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1 surviving Ford Mustang Boss 351 of 5 with 49,000 miles is looking for a new owner. Is it worth the price?

Posted on by angelo
1 surviving Ford Mustang Boss 351 of 5 with 49,000 miles is looking for a new owner. Is it worth the price?

1 surviving Ford Mustang Boss 351 of 5 with 49,000 miles is looking for a new owner. Is it worth the price?
 66 photos

Photo: americanmustangs.com

Between 1969 and 1971, Ford built 11,806 Mustang Bosses in three distinct series. While the 1969-1970 versions of the 302 and 429 racers are undoubtedly the superstars of the family, the final model, built only for the 1971 model year, was the most road-ready of the three. While it doesn’t command the high premiums of its brethren, an original survivor is always a nice find, especially when its history is well-documented.

The Boss 302 and 429 were built to homologate two high-performance engines for Trans Am and NASCAR, respectively, and the road machines that carried them were very expensive, very capable, and very wild stallions. In stark contrast to these track-built powerlifters, the 1971 Boss 351 was probably the best driver’s car ever to wear a Boss badge.

The robust Cleveland 351 engine was specially tuned for its Boss application, with 330 horsepower and 370 lb-ft (335 PS, 502 Nm) under the driver’s right foot. The only transmission offered was a wide-ratio four-speed, and the rear was again a no-choice unit, with 3.91 Traction-Lok ​​gears in the nine-inch Ford differential.

The strengths of the 5.8-liter (351-cubic-inch) V-8 allowed the latest Boss to run a quarter-mile in 13 seconds, but it also required a $4,124 entry fee. The Boss’s rugged internals and special suspension gave it better handling than its predecessors, especially the notoriously ill-mannered 429.

Boss 351 1971

Photo: YouTube/American Mustangs

The 1971 Ford Mustang, including the Boss 351, was designed and built to be larger to accommodate all of Ford’s engines offered for the model, from the small 250-cubic-inch (4.1-liter) six-cylinder to the big, heavy 429-cubic-inch (7.0-liter) Cobra Jet. The restyled pony was 8 inches longer and 6 inches wider than the previous year’s examples, and its engine compartment did not need to be hollowed out to accommodate the big blocks.

(This was a lesson Ford learned the hard way with the Boss 429 and its semi-hemispherical V-8 heads that wouldn’t fit in the standard Mustang engine bay. Hence Kar Kraft’s workaround that butchered the original design and slid the monstrous engine between the front fenders, making the Boss Nines infamously nose-heavy.)

The 1971 Mustang Boss wasn’t meant to be a track car, but it was ready to sprint at a moment’s notice. In fact, Ford encouraged potential customers to outfit the Boss 351 with oil-cooling equipment from the 1970 Boss 302’s parts bin. The oil temperature regulator was easy to install—with minor modifications—on the 1971 model, and the company even provided a complete list of parts needed for the installation.

Boss 351 1971

Photo: YouTube/American Mustangs

For even more power, the Boss 351 could be equipped with high-performance valvetrain parts (titanium intake valves with molybdenum-coated stems, special steel alloy for the exhaust valves). Special “Super Spring” kits were offered with dual valve springs (aircraft grade), and complete racing rocker arms were suggested for extended high-rpm operation. The suggested carburetor was also of unusual design – a four-venturi carburetor relocated to a single bank – and was available in two versions, 850 CFM and 1,400 CFM.

Still, a standard Boss 351 was usually pretty fun for the average enthusiast, and this survivor proves it. It wears its factory-applied livery and, according to its current owner, its numbers match from the engine block to the rear axle. The car is being offered for sale after spending nearly four decades with a single owner. The white exterior over a Vermilion Random Stripe cloth and vinyl interior makes it one of five Boss 351 Mustangs.

The odometer reads 48,746 miles (78,449 km), which is pretty good for a 53-year-old performance car that rides on 1975 tires wrapped around those optional chrome Magnum 500 wheels. The car was ordered new by a Ford executive—it was sold under the company’s lease plan—and in 1972, it was sold to a private buyer who kept (and cared for) it for a long time. In October 2019, the car was offered at public auction, but the high bid of $48,000 didn’t impress the seller.

Boss 351 1971

Photo: YouTube/American Mustangs

But at some point, someone paid the then-owner’s asking price, and last May the car was offered again for $70,000. That must have been considered a bargain because Matt Taylor, owner and founder of American Mustangs, is now offering it again for a bargain price of $88,000.

You can watch the video below and see the car walkaround and test drive. The seller says he’s not particularly interested in cashing in on his 1971 Boss 351, but he’s not looking to keep it for long either. While the Boss 302 is by far the best-selling of the original Boss Mustang trio, with 8,641 built during its two-year production run (1,628 for 1969 and 7,013 for 1970), the Boss 429 and Boss 351 are much rarer.

1,368 examples figure in the big-block’s sales figures – 869 in 1969 and 499 in its final year. The 1971 Ford Mustang Boss 351 was produced in 1,806 examples, all fastbacks, all equipped with the functional Dual Ram Induction hood.


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