(UPDATED FROM 10/9/2020)
Did Ford deviate too much from the original Ford Mustang’s size before finally getting it right once again in 2005? That year was pivotal because it was the first time in a quarter century that the pony car received an all-new body. Although the Mustang has been restyled since then, it is still based on the same platform.
Paul Niedermeyer (2014b) suggested that the original Mustang was a “just about the right size, forever.” He further argued that the 2005 model returned to the original Mustang’s size after quite a few zigs and zags over the years.
This view has some merit — at least if you assume that iconic cars should not evolve any more than the Peanuts comic strip.
The problem with viewing the Mustang in static terms is that automotive technology has significantly evolved over the last half century. In the mid-60s the Mustang was among the smallest and lightest of U.S.-built cars. Today, the first-generation Mustang’s footprint is a far cry from entry level. And that doesn’t take into account how post-2004 models have bloated out in key respects.
If the Mustang was to continue being an entry-level sporty coupe for the masses, then it couldn’t maintain the status quo — let alone get bigger. Ford needed to think smaller.
The Mustang was unusually trim and light for the times
The first-generation Mustang is most famous for its long-hood, short-deck styling. However, the car was also unusually trim and light weight compared to other U.S. compacts.
The 1965-66 Mustang was the narrowest U.S.-made car of that era. In addition, only the 1964-65 Rambler American was much shorter. Perhaps even more importantly, the Mustang – like the Falcon on which it was based – was the lightest front-engined U.S. car of the mid-60s.
A 1965 Mustang notchback with a six-cylinder coupe and manual transmission weighed only 2,562 pounds, which was less than a strippo Rambler American, Chevrolet Chevy II or Plymouth Valiant with comparable drivetrains. The Corvair was roughly 100 pounds lighter, but for present purposes let’s consider it an evolutionary dead end.
Also see ‘1965-69 Chevrolet Corvair: What if it had a front-engined companion?’
The original Mustang was ahead of its time when it came to size and weight. Even so, I question whether the car’s footprint is still ideal. This is partly because the Mustang suffered from a stylistic affliction that has long since become obsolete – an excessively long hood.
The Maverick was better sized than the Mustang
The solution to that problem was to chop five inches from the wheelbase – which Ford did when it liposuctioned the 1969 Mustang in order to create the Maverick. That resulted in a nicely-sized coupe: 179-inches long, 70 inches wide, riding a 103-inch wheelbase and weighing only 2,500 pounds.
Those specifications are strikingly close to a Fox-era Mustang. Indeed, Niedermeyer (2014a) offered a compelling scenario that the 1974-78 Mustang II should have been based on the compact Maverick rather than the subcompact Pinto platform.
Also see ‘Lee Iacocca got lucky with the 1964-66 Ford Mustang’
Nevertheless, I don’t think that even the Maverick is the right size for a 21st Century pony car. When compared to today’s sporty coupes, the Maverick’s size comes close to a 2022 BMW 2 Series. Not bad company if you think the Mustang should have floated up to the low end of the premium-priced class. But if the Mustang was to remain true to its original mission of being an entry-level sporty coupe, current models should be at least a size smaller.
Must an entry-level sporty coupe have a V8 — still?
In our imagined parallel universe, a rear-wheel drive Mustang should have ended up somewhere around the size of a 2022 Toyota GR86 (and badge-engineered sister, Subaru BRZ). The twins are 167 inches long, 70 inches wide, have a 101-inch wheelbase and weigh around 2,800 pounds.
Ironically, this is in the same ballpark as the much maligned Mustang II.
To shrink a Mustang to roughly the size of a Toyota GR86 could have arguably required the abandonment of a V8 in favor of a four or six-cylinder engine. The purists would have howled — but even this arguably doesn’t go far enough.
A truly 21st Century Mustang arguably should have switched to front-wheel drive (with an all-wheel-drive option). That would have allowed the car to shed additional pounds and offer more space-efficient packaging. As a case in point, the Hyundai Veloster has had a relatively tidy size (around 167-inches in length, 71 inches in width, a 104-inch wheelbase and weighing around 2,600 pounds when introduced in 2011).
Such a small footprint would not have precluded Ford from preserving key elements of the Mustang’s design heritage. However, American attitudes about “youthful” cars have changed enough that new approaches might have paid off. For example, in addition to a more normal-looking hatchback coupe, Ford could have offered a quasi-sport wagon variant.
