“When my son, Chris, and I were looking for a father-son car to restore, in 2002, we found a 1970 Sports Roof Mustang outside of Washington D.C.,” says Bruce DeJarnette. “When we went to look at the car, the owner tried to start it and promptly set the engine compartment on fire. Luckily, there was no damage, since we quickly put the fire out.”

Bruce continues, saying that while the father-son duo knew that the car would need a lot of work, they bought the Mustang, anyway.  After all, putting good, hard work into restoring classic cars runs in the DeJarnette family.

For Bruce, his passion for collector vehicles trickled down from his father, who was “a sheet metal man.” In the early 1970s, both Bruce and his dad set aside a year to restore a 1958 MGA that he had bought from a friend.  Bruce says that he kept that car for 36 years. And, he adds that he and his son carried on the family tradition of classic car restoration, when in the late 1990s, he and Chris re-restored that car; Chris was only a teenager.

By 2002, the family was ready for a new project.  Bruce says that his wife did not like convertibles all that much; plus, the MGA did not have “enough motor” for Chris, who was now in his early 20’s.  They tried to sell the ’58 MGA on eBay Motors.  And, Bruce explains that it was during that process that Chris came across the 1970 Mustang.

The Mustang resembled Bruce’s very first car: a 1970 Mustang that was painted in bright Calypso Coral orange.  He had received the Mustang from his parents, as a high school graduation present.

“To me, the 1969-1970 body style… that Fastback/Sports Roof… it is one of the prettiest cars there’s ever been,” says Bruce.  “I’ve had Toyotas, Chevys, Fords.  I’ve driven them all. But there is something about that 69-70 body style.”

He still had pictures of his very first car around the house for the whole family to admire.  And, it inspired them, all the more, to buy that Mustang out of D.C.

“And, after having a friend trailer the car from D.C. to our home in Baltimore, Md., we started to do a restoration back to stock condition,” says Bruce. “After getting the car home, Chris spent every weekend and evening, after work, disassembling the car.”

Bruce says that the dynamic duo built a rotisserie to mount the car on and proceeded to replace all the rusted sheet metal. They found that the car had quarter panel skins riveted over the original rusted quarter panels, along with a quarter-inch of bondo.

“After doing the sheet metal replacement in all the usual areas, we started thinking about the engine for the car,” says Bruce. “Chris wanted to build a 400-plus horsepower engine for the car. I was not too happy with the thought of turning him loose with that much horsepower. Chris was thinking about a race car; I was thinking about a nice driver.”

“While talking to a friend of mine at work about the car, he told me he had several DOHC 4.6 engines,” continues Bruce. “Rick is also a Mustang owner and tunes the newer generation Mustangs. After thinking about never seeing a modular motor in an early Mustang, we decided to take the most complete engine. The DOHC 4.6 engine is approximately 300 horsepower, and I felt Chris could handle that, without too much worry on my part. At the time, I felt we might be lowering the valve of the car, if we ever decided to sell the car. But, we installed the modular motor for the ‘WOW’ factor we thought it might have at car shows.”

What started out as a simple restoration, ended up as a two-and-a-half-year project, to add a modern driveline to a classic car. Bruce explains that by changing the direction in which they were going, with the restoration, the father-son team had to redo some of the work they had already completed.

They cut out the shock towers and installed a Mustang II front suspension from Rod and Custom Motor sport rack and pinion steering. They bought a T-45 transmission and changed the eight-inch rear to a 3:80 gear, set with an Auburn limited slip differential.   They then added an aluminum driveshaft. Bruce and Chris tried to model a 1996 Cobra Mustang driveline. They used an Accel Gen 7 engine management system to run the engine along with MSD ignition.

“We topped the engine off with a functional shaker hood scoop, through a custom made air filter, attached to the throttle body,” says Bruce. “We ran two-and-a-half-inch Spin Tech side exit exhaust, out in front of the wheels.”

On the interior, they used the stock dash cluster and fabricated an adapter to replace the gauges with Autometer white face gauges. They adapted a Hurst shifter to fit the T-45 shifter, in order to keep with the classic looks. Then, they rewired the car with a custom wire harness that they designed and fabricated. Bruce adds that the sound system is an Aiwa head unit and CD player with speakers in the kick panels and the fold-down trap door.

“We did all the work in my garage a home,” says Bruce.  “When it came time to paint the car we built a paint booth and did the paint, as well. The paint is 1970 T Code Candy Apple Red, in BC/CC. The stripes on the sides are from a 1970 Grabber Mustang.”

“We added rear window louvers and wing, along with a front spoiler,” he continues. “We also added 1970 Mach 1 lights and grill. The car rides on 15-inch Magnum wheels, with 235/60 front and 245/60 rear tires.”

Chris, now 28-years-old, started to enter car shows in the spring of 2005, and has done very well. Bruce says that the car won Best of Show, during the first show at which Chris entered the car. The Mustang won two Best of Shows and a Best Muscle Car, along with several other trophies, in 2005. The car also won Best in Class, in Virginia Beach, during the spring of 2008.

“As much fun as it is to win a trophy, it is more fun for me to hear the praise Chris gets from people at the car shows for his work on the car,” says proud dad, Bruce.

“The best part of the restoration was the time we spent in the garage, solving problems that came up as we were working on the car together,” says Bruce. “It was fun to pass along my mechanical knowledge and watch Chris learn how to weld and do body work, along with his first attempt at painting a car. Today, Chris is the proud owner of the car, and I am a proud Dad. We are now working on a complete restoration of my 1970 Boss 302 Mustang. We are in the final assembly stage. My hope is to have the Boss finished this spring, so we can attend car shows and have the cars sit side by side.”

Bruce is a proud member of both the Mustang Club of America and the Mustang Club of Maryland.  He adds that he regularly reads magazines that cover the restoration of Mustangs. He also notes that he is beginning to see more cars in the Mustang magazines with modular motors.

“It seems we were ahead of the times with the installation of a DOHC 4.6 engine,” says Bruce.

Story by: Becky McLaughlin