82 CHP #1963
 

Prototype 1982 SSP Mustang, California Highway Patrol #1963.
Approximately 90k miles. I bought it about ten years ago from a kid who used it as a daily driver. He put me in contact with the retired CHP Trooper who originally bought it from the auction. He told me that he outbid the Henry Ford Museum to win the auction. He told me that it was the first prototype Ford built for the CHP to evaluate. Build date is December 1981. After the CHP tested it, it was taken around the country to other agencies to be evaluated.. It hit the wall at Michigan Speedway during a test, was repaired and put into service as an academy training vehicle. The original owner told me that the roll bar, rear seat delete and race harnesses were installed by the CHP at that time. The black interior is original according to the first owner. I have seen old photos on web sites labeled as this car but I can not tell the color of the interior.

Runs and drives well. It does leak some oil.
It may need carb work, you have to pump the gas pedal for a while to start it after it has sat.
Needs paint and interior work. There are a few small rips in driver’s seat and head liner needs to be fixed. Carpet is worn.
It has original spotlights and siren under the drivers side fender, but both are not wired up.
It has later model wheels, headers and dual exhaust. I do have the original exhaust manifolds.
Body is rust free and straight and in primer. But there are a few small dings and dents.
New shocks, struts, fuel pump, brakes, clutch about 2k ago.
I bought it to turn into a drag car until I learned the history and decided to restore it at some point. I have other projects and don’t have the time or money to do justice to this important piece of Ford history. I will only sell it to somebody who will respect the history of this car. The car is located in Colorado and I have a clean title.
Contact Eric at etbarker@peoplepc and make me an offer. I can send more photos.

Email & PM sent!

Sold!

That was a no-brainer for you. It was an obligation. What a match to the EVOC!:2thumbs:

Great buy, Congrad..

Sounds like a great car.....do you have any documentation for it that you can post up?

Can't you wait till some of us get home from work and look around?

Found this over on org.....same unit #



http://www.sspmustang.org/photos/smf_photo3ac.htm


I have to say, thats pretty neat that car is still around.



Jerry
91 X-CHP
#8990

That's awesome. Will make a good stable mate to the EVOC car. :)

LOL.........

I thought I could take a dump then pm the guy about the car.....

excellent.......an now you have the matched EVOC set. that is cool. :2thumbs:

Found picture of car in Ed Sanow's Ford Police Car Book page 134. Car has roll bar but odd to see chrome spots on it. I think car was used for press photo shoots. I have a copy of that photo from a magazine circa 1982 I believe.




Jerry
91 X-CHP
#8990

I would love to see any pictures you or anyone else would have of this car in service or in publication!

Thanks for the information on the book!

I can send you the picture I cut out of a magazine, like I said, I think it was around 82-83. Has a little blurb about CHP starting to use them.





Jerry
91 X-CHP
#8990

Post the pic here also. We would like to see it also.

Ill run over to Staples and have it scanned.




Jerry
91 X-CHP
#8990

It might be this one from a scanned article on the main site:

http://www.specialservicemustang.net.../85Hotrod2.jpg

http://www.specialservicemustang.net/Articles.html

Very cool. Glad to see a car like that be saved.

Ok need a little help. I had it scanned to a PDF file. However, when I attempt to download, it says the file is too big. I even tried to Zip it and that didnt help either..





Jerry
91 X-CHP
#8990

email the .pdf to me and I will get it up on the site for you
PM coming...

Matt

I doubt that those are pictures of this car. This car has black interior, not the CHP standard tan that you expect. There are some pictures on the web listed as car #1963 with 2 different paint schemes. This car was all black originally per the trim tag. The early photos of the car without the cage show the car with a black roof and what appears to be a black interior. Later photos of the car with the cage show a white roof but no way to tell the interior color so far. I understand the car was painted when the cage was installed for Academy use to reflect the current fleet paint scheme of all Mustangs.

I am sure more information and more photos will appear as I try to find more information about the car. I am currently working with the EVOC sergeant who drove the 92 EVOC car for additional information as he knows the EVOC sergeant at the time who would have been assigned this car at the academy.