Loyalists veto a 1980s attempt to downsize Mustang
Talk of a dramatically downsized Mustang inevitably brings up what happened when Ford attempted to start down that road in the 1980s. As early as 1982 designers began working on a front-wheel drive replacement for the Fox-bodied Mustang that would not include a V8 engine.
“‘Hold your horses!’ came the collective cry from the Blue Oval faithful, who bombed Dearborn with more than 30,000 letters of protest during the summer of 1987,” wrote Mustang historian Mike Mueller (2007, p. 225). Ford relented and updated the aging Fox body for 1994 and slapped the Probe name on a Mazda-based sporty coupe.
I would agree that Ford made the right choice in keeping the Fox-bodied Mustang alive. But that was 35 years ago.
Why is rear-wheel drive essential in the 21st Century?
The state of auto design has evolved to the point where there is no longer a good technical reason why you can’t obtain an impressive level of street performance from a front-wheel drive platform. This is particularly true if an all-wheel drive option is available.
By the same token, cab-forward styling has become so dominant that it has made front- and rear-wheel-drive cars increasingly indistinguishable in smaller size classes. The popularity of sport-utility vehicles and emergence of electric power have further undermined the traditional assumptions about what a “sporty” car should look like.
Ford would have lost the drag racing market if it dramatically downsized the Mustang. But is that a big enough market to bother with anymore? Meanwhile, one big plus for a smaller car is that it could generate more sales abroad. This would make the Mustang more economically viable now that it is the only Ford passenger car still offered in the U.S.
Also see ‘Older Ford Mustangs got too big but not the newer ones?’
If Ford wanted to hedge its bets it could have adopted a two-step strategy of downsizing the Mustang while bringing back the Thunderbird on either the current platform or the Explorer’s. The Thunderbird nameplate would have been a much better fit for such a large coupe.
Why? Because the Thunderbird could have been given a taller notchback roofline and longer deck that would have allowed greater rear-seat room and trunk space. A key reason why the Dodge Challenger has outsold the Chevrolet Camaro in recent years may have been because it is a roomier — and thus more versatile — daily driver.
Contemporary pony cars have gotten awfully obese
Ford instead embraced Detroit’s “bigger, glitzier, more powerful” holy trinity in its recent iterations of the Mustang. Yes, the post-2004 Mustang’s wheelbase is within an inch of the original’s. However, this generation is roughly as long and wide as the bloated 1971-73 Mustang.
Perhaps even more importantly, the 2022 base model is more than 400 pounds heavier than its 1971 equivalent despite having a standard four- rather than a six-cylinder engine.
One might point out that the current Mustang is lighter than the Challenger by more than 300 pounds — and less than 200 pounds heavier than a Camaro. However, this also underlines how far Detroit has strayed. The Mustang and its competitors are far too big and heavy to be considered true pony cars. Yet you can’t even categorize them as descendants of mid-sized “muscle cars” because of their poor space efficiency.
Let’s be honest: A two-ton four seater with more than 400-to-800 horsepower has a limited future in an era of tightening emissions standards . . . at least in the absence of switching to electric power.
The 2015 Mustang was bigger and fatter than ever
The Mustang received its last major restyling in 2015. Prior to its introduction, the press speculated that the car would be put on a badly needed diet (e.g., Kranz, 2013). Unfortunately, Ford management went in the opposite direction — the Mustang was even wider and heavier than the previous one. The only consolation was that a turbocharged four-cylinder model was added (Hellwig, 2013).
The Mustang’s styling was fresh enough to result in output surpassing 122,000 units in 2015. However, it has been all downhill from there. In 2021 sales fell to roughly 52,000 units — which allowed the Challenger to edge past it for the first time.
Mustang sales have fallen to such historically low levels that one could reasonably question the financial viability of continuing to offer the car on a stand-alone platform. Not surprisingly, news reports suggest that Ford has recently considered moving the Mustang to a platform shared with the Ford Explorer and Lincoln Aviator.
Making this switch “could help Ford save on engineering and development costs for a relatively low-volume nameplate,” noted Automotive News reporter Michael Martinez (2020). This would likely also make the Mustang even larger and heavier.
More recent reports have speculated that the Mustang will stay on its current platform and but could receive hybrid and all-wheel-drive variants (Padeanu, 2021).
