Ford Mustang 1965 A/FX Gas Ronda 427 SOHC

Built in just 90 days to counter Chrysler’s Hemi, Ford’s 427 SOHC ‘Cammer’ engine made it into only a handful of 1965 Mustangs, and this bright orange survivor was one of them. See how Holman-Moody stripped it down to a race-ready 3,200 pounds, and what Gas Ronda did with it on the strip.

This bright orange Mustang is second car campaigned by Gas Ronda in 1965 in the A/FX drag racing class. It’s powered by a 427 Single Overhead Cam (SOHC) V8, and has been restored to as-raced condition as seen here at the 2015 Muscle Car and Corvette Nationals…

By 1965, Ford knew its 427-wedge engine wasn’t going to be enough. Chrysler’s Hemi cars were dominating the drag strip, and Ford needed something dramatically more powerful in a shockingly short window before the season-opening Winternationals. What its engineers built in roughly 90 days became one of the most feared engines of the era — and only a handful of cars ever got one. This bright orange Mustang is one of them, and the car underneath the paint is even more extreme than the engine bolted into it.

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The 90-Day Engine Built to Beat the Hemi

Drawing on Indy car technology and using as many off-the-shelf parts as possible, Ford’s engineers created the 427 SOHC — nicknamed the “Cammer” — with 2.25-inch intake valves, 1.90-inch exhaust valves, 12:1 pistons, and dual Holley 780cfm carburetors said to produce north of 700 horsepower. Only five of these engines existed when the race cars were being built, and as the reigning NHRA champion, Gas Ronda was one of the drivers who got one.

Shedding Every Ounce for the Strip

Ford handed the project to Holman-Moody, which stripped the factory K-code Mustangs down to nothing and rebuilt them as pure drag machines in just 30 days. Steel body panels were swapped for fiberglass, glass windows were replaced with lightweight polycarbonate, and every gram that wasn’t essential to going fast was cut. The result carried Ronda to both ends of the NHRA A/FX national record — a 10.43-second run at 134.73 mph, at a scale-tipping 3,200 pounds — in what was his second Mustang of the 1965 season. This particular car has since been restored to its as-raced appearance, right down to the livery it wore when it last hit the strip.

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