From Dad’s Daily to Running Mid 9s - Jonas Delacruz’s 1973 Mustang Mach 1
Ford enthusiasts and car lovers often overlook the 1971-1973 Mustangs. Many people can’t get past the Mile Long Mustang look and the gigantic body shape compared to the late 60s Mustangs. However, these Mustangs can make rowdy quarter-mile drag cars. Just check out this 1973 H Code Mustang Mach 1 that can run mid 9’s owned by Jonas Delacruz. The car's rebirth didn’t begin till the late 2000s, but the Delacruz family has loved it since they bought it in 1984. Jonas’s grandfather bought the car for $2000 as a daily driver for Jonas’s dad and his sister. Back then, this car was just a car, nothing special, nothing hard to find like nowadays. It went for short jaunts to school or craved the Utah canyons. It took canyon corners with ease and dealt with whatever else they threw at it, just not snow; it did not like snow! Through stories shared by his dad, Jonas learned his dad loved the car.
When Jonas would hang out at his grandparent's house, he and his brothers would use the car as an imagination-powered simulator. The car was one big sad mess at the time – flat tires, faded paint, spots of rust flaking away paint, and a few dings and dents. To him and his brothers, none of that mattered one bit. They would still sit inside, curling their little hands around the thick lumpy steering wheel, pretending they were screeching the tires as they slid through sharp corners until the imaginary race was ended by grandpa yelling “get out!” The dream of owning and driving a car like this had always been floating through Jonas’s mind. “I always liked mustangs, especially the older ones. I swear, getting asked in elementary or middle school, “what’s your dream car?” I was always the only one that said something classic, unlike the common “Ferrari, Viper, or Corvette. I loved 67-70 fastbacks the most. I mean, who doesn’t!?” Jonas distinctly remembers when he was around 12, he vowed to himself he would own a Mustang of some sort. You never saw 71-73 Mustangs on the cover of Hot Rod Magazine or sprinkled throughout local car shows. Conversations of him buying the old sad mess of a 1973 Mustang began, but it was just lacking something to him. The taillight panel area had some attractive qualities, but he could not get over the looooong, fastback look. Time continued to pass, as did the chances of the car getting saved. Finally, one day Jonas’s grandpa asked him if he wanted it and said if he weren’t to take it, it would get donated or scrapped. Jonas was really the only grandkid who had a passion for cars, and his grandpa figured he could use the car as a way to learn basic automotive maintenance skills. Little did his grandpa or the car know what heights Jonas would take this neglected Mustang to.
Jonas plugged away at the car when he could, doing whatever he could. “Working on the Mustang didn't really start till I was about 16. I didn’t have any tools, and I mean nothing! My dad wasn’t a big hands-on mechanic-type person, so I spent a lot of time and money buying cheap tools to get by. I worked small little jobs around, saving money here and there to buy things for it. At this point, I was a broke high school kid, trying to fit in the car scene.” The 351 Cleveland in the car had lost a few ponies since it left the stable in 1973. Jonas had some pretty conscious goals at this point – get the car to the point where it was a good solid driver and make it look pretty.
The trajectory for the build was redirected again when some new friends were acquired in high school who shared an interest in cars and a love for drag racing. “I grew up going to our local racetrack Rocky Mountain Raceway for some circle track events, I never really watched drag racing. My parents thought we would lose interest as kids watching cars go in a straight line versus an oval. Well back in my high school days, drag racing was all we watched. We would skip football games and school events to hang out at the track. Every single Friday night, you guessed it, we were there. I was not sure if it was the sound or smell of race cars going down the track or warming up, but all I knew was that I wanted to do it!”
In the winter of 2014, Jonas decided it was time to start building this car for more track use but still somewhat streetable. As a high schooler, many sacrifices had to be made, and the biggest and baddest parts were not on the table to hop this Mustang up. “The motor was still tired, but I hot-rodded the crap out of that thing everywhere. I swapped the 2-barrel carburetor out for an Edelbrock 600 (probably the worst carb choice ever), Chrome Lakewood “slapper bars,” 4.10 gears with a spool, dual 3-inch glass packs out the side, and a 2500 stall converter.” Coincidentally the winter of 2014 is also when the snowball began to grow as the build rolled along.
