Meet Our Second Anniversary Car, The Mustang II!: Cold Start

Cs Mustang2 Top (3)
ADVERTISEMENT

Guess what day it is (without consulting your orrey)? It’s March 32, which means it’s The Autopian’s second anniversary! I know! It’s amazing how far we’ve come, and I do mean we, because all of you in front of this page are as much a part of this as we are, here behind it. Two years! And to think when we launched both the Vatican and the American Dental Association both issued terse, irritated press releases stating we wouldn’t last three months! I’m so proud of all we’ve done, and I’m proud to introduce our official Second Year automotive mascot, the Ford Mustang II.

[Ed note: Guess what! To do all of this we need help from readers like you. The good news is that we’re doing a special 20% discount on annual memberships or upgrades today! Just use the code mustang2yearanniversrary or click this link and it’ll apply the code automatically – MH]

We wanted an automotive mascot that had a two of some kind in its name, to convey the extra-double twoness of a pair of years of existence. There’s not a huge set of these, but there are some, like the Ford Bronco II, Chevy Nova II, Volkswagen of Brazil’s Variant II, the non-Studebaker Avanti II, International’s Scout II, and so on. But there’s something about the Mustang II that really drew us in. Maybe it’s the associations with massive success and near-universal respect that the Mustang II is synonymous with? Maybe antonymous, too, which I just realized was an actual word.

I mean, let’s just take a moment here to drink in some Mustang II goodness. First off, I think it’s worth pointing out that Ford seemed to target Mustang II buyers as people who were open to every single possible form of personal transport, motorized or otherwise. These are all from one brochure:

Cs Mustang2 2x

 

We have boat-people represented here, as the notchback Mustang II sits on the beach, and you could probably stand next to it, quietly, and hear it rusting out. Except for those bumpers, which were plastic, in a surprisingly forward-looking design choice.

Cs Mustang2 4x

 

And look, here we have the fastback version for the dune buggy/sandrail people! Obscured behind stripey shirt in the background there may be the only example of an air-cooled VW engine (barely) seen in a Ford brochure, too.

Cs Mustang2 3x

 

A car brochure staple, the colorful biplane, so we have aircraft-flying Mustang II people represented as well.

Cs Mustang2 5x

 

Even the aircraft people who don’t want to bother with an engine show up, since that’s a glider behind that Mustang II Ghia, with the half-vinyl roof looking like a balding guy’s head, sits proudly there.

Cs Mustang2 6x

 

More engine-less weirdos! Horse people! We have horse people here, with their dual-lunged, sweat-cooled horses back there, and their horse-named car up front.

Cs Mustang2 Cobrax

 

And finally, we have motorcycle people, with that BMW bike being the second air-cooled, horizontally-opposed engine shown in this brochure! Ford never showed any of the Mustang II’s engines here (the actually quite good Pinto 4-cylinder, the 2.8-liter Cologne V6, and the 4.9-liter V8 that somehow only made 140 hp from all of those cubes. That’s what was in the car up above there, with the stripes. I wonder what the name of that model was? I wonder if there’s any clue to what it may have been called. Some sort of snake, I think. An asp? Probably. This was probably The Ford Mustang II Asp. Wish there was some way to know for sure!

Also important in our choice for the Mustang II as the official Autopian Second Anniversary Car is that it was the first American car to have amber rear turn indicators! Starting in 1974! Look:

Cs Mustang2 Ambers

They actually called them “3-color taillights” in the brochures, so they knew what they were doing.

Cs Mustangii

I also appreciate the laziest approach to a sunroof they offered, where the panel just lifts out instead of sliding back into the roof, making it very much your problem to figure out what to do with it then:

Cs Mustang2 Lazyroofx

 

This wasn’t like those cars with a Targa roof, like the Porsche 914, that had a special little drawer in the trunk to hold it; the Mustang II just figured you’d toss it in the back somewhere. But, speaking of tossing things in the back, look at these interiors!

Cs Mustang2 Intx

 

Holy pickles, the colors! The textures! I can feel the cold smoothness of the vinyl, or, if it was parked in the summer, the searing hotness that cooks skin immediately upon contact. I can feel the coarseness of that seat weave, and the soothing plushness of that carpet! What a sensory wonderland!

Cs Mustang2 Varietals

So many varietals from two basic bodystyles, too. It’s a glorious thing.

