![]() ![]() 3.500 orders were placed in the first ten days. ![]() The first production car went on sale on October 22, 1954, as a 1955 model. Ford unveiled the Thunderbird at the Detroit Auto Show on February 20, 1954. It remained the only two-seater Thunderbird until the eleventh-generation in 2002. It was light-weight for its era and fitted with a standard V8 engine, but the Thunderbird focused more on driver comfort than speed and was not a direct rival to either the Corvette or other European sports cars. Though sharing some design characteristics with other Ford cars of the time, such as single, circular headlamps and tail lamps and modest tailfins, the Thunderbird was slender and sportier in its shape, and presented features like a hood scoop and a 150 mph (240 km/h) speedometer hinting a higher performance then other Ford cars. Unlike the Corvette, it was not marketed as a sports car: Ford positioned the Thunderbird as an upscale model. These cars priorities were comfort, styling and a high-level interior feature. Considered a "personal car" by Ford and built upon the heritage of the bespoke roadsters of the 1930s, it was made largely with existing components, marking the first step towards the evolution of the “personal luxury car” as a mass market segment in the United States, a car classification for American luxury coupés and convertibles produced from 1952 to 2007. The Corvette, in turn, had been developed in response to the popularity of European sports cars among Americans. It was developed in response to the 1953 Motorama display at the New York Auto Show, which revealed to the public the Chevrolet Corvette. The first generation of the Thunderbird was a two-seat convertible produced by Ford in between 19, the first 2-seat Ford since 1938. Ford Thunderbird (colloquially, T-Bird) is a nameplate used by Ford for the model produced between 19 and 20 over eleven generations. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |