The chassis structure, as limp as boiled broccoli without its roof, is restrained from jiggling mainly by three crude, weight-enhancing underbody braces resembling the final projects from a high-school shop class. To some eyes, the sheet-molded composite panels (a fancy term for plastic) of the prototypes lacked visual tension and interesting detail when viewed in the sterile backdrop of the auto shows. After all, Ford has basically just reskinned the rear-drive luxury-car platform that underpins the Lincoln LS and Jaguar S-type with suspension and drivetrain changes geared toward making the car softer.Įven the drab dashboard from the Lincoln carries over with only ornamental changes. Ford suits sum up the mission of the new T-Bird as 'relaxed sportiness,' two words we heard here at Hogback Road with the same relish as 'stale doughnuts.' Cynicism was our first reaction. The company has dusted off its old blueprint for a sports car and delivered a 2002 model that is more evocative of the original than any of the 4.2 million built in the 44 years since the last two-seater. Now Ford believes the market climate is similar enough to 1955's to initiate a reboot of the Thunderbird. The first big alteration - the notorious addition of a back seat for 1958 - helped Thunderbird sales jump 77 percent in one year.įrom then on, the T-Bird chased sales in whatever unsavory direction the shifting tastes of American buyers led it. Its main tenets were elegant styling with room for two and an obvious lineage to the Ford gene pool, driving manners akin to those of a balanced touring car, limited production, and liberal plundering of the corporate parts bin. And yet Ford never hesitated to tamper with the original formula. The Thunderbird established itself by outselling its rival, the Chevrolet Corvette, by four to one in those first three heady years of 1955-57.

Had they known about the welded-on roof, the fake landau bars, the faux-leather trunk straps, or the 5000-pound curb weight that lay in the car's future, things might have been different. In 1955, Ford planners winnowing down the list of proposed names for a certain forthcoming two-seater figured Cruisejet, Wheelaway, and Roadocrat didn't quite fit the image they were seeking to create.

60s tbird