The whole plan revolved around just having a fun 12-second street ride. Nothing super crazy, just something that would still move out of its own way but be easy to handle on the streets. “When I decided I wanted to build something that would go 12’s, that was quick in my world. Back in the day, I thought 12’s were quick. Today 12’s isn’t that quick, but back then, I thought, holy cow, that is moving. Going back to my roots, I had zero experience. I never saw engines taken apart, chassis fabrication, tuning, and I mean nothing. I literally knew some basic maintenance, and that was about it. With the help of the internet, I started to pick out what I needed to do. Social media wasn’t big for the car community just yet, so I would go through hundreds of old forums and read about different engine combinations and how they achieved 12s in the quarter-mile. After weeks of browsing combinations, I finally had a game plan.”
Step one of the plan was to get the tired 351 Cleveland out so it could get a bath and be inspected to see if it could handle some more horsepower shoved down its throat. Jonas had seen many people take these 351s into the 12s without that much work. Plus, using the original engine meant there wouldn’t need to be many headaches endured fabbing up new mounts and other parts. This plan was quickly scrapped as the block turned out to be scrap. “A lot of guys say with these Cleveland motors, pretty much anything 30 over you don’t want to really rip on it unless you are looking for problems. The machine shop looked at it and told me it was 40 over, so he basically looked at me and said well, you could just send it, or you can find another block. I could have sleeved the block, but that would have cost more than the whole car, haha.”
Using some internet detective skills, Jonas was able to track down an individual out of Michigan who specialized in building these Cleveland motors. After discussing the ultimate goal of getting the car into the 12s, the engine builder said he had a block laying around they could build. The decision was to make the block into a 393 stroker which could rocket the car well into the low 12s. “I found a set of four-barrel closed chamber heads with a bent valve, but it was all easily fixable. I took those to the machine shop just to get looked over and get the valves fixed, then shipped them off to the guy in Michigan. The engine builder was going to take the heads to the next level, and I was just a young kid trying to go fast, so I said, anything you can do to make this thing go 12s, just do it. So, he planned to take these heads to one of his friends, and they were going to fill the bottom intakes with some epoxy to make them flow better. Then he was going to braze the exhaust ports.” After weeks if not months, Jonas had not heard much about progress on the engine. With the engine in limbo, his attention turned to piecing the rest of the car together. Right around this time, Facebook and other car forums were beginning to take off, which are ideal places to scoop up some odds and ends. A new converter was bought to ensure the original C6 transmission could keep up to the 393 whenever it showed up. All that power is no good if it can’t bury itself into the ground. It doesn’t take much power to go 12s as long as the car can hook. A 1000hp car makes the Flintstones car look fast if it has no traction. Meaning some new suspension parts such as some CalTracs, leaf springs, and other components were mounted to the car.
This was when that snowball got another nudge down the hill. “A buddy of mine said, ‘if you are going to do this much to the car, you are going to put a cage in it.’ I said, ‘no, I’m not going to put a cage in it. It is a waste of money. It will weigh me down, and I don’t think I would make that much power.’ But one day, we just decided to go for it. A local chassis shop dude said let’s build this cage. I was still in limbo with the motor because it took forever to get done. I was just constantly waiting on parts. So, we took it to the shop and put a cage in it.” And then that snowball got hit by a running tackle and flew down the hill because once your buddy and a shop get involved, it's you should do this, it's already on the hoist, so might as well do that, and so on. In the end, a custom 10-point cage was fabricated for the car, a much lighter custom aluminum dash replaced the stock dash, and Lexan replaced the old heavy fogged-up glass. Even though the original Ford 9-inch in the car was a tremendous rear end, it was upgraded to a Fab Chassis Works 9-inch. An anti-roll bar was added in the back, along with a lot of strengthening to the sub-frame. “I Added custom shocks all the way around. This is how I knew I was going crazy. I put double adjustable Menscer shocks all the way around. Those shocks were 500 bucks each, and the car didn’t even run. Then suddenly, I am thinking, man, I am just trying to go 12s. What are we doing all this for.”
