I guess I'll start this out as I'm right on the cusp of being old enough for reading old forums to find old info but just young enough to not have participated in any forums myself so hopefully you can put up with my writing style.
I feel like you can't start a build thread unless you understand where the build came from in the first place. Being born and raised in Wichita, Kansas, one could probably guess that drifting culture was not a prominent thing amidst the vast amount of Midwest America classic muscle cars/muscle car people including of course older family having had old hot rods or American cars of the sort. That being said and to keep a long story short, how did drifting get to me when I had grown up on no option videos or anything related to drift culture other than (oh yay) Fast and Furious?? (Yes unfortunately I'm the age F&F and NFS were my biggest influences into cars in general)
Well, I guess it all starts with the car. A first gen S197 2005 Ford Mustang V6 manual convertible. Dubbed the "Barbie car" or "shitstang" if you will by myself and close friends. How does one make such a bad purchase of a vehicle to have a V6 muscle car? Well in my case it happened to be a silly story that would be told forever as I keep anything wayyy past the time I should. During high school the first vehicles were cool - a 1984 Jeep Cherokee chief with a 4 cylinder and M/T that couldn't get out of its own way and sold that for a 1992 gmc RCSB 350 tbi injected auto pickup (thanks to my dad for the decent Kansas kid first vehicle choices). After having the automatic pickup truck for a time and ready to purchase a vehicle more reliable than it, the hunt for what would be the mustang started. I had made the mistake of driving a 05-09 mustang that a high school buddy had with a manual transmission and I ended up being in love with the interior and how it drove due to not having a sports car at all. So when the v8 Trans Ams and Mustangs that had been looked at were all roached and the search was wearing thin, a suggestion popped up from my mom (she was smart for that one LOL) of an IMMACULATE grandma driven 4.0 30k mile mustang at a dealership close by. Then it popped into my head, that interior that I loved (very retro but modern feeling) and that same car I had driven a year before that. There it started, the impulse bought v6 car. Mind you, I was not even fully into cars at this point, and had not even realized it as a passion until this car came around and helped me into, which I will always appreciate it for.
So there it was, bone stock and showroom fresh. As I started to grow into realizing you can play with modifying a car more and more, there the mustang was with its first phases. "American muscle" branded wheels and influence from mustang "builds" on Instagram or the local mustang scene with the basic bolt ons that make mustangs what we all hate with the silly stick on/part swap stuff, that's the road I was going down.
After I had done all the basic Mustang things, black wheels, headlights, lip, lowering springs, meaty rear tires like it was the sweetest 16 second car on the planet, dual exhaust conversion, etc. there I was and hindsight it was a slick little daily at the time, just not my style whatsoever anymore. To be able to do all of these things to the Mustang I had to gain the know how, and to gain the know how you hop into a career that will get you that of being an automotive technician. There's where the true problems came with throwing all of my money towards drifting. While messing around in the shop one day I had 2 coworkers showing each other videos of their cars on track and talking car specs/driving techniques of something I didn't even think was possible to do on track where we lived - drifting. After hearing that they had done track days only a couple hours away and them showing me good old Risky Devil videos (wasted summer 2011 if you know it is still a banger) and plenty of other good Midwest drifting, I was in. How do I try this type of thing? They both have cars I had no idea about at the time (e36 m3 and s13 hatch at the time) and I have no idea how to set up a drift car yet here I am with a RWD american muscle car. It was settled, the car needed an LSD as the V6s of 05-09 only came with a 7.5 (weaker than the V8 cars) ring gear open differential. So there the most important mod of the car came, a 8.8 rear axle housing complete with LSD out of a 2014 mustang GT, the start of getting the car to slide.
For those that are unaware or who wants one of these mustang 4.0s as a slightly slower (and much cheaper in late 2023) 350z these 05-14 8.8 rear ends are a bolt in application with a pinion flange swapped from I believe a terminator cobra... I will check and update when I find. Pic of the flange for example. Also will have to find the rear end pictures when it was painted and prepped to go in!
The next order of business was insight from the guys already drifting and that was a suggestion on a good set of coilovers which one of them had the good affordable option we all know and love - BCs. I ordered a set of extreme lows and slapped them on before the first event I had ever gone to came around. The car was still basic mustang but now on the ground thanks to the influence of low style Japanese cars in videos I had brainwashed myself with.
Then the first event came, June 10th, 2017. Stroud OK had a venue that existed for not long after I went for the first time - an old mall parking lot/cone skid pad. Street drove the car with all the essentials and a pair of mustang reps I had picked up.
RIP to this good tire wear. Solid rear axle is really a maintenance blessing when it comes to D cars.
So things kept progressing, I was at this point addicted and ready for more events. Being that the car was a convertible it was hard to hit events as most at the time (now all and should) require a 4 point roll bar at minimum for convertibles. So October of 2017 I finally got to watch the bud with more experience do their thing at heartland park Topeka IFO event. Shouts out Beau for letting us tag along and the first good ride alongs.
