Cars. Coffee. And a Boss 429 Treat

It’s been a while since I went to Cars and Coffee. Last time I showed up, it was still in the parking lot at Classic BMW in Plano. TXGarage covered those mornings more than a decade ago. I have been doing this long enough that I should have known the scene was still alive in DFW. I guess I assumed it had quietly faded, but it definitely hasn’t.

First Saturday of the month, Garages of America in Carrollton opens the campus as Garages & Gearheads. 2323 Tarpley Road. If you live here and you care about cars, go. I was there for that, and for a Revology treat after.

It was brutally hot. Early in the morning and it was already 96 on the lot, and with the concrete and the buildings around it, it ran hotter than the number. I took a pile of photos, then sat in the car with the air on just to get my head back.

A lot I didn’t know was here

I did not know this place existed. Little shop-sized suites with real cars parked in them. Lounges with lofts and bars and offices inside. More cars lined up outside the buildings. Same energy as those old Plano mornings, just bigger and more spread out, so you stop trying to count. Walk inside a garage, like the P1 Motor Lounge, and there is still more.

The two Mustangs were already on the lot. Revology’s people were there with them and they were great — patient, easy to talk to. They took the time to walk me around the car before handing over the keys.

Revology builds new 1965–1970 Mustangs in Orlando. New sheet metal, new parts, classic shape. These are not restorations of tired survivors. Ford licensed them to build reproduction rolling chassis, and the deep integration shows.

On the lot that morning: a Liquid Blue 1969 Boss 429 Fastback and an Ivy Green 1968 Shelby GT350. I drove the blue one. BOSS 429 on the fender, supercharger under the hood, and a 6-speed Tremec manual. REVOLOGY on the plate.

The walkaround ate part of the morning, which was the point. They talked through the company and the car before anyone sent me out. When I did leave, I had about 15 minutes behind the wheel.

Industrial roads, then a few honest ones

Just opening and closing the doors to get in gives you all you need to know about these builds. This is not a car that has been baked in a Texas field since Nixon. The metal feels new because it is new.

The way they explained the build, standing next to it: the structure gets reinforced, they make a lot of their own parts, and the rest comes from Ford and Ford-approved vendors. They were explicit that these start as convertible structures because that chassis is stiffer, then the fastback body goes on. I can immediately tell they spend a lot of time obsessing over the details, and these cars look and feel great as a result.

Tom Scarpello, the founder, came out of Ford SVT marketing and sales. Think the Lightning and Mustang Cobra era. When he left, Ford blessed the reproduction idea. If you grew up in the ’90s as I did, the Mustang everybody wanted when I was getting out of college was the SVT Cobra — Terminator. That is the world he came out of.

The loop was mostly industrial roads around the Carrollton campus. Not a canyon. Not a test track. Enough straight bits that I laid into it a few times anyway.

The power is there. Revology rates the supercharged 5.0 Coyote at 710 horsepower and 610 pound-feet, and on a hot empty stretch you feel why they bother with the number. What surprised me more was how light the car feels. Old-school light. Sit in a current Mustang after this and the new one feels big and heavy. This one is small and tight, and that hood scoop sits in the windshield the whole time so you never forget what you are in.

The Tremec is the part I would take home. Easy to shift. Easy to live with. You are not fighting a museum piece or a race box. The clutch matches it with real feel. Steering was on point the first corner and stayed there. Nothing vague, nothing heavy for the sake of feeling “period.”

Fifteen minutes is not a road test, but it was enough to know this would work as a daily if you actually used it that way.

The cabin, and the little garage door

The interior is the modern half of the deal, and it is done right. Push-button start. Power windows and mirrors. Wireless charger. USB-C. Nappa leather in this one. Digital cluster mixed with backlit analog gauges you can actually read. Nothing in there felt like a compromise you accepted because the outside looks like 1969.

The screen is the detail people might argue about. It lives behind a little door in the center stack that flips up like a garage door and gives you a backup camera, CarPlay, and a modern interface. Closed, you get a 1969 dash. Open it and you feel a lot more modern. That is the whole trick, and it works.

The Boss 429 starts at $395,000. That may sound like a lot, but you’re getting a hand-built classic that’s easy to live with every day.

Show up

This was not a 400-mile week and it is not a comparison test. It was a Saturday Cars and Coffee, a straight conversation with the good people who build the car, then a short blast down some industrial roads in a brand-new 1969 Boss 429.

The heat didn’t ruin the morning. Good cars. Better people. DFW still shows up for this, and if you have been sitting it out because you also thought Cars and Coffee was a 2012 thing, it isn’t. First Saturday. Carrollton. Bring the car you actually drive.

The garages were the other half of why I stayed. Park the cars, put a bar in the corner, build a loft and an office if you want. I walked out with a new and extremely unhelpful life goal: own one of those suites. Thanks, Garages of America.

Full gallery of the Ravology Mustangs HERE

Full gallery from the Garages and Gearheads show HERE