All,
I have been watching for some years now as Goose #508, a local car for a long time, has been touted and paraded as a "1967 Mangusta".
I raise a challenge to you early (#'s 500- 530ish) Goose owners to help out by chiming in! Read on!
I ask you this..... if the windows are all dated as produced in early 1968, would you believe the car salesman trying to tell you it was produced in 1967??? (OK, presuming that not all 9-10 pieces of glass have been replaced for some insane reason....!!!!)
I will concede that construction of the car most likely started in 1967....but if the windows are dated 1968....the car was not finished in 1968 and therefore would BE a 1968 Mangusta. (Criteria for a 1967 Goose being 1) "completed build" in year 1967, or 2) sold as a model year 1967 ie produced in 1966)
If you follow the logic of "production year" this would still hold true, that it would not be a 1967 car. As early as late July and early August, US car co's began building the "next" year model cars....so this would STILL make this particular Goose a 1968 model.
Now, we know that there weren't too many cars built before this one...
However, after prowling around looking at early supposed 1967 Mangusta on the DeTomaso Registry website put together by Chuck Melton, I found some VERY interesting things!
#508 appears very much like most of the early Mangustas built. It does have steel hatches and a steel hood, making them very heavy! It does have a 289 HiPo motor with matching 1967 date codes. (I saw the car with valve covers off and confirmed the dates and part numbers)
However, it has many features of later cars! It has the full length engine covers, full gas tank in the area front of the RH wheel well. It has open areas behind the rear wheels for the battery and the ac drier and jack. I am presuming that it would also have the full sized "auxiliary" storage area in front of the LH rear wheel. (I couldn't find my pictures of it nor could I find any others....)
It also has a screened rear AC condenser area out back, and "almost" a two sided rear crossmember for the bottom a-arms to attach to. The second side of the rear crossmember does not attach at the frame rail like the other side does. Later, both sides attached to the frame rails. (MUCH stronger IMHO!)
If you look at the pictures for car #514, it has very distinctive and unique "box areas" in front of the rear wheels, and the rear opening areas are not present at all! This area from below the tail lamp housings to the wheel well area is level and flush, no drop at all! (Unless the current restorer is doing all sorts of funny things with the restoration!)
Further on #514, we see wheel well arch supports from the chassis to the wheel wells. These are also seen on/in chassis #500 pics. This feature was discontinued early on, only to be resurrected well into the 1970 production timeframe. (see pics of this in my "oops I did it again" post in the chassis discussion pages...)
Car #508 does NOT have these braces!
Car #514 also has a one sided one legged rear lower crossmember. Something I would fix right away!
The rear AC vent area on #514 has long slots running in parallel with the center line of the car! No metal screen.... #500 has the same....
So, which is real? It was not unheard of back in the days, for the Italian car manufacturers to renumber cars, make duplicates, fix crashed cars and renumber them, leave a "problem" child off in a corner for some time until it could be placed back into production....
Any number of things could have occurred in the small production facility which was Ghia and then to DeTomaso where the cars were finished.
OK, back to you early car owning types! If you could look at your windows where the small manufacturers seal is etched. There will be a one or two digit number to the left of the SECURIT diamond shaped logo and an alpha character to the right of it.
On my side window, I have a 9 and C indicating March (3rd month) of 1969. My car was built somewhere after or perhaps during March of 1969. Could not have been finished in February or January, as the dates on my calipers would have you believe!
If you could publish the window dates and your chassis number in this post, it would help with putting this myth to rest! It will either be real, or just wishful thinking..... and we will all know!
Next myth? Were all two head lamp cars "1970" cars....?
Ciao!
Steve
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