1967 Ford Mustang - Obsidian

Let's just address the cost issue right off the top, since it is what first made us take notice. This '67 Mustang has had $1.3 million invested in its build. That's right, a one, then a three, then five zeros, followed by a decimal point and two more zeros. "What the hell?" you may ask. That's OK, so did we.


This car came about after many conversations between owner/financier Steve Groat and Matt Couper of Autoworks International (www.autoworksracing.com) in El Cajon, California. As with many projects, this one snowballed in a big way, with midbuild changes and alterations that took enough labor and parts to put some clarification on that enormous price tag. There is not one square inch on this car that has not been touched in some way, from the inner fender panels to the roof, and everything in between.



The official name for the car is the Obsidian SG-One: Obsidian for the color (obsidian lava rock), SG for the owner (Steve Groat), and One meaning only one will ever be built. At that price, we can understand why, but the end result is one of the wildest, technology-packed muscle cars to ever come down the pike.
1967 Ford Mustang Motor We're still skeptical about those air-to-air intercoolers mounted on top of a hot engine.


Forced to pick a focal point, we, of course, gravitate to the engine, which is as wild as they come. It's dominated by twin air-to-air intercoolers mounted on top of the engine, which take boost from a pair of Rotrex superchargers and shove it into a Hogan sheetmetal intake on its way into 392 ci of Windsor small-block Ford. On 91-octane fuel, it made 847 hp at 5,800 rpm and 770 lb-ft at 4,400. The transmission is a Tremec TKO 600 five-speed, but there is no shift lever; rather, it's controlled by a Master Shift steering wheel-mounted paddle shifter that uses some fairly complicated electronics and linkage to work the shifter tower in the TKO without the driver ever putting hand to shift knob.



With that kind of power and trickery, the suspension needed to be up to the job, so Matt (who's from Down Under) went with his homeland brethren at RRS Suspension and put its complete Phase 5 setup on the car. That includes coilovers, Control Freak control arms, and a rack-and-pinion in the front, with a three-link in the rear and big Brembo 14-inch brakes at all four corners.


1967 Ford Mustang Interior The smell of leather is a very nice thing indeed. Every electronic accessory is present in


All that stuff is hidden by the intense body modifications, however. Necessitated by the intercoolers, the hood was fitted with a custom air-extraction bubble and attached with billet hinges. On top of the front fenders are functional vents for the brakes. A custom front valance with a pair of intakes for the superchargers dominates the front end, as do the '05-later Mustang headlights and turn signals. Moving aft, you'll find custom side skirts, a functional rear diffuser, and brake cooling ducts on the flared quarter-panels. The grille and taillight panel were cut from billet aluminum in a water jet machine. Finally, the wheels and tires are Couper-designed 18x8.5-inch fronts and 20x10.5-inch rears wearing BFGoodrich KDW-NT tires.



Not surprisingly, the interior received as much attention as the rest of the car, with Recaro heated seats, swanky carpeting, power everything, and a 3,000-watt Kicker stereo with surround sound, XM radio, an MP3 player, WMA, an iPod, Bluetooth, and wireless Internet capability, controlled with a 10.5-inch LCD monitor and a 60-gig hard drive. Jeez, that's better than anything we have at home. Under all the leather and electronic gizmos, the seat boxes were moved back a bit to fit taller drivers and give the car more of a sports car feel.


OK, that's all fine and dandy, but how does it work? We wanted to find out, and the condition for this feature was to take it to the big (and fast) track at Willow Springs, put a pro driver behind the wheel, and give it hell. The deal was we would report the truth, good or bad, and Matt and crew agreed to the challenge.
1967 Ford Mustang Sound System Part of the problem on our day at the track was that the Master Shift controls were mounte



So we met at Willow one morning with our driver, former Indy driver Roberto Guerrero, to put it to the test. Despite claims that the car had been driven quite a bit without trouble-and with video of massive burnouts, donuts, and highway cruising as proof-nobody could figure out why it had so many problems. First, the trick electronic paddle shifter wouldn't let it get out of Reverse. The Master Shift guys completely replaced and reprogrammed the system, and five hours later it was working.



