VIN & Picture Gallery

1964 1/2 Ford Mustang Hardtop VIN: 5F07D111470

Vehicle Description
This is a very early Mustang coupe. I finished the car in June of this year. This is one of the earliest cars with Power Steering, Power Brakes, and Factory Air (not installed) but I have the complete unit. The passanger seat is stationary which means that it was built before March of '64. The car sat in a garage for 20 years before I restored it. Someone replaced the driver side door so I do not have the door tag. The car already had a 1969 302 in it. It ran good and has 120 compression in every cylinder, so I found rare 68 4v HO heads, had them reconditioned, and put them on. This car can really move with the new Edlebrock performer intake and 600 cfm carb. All wear parts have been either replaced or rebuilt. New complete brake system (power 10"drum), new 2" dual alluminizied exhaust, new intake, new carb, new fuel tank, new tires, new Cager SS Rims (have original), new 3+ core radiator w/ shroud, new engine harness,& rebuilt generator, rebuilt rear mount Eaton power steering pump, new fan, new heater core and heater box, new battery, new hoses, new neutral safety switch, new universals, new sending units, new oil pump, new motor mounts and transmission mount. This car is in great shape with fresh paint ( basecoat clearcoat). All new chrome inside and out. Radio is original and works with new speakers. The front right fender was dented in so I put a new one on, New grille, new bumpers, new door handles in and out, new emblems, new interior, new seat covers, new dash pad, new sunvisors, new arm rests, new dash bezel, new carpet. Car was origanally white with a vinyl and red interior. Front floor pans replaced. Cowl does not leak. Tork boxes are in great shape never touched. On a scale from 1 to 10 this car is a 9.

Added: April 29th 2007

1964 1/2 Ford Mustang Hardtop VIN: 5F07D110278

Vehicle Description
This is not a mint-restored vehicle, it is a hot rod, the frame and most of the chassis are from the original 1964 ½, several sources have told me that the motor and transmission are also original. There are some modifications to the motor, such as the MSD ignition box on the right side, small neon blue light behind the front grill, and chrome accents throughout the motor.
# Here are the numbers: VIN: 5F07D110278
# TRIM CODE: Body: 65A/ Color: M/ Trim: 82/ Date: 08D/ Dist: 71/ Axle: 1/ Trans: 6
# Current Motor: V-8 289cu
# Current Trans: C-4

I bought this car as a private(E-1) for $1000 eleven years ago because it was all I could afford, it was my first car and I still drive it every day to and from work here on base. I went to Iraq in February 2003 and came back in March, I used my “war money” to invest $7000 into rebuilding the engine, transmission, suspension and doing the paint job myself. The front quarters have what I call tasteful ghost flames, tasteful meaning that you can only see them as you pass directly beside the car and they don’t show up in photos, if you look really closely at the picture you may pick them up (it took three weeks to do that). There is a nice CD player hidden in the glove box with the dual 10inch woofers and alpine amp tucked in the trunk. The interior is in very good condition and was re-done in 1998 by my mom (original light blue). Overall it is a nice car that has been good to me for over a decade.

Added: April 29th 2007

1964 1/2 Ford Mustang Hardtop VIN: 5F07D110062

Vehicle Description
This is a very early built Mustang. Mustang production started the first week of March, 1964. This car was built on April 8th, 9 days before the Mustang was officially introduced to the world on April 17th. It was even built a few days prior to the Indy 500 Replica cars. All of the front sheet metal/fender aprons/hood (with exception of the driver’s fender) is correctly date stamped and coded for March and the first week of April, 1964.

Warranty Number: 5F07D110062
Year: 5 1965 (1964 1/2)
Plant: F Dearborn, MI
Body Series: 07 2 Door Hardtop
Engine: D 289 4v V8
Unit: 110062 110062

Miscellaneous Vehicle Data
Body: 65A 2 Door Hardtop, Standard Interior
Color: J Rangoon Red
Trim: 86 Black Crinkle Vinyl, Standard Interior
Date: 08D April 08, 1964
D.S.O: 74 Seattle
Axle: 1 3.00:1, Conventional
Trans: 6 C4 Automatic

Options the car has:
This car was built with some interesting options. It is a factory 4v 289 (D code), C4 automatic transmission, 6K Rally Pac, console, an accent package (which consisted of the black pin stripe, chrome rocker molding and quarter panel emblem delete), deluxe seat belts, rear backup lights, and padded visors. Yes, these last two were options… I added the styled steel wheels, as they weren’t available this early in production. I do have the original hub caps for the car as well.

Body:
The car went through a minor restoration roughly 15 years ago. At this time it was repainted the correct original color - Rangoon Red. The paint is in good shape with only a few minor flaws. Before I bought the car I thoroughly checked it for rust and did not find any at all. The car remains to be rust free – it’s been garaged most of the past 15 years. A few months ago the car was parked curbside in front of my home when it was victim to a hit and run. The driver’s fender, bumper, and gravel pan were replaced. An original fender was used in lieu of a reproduction. The car was taken to a very reputable Mustang shop for repair.