The 1967 and 1969 Mustang began the slide to obesity
The Mustang started to get fatter with its first reskinning in 1967. Niedermeyer (2014b) quite rightly argued that this was a crucial step away from being a true pony car.
Although the Mustang retained its original platform, the track was increased more than two inches. This allowed Ford to squeeze in big-block, 390- and 429-cubic-inch V8s. Niedermeyer argued that this “utterly destroyed the Mustang’s reasonably good handling and semi-good balance.”
That’s true — if you were among those who chose a big-block V8 engine, which would appear to have been a relatively small proportion of buyers (Dellis, 2022). More important was the opportunity cost of going bigger, glitzier and more powerful.
“If only they’d spent the money on other things, like a high performance version of the 200 six, or that independent rear suspension Ford was already teasing about back then,” Niedermeyer (2014b) lamented.
In the 1960s Detroit was obsessed with big-block V8s
Unfortunately, Niedermeyer’s scenario did not come to pass. In the late-60s all of the U.S. automakers crammed big-block V8s into as many cars in their lineups as they could.
Also see ‘1970 Plymouth Barracuda should have been like an Australian Valiant Charger’
As a case in point, for 1969 American Motors squeezed its biggest engine — a 390 V8 — into the compact Rambler. This was despite the car’s body suffering from “serious flexing” due to the torque of the smaller 343 V8, which was offered in 1967 (Mitchell, 1994; p. 32).
Might AMC have better positioned itself by instead offering a sporty six-cylinder model along the lines of the IKA Torino, an Argentinian car based upon the Rambler (Wikipedia, 2014)? Go here for further discussion.
Pontiac’s OHC six deviated from big-block groupthink
Of course, a few players deviated from Detroit groupthink. The second-generation Corvair displayed the promise of a lively six teamed up with independent-rear suspension. Alas, the car’s days were numbered once it failed to keep pace with the original Mustang’s spectacular sales.
Meanwhile, Pontiac offered an overhead-cam six, which could be ordered in a four-carb, 215-horsepower version.
“Similar to many overhead cam engines found on expensive European sports cars, the OHC-6 gives true sports car performance with outstanding economy,” stated a 1967 Firebird fact sheet, which parenthetically added: “Conventional 6 cylinder engines, standard in Mustang, Camaro, and Barracuda are smaller and develop as much as 45 horsepower less than FIREBIRD.” (Old Car Brochures)
In discussing the high-performance version of Pontiac’s six, Niedermeyer (2011) suggested that it “never did quite fit where cars were going in the late sixties, as well as the price of gas, which continued to drop in inflation-adjusted real terms, and even more so in terms of the (then) growing real wages. By 1969, sixes were strictly for the (genuinely) primmest of secretaries, or raffle-mobiles.”
In the Firebird’s case, its OHC six represented only 20 percent of total 1967-68 sales. More ominously, the proportion of buyers who opted for the high-performance version dropped from 8 percent in 1967 to less than 3 percent in 1968.
The first Mustang partly owed its success to the Falcon
The unpopularity of sixes partly reflected Detroit’s inability to get the details right. The Mustang could have made better use of an OHC six than the 1967 Firebird, which weighted 3,093 pounds. That’s more than 400 pounds greater than a 1967 Mustang.
That said, the biggest roadblock to redefining the six-cylinder engine’s image was Detroit’s unwillingness to shift marketing dollars away from V8s. This was myopic thinking. By the late-60s, import sales were once again soaring. Volkswagen alone sold more than 566,000 cars in 1969.
It’s not surprising that the Mustang grew bigger and fatter in the late-60s rather than trying to compete at least indirectly with imports. The underpinnings of the original Mustang were an anomaly grounded in the unusually utilitarian sensibilities of Ford executive Robert McNamera.
According to David Halberstam, Lee Iacocca “felt like crying” when he saw how McNamara pressed for the 1960 Falcon to be stolidly functional rather than evoke the sporty Thunderbird (1986, p. 362). Yet if McNamara had not placed such an emphasis on the Falcon achieving good gas mileage through a light-weight body, the early Mustang might not have been so lithe.
Who woulda thunk: Bigger has usually sold worser
The most popular excuse automakers use when lapsing into groupthink is, “We’re simply following the market.” That may sometimes be true. When the economy is good, more buyers will tend to upsize their vehicle choices. The trouble is when “bigger is better” becomes an all-purpose, knee-jerk reaction.