It appears car may have had several looks to it. There are two pictures of car on org., they came from Darryl Lindsay. One shows white roof (just roof, not a or c pillars) with chrome spots and other has correct roof paint and black spots. Stay tuned for posting of pic I have..




Jerry
91 X-CHP
#8990

This a smaller pic of it out of another book. Already had it scanned, will scan the larger one out of the police car book in a bit.

Here is the larger pic of it out of the police book. Sucks trying to scan a book.

The seats and interior look black in that picture.

Here is another pictures that "may" be of the car as it looks like it has a black interior. I would say this would be a very early picture of the car. Cannot see the license plate so who knows???

Check out the chrome rocker mouldings and hood...probably a different car.

Has anyone (Mike included) seen anything to document this car other than the number painted in the door?

I just talked to the original purchaser of the car from the CHP auction. He purchased this car from the CHP in Sacremento. The car was purchased for his daughter as her second car when she was in college. I will be talking with her tonight when she returns home. They tell me they still have the original sales invoice for the car from the CHP auction and will look for that. They also are looking for pictures of the car after their purchase. The car had the rollcage, spot lights, siren and other parts still on the car when they purchased the car. The decals, radio, radio rack and rear lights had already been removed from the car. The spotlights also had clear lenses in both lights when they purchased the car from the CHP. They also gave me a lot of history about the car since their purchase and history they were told about the car by the sergeants when his wife and daughter picked up the car in Sacremento after the auction. They were specifically told that this was the CHP prototype Mustang. True or not true that's what the original purchaser has said. If they can find the invoice that should tell the tale with the unit number and more information. He said the car was very low mileage, in good condition and ran very well. The car was black/white. Their was and still is an antennae plug for a low band antennae on the right rear quarter panel, not the left. The cage was in the car along with the aluminum plate over the rear bulkhead. The car has steel wheels with dog dish caps. With the exception of the original wheels which the 16 year old kid replaced with cheap mags and black primer paint on the lower part of the car, the car is very much just like is was purchased from the CHP.

The original purchaser, her father, worked for Socal Automotive which he said had a contract with the CHP to service their vehicles. Because of that contract he was also privy to cars coming up for auction. He specifically bid on this car to give to his 21 year old daughter for her second car. They won and this became her second car. She drove the car for years and took the car to Colorado when she moved. She eventually "gave" the car to a 16 year old kid across the street from her in Colorado Springs. The current seller bought the car from that kid 10 years ago.

Additional information as I am halfway through writing this post!

Just got off the phone with the daughter who got the car. She tells me the car had the decals removed and the doors painted black when she got the car. She remembers vividly that the car had 10,006 miles when she got the car in 1985. She still has pictures of when she picked up the car with the CHP sergeants handing her the keys and of the car. She will look for those. She also has the original invoice from their purchase from the CHP somewhere! She says the officers told her and her mother at the time they picked the car up from the CHP that the car was the original prototype Mustang for the CHP and was low miles because the car was trailered around the state for show and demonstration. The officers also told her that the car was also sent to the Michigan State Police Trials for evaluation in their police car trials and then returned to California. The trials is where the car "kissed" the wall as she says during high speed evaluation. She "gave" the car to her 16 year old neighbor who helped her for over a year to earn the car while her husband was on a job assignment out of state and she needed help with snow removal, yard care and house maintainance. The car had about 53,000 miles at that time in 1997. The second owner got the car in 1997. The second owner graduated high school and the car was sold to the 3rd owner (current seller) in 1998. All of these people still know each other and still reside in Colorado.

She provided a lot of other information and history about what she and her mother were told when they picked up the car from the CHP and the cars history since that time. She will look for pictures and paperwork on the car.

Still no definitive documentation as to the specific unit number and use other than the number in the door jamb but there is lot's of owner information available since all the people involved in ownership since the CHP are alive and well. I will know more when the car arrives in Nashville and I can go over the car closely.

More to come!

More to come!

