The baby boomers have had their time. The generation that includes my parents have influenced the Mustang hobby for at least the last decade. That’s not necessarily a bad thing either, it gave us the S197 platform Mustang, which has been the best performing Mustang to date. It also gave us the restomod craze, which we’ve seen build some of the coolest and wildest first generation Mustangs ever.

Last year Creation’s ‘n Chrome set the Mustang world abuzz with one of the most extreme Fox-body builds we have ever seen. Photo CNC Pics

What we’ve started to notice permeating the surface now though is the return of the Fox body. The Fox was all the rage with young people everywhere when I was in high school. Now that we’ve all grown up, and been in the workforce for 20-plus years, Gen X, and Gen Y are eager to spend some of their leisure money on the cars they always wanted to build.

What is it about Fox body Mustangs that strikes such a chord with these enthusiasts? I will admit the Fox body appeals to me on many levels however, if I look at it objectively it’s not the most attractive looking Mustang design ever built. While it had the lowest drag coefficient of any production car offered in 1979, when you step back and look it’s a boxy, 80’s machine, devoid of flowing lines, curves, or sharp edges that define so many designs. While the car was a back to the roots of the Mustang idea when it debuted in 1979, to younger kids today it’s hardly recognizable as a Mustang. Three of my nephews, all brothers, who have ridden in my ’98 GT, and are fans of the current S197 were shocked, to the point of disbelief when I pointed out a Fox body Mustang as a Mustang to them for the first time “That old thing, it looks like an old clunker,” I remember the middle one’s reaction.

The Fox body is also not the most powerful Mustang either, in-spite of our nostalgia, and my own love of the cars. The fact is that by today’s standards the 5.0 HO dropped in the Foxes in stock form is downright anemic, new four-cylinder cars make more power. Still, there’s just  something about it. That shape, even though kind of vanilla, is unmistakeable from 500 yards away (or more). The exhaust note defined Flowmaster as a company. Images of Fox body’s standing on the bumper and Saleen racers rounding corners at speed are forever burned into our minds.

Last year we saw the first Fox body inside the Las Vegas convention center at SEMA in close to 20 years. It was the work of Gary Watson and his Creations ‘n Chrome shop. Watson’s Top Notch was no ordinary Fox, and a Gen X’er himself, he was quick to point out when I interviewed him that this was the Mustang style he grew up loving (as did I).

Dakota Digital’s new VHX Instruments for Fox-body Mustangs are just one of many new products targeted squarely at the rising Fox-body popularity and market of builders.

I fully believe that Watson’s car has set the bar for high-end Fox body racer builds, and may be the ultimate representation of what these cars can be. That doesn’t mean that I don’t think someone will try to do one better though.

With the exception of the special edition cars I don’t know that the Fox body will ever see a full on restoration craze like with earlier Mustangs. I for one can’t stand driving around in a stock Mustang, but then again we may find some folks over the years that get nostalgic for correct build information, accurate color codes, chalk marks, and the like within the Fox body set.

Even a beat up car like Project Rehab draws a lot of attention, although parked next to newer, nicer looking Mustangs.

I think that’s in large part because the Fox platform is so extremely versatile. I hate to say it, but this car really is the ’32 Ford or the Tri-five Chevy (take your pick) of Gen X. There is so much aftermarket support that parts for nearly every modification are available overnight. Aftermarket companies continue to come up with new parts for these cars 20 years after they stopped building them. Take for example Dakota Digital’s new VHX instrument cluster, which will no doubt be the hot new part on many Fox body builds. There’s even an entire company that sprang from the desire of enthusiasts to modify and preserve these cars, LateModelRestoration.com.

The car’s versatility lends itself well to a variety of builds. Whether those builds are budget minded, straight line, road race, top speed, or high dollar. Most agree you can build a fairly quick Fox body for minimal investment or you can go all out, and build a car that has over $100k invested in it.

The platform takes a variety of engine swaps better than nearly any other Mustang. You can drop pretty much anything you want into a Fox body, from turbo four-cylinders, to the new Coyote, to big block monsters with massive cubic inches, the engine bay will swallow them all. For the most part they’re easy to turn wrenches on, although every time I work on Project Rehab I curse the fact that Ford mixed metric and standard bolts throughout the car.

This isn’t my first Fox body, and it won’t be the last one I build either.

Even though I’ve owned Project Rehab for less than a year, every time I get behind the wheel of this car and go for a drive, it’s like I’ve been visiting with an old friend that I was once close with. I get a little nostalgic, and I think about times gone by, life seems a little simpler, and I’m usually overwhelmed with an urge to just keep driving. Of course eventually I come to a corner and Rehab threatens my life with it’s worn suspension, tires that were better suited for a Honda, and terrifying brakes, (all things I plant to remedy soon).

For the most part though those cruises, even the short ones get me thinking about my high school days, when I would sit on my bed with my Summit catalog and Bargain-Mart classifieds, picking potential candidates in one, and circling parts for my ultimate 5.0 build in the other. Afterwords I’d spend at least an hour trying to figure out how many hours I’d have to spend washing cars working my job at a local car dealer to get those parts, let alone the car in any of these fantasy builds I’d managed to dream up. I’d then bore my girlfriend with all the juicy details in a lengthy phone call (we didn’t have texting in those days kids) -good times.

There’s little doubt in my mind that Project Rehab won’t be my last Fox-body, I could ramble here about Fox project ideas all day long, and only time will tell what will follow as my next project. Whether it’s nostalgia, budget, or versatility the Fox body is making a comeback. The new Fox body craze is just heating up, and with new technology and parts to make the cars even better than they were the first time, we’re seeing that like with the early Mustang craze this time around there are more possibilities for creative builds than ever before.