Now that the Mustang has been around for more than a half century, we have plenty of data to assess what was more popular — bigger or smaller. As you can see when comparing the two graphs below, the Mustang usually sold more poorly when it was larger and heavier.
Production of the porktastic 1971-73 models hit a low that would not be repeated until the early-80s recession. By the same token, the even heavier platform introduced in 2005 saw sales plateau at historically low levels beginning in 2008.
I grant you that other factors have inevitably played a role. For example, the prime reason Mustang production fell off in the early-90s was probably because the original Fox body had not been substantially updated in more than a decade.
In addition, when comparing the Mustang to the Camaro, one can point to the mid-80s as a time when bigger did sell better. However, the flip side can also be shown. Around the turn of the century Mustang sales held steady while the Camaro and Firebird died on the vine. That’s despite the more modern design of General Motors’ F-Body siblings.
The Mustang shows how groupthink is still alive
A central part of the Mustang’s history has been a tug-of-war within Ford between advocates of a bigger versus a smaller car. The most crucial battle of all may have been over the 2005 redesign, when bigness won the day.
One could argue that Ford has lost its way. However, much the same could be said of its competitors. When it comes to pony cars, the gravitational pull of industry groupthink is apparently too great to escape.
NOTES:
This is an updated version of a story that was originally posted May 14, 2014 and expanded on Oct. 9, 2020. Specifications are for base coupes and draw upon data from the Automobile Catalog (2022), Classic Car Database (2022), CJ Pony Parts (2022) and Mueller (2010). Mustang production figures are from Gunnell (2002), Flammang and Kowlke (1999) and Wikipedia (2014). Other sales figures come from the following sources: Camaro (Wikipedia, 2014), Challenger (carsalesbase.com, 2022) and Volkswagen (Gunnell, 2004).
Share your reactions to this post with a comment below or a note to the editor.
RE:SOURCES
- Automobile Catalog; 2022. Accessed Jan. 13.
- Car Sales Base; 2022. Accessed Jan. 13.
- Classic Car Database; 2014. “Search for Specifications.” Accessed April 26.
- CJ Pony Parts; 2022. “Understanding Mustang Curb Weights.” Accessed Jan. 13.
- Dellis, Nick; 2022. “1969 Ford Mustang Production Numbers.” Mustangspecs.com. Accessed Jan. 13.
- Flammang, James M. and Ron Kowalke; 1999. Standard Catalog of American Cars, 1976-1999. 3rd Ed. Krause Publications, Iola, WI.
- Gunnell, John; 2002. Standard Catalog of American Cars, 1946-1975. Revised 4th Ed. Krause Publications, Iola, WI.
- ——–; 2004. Standard Catalog of Volkswagen: 1946-2004. KP Books, Iola, WI.
- Hellwig, Ed; 2013. “2015 Ford Mustang vs. 2014 Chevrolet Camaro: How Does Ford’s New Pony Car Stack Up Against Its Archrival?” Edmonds.com. Posted Dec. 6.
- Kranz, Rick; 2013. “2015 Ford Mustang Goes on a Diet.” Edmonds.com. Posted Aug. 14; accessed April 22, 2014.
- Halberstam, David; 1986. The Reckoning. William Morrow & Co., New York, NY.
- Martinez, Michael; 2020. “Next-gen Mustang gets 8-year life cycle.” Automotive News (subscription required). Posted Aug. 17.
- Mitchell, Larry G.; 1994. Illustrated AMC Buyer’s Guide. MBI Publishing Company, Osceola, WI.
- Mueller, Mike; 2010. The Complete Book of Mustang: Every Model Since 1964 1/2. Motorbooks, Minneapolis, MN.
- Niedermeyer, Paul; 2111. “Curbside Classic: 1969 Pontiac Tempest Custom S — The Ex-Secretary’s Wanna-be GTO.” Curbside Classic. Posted Sept. 30.
- ——–; 2014a. “Curbside What If? CC Builds A Better Mustang II.” Curbside Classic. Posted April 16.
- ——–; 2014b. “Mustang Salute Finale CC: 1967 Mustang 2+2 Fastback — The Beginning Of The End Of The True Pony Car.” Curbside Classic. Posted April 20.
