If the last Ringbrothers car we featured – the Aston Martin DBS V8 dubbed ‘Octavia’ (SM, Nov ’25) – was the James Bond hero car, then this ’69 Mach 1 Mustang is most definitely the villain.

First published in the January 2026 issue of Street Machine

When the owner, Jake Hodess, brought the car to the award-winning Wisconsin-based workshop, he had a pretty simple brief: black paint, no chrome, and an interior that looks like a tuxedo. The rest of the details were left to Ringbrothers’ Mike and Jim Ring and their team, along with Ragle Design (which also worked on Octavia), and the result, known as ‘Kingpin’, is an even more pumped-up version of one of the best-looking muscle cars to ever hit the road.

STRIPES: Satin-grey vinyl stripes adorn the bonnet and sides to offer a subtle contrast to the inky black paint, in a pattern designed by Ringbrothers. It’s not based on anything the factory did; it’s just what Jim and Mike figured the car needed, and it also ties into the grey on the wheel centres

“The Mustang Mach 1 has always been an aggressive-looking car, and the client was adamant about creating a sinister aesthetic,” says Jim Ring. “We asked ourselves: ‘What would the final boss in a John Wick film drive?’ This was the result.”

While Ringbrothers is becoming renowned for making carbonfibre-bodied cars, this wide-body Mustang was created the old-fashioned way by splitting the quarters, pulling out the wheel opening, and then filling in the gaps. It’s wider than stock by just under four inches at the rear and two inches at the front. “I think it took me four quarters and four front fenders to do this car,” says Mike Ring. “If you look down a regular ’69, the front and rear fenders are a pretty straight line, whereas these hourglass out. I had a lot of help from Bryce Hilton at Moselle Panel & Paint in New Zealand. He came over for about a month; he’s a super-talented metal guy.”

As with all of their top-end builds, Jim and Mike went straight to the Roadster Shop to sort the car’s underpinnings, ticking the box for a Fast Track Stage III chassis with independent rear suspension and Fox RS SV single-adjustable coil-overs front and rear. Mike also asked that the wheelbase be stretched 1.5 inches by pushing the front wheels forward. This not only cleans up the proportions but also helps get the engine behind the front axle line.

SCOOP: With its ribbed top and intake grille, the carbonfibre bonnet scoop is an obvious nod to the classic ‘shaker’ scoop that was a factory option on Mustangs (as well as our own Falcon GTs, of course). The ribs are painted a satin clear to help them stand out

Brembo brakes peek through the HRE Vintage Series 517 wheels, which measure up at 19×10 in the front and a massive 20×13 out back, wrapped in 295/35 and 345/30 Michelin Pilot Sport 4 S rubber, respectively. No wonder they needed to pump out those guards!

BADGE: The Grabber Green-based highlights on the Ringbrothers badge and a few other spots on the car was one of the few specific requests the owner had for the build. Mike and Jim tweaked the colour a little and renamed it Grab-Her Green; a little non-PC, perhaps, but it was actually Mike’s wife Nancy Ring who came up with it!

While it would be fairly straightforward to simply bolt the chassis to the body, Ringbrothers prefers to weld the chassis to the floor to return it to a unibody construction as per factory. Of course, it’s now much stiffer than anything Ford managed back in the day, thanks not only to the RS chassis but also to the extensive rollcage hidden behind the interior trim. A rigid platform was essential so that the fancy independent suspension could work as intended.

For the driveline, Ringbrothers once again turned to Wegner Motorsports for one of the company’s supercharged 5.0-litre Coyote engines, topped with a 3.0-litre Whipple blower and capable of more than 800hp. The transmission is a Bowler Carbon Edition T56 six-speed, backed up with an IRS nine-inch.

TAIL-LIGHTS: The wild LED tail-lights feature 3D-printed lenses and diffusers painted in a satin clear to give them an almost ethereal glow. Openings on the tail panel provide exit points for the air flowing through the now functional scoops on the quarter panels

While the body is mostly steel, there are still quite a few carbonfibre parts, including the bonnet, grille surround, spoiler, rear diffuser and tail panel. And if you’re a follower of Ringbrothers’ builds, you might recognise that tail-light panel as being similar to the one used on their ‘Patriarc’ Mach 1 – but there’s a twist. “It’s a 360-degree light, and it’s ducted all the way through to the scoop at the front of the rear quarter [to allow air to exit through the tail-light housing],” Mike explains. “I matte-cleared the tail-light lenses; I’d never done that before, but it’s kind of a cool look. It makes everybody want to touch them, because they don’t know where it starts.”

