Modified Mustangs & Fords

[KCoker]

I have done a lot of research on the t-top svo's. Like FoxChassis says there are none with a (D) on the door data sticker for "factory" installed. I forgot that the Hatfield car had that many miles on it. I do have a copy of the invoice when he had them installed at Cars and Concepts. From what I understand anyone could drive up there and have them put in. I have documentation on my Silver one that the t-tops were put in at the local t-top shop down the road from the dealership. They are from a Cars and Concepts Kit. The charcoal one came from the Atlanta area and dont know how they got there. There is no way of knowing how many are out there or how many had been converted. There is a Cars and Concepts Brochure with a picture of a SVO getting t-tops, I have not seen it but have talked to people that have.

[chalkysexplorer]

Kendal, I visited with Col. Bill Hatfield on my way home from the reunion and saw the 85.5 2R t-top in person as well as all the original documentation. Bill bought the car from the original owner who was a Ford employee and ordered the car as such. Apprently production of 86 SVO's had already begun and the owner wanted an 85.5, no third brake light, so the car was built as an 85.5.

The original invoice shows trhe car having 5.5 miles on the clock as delivered and, as the story goes, the car was sent to Cars and Concepts (C&C) for conversion from the dealership. The C&C invoice shows 537 miles but this a typo as the distance from the delaership to C&C was roughly 50 miles. There was a transportation strike at the time so the car had to driven from the delaership to C&C so one can only assume that the truthful mileage at the time of delivery to C&C was 53.7 miles.

Now, as Kendal and Fox say, no SVO has ever been documented as a "factory" t-top due to the lack of documentation on a door tag, buck tag, build sheet or window sticker. T-tops were never an option on SVO's. The SVO team rightly believed that t-tops would weaken the structural integrity too much on a car that was so focused on good balanced handling.

But, here's where things get a bit sticky. All t-top cars , SVO or not, were converted off the DAP line at Cars and Concepts. So technically(!!!!), and this really splitting hairs, NO t-top car's were built at DAP. The same can be said for convertibles, another C&C conversion. It is a similar situation to non-AC cars getting AC at the delaership or SVO Comp Preps with Radios.

Now, the other thing to consider is that C&C sold a kit via their distributors. Looking at the differences between the Hatfield car and my 84, I believe that my 84 was a dealer install due to the way the kit was installed. 85ttops, who owns the white 85 SVO in the pic earlier has shown me pics of his car with C&C stickers on the door jam. We believe that his car is also a dealer install. There are no stickers on my car due to a repaint from 1E to 9L so we may never know. Either way. both cars are originally from CA, mines is DSO 72.

My theory on this is that t-tops were a very popular option at the time and they were used by dealers to help move SVO's of the showroom floors. Either that or poeple buying SVO's decided to have them converted for the cool factor.

Either way, a t-top SVO is a pretty coool car regardless of it's "factory originality". As for production numbers, totally unknown as this was not an "official" option and so not recorded by the factory. The number's quoted in the article was an estimate taken from the numbers in the SVOCA registry.

BTW, Kendal, if you ever get a copy of that ad, scan it and send me a copy

[chalkysexplorer]

Nelson, thanks for posting the pics. Now, heres the story.

I'd heard about the car from several sources, Schoolboy mentioned it to me, there was talk on the SVOCA Sunday afternoon chat session and I'd even seen the ad myself on Craigslist. I had initially thought that Pat_in_LA or one of the SoCal SVOCA guys would pick it up, but no. The car looked like a real basket case with a capri nose and some SVO bits for $800 sounded like a real bad deal. It was also advertised as an 83 which added to the confusion.

Pat and I were chatting one Sunday a few weeks later and I asked if he or one of the boys was going to buy it. The answer was no as no-one had really been able to ascertain any info about the car. Pat suggested I e-mail the seller and low-ball him. I sent the guy and e-mail asking for the vin number and some more photos of the car. The reply e-mail basically said, "$300 bucks, come get it or it goes to the crusher this weekend. By the way the vin is 1FABP28T3EF134153." Ok, so it's an 84 and it's an SVO.....now I'm interested.

I called the seller the next day and said I'd come have a look on Friday. Bear in mind, the car was in Frseno, CA and I line in Portland, OR. So, Thursaday night I drive down to Ashland, OR and spend the night with a buddy before departing on a 16 hour Ashland to Fresno to Ashland round trip at the end of which I was the new owner of a REAL basket case 84 SVO. I told him he could keep the CApri parts as I wasn't going to need them.

