I've been looking back and forth between '76/'77, but it seems they are identical and interchangeable; am I missing something here?
They had different speedometer clusters...some went to 120 mph, 100 mph or 85 mph Textured interior door and smooth interior door, different window regulators, different trunk lid and hood webbing, different parking/turn signal lamp sockets, different center link/idler arm. The list gets long. And people still want to know if Mustang parts will fit a Maverick when Maverick parts don't even fit a Maverick
My ex-brother-in-law was a Ford engineer. The company had incentives for money-saving ideas. They gave him a 1972 Mustang for his idea of replacing a paper label with some additional stamping embossed into an air cleaner lid on one model. Seems really trivial, but the cost savings were thousands of dollars, and probably eliminated one person's manual labor .... they gave him a really nice car for that idea. Some other guy probably asked "why are we making this as two pieces? Let's make it as a single unit". A committee declared his brilliance and hands him the keys to a Mustang II .... coupe .... with a vinyl top ....