars. It was a very strange decision to make. It would probably have never even crossed my mind to do that, unless I was sitting in a meeting discussing this and someone said, " You know, we're all going to be looking for jobs if these things don't sell" Then we would start brainstorming about how to avoid that very unattractive eventuality, and that's where the idea for 65 VINs came up. For as far back as I can remember, I would just sit down and think about something that pertained to a 65/66 Mustang on a regular basis. Sometimes I put my car up on jackstands and crawl around underneath it, just looking at stuff. Like watching television. For hours.This 65 VIN thing has confused me to no end for the longest time, and, again, finally coming up with something that makes sense about this, to me anyway, very perplexing question, has made me really happy.

Trunk lock cylinder replacement 1965 1966 Mustang

The first picture shows the trunk latch. Remove the two bolts holding it onto the trunk lid and it will basically fall off into your hand. Make sure that it is, in fact, your hand that it falls into, instead of letting it figure out a way to hit a painted surface.
This is a picture of what you will see when you get the trunk latch out of the way. Remove that nut with a socket wrench and pull the washer off with the nut. That will leave a split, funny looking tube thingy that is pinched onto the back side of the lock cylinder bezel. The split tube thingy will pull off of there.
The next two pictures are the entire assembly. The first is full assembled, minus that pesky trunk lid, and the second is everything disassembled.

This last picture shows the release button for the lock cylinder. You just depress that button with the key in the lock, turn the key a little bit so that the key won't come out of the cylinder when you pull on it, and pull the cylinder out. If the reason that you are replacing the cylinder is that you have no key for it, you can also take a very small flat-bladed screwdriver and get behind the cylinder with it and, with the button depressed, pop the cylinder out like that. The rod sticking out of the back of the bezel is a seperate piece that you will need to put back in before you install the new cylinder, or put your old cylinder back into your new bezel. Whatever it is that you are trying to accomplish here, drop the rod into the bezel, put the lock cylinder into the bezel, making sure that the tab on the end of the lock cylinder is lined up with the slot in the end of the rod, put the trunk lid gasket onto the bezel, put the bezel into hole in the trunk lid, put the split tube thingy onto the bezel from inside the trunk, put the washer and the nut on the bezel and snug up the nut. It doesn't need to be tight enough to have the bezel squash the gasket and crack the paint.


As a side note, if you have accidentally locked your keys in the trunk of the car, ( hey, it happens ) what you do is, on a coupe or a convertible remove the upper part of the back seat and take a half inch socket wrench with about 3 miles of extensions on it, and remove either the two bolts holding the trunk latch to the trunk lid or the two holding the the other part of the trunk latch to the taillight panel area, whichever you can get to the easiest. If you have a fastback, crawl through the trap door and do the same thing. You might have to remove that rear carpeted piece to get the trap door open, depending on how well the trap door is adjusted, which is usually not very well.