1972 Ford Maverick Street Machine Hidden for Nearly 40 Years!

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The underappreciated marques and models often make the most eye-catching custom cars, and "Midnight Express"—a 1972 Ford Maverick street machine—is exactly that. Only true Fordophiles love original Ford Mavericks, and as Gray Baskerville commented in the July 1979 feature "12 O'Clock High" in HOT ROD Magazine, making any Ford go fast with all Ford parts isn't easy. But for former Ford quality control inspector and prototype technician Nick "The Greek" Zuk, swapping a Tunnel Port 427 FE side oiler into a crashed '72 Maverick was an opportunity he couldn't pass up.

Nick originally purchased the Maverick around 1976 or 1977 from a line mechanic at Gene Butman Ford, near Ann Arbor, Michigan. The mechanic had already started hacking the front suspension to make room for the legendary 427 FE side oiler V-8 (the GT40 engine), and Zuk didn't waste any time correcting the hacks and transforming the mundane compact into a 10-second brawler that was one of the nine runners up for HOT ROD's Street Machine of the Year in 1979. It was a few short years later that Nick the Greek would stable his fire-breathing mini-horse, which wasn't to be seen again in public until the 2022 Detroit Autorama.

What did it take for legendary HOT ROD editor Gray Baskerville to personally visit Nick in Wayne, Michigan? For starters, a 10.79 at 123 mph in a naturally aspirated, single-carburetor Ford Maverick—in 1979. 10-second street cars weren't available off of showroom floors back then, kids. It took some doing to build something quick in the late 1970s. The doing for Midnight Express started with correcting the flimsy front suspension modifications done before Nick the Greek took over.

Relocated shock towers and upper spring mounts, shortened upper control arms, a relocated steering box, and the appropriate amount of gussetting and stiffening plates made room for the high-revving 427 FE engine and kept the camber angles of the front wheels in good order under hard launches. The rear subframe was stiffened with 2-inch square tubing and treated to custom 34-inch ladder bars to contain the narrowed Ford 9-inch rear axle from a 1966 Galaxie stuffed with 5.14 gears. 50/50 Monroe shocks and relocated semi-elliptic leaf springs finished out the rear suspension modifications.

Tunnel Port 427 V-8s were already high-revving engines, but according to its builder, Midnight Express was about as high-strung as they came. 14:1 TRW pistons, a fully-balanced and Tufftrided (a special salt-bath heat-treating process) Moldex crankshaft, 0.600-inch-lift, 330-duration Cam Dynamics camshaft, and triple valvesprings, sodium-filled exhaust valves, single-plane intake, and a 750-cfm Holley four-barrel carburetor made the Maverick a little less than friendly at low speeds, but a fire-breathing torque-monster with proper application of the go-pedal.

Zuk's '72 Ford Maverick has the style to match the speed, riding on polished 15-inch Motor Wheel Flys front and rear. When he first built the car for NHRA Super Modified racing, Nick was often asked how he fitted the 11.50-15 Firestone "sleeks" (as Baskerville called them). The answer was simple: a cutting torch and mini-tubs. The custom candy-and-pearl paint was applied as a wedding present three days before Nick tied the knot, and the fiberglass snorkel hood and stance harken back to the classic A/FX racers he was fond of as a younger man.

Zuk knew celebrated hot-rodder Al Kirschenbaum through the Detroit car scene, and it was Kirschenbaum who brought the Midnight Express Maverick to the attention of Gray Baskerville. After the commotion of being featured in HOT ROD Magazine and making it into the top 10 for Street Machine of the Year in 1979, Nick the Greek showed and raced his 10-second Maverick for a few more years, but around 1982 decided to put the car in storage. Finding gas that could handle the 427 FE's 14:1 compression ratio wasn't easy.

It was Zuk's intention to be buried in the old Maverick—he never wanted to sell it and had no intention of ever waking the demon pony from its slumber—but oral hygiene changed his mind. Joe Gimmarro is older brother to Dave Gimmarro, and Nick's dentist. As is natural in that kind of relationship, the two struck up a conversation about hobbies, which led to cars and Nick telling Joe about his classic Maverick street machine. Joe relayed the story to his car-enthusiast younger brother, Dave, and Dave got excited. When Dave was in high school, he read the July 1979 issue of HOT ROD Magazine, and was smitten by the 427-powered Maverick, telling himself he would one day own a car like that.

So, nearly 40 years later, Dave convinced his older brother to put him in touch with Zuk, and after months of friendly pestering, convinced Nick to sell him the Maverick. Nick wouldn't let his beloved street machine go to just anyone, but Dave promised to keep the car as original as possible and use it as it was intended—a fun, quick show car that was meant to be driven. The 2022 Detroit Autorama (where we discovered the Maverick) was just the start of the journey. Since then, Dave and Nick (now good friends) have taken the Maverick to the inaugural Sick Nights and the Woodward Dream Cruise in 2022, and more.

The 44-year old lacquer paint was still vibrant under the harsh Huntington Place lights (formerly Cobo Hall, site of the Detroit Autorama) after hiding under blankets and behind a Boss 302 Mustang clone since the early 1980s. True to his word, Dave has only made a few reliability modifications to the classic Maverick street machine. Gimarro was worried about the longevity of the original sodium-filled valves, so they were replaced with titanium units, and he also updated the induction with a Holley Terminator X Stealth EFI system to help with driveability, but otherwise the Maverick is as Nick built it in the late 1970s.

After the updates, the Maverick was put on a dyno and "only" made 514 hp at 6,000 rpm, much to Nick's chagrin. The dyno operator, being used to long-stroke big-blocks, refused to run it past that range. He told us over the phone that the Tunnel Port 427 doesn't come alive until after 7,000 rpm, and back when he was racing it, he wouldn't shift the Doug Nash-built Ford Top Loader four-speed manual transmission until 7,800 rpm. Dave is still getting comfortable in the car, but has managed to run mid-11s in the Midnight Express Maverick, and is happy to keep the 427 off the limiter for now. You can read the Gray Baskerville feature about Nick Zuk's 10-second 1972 Ford Maverick and the 1979 Street Machine of the Year cars in the HOT ROD Digital Archives—click here for free access!

Additional photos courtesy of owner Dave Gimmarro

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