As mentioned there the roll bar came, along with the cars signature wheels - VSKFs. At the time it was rare to find any American cars on Japanese wheels so I was over the moon about the deal I found on them even being such weak spec. (Both around March-April 2018) Roll bar was an Autopower bolt in 4 point, the only thing made for convertibles at the time. VSKF original spec was 19x8.5 +45 squared.
Skipping forward some more so I don't over type, summer of 2018 Mr. d00mwizard and I started hitting events together as a unit and from then on it was consistent events every month or so during the drifting seasons and every year after that until now. Again with drift talks with the buds, a bucket seat was added for the extra car control not worrying about holding yourself off the sides. - a Bride Zeta 2 with PLM side brackets and a corbeau slider.
At this point into our second full season of drifting, (2019) I wanted more. Growing up on NFS underground and discovering and going to Final Bout, the ricer in me was full into the "rolling car show" aspect of drifting. I will always try to bring as much style and cleanliness to drifting as I can along with aggressive driving.
That being said the KFs needed an upgrade. People asked the spec for years, I still own them and I couldn't tell ya the offset. I measured the distance I needed from the old lips to fenders and realized I needed about 2 extra inches on all 4. So delete 2.5 lips and install VR wheels 4.5 inch lips and there's the math.
The poke in the rear was a little aggressive, but workable, and we would correct that later. I WAS NOT going to do a reverse stagger in order to fit them, so wrong to me. So they were squared 19x10.5. Also cutting welded wheels is a ton of fun with no lathe.
Little side note, the entirety of the cars life drifting was on an ebay clutch put in a year before it started drifting, and it always performed perfectly minus the time I money shifted the shift forks into outer space. So a replacement T5 transmission from a junkyard was swapped in with the same old clutch. Driver skill growing pains with the first time it got towed. (Aug 2019)
Fast forward the car was being maintained on those basics. Some bumpers, side skirts, lights etc. being replaced to keep it a car. I wanted more Japanese styling so the duals finally came off for a 3 inch custom exhaust made by friends of mine with a single sided turndown dual tip. Factory knuckles at this point had been modified (cut and rewelded) and I would not raise the car for anyone to function so I embarked on the craziest fuse box/ecu relocation to the factory battery spot and the battery kicked to the trunk to have steering angle with no wiring damage. A mismatched kit with eBay front and rear lips and street scene side skirts added for not normal mustang feels.
Some point in the mix a 350mm nardi deep corn was added. After thrashing on the car learning tandems and all the goodness the car ended up here.
The final stage of the chassis had begun, I wanted something unlike any other mustang, and something that was full low style D car spec. It needed something wild, it needed to be different yet eye appealing. We played with body work, molded factory rear quarters to fit the KFs properly, shaved the antenna and trunk, added a unique unpopular hood, and a bonus, added a passenger bucket rep since the factory seatbelt died to install harnesses. It was coming into its final form.
... and there it was, minus paint, in a matte black primer.
From here life happened, I moved states away from my closest friends (whom I also drifted with) and the car continued to be used and had plans for continuing. By the end of the mustang the body panels needed repairs, a new lip and bumper were purchased, and some other items collected to revamp it and complete the painted "pretty" stages. People loved the black on the car but I had internally hated it knowing it was primer. I had also gone through numerous phases of hating/loving the car having such an oddball chassis but being into such a Japanese driven culture.
I took a step back and contemplated the sheer amount of funds it would take to get the car to where I would be pleased asthetically, let alone start power adding, and after 8 years of ownership, it was time to part ways with just that. It was time for a chassis I was happy with putting the amount of money and effort in that we as drifters put into it. For years of watching plenty of Eletor, Final Bout, Animal style, Naoki, Casey, and all of the good people in between, the talk of "endgame" cars would always come up. What would be the car we would have 10/15 years into drifting. One of the top cars on that list for me is a Mazda Rx7 FC.
There we introduce my 1988 RX7 N/A. One of the crappiest examples of an Rx7 on the planet but something that would revive my entire passion for drifting and cars alike. Possibly the weirdest trade deals accomplished to trade a 2005 mustang v6 for said rx7. The ad was a factory manual n/a that would start and then die. After contemplating and talking with the owner a deal was made, a drive every event car with minimal maintenance for a car that has a stigma for being unreliable and had not been driven in over 3 years.
This will be the end of this post, the rx7 will have its own build thread with more car specs and small details but I wanted to make something about the mustang since it was what led me to even post on this amazing site. If you've read this far of my rambling I appreciate you and hope to see ya at an event someday. I will add little details to this post as I find small memories and whatnot along with adding the link to the new build when I make it. Thanks for reading.