I am looking at buying a Maverick, had one about 13 years ago and want another. I have able to find two Mavericks and look at both today. The first was an early 1970 manual steering, and a 74 power steering. They both had steering problems, the 1970 was very hard to steer and did not want to return to straight very quickly when coming out of a turn. The 1974 was super sloppy over steered, just touch the wheel and it was all over the place. Both of these had a lot of play in the steering from side to side. From what I can remember my old 1970 Maverick was never this hard to steer, and returned to straight fine out of a turn. I am thinking both of these have worn steering boxes. What do you think?
The 1970 is the one I want also, it's an early 70 though, remote mounted ignition switch, horn ring on steering wheel. I have heard the early 70s had weaker front end parts, than later, a lot of left over Falcon stuff. Is there any truth to this? Is there a difference? The 1970 is a V8 convert, someone dropped in a nice little 289 and C4, but left the 7.5. I have a lead on a 1966 Mustang 8" though. The 1966 rear end will bolt up, correct? Thanks for the help
The Mustang rear should bolt right in. I think the early tie-rod shafts are smaller but not a big deal IMO. Someone else may chime in with more info.
65-66 Mustang rear end has small axle bearings, Granada will have the larger bearing, same as the Maverick. Both early Mustang and Granada have the same width rear end which is wider than the Maverick rear.
from a fellow 69.5 owner in Northeast Pennsylvania Not all 69.5 Mavericks had the earlier Falcon based front suspension parts. I assume the very early ones did as I'm sure that Ford was in a hurry to introduce the Maverick in April 69 so they installed what would fit at the time. My later built 69.5 was built with the normal 70+ Maverick front end parts on it.
Yup, someone may have over tighted the pre-load on the box or something is binding(tie, rod, idler arm, ball joint etc)... I'd get it up in the air and check it with no load on the front wheels, should be able to turn the wheel with one finger...
Its also quite possible the front end on the 70 hasnt been greased in many many years...Hence the stiffness, also its possible the frt end parts are just plain worn out. As for parts compatibility on the 69 1/2 (Which is what you have) 70/71/72/73 frt end parts will work just fine. Welcome and good luck!!!
The parts were not left over but same as used in the then current '69 production of other models... As far as weaker I think it's a myth(if not someone please enlighten me), the early '70('69.5) Maverick basically used the same control arms, ball joints, tie rods, etc as all '68-'69 Mustang(Boss 429 excepted), Torino & Falcon... Actually most pieces are same back to '66 Fairlane & Falcon... The main differences are the early Mav used the '69 four bolt ball joint, vs three of '70 and the stud/pin on the tie '68/'69 rods is slightly smaller but it's a total non issue, also '70 drums/rotors use a larger bearing but spindle size is same... I'm using '69 Torino front spindles with the smaller pin/stud in tie rod and not loosing any sleep over it...
^^ I do know the 70 Mustang have a bigger wheel bearing/fatter spindle than the 69 Mustang. This change came in April on the 69 Boss 302 and was standard in '70 for the Mustang
Yeah I was wrong about spindle size being same in '70 as '69... I suppose Ford felt something larger would be a good idea on a tracked vehicle like the Boss 302 that would likely be tossed from side to side on the track... No doubt it didn't make sense to produce two different sets of components for similar vehicles when the larger stuff was probably just as economical to produce... I haven't checked but I'd venture a guess the larger spindle size, bearings, tie rods, etc were "borrowed" from the full size Ford or maybe T-Bird... Still this doesn't erase the fact the "smaller" components were used even on the 390 & 428 Stangs/Torinos and surely are not failure prone... I have the original bearings in my 428CJ Fairlane Cobra and excepting for upper ball joints, everything in the front end is orig... I am planning on a rebuild but nothing will be upgraded...