Matt took the car out for a shakedown lap and it shifted through all the gears just fine, so Roberto got suited up and slid behind the wheel. But the counterintuitive nature of the paddle shifter (hit the button whenever, but it doesn't shift until you hit the clutch pedal) confused the driver and he missed a shift, and then it wouldn't come out of First gear. After a slow but full lap in First, Roberto brought the car back onto pit lane and shut it off, which was followed by a gush of hot, green fluid from under the car.
1967 Ford Mustang On The Track The taillight panel (and also the grille) was cut from aluminum in a honeycomb pattern wit


Matt was visibly devastated and uncertain why there were so many problems with the car that day, as he told us he had put a lot of miles on it and had no problems with either the shifter or overheating.


I had a scuba diving instructor tell me once that the best way to avoid sharks is to take a camera with you. What he meant was when you really want to see a shark and get a photo of one, that's when you won't. The same deal often happens with magazine photo shoots-the surest way to make a car fail is to schedule a time to run it hard and shoot photos of it. It happens more often than you know, and it's what happened here.



We can't slam Matt or the car too much, though, since the finished product is still one of the wildest Mustangs on the planet-at any price-and certainly has the parts and pedigree to run hard. Yeah, that's an enormous price tag and it shocks anyone who sees it, but the team is hoping that it'll gather a bid that high at a Barrett-Jackson auction coming soon. We'll see. In the meantime, Matt is fixing what ails it and promises a return test in the near future. If that happens, we'll be sure to let you know.


Quick Inspection
'67 Ford Mustang
Steve Groat * El Cajon, CA

Powertrain
Engine: Autoworks International put together a 392ci small-block with a Lunati 3.875-inch crank, Lunati Pro Billet rods, Arias 9.25:1 pistons, Total Seal rings, Edelbrock Victor Jr. 70cc heads (which were ported to flow 325 cfm on the intakes and 215 on the exhausts), a Crane 1.6:1 shaft rocker, and a Crane hydraulic roller cam. A BigStuff3 EFI setup has in-dash diagnostics and controls the fuel and spark coming from Aeromotive and MSD hardware.


Power: It made 847.8 hp at 5,800 rpm and 770 lb-ft at 4,400 on 91-octane gas.
Transmission: A Tremec TKO 600 five-speed is controlled by a trick Master Shift electronic paddle shifter and hooks to the motor with a Clutch Net custom clutch and scattershield.
Rearend: A 3-inch steel driveshaft sends power to a Mittler Bros.-fabricated 9-inch rearend with Currie 31-spline axles and a 3.50:1 ring-and-pinion. With the 0.64:1 Fifth gear ratio in the Tremec, the final drive ratio is 2.24:1.

Chassis
Frame: The stock unibody was upgraded with a tubular box frame, and a hidden four-point rollbar helps tie it together even more. There's also a four-piece removable bellypan. The engine and firewall were also pushed back a bit for better weight distribution. Fully wet, it weighs 4,100 pounds.
Suspension: Everything RRS (www.rrs-online.com) makes for the early Mustang was thrown at Obsidian, including its Phase 5 front suspension and three-link rear. The coilovers are from Koni and Eibach, the control arms are from Control Freak, and the spindles are forged RRS units. Energy Suspension urethane bushings locate it all, and an RRS rack-and-pinion (controlled with an ididit column) steers it.
Brakes: Brembo 14-inch slotted rotors are all 'round, clamped with four-piston calipers.
Wheels: Couper GT wheels, coated to match the deep black paint, are 18x8.5 in the front and 20x10.5 in the rear.
Tires: BFGoodrich KDW-NT tires measure 225x50ZR18 front and 285x30ZR20 rear.



Style
Body: There were more than 18 one-of-a-kind body modifications done to this car. Study the photos and you'll see most of them. Flaring, ducts, and billet aluminum are the theme of the day here.
Paint: The deepest, darkest black paint on the planet must be Sikkens Obsidian, 'cause this car's paint sucks you in like a black hole.
Interior: It would be easier to say what it doesn't have inside, which isn't much. There are 17 custom interior panels, heated seats, full electronics for entertainment and navigation, and even a rearview camera.



Source
www.hotrod.com/featuredvehicles/hrdp_0902_1967_ford_mustang_obsidian/viewall.html