Writer’s note: trying some new picture techniques. These pictures were taken on the sill of one of the leaded glass windows in my house. I think I may do pics like this once in a while.
The “Fox” Mustang was a long-standing platform for the Mustang, being used from 1979 through 1993 before a full redesign. During that time, many automakers were experimenting with using turbochargers their vehicles. Ford was no different, and had a turbo I-4 engine they used for a number of years.
Casting backgrounds:
The Turbo Mustang casting debuted in 1980. It was released in a number of versions through the early-mid 1980s, culminating in the final white and yellow Hot Ones release. The tooling was eventually sent to India and the casting lived as a LEO for a while before fully disappearing. It was brought back in 2013, retooled for use in the Flying Customs series but didn’t actually appear until the Cool Classics release later in the year. Sadly it hasn’t been used again yet.
The ’84 Mustang SVO casting debuted in 2012 as one of a number of new tools for the Hot Ones series that year. It was later used for Boulevard, Cool Classics and Heritage, and Car Culture. The car has never been used in the basic line, so to speak. It’s most recent use was a mail-in in 2020. It might get it’s first taste of a plastic base release, though, as it was part of the collector vote for the 2022 “Flames” mainline segment.
Now, the Fox Mustang is a rather “small” car. It’s definitely a compact-size vehicle. The Turbo Mustang casting has that look to it, a “trim” feel if you will. It’s not muscle bound. It even feels small in hand. It does have the signature Hot Wheels look of the larger rear wheels but as a whole the casting does seem small on its own. The ’84 Mustang SVO casting, however, just looks big. I want to say Jun Imai’s ’92 Mustang design was used as a basis for this, at least as far as dimensions are concerned. The ’92 has the meaty rear wheels, the ’84 SVO does too. The casting has that full, mean muscle look to it.
Separately, the Turbo Mustang and ’84 SVO just look and feel so different. The Turbo Mustang looks like it’d be up against the smaller European market sports cars of the day while the ’84 SVO would be the big-block streetlight drag warrior.
However, place them side by side, the differences aren’t as they seem. The biggest difference are the “ground effects” and meaty wheels on the ’84 SVO versus the rather “base” looking Turbo.
While the ’84 has received some love after this third release of the casting, the Turbo retool has been left to sit with only this Cool Classics release to have (it was supposed to be the second release of the retool but the original planned first release for 2013 Flying Customs sadly got canned).
So always remember: looks can be deceiving.
Both are large compared to all my other mustangs from hw,mb and gl. They are well done like all the larger hw jdm stuff, but scale bad with the largest part of my diecast collection. Scaling is a conundrum for a collector like me. While m2 might actually be closer to 1/64 in muscle and trucks, they seem exceptionally small in japanese cars. Put hw jdm with m2 for a little better scale proportions? Anyways, although nice casts I pass up hw fox body for gl. I like scale articles and would like to see more, since scale is important but might be subjective to individual collectors. Something i think scales well, might actually be proportional. For mustangs, the ball park where I play is scaled to the mb, gl, and hw 68-70 editions where the gl fox seems to fit. Oh, and the jl 65 plays in my scale selection too.
Scale is one of the main reasons on whether or not I will purchase a casting. So far, GL makes the best Fox body. Of these two, I have to go with the retool over the SVO, which seems a bit chunky to me.
Might be a hot take, but the SVO casting just seems odd to me. It’s too tall and chunky and it doesn’t capture the presence of the real car. I’m also just personally against staggered setups on Hot Wheels in most instances, especially on a street car, so that’s another knock against. Still, the new F&F one should be finding its way into my collection.
Of all the old cars getting brand new castings recently (Buick GNX, Silvia S15, Skyline R32, Porsche 935 etc) I think the SVO also deserves a new casting, because this one, like the ’92 Mustang, is too big and bulky and that’s not how the real SVO looks. Hoping to see one in the future.
The Foxbody Mustang is iconic for its day and deserves to be properly represented. I know they current SVO and 92 models are meant to exaggerate the rake and power of the car but, for adult collectors a more realistic stance is better. Take the RLC Cobra R that was just released. That is a beautiful representation of that body style. The same size wheels, the details around the lights, the ground affects and I could go on but you get the point. There will always be a need to draw kids attention to these toys but, lets not forget there are a LOT of adults collecting these now.