The Fifth-Generation Ford Thunderbird Was A Mystery Wrapped Inside Of An Enigma But It Was Also One Of The Fastest T-Birds

Adolescence is an awkward time for anyone. Cars aren’t people, but the Ford Thunderbird has struggled with this challenge that usually affects human teenagers. One T-Bird that had such a difficult time was the all-new 1967 fifth-generation model.

However, while other troublesome transitional Thunderbirds have been rather easy to explain, the 1967 “Glamour Bird” to this day remains a confusing product; one that’s hard to pin down and define. Maybe it was the hearse-like landau bars or the scary machine-like faceless front, but there was always an element of sinister mystery surrounding it. You can dismiss it as a bit of a failure but that’s too easy, and it deserves our closer inspection.

Flipping The ‘Bird

Over its half-century of life, the mission of the T-Bird went through more major changes than virtually any other car you can think of. There were some great cars, and even some that were not-so-great by an enthusiast’s standpoint that nonetheless sold well, but it seems like with each significant shift there was a transition period car that didn’t always click.

The 1955-57 two-seat models were iconic but just couldn’t gain the kind of sales that Ford needed to sustain. While the four-seat model “Box Bird” that replaced it for 1958 sold far better, there was an adolescent awkwardness to the styling that seemed stuck somewhere between the previous car and larger Ford coupes.

It wasn’t until the third-generation 1961-63 “rocket bird” that the new direction was truly resolved.

Another adolescent period occurred later. Whatever you think about the Torino-based 1977-79 T-Birds, they sold extremely well and were some of the most popular examples of the nameplate ever.

Of course, with CAFÉ fuel economy requirements this size of Thunderbird couldn’t last. Ford’s decision was to put the name onto the smaller 1980-82 Fox-body-based ‘Bird. This move drastically dropped the size and was more maneuverable, but Ford also chose to try and mimic the styling of the previous, much larger car.

This didn’t work. The scaled-down-brougham looks were so universally disliked that it led to a revolution at Ford which resulted the awesome critically acclaimed and publicly welcomed 1983 “aero bird.”

Still, possibly the most controversial big change for the T-Bird occurred when it came time to replace the 1964-66 “Flair Bird,” better known to many as the “Thelma and Louise” car that meets a tragic end in the film of that name. Times had changed, cars had changed, and the Thunderbird was desperately looking for a new identity.

This Bird Had Bones (Dr. McCoy That Is)

The mid-sixties was an odd time for the Thunderbird, with the 1965 Mustang taking on the role of Ford’s youthful, fun, and affordable coupe. The Mustang-based Cougar would soon arrive to take on a slightly more luxurious role for the pony car and further erode sales of the fourth-generation T-Bird.

At the same time, General Motors was getting on the Thunderbird bandwagon in a big way with such personal luxury car masterpieces as the Buick Riviera and the new-for-’66 Oldsmobile Toronado. For this next generation, the Thunderbird would need to emphasize the “luxury” part if it’s “sport/luxury” mix to stay competitive. Ford began by changing the T-Bird from a unit body platform to a unique new body-on-frame structure (shared with no other Ford at the time) for more isolation and quiet. Next, the slow-selling convertible was dropped since few if any competitors offered a drop-top personal luxury entry.

Styling of this new fifth-gen T-Bird followed the path of the GM players: clean, simple and imposing. The Thunderbird’s front end was simply a large rectangular grille with hidden headlamps; a dramatic departure from the earlier T-Birds. The ’67 Olds Toronado and Buick Riviera also had concealed lamps and blunt fascias, but the object on the cover of the 1967 Thunderbird brochure below looked more like an industrial threshing machine or a killer cyborg than it did a car. As a young kid I was terrified of the old one in our ‘hood and always crossed to the other side of the street rather than walk on the sidewalk beside it. It’s pure evil.

In back, the rectangular shape of the front was echoed with a rectangular “loop” taillight; connecting both ends of the car was a very simple fuselage-style body with a subtle “Coke bottle” shape, bumped-out front fenders and thick rear pillars with, on upper models, those hearse-style “S” bars. I was going to crop these images below but decided that I just have to show the entire set of illustrations from the ’67 brochure since they’re just so magnificent and add the mystique that must have helped give it the name “glamour bird.”

Actually, getting the “base” coupe model got you a vinyl-and-landau-bar-free C-pillar and looked pretty damn good:

Overall, it was like something right out of a period sci-fi like a Syd Mead rendering or a Star Trek set (ironically, “Bones” McCoy actor DeForrest Kelley owned such a ‘Bird to park near Spock’s Riviera).