Anyway, Happy Second Anniversary to us all! We appreciate you all so very much, and I hope you know that, and feel the Mustang II goodness shining down upon you.

 

About the Author

Mercedes Streeter

View All My Posts

80 thoughts on “Meet Our Second Anniversary Car, The Mustang II!: Cold Start”

    1. That was a great looking car. And clearly had its emissions equipment deleted.
      “Red light stop, green light go, yellow light go very fast.”

  3. The broughamiest Mustang? Hell yeah. Bring back brougham. Just…maybe not on the Mustang, though.

    Also, can Ford finally drop the April Fool’s joke that a four-door crossover is a Mustang? No one likes this “holiday.” Knock it off. Don’t make me whip out the water sprayer to shoo anyone away from typing out twaddle like “BMW Pivoting to Horse Trailers” or “Subaru Brings Console-Mounted Raclette Heater to New Outback.”

    { sprays }

    NO

    STOP

    STEP AWAY FROM ADOBE PHOTOSHOP OR I SWITCH TO A FIRE HOSE

    { sprays }
    { sprays }

  4. My first car was a 1985 Nissan Pulser NX. It also had a flip up sunroof that I learned could be removed and tossed in the back seat.

    There were two little plastic Mickey Mouse ears you needed to manually raise after removing the sunroof. I drove the car exactly one time without doing that and learned they served a very valuable purpose. They redirected the air over the open sunroof. Lowered, the air would come in and pound the top of your head, like a jack hammer.

    My mom’s 1986 MR2 was the same, but the air deflector was spring loaded and popped up automatically when you removed the sun roof. I shoved the sun roof behind the drivers seat.

  6. Happy anniversary! And that’s no joke, Mustang II notwithstanding. May this website live long and prosper.
    As for that sunroof:
    “[T]he Mustang II just figured you’d toss it in the back somewhere.”
    Oh, yeah, a college classmate had a Mk1 VW Golf (Rabbit) when it was just a few years old and the previous owner had installed an aftermarket sunroof exactly like the Mustang II’s sunroof; I always cringe when I remember riding with him where he would pop open the sunroof, extricate it through the hole, and toss it in the back all while driving (the Golf was a manual, to boot) and I often wonder how I managed to make it this far still alive. Good grief.

    1. As for being lucky to have made it alive this far, it’s not just me but anyone who grew up in the 20th century (!!) as pretty much any car sold in the US after circa 2000 is simply light years ahead of older cars in terms of safety, not to mention that we now have better public awareness about drunk driving and other safety matters such as seat belts (ironically the aforementioned college classmate was always conscientious about using his seat belt, cavalier sunroof maneuvers notwithstanding.)
      Speaking of sunroofs and seat belts, another college classmate once told me about how she was driving her dad’s brand new Mercedes in high school one night after having had a few beers; she normally didn’t use her seat belt but this time, after she opened the Mercedes’s sunroof, she decided to buckle up which indeed saved her life as she ended up running off the road and rolling several times down into a ravine. The police officers responding to the accident told her that the *two* previous accidents that they had responded to were also rollovers where the drivers had the sunroof open but were not wearing their seat belts and were consequently decapitated. Egad. So, yes, always buckle up, especially if the sunroof is open.

      1. I’m amazed at the sheer amount of people who refuse to use their seatbelts NOW, in 2024. And apparently the number ticked up in the past few years even.

        I’m Gen-X, so I have memories of people not doing it, but by the time I was in driver’s ed, there was a constant drumbeat about always doing it that just became part of societal consciousness.

        1. Agree as a fellow Gen-X’er. Perhaps the current driver’s ed safety videos need to show what happens when one or more airbags go off and the occupant isn’t wearing a seat belt. My firefighter friends have some very descriptive and graphic terms that I won’t share here.

  7. You weren’t kidding about them trying to shove every other kind of transportation into that brochure! Regarding the BMW bike, is it weird that they’d put an identifiable model of a different brand’s vehicle in their brochure? I guess that was more common back then.

