About 1969 mustang

[RagmopInKona]

I drove my 86 bronco for the first time in about 2 months today after driving only my bike and my 2022 mach 1.

lol. steering? what? road noise? body roll? I mean, I know a bronco is not a mustang, but from newer trucks, and older cars....the diff is absolutely amazing.

Oh, hell ya.
We tend to forget what older vehicles drove like, I mean I love my old vehicles, but they need a lot of work to handle, brake, or even go, compared to even today's basic econobox.
Only thing they have not topped is the 60-90's floating down the road living room on wheels ride . I don't think they will ever be able to top,best that. The downside of that living room on wheels is they don't handle well at todays speeds, and stopping distance is a lot longer than vehicles today. But the ride. WORTH IT.

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[K4fxd]

But the ride. WORTH IT.

I loved my 1963 Impala SS 409 4 speed. It got up and went and rode like a living room sofa on the freeway.

Huge back seat. Was my HS car.

 

[RagmopInKona]

I loved my 1963 Impala SS 409 4 speed. It got up and went and rode like a living room sofa on the freeway.

Huge back seat. Was my HS car.

Got up and went. maybe but today a base camry is faster.
I mean I'll admit, I was stupid as a kid, thinking just because a car barked the tires at shift ment it was fast. Or the ever famous, matting the gas through the wood at 50mph it roast the tires. lol, the crap many of us though = fast.
Oh, to be young and dumb again.

 

[K4fxd]

Got up and went. maybe but today a base camry is faster.

Maybe if you used the stock 14 x 7 inch tires.

3400 pounds 425 HP. Needed 100 octane gas.

If we had todays tires I'll bet it would hold it's own.

 

[Lemien]

Thank you guys for the clear answer

 

[K4fxd]

Thank you guys for the clear answer

If you want it to handle like a race car, have the money and love the car, it is absolutely worth it. Only you can answer this.

 

[RagmopInKona]

Maybe if you used the stock 14 x 7 inch tires.

3400 pounds 425 HP. Needed 100 octane gas.

If we had todays tires I'll bet it would hold it's own.

Sticky tires just broke stuff. Nothing like repairing the upper 4 link crossmember mounts you ripped out of it with a 4000+ rpm launch. G.m. frame welds in the 60-70's were, um special.

 

[K4fxd]

I broke many carrier bearings, never any welds.

 

[Biggus Dickus]

lol. steering? what? road noise? body roll? I mean, I know a bronco is not a mustang, but from newer trucks, and older cars....the diff is absolutely amazing.

There's a reason AC didn't drive OJ around at high speeds

 

[Jimmy Dean]

Oh, hell ya.
We tend to forget what older vehicles drove like, I mean I love my old vehicles, but they need a lot of work to handle, brake, or even go, compared to even today's basic econobox.
Only thing they have not topped is the 60-90's floating down the road living room on wheels ride . I don't think they will ever be able to top,best that. The downside of that living room on wheels is they don't handle well at todays speeds, and stopping distance is a lot longer than vehicles today. But the ride. WORTH IT.

had an ole monte carlo. man, those seats were like a lazy-boy

 

[Jimmy Dean]

I broke many carrier bearings, never any welds.

I've got a 9" in my 82 bronco with a 513 c.i. with broken carrier bearings right now. it broke the entire housing actually on the last launch. who woulda thunk that 650 horses and 39x15.5" tires on a spool would be too much for a 9" Ford huh?

 

[RagmopInKona]

I've got a 9" in my 82 bronco with a 513 c.i. with broken carrier bearings right now. it broke the entire housing actually on the last launch. who woulda thunk that 650 horses and 39x15.5" tires on a spool would be too much for a 9" Ford huh?

Think he was talking about the two piece drive shaft carrier bearing.

 

[Buldawg76]

My 64 goat 389 tri power, 4 speed, posi rear with delete everything but alternator never broke anything and would run with today's cars pretty well at 12.70 off the showroom floor. It did not handle or stop worth a darn but went straight ok once you learned to feather the go pedal to keep the tires hooked up. If you dumped the clutch from a stop, it would smoke those H60-15s thru 1st, 2nd and 3rd gears all the way to 100mph, with today's tires I am sure it would break all kinds of stuff since they would hook up so much better.

Still was a fun car and if you drove it sensibly it would get 18mpg around town and 22mpg on interstate at 80 mph. You could watch gas gauge drop every time you opened the Tri Power though.

I miss that goat.

BD

 

[IPOGT]

Or leave it stockish and get a feel for what we old timers had to drive when we were young.

Except by the time some of us got a hold of them they had already seen better days.

 

[Rick#7]

If you want to drive the car, early Mustang stock suspension (especially the front) is completely terrible.

But I would just buy something from TCP, Griggs or Ridetech for the front and leave the rear suspension alone. Maybe if you really want to mistreat the car add in some subframe connectors. You can get by with cheap disc brakes in the front and stock drums out back. If you want to lower the rear either rebuild or buy specific leaf springs for that. I wouldn't bother with a conversion to a fancy multilink setup in the rear.

My answer is no you don't have to spend that much, but it's going to be expensive. FIgure out what you want and add everything up before you start. Decide if you really want to go down that road.

But I would also encourage you to make a cruiser. Don't try to build it into a race car. I think that will cost way too much money. Use a modern car for track days, not a classic.

IMO the biggest issue with most classic mustang suspensions is they are completely worn out, especially the steering, and people drive them expecting them to handle like a new car. If you refresh a 69 mustang suspension with all new quality parts using readily available aftermarket springs and sway bars, it can provide a surprisingly decent ride and handling characteristics.

The biggest shortcomings in the factory suspension are pretty easy to fix, and the aftermarket has long ago provided multiple solutions that don't dramatically increase the cost of simply rebuilding the factory suspension. For spirited Street driving, all you need is a simple wedge kit to lower the upper control arm and correct the camber curve, then simply replace all of the rubber bushings with poly or bearings to eliminate binding and deflection in the components, allowing the suspension to move as the engineers designed it to.

Vintage racers use that type of setup to turn some surprisingly quick track times.

To answer the OPs question, no, expensive and or elaborate chassis bracing is not necessary unless you plan to seriously track the car. Simple sub-frame connectors can stiffen the chassis enough for cruising and even some spirited street driving.

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