Interior:
The interior is all original, so yes that means it is 40 years old and does show some wear. Carpet is lightly faded, and each front seat has a small tear. The dash is original and not warped and in very good condition. All of the dash chrome and bezels are in good condition. The deluxe seat belts are in nice condition, although the passenger side is missing the chrome roll up mechanism. Has new black pony floor mats. The 6k rpm Rally Pac and console were original options with this car. The previous owner added a small JVC cassette deck in the console along with two 6x9 speakers in the package tray. Overall, the condition of the interior is good for its age. I was going to replace it, but decided to leave it because I thought it gave the car a sense of history.

Engine:
The engine was rebuilt at the same time the car was painted 15 years ago. When I bought the car I was told it had approximately 20k miles on the rebuild. I’ve put roughly 10,000 miles on the car. Estimated mileage on the rebuild is around 30k miles. The engine runs very strong, and has had oil changes/tune ups regularly. A full tune up/oil change was done two weeks ago. The carburetor was also recently tuned. The car starts, runs, & drives very nicely. Over Memorial Day weekend, I took the car on a 200+ mile cruise and it performed very well. I was going to repaint and detail the engine but just haven't had the time recently to do it.

Everything else:
All four drum brakes were recently overhauled with new drums, brake pads, wheel cylinders, and hardware. All parts have approximately 300 miles on them. New Scott Drake reproduction single exhaust muffler was recently installed. Underside of car is clean, again no sign of any rust or corrosion. All unique 1964 ½ parts are still on the car (see http://www.early-mustang.com/64list.html for the differences between 1964 ½ & 1965’s). It was used for a daily driver last year during the summer months, but now is just driven occasionally on the weekends.

Added: April 22nd 2007

1964 1/2 Mustang Hardtop VIN: 5F07U100002 Vehicle Description
According to Ford Motor Company, the first production Mustang was formally rolled off the assembly line on Monday, March 9, 1964 at Ford’s Dearborn, Michigan, assembly plant located 12 miles southwest of downtown Detroit in the massive Rouge Industrial Complex. This Caspian Blue Mustang, the first production hardtop assigned a VIN number, 5F07U100002, was scheduled for final production Thursday, March 5th . It was actually first hand assembled as a pilot vehicle prior to that March 9th date, the day the first cars were scheduled to come off the assembly line. On the apparent real first day of production, March 5th, 1964, approximately 180 Mustangs were scheduled to be built. Out of all of those first day cars that are known to exist, this 002 car was the only one to be painted blue – all the rest were either red or white. (It is rumored amongst Canadians that production car #3, a hardtop thought to be in Canada, was painted red – making the first three production cars red, white and blue. A coincidence? (Look at the vertical bars behind the running horse fender badge!) It also was the only one with a 6 cylinder engine as all the others had V-8’s. (ref.source Mustang Production Guide #1 by Jim Smart & Jim Haskell)
As best can be reconstructed from all available sources, the first 5 Mustangs assigned VIN numbers were built for sale in Canada. The next 16 Mustangs were built to be used as display cars at the 1964 World's Fair in New York. As to why the first 5 cars were sent to Canada, only an educated guess can be made. Ford was planning a spectacular Mustang introduction to the public internationally on the evening of April 16th, at which time the actual car would be shown for the first time formally to millions of viewers at home on their televisions. In order to be sure that Mustangs were available to be seen in dealerships the very next day, it was imperative that key dealerships had at least one car on display in their showroom. As the theory goes, t made sense to first ship those cars which would take the longest time in terms of distance and logistics to get in place for the formal showing date. The cars for Canada fit into this category, since they were to be spread in five different provinces from the east to west coasts. These 5 cars were sent, most probably, by rail car, to the Ford of Canada facility in Windsor, Ontario, just across the Detroit River for processing. According to Ford of Canada, these cars were not actually sold to Ford of Canada, but were invoiced by the factory directly to the individual Canadian dealer where the car was eventually destined to be sold. It is assumed each of these 5 cars were immediately shipped by Ford of Canada to their intended destinations by the appropriate means of transportation. According to the Ford of Canada Historical Department, there was a directive sent to those 5 Canadian Dealers relating specifically that each of those cars was to be used as a display model in the showroom and not sold at least until a sufficient supply of Mustangs were received by the dealer so as to not leave the dealership without merchandise to display. The length of time referred to in the directive is not known at this time.