  8. At least Ford gave them a sunroof the was possible to throw in the back. Let’s talk about the Solstice Coupe, whose targa top had to be left behind at home if you wanted to go open-roof. Better watch the weather forecast before you leave…

  10. I get that you’re leaning into April Fool’s with gusto, but the Mustang II is a very misunderstood car.
    Admittedly, I have rose-colored glasses on the Mustang II because I dated a few girls who drove one back in the day. I guess that’s why I also like Dart Swingers.
    Anyway, Lido sold more than a million of them in just 5 model years, and because they were badge-engineered, parts-bin specials, Ford made a ton of money off of them. GM almost killed the Fs because if it, and they were only saved by the cinematic antics of Beau, Carrie, and Cletus.
    Plus, you had this person driving a Mustang II, and she pretty much ruled the world in those days.

    https://i.redd.it/98uyhstcfyo71.jpg

    1. I think what doomed them reputation-wise down the road was the lack of an available V8 in that critical first year. Ford underestimated how much that option imparted the car with its halo, even if a majority of buyers didn’t purchase it.

      Sure, the car did sell gangbusters early on, but all the enthusiast anger over the missing V8 (and then Ford’s underwhelming attempt to make up for it) would eventually filter to the everyday buyer so that it’s remembered as it is.

    2. Thanks for the link! That made my day. A lot of babes did the Mustang II thing back then.
      But not as well as she did. Again thanks…All of a sudden I feel 19 again.
      But where did the babes disappear to? Guess everything gets old eventually.

    1. I know the Lima motor was the basis for the Thunderbird Turbo Coupe and SVO Mustang. They are solid engines that can handle forced induction.

  14. As the owner of a KV/KVS Mini 1 I’ll note that the company was around along enough to make a KVS Mini 2 with an entirely different body:

    https://live.staticflickr.com/2615/32975670226_4f91151596_o.jpg

    Confusingly, however, some specimens of the Mini 2 were built using the earlier body of the Mini 1, such as the example in the Lane Motor Museum:

    https://www.lanemotormuseum.org/collection/cars/item/kvs-mini-2-1974/

    in which case the difference seems to come down to pretty much just the markings on the data plate.

  15. We wanted an automotive mascot that had a two of some kind in its name, to convey the extra-double twoness of a pair of years of existence.

    I was kind of expecting the 2CV.

    2. We talked about the 2CV but then thought it should be cars that were, like, a name and a II, the second take on that car. Which is different than the 2CV, if that makes sense?

      1. It does [make sense]: 2 as in a sequel, so to speak. The 2CV was its own standalone… thing.

        For next year may I suggest the Plymouth Fury III. 🙂

  16. I really hoped one of those links would Rickroll me. I know it has become cliche’, but I still appreciate the greatest internet prank.

  18. Also, note that the brown one with the sunroof is the only actual 1974 model. Check the location of the gas fill cap just below the character line in the rear fender. In 74 only, that was below that line, versus the rest of the years it was above that line. With it below the line it was a right proper PITA to use the pumps with the auto shutoff at the gas station.

  19. Know what I always do after a swim? Stand on the passenger seat, poking my body through the sunroof while I dry off. So relatable, that image.

    1. I’m just pleased to see a sunroof advertised as something cool and (importantly) used. These days, they’re fairly common, the ads all show them, but usually not in a way that suggests people actually use them. Which seems to fit with how most people drive their vehicles now, completely closed up, but still…

      I miss the days when a sunroof was something desirable, and if you owned one, you made a point to keep it open as much as you could.

  20. My first car was a 1974 Mustang II, 2.3, 4MT, I bought it for $65 from my uncle who just wanted it out of his yard. It was the hideous yellow, with the black full vinyl roof. It was transportation, nothing more, nothing less.

    1. My second car was a similarly spec’ed 74 hatchback, no sunroof however. The sellers had one of those $99 paint jobs done in white and it had puke green vinyl interior. Got it 2 weeks after rolling my first car. I was not easy on cars in my teen years.

      1. My 2nd car was a mix of both of yours… ’74 hatch in that yellow with white vinyl over puke-green dash and carpets. V6 though. I looooved that thing.

  21. It bugs me the tires don’t leave tracks in the sand. Even in the magical world of car brochures and their beautiful people, I still want cars to leave their mark.

    1. Woe unto us!!

      But, everyone expects it on April Fools Day. So it’ll be that much more delicious when it happens on a random Thursday next fall.

      1. That would hilarious, just some random day in October the site just goes off the wall, and the next day reverts back with nobody acknowledging it whatsoever.

        1. It would be cool.

          However, as eccentric as this site is, how could you even tell if it went off the rails? And what would a return to normalcy even look like?

Leave a Reply