Lost Wages

Whereas many people in Las Vegas are laden with a comp-ulsive gambling habit, Kevin Kuch-man has fallen victim to compulsive customizing. It all started a few years back when he transformed his Toyota pickup into an award-winning vehicle. After the project was completed, Kevin was in need of a daily driver.

"A couple of my friends had Mustangs," Kevin says. "I went to a Knott's Berry Farm show and really fell in love with the '87-'93 Fox-body Mustang." It was that simple, but finding a nice 5.0 wasn't--that is, until his friend Todd stopped by with his newly acquired '90 Mustang GT. Six months later, and after a bit of persuasion, Kevin was parking that Pony in his own garage.

The Nevada resident's newest daily driver quickly received Center Line 17-inch billet wheels and a dropped suspension from BBK. Handling and looks were much improved, but the Mustang's engine was racking up miles faster than an SR-71 at full clip. So the tired 302 was retired to the corner of the garage and was replaced with a rebuilt '89 vintage block built by Kevin and his friend Travis Newport. The stock E7TE heads were decked, ported, polished, and received new valves and Ford Racing valvesprings.

The Mustang was now pretty quick, but Kevin got the urge to go a bit faster. He added a Crane 2040 cam with 282 degrees of duration on both the intake and exhaust lobes, along with 0.498-inch valve lift. He also added an Edelbrock intake manifold, a BBK 70mm throttle body and BBK headers, as well as a BBK H-pipe and Flowmaster mufflers with custom "dump" tailpipes to turn up the volume.

The exterior was next, and like most enthusiasts, Kevin began by replacing the often-yellow headlight assemblies and ditched the GT cheese-grater taillamps for LX units. The desert sun and heat had taken its toll on the stock Twilight Blue metallic paint, so Kevin called up his buddy Travis again for some help.

Working out of Travis' family business, Newport Auto Body of Las Vegas, the two worked the kinks out of the sheetmetal and drew up a design for a clean, two-tone paint scheme that was a bit different than the factory look. A Cobra grille insert and a 2.5-inch Cervini cowl-induction hood went on, and the Mustang GT lettering in the ground effects was smoothed over. Kevin continually refined the graphics until the simple two-tone was a bit more than just two colors.

"We could tell this was going to be a little more than your everyday car," Kevin says. "The quality of the initial paint was flawless, but it needed some help with the presentation, so we whisked the car over to Harley painting legend Bob Spena. After another week of airbrushing, painting and pinstriping, the paint job was complete."

With its custom paint job and shiny wheels, Kevin's daily driver was certainly something to be proud of. But an offer from Kicker and KMC wheels changed the Pony's domestic destiny.

It turns out Kevin's friend Misha Munoz, who happens to own a stereo shop, gave Kicker and KMC a glimpse of Kevin's ride, and it was decided the Mustang would make an excellent display piece for the '04 SEMA show. The only problem--and it was a big one--was that Kevin and crew had just one month to install all the stereo equipment and have the car ready for the display.