- Padeanu, Adrian; 2021. “Next-Gen Ford Mustang To Enter Production In March 2023: Report.” Motor1. Posted Dec. 30.
- Wikipedia; 2014. “Chevrolet Camaro,” “Ford Mustang”and “IKA-Renault Torino.” en.wikipedia.org. Accessed April 26.
ADVERTISING & BROCHURES:
- oldcarbrochures.org: AMC Rambler (1969); Ford Falcon (1960); Pontiac Firebird (1967)
Rehashing the story of the Mustang’s development is always fun for fans. The Mustang is the longest lived nameplate on the American market. It has changed over time, riding the waves of consumer preferences. The original version caught the public’s imagination and desire. Ford had already supplied a sporty version of the Falcon, the V8 powered Sprint,even competing successfully in European road racing events. But it was clearly identifiable as a Falcon. The genius was to hide the bones of the cheap to produce Falcon, under the svelte new bodywork of the much hipper Mustang. The Mustang could be many things to many people. Low powered stripper, secretary special, optioned out personal car, even a smoking variant supercar with the Shelby 350. The car was the right size and the right configuration, a close coupled 2+2. Those back seats were what made it possible to rationalize the purchase to most buyers. Not something found in an MG, Triumph Spitfire, or Alfa Romeo. We needed those seats for our kids. The Mustang wasn’t really a sports car, especially in base level specs, but it was close enough for most of us. I have lots more thoughts about the styling and market placement but it’s too much for a comment section space.
In terms of size (from an outsider’s perspective) Ford would have been better off going with the Maverick-based Mustang II proposal, on top of that Ford could have merged the Maverick with the European Ford Granada/Taunus TC as said to said to have been attempted (in addition to earlier attempts to merge the Thunderbird with the 1964 Falcon with the 1966 Ford Zodiac/Zephyr Mark IV).
That would have potentially provided for a more sophisticated Mustang II to be introduced across the Atlantic (as well as possibly Australia) in place of the European Ford Taunus TC/Granada Coupe (and Ford Falcon Cobra), on top of giving the European Ford Capri a bigger brother with the appeal of the Mustang name.
There was also a later potential for Ford to merge the Fox and the Sierra/Scorpio platforms, which would allowed for both a smaller Capri successor (as seen in Steve Saxty’s books) as well as the Mustang III/IV.
The industry can’t help itself. Compacts, intermediates, sports cars, pony cars, personal luxury compact trucks and SUVs. Every generation in every category got the “bigger is better” taint applied to them when an “overhaul” was done.
Compare grotesque 72 Torino to 62 Fairlane. 70 Monte Carlo to the ’73. S-10 and Colorado. Original Ranger and current. Original Rav4 and current. Civic. Corolla.
Even the Chevy Cruze sized like GM’s template for compacts since the first Corvair [apprx 180″ long]bloated up in it’s second and last iteration.
It’s some sort of compulsion.
Look what happened to the trim and nice downsized B Body 77 Impala/Caprice by 1991 ? All that knowledge gained, treasure spent to bring the full size platform back to some sense of rationality thrown out over night with the bathtub Caprice just a few years later.
They can’t help themselves. They destroyed any practicality a sedan might have by adhering to some “coupe like” theme, fastback look [without the usefulness of a hatch] close coupled interiors with ridiculously sized consoles, inferior headroom and visibility in addition to size and weight, even a “compact” sedan is an absurd size these days.
And it’s not all saaaafety regulations that have driven this either. It’s lack of restraint on the part of the designers.
Of course, you’re singing to the choir here. And summing it up in a more concise and clear way than I do.
The only friendly amendment I’d offer is that top management may often drive the lack of restraint more than the designers. And even if they didn’t, management does have the final say.
As a case in point, I suspect that Richard Teague would have produced very different designs if George Romney rather than Roy D. Chapin Jr. had been in charge of American Motors during the 1970s (go here for further discussion).
Although I am a die-hard Studebaker guy, the original Ford Mustang was the right size and look for the mid-60s era and almost certainly helped to seal the fate of Studebaker. As I see it, the Mustang revisions over the years were poorly executed. As luck would have it, the competition wasn’t much better with styling and quality execution. However, that happens a lot in the car business. Things have certainly gotten significantly better. I would add that the current Mustang isn’t as bloated looking as are the Camaro and Challenger remakes and is arguably the best looking remake since the original.