Year Identification of Pantera 73/74

If it was built in '73, its a '73 car IMHO. Just because it was first sold in '74 doesn't make it a '74. When the smog laws in CA were changed to exempt up to & including 1973-made cars, a whole slew of sold-in-'74 Panteras were successfully re-registered as 1973s. Somewhere on your car, there should also be a 'build date' tag to show your DMV. In fact, somewhere I read that Ford actually stopped building Panteras sometime in March of '74, which is why when Ford sold the 'assembly plant' back to DeTomaso at the end of '74, there were some 200+ unfinished bodies laying around inside. These then became 1975-1977 Panteras custom-built mostly for Euro customers.

Looks like even back in 1994 in the DupontRegistry book (where I have a pic of it back then from the PO where he found the car) it was listed as a 74 also. But, like you said, if the VIN has 73, hey its a 73'.

Of course, historically, almost all American manufacturers introduced the new model year before the actual start of the calendar year, for example, almost if not all 2004 models were available long before last week. My car is THPNNE06984 and it has always been titled as a 74. Living in Florida there is no difference in any regulations regarding smog or otherwise. Its always been my story that my car was the last year Ford was involved with the project and I'm sticking to it, but if I lived in California I might change my tune.