The car itself was in pretty good shape for a car that hadn't been registered for 11 years, had been sitting in the FResno desert and had a lot of parts removed. The original SVO suspension, bumper cover, fenders, front lights, rear end and transmission were missing. Most all the other SVO parts, sails panels, spats, bi-wing, steering wheel, door panels etc were still in place. The original matching numbers engine was in a adjoining shed and most of the bolt on accessories were sitting in the trunk. The interiors was pretty sunfried and covered in dust but the car is 95% rust and dent free so I considered it a good deal and very restoreable. As an aside, I paid $300 for the car and that included the Ford Motorsport vavle cover. The guy I bought it from, Javier, had a few foxes but didn't seem to know anything about SVO's from the very little I mentioned. After that I kept my mouth shut till the deal was done

The following weekend Meotch (SVOCA) was doing a run between LA and Seattle and kindly offered to tow the car up to Portland for me. I organised a trailer, he picked it up and delivered the car to Portland for me. Valve cover and all.

I'm not sure of the real lineage of the car but it has a San Jose DSO (72) and spent most of it's early life in that region. Sometime in '95 it was smogged in Fresno, found that record on-line, and then dissapears from the map. Due to the long time being unlicensed the records were expunged from the CA DMV system but I have a letter from them saying that it no longer exsists in their system. I'm in the process of aquiring a title for the car but there are no red flags on the carfax report, stolen salvaged etc, and I'm still jumping through some hoops. I'm not in a great rush so it'll happen when it happens. I'd love to know when the t-tops were installed, and where, but this may not become obvious untill we strip the car down some more.

The plan is to restore the car to mostly stock condition with some modifications for safety( braided brake lines, subframe connectors) and comfort (cloth interior). I think I'm going to keep it white, mainly cause i don't like silver, and then I'll drive it and take it to shows. It won't be a daily driver, that's what my 86 SVO is for.

[FoxChassis]

So technically(!!!!), and this really splitting hairs, NO t-top car's were built at DAP. ... It is a similar situation to non-AC cars getting AC at the delaership or SVO Comp Preps with Radios.

Sorry, but I'm not going to blur the line as to who "builds" what. Ford assembly plants build cars. They have OEM suppliers or partners supplying parts or sub-assemblies all the time, or doing this or that for them (including conversions) outside of DAP. Bottom line is whatever a car is ordered with and leaves DAP with is "original", i.e. "factory".

Ford dealerships do not build cars. They sell vehicles. If they have to modify them to move them, that's what they'll do. That doesn't mean the modifications are now considered original because they could have been ordered, but for whatever reaosn weren't.

To rehash what I wrote the last time this "SVO T-top" subject was posted....

If a dealer sends a car to somebody to have something installed, converted, changed, swapped, whatever, or they do it themselves, it has been modified from it's "original" state.

"Original" is how it left the assembly plant. "Original" is how it was built by it's manufacturer. All of the codes on the Build Sheet, VC Label, Body/Buck Tag, Transmission Tag, Axle Tag, Emissions Calibration Label, and so on proves what was on the car when it left DAP and what wasn't.

Non-AC cars with dealer-installed AC were not ordered with AC and did not leave DAP with AC.

Comp Preps with radios were not ordered with radios and did not leave DAP with radios.

SVOs with a T-roof were not ordered with a T-roof and did not leave DAP with a T-roof.

[Red]

What a great story. So in the modified mustangs & fords, it says that svoca figures there were about 25-30 svo's know to exist. They didn't leave the factory with t-top's, so how could anyone really know how many were converted to t-top? To chalkysexplorer good luck with the resto & thanks for sharing your story. Keep us posted on the progress.....

[chalkysexplorer]

Fox, didn't mean to be totally nit-picky about it, just looking at things from a different angle and trying to share some knowledge. As stated, time and and again, there are NO factory ordered SVO's with the t-top option beacuse it was not an AVAILABLE option.

Either way, they're still cool cars.

[chalkysexplorer]

You can see pics of the car restored, and the restoration process here.....

https://www.instagram.com/p/CQC17peBvS5/

[NAVYCAT]

Sooooooo are "WE" bringing it to the show in April??????? they are having open parking now