With all the work done, the chassis builder was convinced with the weight reduction and the 393; this car could easily go into the 10s. Then the engine builder was gone off the face of the earth with the heads or motor never being seen again. With frustration building, Jonas decided to buy a short block and then figure out how to build it himself. “I was on Facebook and found a new set of cylinder heads. The guy I bought them from had a crazy small block and decided he would take the engine to the next level, so he was selling off his old stuff. He had a set of CHI 3v Cleveland heads that were fully done up. Plus, he was selling the matching intake. He was going high 8’s low 9s in a 4000-pound truck with these heads on a Cleveland motor. The heads are badass. So anyway, I scooped it up and made sure it worked with the pistons in the short block. I just had some flat tops in it. We found out the compression was going to be around 14 to 1, so straight-up race gas was needed. From there on, I hit up Kuntz and Craft in Arkansas, who built a lot of ford stuff, and said build me a cam. I gave them the specs for the heads, and they were like, damn, those are badass heads. You are going to make some power with those. We will make you a cam to match.”
At this point, Jonas admits it felt like he was going in the right direction, but at the same time, he was going backwards. New parts were being built and added. On the other hand, recently bought parts had to be rebought as power kept being added or other items modified. He just knew if he stayed on this path, it would be a badass car and be worth it in the end. “I ended up taking the c6 tranny out. I went with a c4; it was lighter but could still take power as long as it was built right. It is a solid transmission. The c4 is still living to this day. I had the motor there and put the cam in. It took forever. We put a motor plate on the front and took the engine mounts out. Then if you have a front plate, you need a mid-plate. So I was just learning new stuff as I was going. At this point, I just regret everything I have done. Until then, I had never really even driven a drag car, and now I have this machine that’s supposed to go fast, so hopefully, I don’t kill myself. I always tell people building a car like this that everything is a combination. If you want to go fast on the track, everything has to work together,r from the carb to the rear-end gears. Everything has to work together to make it go down the track. It can't just be a 1000hp engine with everything else stock.”
While there was a light at the end of the tunnel that the car would be finished soon, Jonas got rocked by a big gut punch. The drag strip in Utah closed down after being open since the 80s. After years of putting whatever time and money he had to spare into the car, there was no track now. “Putting my heart and soul into it, and now here we are with no track. I still kept my chin up and kept progressing on the car.” Finally, after years of changing plans and learning new things, the highs and the lows, the motor was dropped into the car and hooked up to the transmission. There was still that missing piece, that cherry on top to complete the engine, or something that literally sits on top of the engine - the carburetor. “At the time, I didn’t even know what fuel the car would run on. So when I called the guy who made my carb, I told him the engine's specs and said whatever makes my car go the fastest, do that. At this time, I was so used to saying I wanted to go 12s, but as the build snowballed, I would say let's get it into the high 10s, then I just started saying, whatever makes this car go, the fastest, let's do that. He built me a badass carb that you could fit your fist down the butterflies. He suggested I run Q16. It is forgiving if you want to run nitrous. It's not super hard to tune, but it is super corrosive, so it will need to be drained when you aren’t using the car, but it makes crazy power. Q16 last time I checked was like 8.75 a gallon, so that’s always fun.”
That glorious triumphant moment of hearing the engine's first start-up came in 2019. “I had not heard of the car since 2012 when it was unmodified. I went through every nut and bolt for three days to ensure I didn’t have any troubles off the hop. There were some slight hiccups at the start, as some stuff was just wired wrong. I fired it up for the first time, and I didn’t know if I would get in the car to drive it. I have heard some nasty motors, but this thing is crazy. This new monster cam in the small block with high compression was nasty. I have been trying to build a 12-second car since I was 12. Now I have this.”