In the cockpit, the interior fit-out is thoroughly modern yet still looks like it belongs in a ’69 Mustang – a case of taking the factory design and giving it some subtle tweaks. In keeping with the sinister theme of the car, the cabin is swathed entirely in black, which isn’t something Ringbrothers would usually do. “Black’s not really my interior colour, but the owner wanted it to look more like a tuxedo,” Mike says. “If you look at the seats, it’s black leather, but you’ll also see a shinier black leather, like on a tuxedo where you’ll have a glossier material on the lapels and the pants will have a black stripe that’s glossy. The cloth inserts in the seats actually look like little bowties. It’s hard to pick up, but there’s one line of stitching that’s kind of a bronze colour to match the dash.”

ENGINE BAY: Wegner Motorsports supplied one of its Whipple-blown, 5.0L Coyote motors for Kingpin, and boy, is this one a beauty! It’s full of bulletproof internals like Manley forged rods and pistons and a forged crank, abetted by a secret cam grind that helps the motor punch out 800hp

As for the exterior paint, there was never any discussion over colour – it was always going to be black, so the BASF Glasurit catalogue was consulted and Bootleg Black was chosen. To break it up a little, Charcoal Grey was used on the front spoiler, rear diffuser and wheel centres, and some matte silver stripes were added along the sides and bonnet in vinyl rather than paint. “Honestly, I think vinyl is cooler in the way that it pays homage to the way the cars were; it’s timeless. I think when you gloss over stripes it just kind of dates cars,” says Mike.

There are some splashes of colour, but you’d have to look pretty hard. “The owner wanted a little bit of Grabber Green; he loved that colour. He said he really wanted the brake calipers that colour, and then we added a little bit on the mirror and steering wheel,” Mike says. Of course, they had to tweak the colour a little bit, and the result has been dubbed Grab-Her Green, named by Mike’s wife Nancy.

INTERIOR: Jim and Mike Ring are masters at blending 60s styling with modern design and materials, and Kingpin’s interior is no exception. The flow-through dash binnacles are a neat touch, and the door panels adopt the styling of the originals. The black leather upholstery incorporates subtly contrasting matte and gloss finishes

Kingpin debuted at the 2025 SEMA Show in Las Vegas, where the car had a crowd around it all week, with people returning multiple times to pick out more of the subtle – and not so subtle – details that differentiate this Mach 1 from the factory version. In other words, Kingpin is typical of a Ringbrothers build: everything’s been changed, but it’s all done so well and looks so right that you’d swear it came like that from the factory.

SOUND SYSTEM: The owner is a bit of an audiophile, so the Mustang has a very serious sound system – no rear seat passengers allowed! There are some giant subs behind these ribbed panels, and there’s storage room under where the seat base would have beenRINGBROTHERS FOR JAKE HODESS
1969 FORD MUSTANG MACH 1Paint:BASF Glasurit Bootleg Black, Grab-Her Green trimENGINEBrand:5.0L Wegner Motorsports Gen 2 CoyoteInduction:Whipple 103mmECU:Holley Terminator X MaxSupercharger:Whipple Gen 5 3.0LHeads:Gen 2 CoyoteCamshaft:CustomConrods:Manley H-beamPistons:Manley 2618 forgedCrank:Ford Racing forged Boss 302Fuel system:Holley, custom Rock Valley tank, Atwood Radium triple pumpCooling:FordExhaust:Custom headers, Flowmaster Super 44 Series stainless systemTRANSMISSIONGearbox:Bowler Carbon Edition T56 six-speedClutch:Tilton ST-246 twin-discDiff:Roadster Shop Fast Track IRS 9inSUSPENSION & BRAKESFront:Roadster Shop, Fox RS SV single-adjustable coil-oversRear:Roadster Shop, Fox RS SV single-adjustable coil-oversBrakes:Brembo discs & six-piston calipers (f), Brembo discs & four-piston calipers (r)Master cylinder:Hellcat pedal assembly and master boosterWHEELS & TYRESRims:HRE Vintage Series 517; 19×10 (f), 20×13 (r)Rubber:Michelin Pilot Sport 4 S; 295/35R19 (f), 345/30R20 (r)

THANKS
BASF Glasurit Paint; Gentex Mirrors; HRE Wheels.

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