Good stuff Mike. Hopefully the original paperwork will shed some more light on the story and I hope you get some nice pics too.

This picture shows #1963 with the later style standard Mustang CHP paint package. This picture also shows a right hand installed antennae EXACTLY where pictures of the car I am purchasing has an antennae plug. Unfortunately we cannot see the interior color or if there is a roll cage in the car. This picture also shows black spots instead of chrome.

Although this one is not technically an SSP car, as verified by the lack of a 6 digit DSO, it's pretty historically significant IMHO, once verified (much like Kevin's CHP hatchback). I know you'll keep us all posted as the info becomes available to you, and it's good to see this one surface and be able to track the progress. :2thumbs:

Looks like you have several ways to re-do this car.

I played with the contrast and brightness and the interrior color never changed. Light colors would get brighter. Next to what I believe is the roll bar, clearly visible, is the seat belt.

If, and I only say if, this truly is one of the prototype Mustangs for the CHP and possibly/ultimately the 1st EVOC Mustang, isn't it possible/probable that Ford would have provided the car to the CHP to test and help develop and package and the DSO "may" have been different than what is normally expected? This car shows a color code of 1C, all black. Given the production date of 12/81, had the SSP package even been created at that time?

I personally do not know any of these answers. I am just speculating and looking to see if any of you with much more knowledge than I can answer many of the questions that have and will arise with this car.

I believe this car was a solid color car of 1C. Notice on the first picture the roof is only painted on the very top. The part of the sail panels and the spot light areas are black, very much like how they paint cars now witht he CVs.

Here is the Ad that Jerry had scanned in yesterday...

Good questions, and I'm sure there will be more discussion on the car as more information becomes available.

As for the DSO....it wasn't a special ordered car, because it doesn't have the order number next to the sales office code. Ford was doing special orders (and fleet orders) long before this and still does (with the longer, 6 digit codes). It looks like the sales office code for this car code is for Detriot, which doesn't really help, either, as any car destined for a dealership lot up there would have had the same code. I've seen Ford executive cars with Transportation Services DSOs, and there was even an SSP on ORG last year with that same DSO (I think it was 89), so who knows?

It's definitely a 1C, non-special paint car, per the door label, which does not have a blank paint code. Did you ask the seller if it had two buck tags? My guess is that it does not, since it wasn't a special order.

Bottom line is that any documentation will go a long way to help prove what this car is or isn't. I'm sure some of the contacts at CHP that we now have may be able to help as well.

While we are on the subject...Texas DPS tested a car in 1982 also...also with black interior. :)

http://www.specialservicemustang.net/images/1982dps.jpg

Charles Ricks already did a fair amount of research on SSP vehicle usage and a state by state chart of his work was published in the "Fox-Body Mustang Recognition Guide 1979-1993" by Shreiner and Sessler.

About CHP vehicles, here is one of the footnote quotes:

"Total number includes five 1982 hatchback Mustangs (part of original 400) which may not have been actual SS Package Mustangs. Total does not include 1982 California Highway Patrol Mustang E851963 which is a prototype car."

Jim Dingell will argue with the 400 number, and I think Mike Riley ran the VINs up via Carfax and posted them on his website. I think the number that he came up with is 406 package-cars, which is the same as Jim.

The shot of E851963 above is the same pic used by Ford in the press release, which I guess is why were are seeing it in so many places.

I'm not sure where the "prototype" designation came from in Charles' research, but I hope Mike is able to put some documentation with the story and fully identify this car.

I had a conversation with Charles Ricks once about the prototype car and I recall him telling me it was suspected that there may have been more than one protype car built and that the E851963 plate may have been used on more than one vehicle. Might explain that odd looking one with the chrome rockers and turbine wheels...or maybe not. I too am anxious to see what documentation turns up on this latest car. If it's legit, it is a hugely historic vehicle for sure!

That's entirely possible....and we don't know if the cars were just modified regular-production models or not. Judging from the tags on this one, if it turns out to be verified, I'd guess that they were. Remember, CHP was given the cars to evaluate, and I doubt that they special-built a one-off version for them.