Going back to 14-year-old Jonas’s goal of making the car good to look at, he was constantly asked while piecing the motor together, “are you going to paint the car when you are done?”. His reply was true to the form of someone who only cares about speed “No, paint doesn't add horsepower.” Luckily for him, along the journey, he had friends who were always willing to lend a hand. A long-time friend ended up getting a job at a body shop and offered to paint the car as long as Jonas prepped it and bought the paint. “He gave me all the steps on prepping it before I brought it to him. The front fenders on the car were bad, so now the whole front end of the car is fiberglass which greatly reduced the car's weight. Again, I just made some new mounts, and, in the end, it turned out really nice actually. And the whole front-end weighs like 30 pounds compared to like 400. After that, I thought I prepped the car pretty well. I’m not a paint or body car; I have never watched a car get prepped or painted. The closest thing I had to painting a car was getting a rattle can and painting some parts. I thought I had it good. I thought, oh ya, this is buttery smooth. And no, man, that car is not for someone who wants something perfect. I mean, I never did true bodywork on it. I just took some blocks to it and did what I could. I was just looking for a 10-foot paint job. I wasn’t trying to go to SEMA or anything. It was just to race but do I regret not going back and cutting my quarter panels out absolutely. In the end, it looks great going down the track, so it's okay.” Jonas ended up spending hours flipping through hundreds of pages of paint samples until he landed on a green that started life out as a dodge color. “Yes, Ford guys I did look for a Ford green they just didn’t pop to me. I have never had something fully painted like that. Seeing the car with the paint and stripe kit was a dream come true. You could tell from a mile away this was a Mach 1 now. As I said, I wanted a factory-looking Mach 1, but under the skin was built. Everything was happening all at once. Trying to get an engine built, paint, track closing, just a lot went down in 2 years.”
The car was completed just in time to attend an event Jonas had been going to for years just to watch and learn the art of drag racing - Las Vegas Street Car Nationals. Las Vegas Street Car nationals has heads-up racing with cars from 500hp to 2000hp. As long as your car has doors, you can race. “The whole way to the event, I was thinking what am I doing? Is this real? I have never even really had this car on the track. I was on cloud 9 for the whole six-hour drive I had. I remember just shaking while signing the registration, thinking I am actually here with my car. I was telling everyone I was excited, but deep down, I was thinking, damn, this car might kill me. A couple of guys in the pits asked me what do you think you will run? I just answered man, if this car goes 10.99 by the end of the event, I will be stoked. I entered the Mustang Madness class, which was the first class every day. So, I had to be at the track at like eight every day. That kind of sucked because I couldn’t ease into the event and watch some other guys go. It was just like show up, fuel up, and go.
I got into the car, strapped in, and was ready to rock. I did my first burnout, which was not overly impressive, and rolled up to the line. The lights dropped, and I stomped on it and quickly realized this was not a 12-second car. The car scared the crap out of me. Around the halfway mark, it fell on its face. I coasted through the line and still got 11.10. I got towed back to the lanes thinking I broke something, thinking, oh god, what did I do. And it turned out it just didn’t have enough gas in it. My buddy and I just forgot to add more gas in all the excitement and nerves. After that, the nerves were gone. I thought I’m good now that I know what to expect. I got my next race later in the day and lined up with Jack Roush's daughter. I don’t know how it happened because I was trying to line myself up with an older, slower fox body. And man, this car was fully kitted out with mini tubs, the best motor, just everything. I didn’t even realize it was her until after the race. At the start of this race, I did a much better burnout which felt good. I rolled up to the line, the lights dropped, and my car spun. I thought, man was that another weak burnout, so I let out and stomped on it again, and man I was on her bumper the whole time. I could not believe I was keeping up with a fully kitted-out drag car. I made it to the end of the track, and the official handed me my slip, and I went 9.99 the second time I had ever driven the car down a track. I wasn’t even licensed to go that fast. It was the craziest thing ever. As a kid, I would go to the track, and my family didn’t have a car, so we would walk through the pits and think, holy, that guy has a 10-second car. Then all of a sudden, I have a car that is just as fast, if not faster, than those guys. I always just dreamed of going in 12s, maybe the 10s, and now I have something that runs in the 9s. It's crazy even to this day. Like motor trend will release something about a new Lamborghini that says it goes will 10.30 from the factory. And I think, wow, my car is faster than a Lamborghini. Some people thought I would never build a car that could go in 12s, let alone the 9s. Needless to say, I was on cloud 9. I had people texting me as the race was live-streamed. Friends and family were calling me before I even had the ticket as I had to drive back to the exit road to get my ticket. It was pretty quiet in the pits where we were parked, but man, it was like I just won the Indianapolis 500 in my pit area. People around us were like, " Oh, did you finally get a good run? How fast did it go? I would say 9.99, and they would say oh, how much nitrous are you spraying. I would just say I’m not. It's not nitrous. It's all motor. Oh, ya big block? No original cast iron small block.
