I was cleaning out my closet this evening and ran across some old pictures of my old Mustang. It was a '79 Mustang Turbo. I was 17 years old and it was my first new car. I paid cash for it ($6,100) from money I had saved working. I bought it the summer of '79, right before I started my Freshman year at DePaul University (I commuted daily from home to school). I couldn't afford A/C or the TRX suspension, but I did get the flip-open glass sunroof. It also came with blackwall tires and plastic hubcaps. I installed my own stereo (cassette had replaced the 8-track as the rage) and the following summer I saved more money to purchase the American Racing Vector wheels on BFG Radial T/A tires you see in the picture. The color was called "Red Glow" and it had a 4-speed manual tranny.

7 daily driver's later, not including 3 Corvettes, I have come around to my first love again, even down to the metallic Red paint and the manual tranny. The other funny thing is that I learned how to drive on my friend's mom's '69 Mustang. The new vert reminds me so much of that car too.

Happy New Year everyone!!!

P.S. For those of you that think the '79 was ugly (my 15 and 16 year old's thought the car was ugly when I showed them this evening, get a glimpse of my neighbor's '78 Mustang II (in a dreamsicle color combo) across the street in the second picture.

 

black leather. Mostly vinyl except for the surface areas. I had a V8 but remember very little about the drive train. I don't think the orange was grabber orange it seemed brighter. It was a very cool car when it first came out. The previous Mustang series was very a modified Pinto. This one wasn't much better but it was better than the mid 70's models.

Nice photos. I bet you'd like to drive it again.

 

Nice. I bought a new '79 Mustang Turbo as well. It was the non-metallic red, though I can't remember what it was called, loaded except for the sunroof. To tell you the truth, that car was the worst car I have ever owned. It just loved to stop running while driving on I-70 in Denver, or any other road for that matter. The stupid dealers could not figure it out. Then when I was going home on leave to south Texas, it stalled on the freeway in Dallas and got hit. Oh joy! At least the Ford dealer in Dallas figured out the stalling problem. After that I traded it for a new Datsun 200SX. But that car is a totally different story. hehe

 

Beautiful Fox! (Forgot how much I liked those old Illinois plates as well!)

 

nice car. what happened to it?

 

I love the early Foxes. Nice

I like your neigbors II too

 

I had a '79 as well. My first car... not new though. I've owed several more throughout the years. I think you can appreciate what you had, with what you have, more

 

Ugly? I loved that body style! I can still remember going to the dealer and drooling over them on the lot. Let's see....1979....I was all of 15 with no license, no money, and no job but boy did I want one of those. I came real close but ended up with a black and gray Firebird in 1983, then it was all Mustangs from 1987 til now!

 

You're kids just don't understand, I'd love to have one of those now (I'm 18) so I can imagine it was pretty sweet having that brand new at 17.

 

I recently "found" some old pics of my '89. It's cool to look back at pics that you either forgot about or lost. I'm 35 (I was 8 in '79) and I do remember that style well. My buddy's dad had an '80 Stang.

Wasn't the horn a rod similar to the turn signal stalk? I believe that you had to push it in to make the horn work.

 

My brother had a red 79 turbo he bought new. Can't believe he ever let me drive it. One night my idiot buddys pulled off two plug wires. Car started just fine but I could not get over 30 miles per hour on the way home. I finally stopped under a bright street light and found the problem ,but man I freaking big time.

 

Thats cool!..Mustang memory lane is always fun. I think most of us would kill to have our 1st Mustang back. I love the 2 I have now, but I would love to drive my '85 SVO again, in the condition it was before I sold it of course. Thanks for sharing!

 

Bob, I sold that Mustang in '83 and bought an '83 Black & Gold Trans-Am. That T/A was in the repair shop more than in my garage.

Oh my God, I totally forgot about the stupid horn. The turn signal worked the signals and the brights. To honk the horn, you pushed the whole stalk inwards toward the steering column.

There was one other cool mod (for a 17 year old) that I ended up doing. Since the car had no A/C, Ford put a different dash panel on that had no center vents. So here I had this center of the dash that was just begging for a vacuum/turbo boost gauge. The '79 turbo's only had a green idiot light for boost and a red light & buzzer for overboast. I found the vacuum lines that worked the pressure switches and tapped in the line for the gauge. It worked like a charm. I used to love seeing the gauge swing over from the vacuum side to the boost side.

I remember looking at the white bath towels after waxing and buffing the red pony. The towels were so red they looked like they just came from a CSI site. Factory clear coat paints were still a couple of years away.

That car new today would still look good.

Thanks for letting me share with you guys.

Steve

 

My 81 T-bird has basically the same engine as the 79 Cobra: 130-140 hp 302/5.0 V8. My, how times have changed!

 

She's a beauty...!!!

These are/where mine..white one (81) and used to own the glow one (80)





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