Topic: 1966 Californian smog question

[outlawincorporated]

I have a bit of a long winded question that relates to "1966 Mustangs only" specifically to the Californian smog equipment that was put on these engines.

I cut my teeth on 1966 Smog cars as that was the vast majority of Mustang that headed down under and still do to this day, though very few now have original smog equipment attached.

so here goes.
recently I found a Dearborn built 66 mustang that was strangely sent to a Ford dealer in San Jose California, doesn't make any sense to me but that's another story to search out. DSO on door tag and owners Manual is 72, San Jose California

when I checked out this car (more out of curiousity than anything else) I discovered that the engine had the original smog equipment attached as per other San Jose mustangs I had played with over many years, from what I can determine the engine seems to be its original one.  yes I know its impossible to be 100% sure but all dated parts seem to line up with build of the car itself and anything that was stamped or dated are in a very close date range.
so lets say it is correct to the car from day one.

question; was Dearborn and for that matter NJ equipped on there assembly lines to put Smog equipment on there builds??
I have never seen another Mustang in 66 from a different assembly plant that was equipped with smog equipment and sent to a Californian DSO

Jim/Jeff both of you have had your hands in and over smog equipped cars for many decades, what's your thoughts??

a few other things to discuss on this find but we will start with the smog stuff first.

look forward to some chats on the matter

regards

PHILL BERESFORD
MELBOURNE.
AUSTRALIA.

[jwc66k]

Phil,
Were there any other options on this particular Mustang, A/C, AM/FM, etc? From what as been determined, Ford scheduled cars for easy shipment and a Dearborn build, San Jose DSO would not be standard - but if a certain option was ordered, and Dearborn was building Mustangs with that option, it would be made there. Also, consider this - San Jose was behind schedule, and Dearborn could help out.
Jim

[outlawincorporated]

JIM

thanks for the reply.
This car is a GT, auto trans, console, power steering, AM radio, Tinted windshield and 6.95 wsw which was all taken from from original dealers sales receipt.  nothing fancy or out of the ordinary there IMHO

one thing that is a little strange and confusing is the colour code on the owners manual and the sales receipt.
it is marked on both as colour code "D" which I cant find any relation to in my colour sheets.  please don't ask about the door tag as the owner has removed that and every other tag possible and has that stored else where, which I wasn't able to view at the time of insoection.  The car is presently Nightmist Blue colour code "K" and from what I can see it always has and was Nightmist blue (yes it has been repainted in a previous life but everything too me looks like it was genuinely a Nightmist blue car from day 1)

I understand the idea of Dearborn building cars that are in high demand for some options and shipping them elsewhere but that doesn't answer the smog question.
"was Dearborn and for that matter NJ equipped on there assembly lines to put Smog equipment on there builds??"

Another thing against the high demand suggestion is that this car has a schedule build date of march 1966 but wasn't sold from this San Jose dealer till September 1966. that seems like a long time to sit on he lot before being sold...…….

when the owner finds the door tag that should answer the issue over colour very quickly, lets hope he allows me back there to do another inspection.

regards

PHILL BERESFORD
MELBOURNE.
AUSTRALIA.

[67gta289]

Keep in mind that thermactor appointments (heads, air rails, unique distributor/carb, etc.) for the 289 was done at Windsor or Cleveland regardless of the assembly plant.

SJ built cars destined for non-California DSOs, so they had thermactor and non-thermactor engines to handle.

In 67 Dearborn built all Cougars, which would mean that they handled thermactor for California DSOs as well as non-thermactor.

It was (and is) probably the case that all assembly plants handled whatever California was requiring at the time.

That said, it is odd though for a Mustang to have taken this route, so something along the lines of what Jim mentioned seems logical.

[Building 3]

Wasn't the "California" emissions equipment available to any customer?  There was an option "Exhaust Emission Control" for $45 that seems to be available in all 50 states; if so, then all the plants should have had it to install.

[J_Speegle]

question; was Dearborn and for that matter NJ equipped on there assembly lines to put Smog equipment on there builds??
I have never seen another Mustang in 66 from a different assembly plant that was equipped with smog equipment and sent to a Californian DSO

Jim/Jeff both of you have had your hands in and over smog equipped cars for many decades, what's your thoughts??

Bottom line yes you can find cars built in 66 and 67 destined for Calif built at Dearborn. Have not found a NJ built one yet. I don't believe it had anything to do with San Jose not being able to build enough cars but instead where the order was generated. As an example we had a car where the owner had kept all the paperwork on the car (original owner) and he had a Dearborn built car with Thermactor. I had ordered the car prior to being transferred to Calif so the order was generated, apparently sent to the closest plant where they built the car as ordered then shipped it cross country to where he moved. Don't make sense dollar wise but there it was. Have seen other examples and sometimes the installation details differed from how San Jose did things. Recall one owner at a local show could not figure out (and yes he asked after hearing our conversation) why a group of us was so interested in is 6 cylinder 66 with Thermactor. It has some oddities that we picked up on and were discussing.