Saturday morning, we get back in the lanes, and I get lined up beside a fox body with a parachute and everything. I was just thinking, oh man, don’t get embarrassed right now. I was just there to have fun and race, but you still want to be competitive. I knew it was a pro tree, so I just thought I have to tree this dude. If I go red, I go red. I nailed the light drop and went 9.50. I later found out that car was a twin-turbo LS car. I probably insulted so many of my LS friends after I just beat an LS car with my small block ford. The next day got another even better pass and hit 9.40. That was the first event the car had ever been to. It still shocks me to this day. Just how everything went down, all the work paid off. It was an excellent end to the chapter. That was in 2019, and then in 2020, because of covid, there weren’t any races. The next time we took it out was muscle cars at the strip, another Las Vegas race. We tried to get the trans brake to work because up until then, I was just using the foot brake. Once I started using the trans brake, the suspension absolutely hated it. It was just too violent. It just hops down the track. Found out the suspension just needed some adjustment in the rear. I fixed that, and on the first pass, it hit 9.50 again.
The car broke during the next event. I just coasted to a 9.60. Back at the pits, I took the intake off and saw a valve had gone through a piston. I still have the motor. Cylinder number three is just hurt. Besides the engine being broken, I am really happy with the car. If I could give anyone advice, it would be to build whatever you can, learn how to tune it, learn how to fix things, and then start adding more power to it. For me, I was trying to learn how to drive, build power, tune, and everything else all at once. I got very lucky it worked out the way it did. With a little more tuning and seat time, I think it could get into the 8s at some point. I only have like 20 passes in the car, so once it is fixed, the plan is to keep tuning the suspension and other stuff to squeeze whatever I can out of it. I don’t need to go 7s right now. It is just fun to drive the car. That’s what I would tell people to just get seat time. Even if it is not in the fastest car, just get seat time. I started this project when I was 14 and took the car down the track for the first time when I was 23. It has been a hell of a journey,”
Parts Combo
393 ford Cleveland stroker
Factory 1970 block
CHI 3v heads and Intake
T&D rockers
Kuntz and craft comp roller cam
Dale Cubic 4500 carburetor
Magnafuel 500 fuel pump
VP racing Q16 fuel
Hooker headers
Msd ignition
GZ Motorsports vacuum pump.
RacePak data logger and dash
Custom cage from Dean Averett race cars
C4 transmission from dynamic
UCC 8 inch converter
FAB 9 rear end
Yuckon center section
Moser axles
Strange brakes
Menscer DA shocks
Open tracker control arms and perches
TRZ anti Roll Bar
Calvert springs and caltracs
Hoosier tires
15x3.5 weld wheels (front)
15x10 RC components wheels (rear)
Link Garage
Follow Jonas:
Instagram: nos_xdelacruz
Special Thanks to
Luis Delacruz (dad), Charana Delacruz (Mom), Sam (Brother), Travis Ellis, Dean Averett (DA Racecars), Tom Magyar, Rich Concato, Jr Sanchez, and Dustin Rinne.
Everything that is underlined and bolded is a direct link to people or things
