1969 Ford Mustang - Coupe 2 Fastback
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Classic Automotive Restoration Specialists Builds A '69 Mustang, Converting It From A Coupe To A SportsRoof
From the January, 2010 issue of Hot Rod
By Rob Kinnan
Photography by Rob Kinnan

       

Classic Automotive Restoration Specialists in Belews Creek, North Carolina, handled everything from the roof conversion to the chassis to the paint and interior. The color is DuPont Hot Hues True Blue over Starry Night.
As so often happens, the buildup of this car began in a bar. A few years ago, our Senior Vice President, Doug Evans, was sitting at the bar in the Peabody hotel in Memphis, knocking back a few with Editor-In-Chief Freiburger.

Evans: "You know, I love '69 Mustang SportsRoofs, but they are outta sight and getting hard to find, even rust buckets. Coupes are cheap enough, but I just am not crazy about the lines."

Freiburger: "Well, we built a crate Camaro."

Both in unison: "How about a coupe-to-fastback conversion kit?"

More beers and four years later, the car is finished. A '69 coupe was bought from Ron Coleman of Comp Cams, and Jim Barber at Classic Automotive Restoration Specialists (www.classicautomotiverestoration.com) was charged with making it happen. Jim conspired with a number of sheetmetal suppliers to assemble a kit with all-new steel to convert a coupe to a fastback.

Yes, this Mustang used to be a coupe. The taillight panel was converted to Shelby style with a fiberglass bolt-on panel, and it carries LED taillights made by Safe Code.
That sounds like a lot of work, doesn't it? Well it is, and we wanted to know just how involved the swap would be, so we went to CARS' shop in Belews Creek, North Carolina, to see for ourselves. There are Mustang coupe fans out there who are probably cringing right now, and we hear ya, but c'mon, admit it-a fastback just looks better.

After roughly 50 hours of measuring a coupe and a fastback next to each other, Jim found out that the differences in the two body styles were significant-it's more than just the roof and quarters. The fastback's A-pillar is laid back 5 degrees farther than the coupe's, which also makes the door glass different. The coupe's windshield is 1.185 inches taller and the coupe's roof is 1.250 inches higher. Therefore, there are 22 different inner structure pieces and 35 total pieces needed for the conversion. Jim tooled up 16 of the pieces on his own, so CARS is the only place you can get the complete conversion kit.


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