According to Mr. M. C. W. "Moe" Grant, then General Manager of Whitehorse Motors in the town of Whitehorse, Yukon Territory, this Mustang was sent to his dealership by mistake and arrived in May of 1964. Mr. Wayne McKenna, the Whitehorse Motors salesman who first sold this car, states the Mustang was never ordered by his dealership! There was an error made by the shipping company in Vancouver, British Columbia, and the car was dispatched from there to his dealership in the Yukon. McKenna believes the Mustang was originally destined for the large Brown Brothers Ford dealership in Vancouver. Apparently this wasn't the first time a new Ford vehicle was shipped in error to Whitehorse Motors instead of Brown Brothers Ford. The costs of shipping it back to Vancouver were prohibitive, even though paid by Ford, and the decision was made by Ford to leave the car in Whitehorse for sale by Whitehorse Motors. Just where this Mustang had been between March and May is unknown, but it is assumed the vehicle was delayed in transit due to the shipping error. Needless to say, it never made the worldwide Mustang April 17th debut!
In 1964, all Ford new-car-shipping to Whitehorse Motors was by rail from Detroit to Vancouver, where the vehicle was placed in a shipping container and loaded aboard a ship. The ship then sailed a 4 day journey off the west coast of Canada to the port of Skagway, Alaska. The vehicle, container and all, was then transferred to the White Pass & Yukon Route Railway narrow gauge railway train for a 120 mile mountainous trip to the town of Whitehorse where it was unloaded downtown on First Ave., about 1/4 mile from Whitehorse Motors. It was then removed from the container and a salesman from Whitehorse Motors picked it up and drove it to the dealership. (This method of shipping was confirmed by the Historical Dept., Ford of Canada)
This first Mustang hardtop was displayed in the Main Street single car showroom of Whitehorse Motors, the only Ford dealer in the entire Yukon Territory, and with sales of less than 40 new cars per year! Wayne McKenna remembers he had an immediate sale for it, but the factory invoice had not been received and the dealer cost was unknown at the time so the purchase oft er was consequently rejected.

Numerous people came in to drive the new Mustang, but since it was a"plain Jane" car with a small 6 cylinder engine, 13" wheels and no options, there were no offers to purchase. With several hundred miles now on the Mustang, General Manager Moe Grant directed salesman McKenna to drive the car as his demonstrator until sold. McKenna states "I hated that car because it had no horsepower and no options like power steering". The dealership installed an engine block heater and he drove the car, remaining always in the immediate Whitehorse area, over that summer and winter, putting about 2000 miles on it. Sometime in the spring of 1965, a deal was finally made for the purchase of the car. A 1957 Plymouth was traded in by Mr. Doug Wootton, and the Mustang was sold to him for $3200.00 Canadian. McKenna stated "we normally would have never taken a`57 Plymouth in trade at our dealership, but we were so anxious to get rid of that Mustang we would take almost any deal!" Incredibly, now one year old , the first Mustang hardtop was finally sold!

Ownership chronology from that first sale is known and documented in it's entirety through 14 owners. It was driven in the Yukon until October, 1983, including 3 years at a remote small silver mining town north of Whitehorse named Elsa. A later owner then moved to a suburb of Edmonton, Alberta, where the Mustang remained until December of 1993 when it was sold to a new owner in Bozeman, Montana. It was not until this time that the Mustang was recognized as being something special because of it's serial number, but that history was not thoroughly investigated. The Mustang was resold as inoperable with a blown engine to a Mustang enthusiast in Temecula, California, and was then sold to me 1 year later as inoperable in September of 1997. 1 brought the car to it's new home in the Los Angeles area.
After more than three years of extensive and exhausting research, I was able to uncover all of the true facts and document the car as a genuine pilot plant preproduction vehicle as well as the first production Mustang hardtop. The car has received a total restoration utilizing a “return to original as best possible” philosophy. The authentically restored Mustang will be on display at various shows, museums and national Mustang venues.

Who would have ever thought the first Mustang hardtop would have been sold new at the top of the World?

The photo was taken in Sept, 2004, at the Peterson Automotive Museum in Los Angeles, California. Mr. Lee Iacocca and I are shaking hands as we stand between my car VIN #002 and the actual (real) Mustang II prototype that was transported to the Museum for display with my car for the 40th Anniversary of the Mustang.

by Bob Fria (Owner)

Warranty Number: 5F07U100002 Year: 5 1965 (1964 1/2) Plant: F Dearborn, MI Body Series: 07 2 Door Hardtop Engine: U 170 1v I6 Unit: 100002 100002

Miscellaneous Vehicle Data Body: 65A 2 Door Hardtop, Standard Interior Color: H Caspian Blue Trim: 82 Blue Crinkle Vinyl, Standard Interior DSO: 81 Ford Canada, 1964 Date: 05C March 05th, 1964 Axle: 5 3.50:1, Conventional Trans: A 3-Speed Manual

Added: November 8th 2009
Posted by: Bob Fria

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