Athens, Georgia native Thomas Dickerson remodeled a 1967 Ford Shelby GT350 Mustang using the skills he learned at Athens Technical College, where much of the work was done on the car. He was named in the top 10 'Young Guns' and top 40 overall at the Specialty Equipment Manufacturers Association (SEMA) competition in Las Vegas, NV last fall. (Photo by Josh Paine/ATC)

It was a laborious process for Athens Technical College student Thomas Dickerson to tote his ‘homework’ — a 1967 Ford Shelby GT350 Mustang — to and from campus, but the hard work of totally rebuilding the car has paid off.

Dickerson is set to appear during the 2021 SEMA Battle of the Builders episode premiere on the History Channel Sunday, Jan. 23, 2022, at 9 a.m. as one of the three recipients who won a ‘Young Gun’ Golden ticket with all expenses paid to participate in the Specialty Equipment Manufacturers Association (SEMA) competition in Las Vegas, NV, this past November. 

At the competition, Dickerson was awarded Top 10 in the Young Guns (builders under the age of 27) and Top 40 overall for his work. It also caught the eye of producers of the TV show who interviewed him on campus about his experience as one of the youngest to enter the competition at age 21.

“I started with a stock 1967 Mustang Fastback and had to carefully craft parts to turn it into a Shelby (Tribute),” said Dickerson. “I designed my Mustang with many modern components, taking it all the way to the point where you can drive a brand-new Mustang and not feel a difference between it and my car. In some cases, it will drive better and perform exceptionally better too. All of this took an immense amount of engineering and custom fabrication to make it perform the way I had designed. I had to make many of the parts because they simply did not exist or work with my specifications.” 

The entire project took about three years to complete, with much of the work completed on campus at ATC, and Dickerson documented his work on Instagram @67shelby_thomasdickerson throughout the project.

“This was the first car I ever painted. It took over 26 hours to paint over two days, and I spent two to three weeks wet sanding it afterward,” Dickerson explained. “I made my own center console using classes here that we have – mechanical engineering technology – and I designed my whole console on SolidWorks. I made all the pieces, I had some parts CNC’d, and I had some parts that I 3D printed in class.” 

The car has all the modern luxuries including fuel injection, LED headlights, electric cooling, digital analog gauges, a 7-inch touchscreen radio, push-button start and a key fob. Seats from a 2017 Mustang were used as a have custom upholstery made to his hand-drawn design.

“Seventy percent of the car is brand new, and every panel on the outside of the car is 100% new. When I bought the car, I was interested in mechanical engineering but it was not as hands-on as I had imagined, so that’s when I enrolled in the automotive collision repair program at Athens Tech,” said Dickerson.  

The accolades in Las Vegas weren’t the first for Dickerson, who took first place in Georgia’s SkillsUSA Auto Refinishing contest and second place in the national SkillsUSA category in 2021.

“Thomas was a great student and worked very hard to master the skills needed to build the dream he had envisioned,” said Greg Thomas, program chair for automotive collision repair. “With his skills and hard work, he was able to build a truly beautiful car. He was also able to go toe to toe against the best builders in the country at SEMA with amazing results! I couldn’t be prouder of him for his accomplishments.”

To learn more about the Young Guns competition, visit www.semayoungguns.com. For more information on the college, visit www.AthensTech.edu.