The most radical change for the ’67 fifth generation was the introduction of a new four-door Thunderbird, the first (and would turn out to be only) T-Bird sedan ever offered. An early if not pioneering adaptor of making a sedan that tried to look like a coupe, the center-opening “suicide doors” with adjacent door handles helped to disguise the rear portal.

The thick coupe C-pillars remained and the door cut in the sheet metal was blended in with the bottom of the silly chrome Landau bar. The sheet metal “fin” on the back of the rear door opened with it:

Are you checking out that interior in the image above? You really should.

Yo Dawg, I Heard You Like Landau Bars

Inside is where the battle of personal luxury cars is won and lost, and this T-Bird really went all-out with the Mad Men-style. You have bucket seats separated by a slick console up front, though a front bench was available to seat six. This looks like it was absolutely the thing to pull up at a Playboy Club with.

Do you like landau bars? Well, if you do, Ford put interior landau bars on the other side of the outside landau bars just for you, dawg. They even incorporated the rear courtesy light into these funeral coach-like details that seem to add to the Glamour Bird’s creepiness and mystery. This thing’s Landau bar game is strong, and I especially like the inlaid “woodgrain.”

source: Orlando Classic Cars

Admittedly, they did a surprisingly good job of the hidden back portal ruse; far better than many “four door coupes” of today that this T-Bird seems to have presaged decades before.

The extra doors certainly helped with rear seat ingress and egress, and selecting the four-door version of the T-Bird avoided the two-door’s cool-looking “wraparound” rear seatback you can see below that looked like a comfy lounge booth from Goodfellas but actually pushed you uncomfortably into Joe Pesci in the center. Interestingly, the rear quarter windows on the two-door slide back to open instead of down

The dashboard seemed to project an image of a GT car instead of a luxo cruiser with round gauges, power window switches all lined up in a row, sliding HVAC levers that look like airplane controls, and even an available overhead console with warning lights.

If there’s one thing that this T-Bird didn’t lack it was features, and those features seemed to operate on some of the strangest steampunk technologies. The windshield wipers ran off of the power steering pump. Headlight covers on that “Norelco razor” front end lifted via engine vacuum, which also controlled the locking mechanism of the steering wheel that tilted inward to allow easier access when the car was off. Fiber optic lines monitored the functionality of lighting. The sequential rear turn signals- one of the first to incorporate them- operated by an actual mechanical distributor that ran whenever you turned the indicators on. Signaling a turn ran a motor in the distributor that sent power to the appropriate bulb.

There are likely many reasons you never see this generation of T-Bird on the road anymore, but that BMW 7-Series-like complexity likely worked against it and resulted in many examples becoming fodder for CHiPs car wrecks when they weren’t even ten years old

One of the lesser-known innovations that Ford offered in 1968 was what might have been the first appearance of supplemental high-mounted stop lights, long before they became mandatory in America for 1986. This was apparently a rarely selected option, and only available on four doors.

None of that seems totally unexpected for this mysterious T-Bird. However, the oddly strong straight-line performance adds another layer to the enigma.

The Boss Bird

What would you imagine to be the fastest Thunderbirds made? Maybe you’re thinking some early two-seater like the supercharged 1957, or more likely one of the later supercharged stick shift 1990 Super Coupes. You’d be right, but this strange fifth-generation car will surprise you again since some of them can vie for the title of fastest factory T-Birds ever

For 1967, power came from a standard 390 cubic inch 4-barrel V8 with twin exhausts rated at 315 horsepower; a 428 with 345 horsepower on tap was optional. However, next year the new 385 series big block “Thunder Jet” 429 V8 became an option; the first appearance of the motor that would become much more famous in the late sixties “hot” Mustangs. Quoted conservatively by Ford as producing 360 horsepower, many reports claim that the motor produced at least 40 more than that. Despite the 4300 pound curb weight, this redundantly named Thunder Jet Thunderbird was quick, with sources giving zero to sixty times anywhere from low-nines to as low as mid-sevens, making it one of the quickest cars in T-Bird history, landau bars and all.

The ’67 T-Bird handily outsold the Riviera and Toronado, but despite an all-new design and the addition of the four-door model, sales of the fifth-generation never achieved the boost that was expected. The 77,976 cars sold for the 1967 model year barely beat that 69,176 of the previous year’s final “Flair Bird”, but they dropped to below 65,000 for 1968 and never went over 50,000 after that. It didn’t help that Ford chose to add a pronounced and absurd “beak” to the thing near the end. Look at the nose on that thing! I also really hate T-Birds (or almost any car) where they block off the entire C pillar.

Expanding into four-door territory also proved to be a failed experiment, and that variation of T-Bird ended with the last fifth generation cars in 1971. Only 24,967 sedans sold in 1967, a number that steadily dropped to a mere 6,600 moving in 1971. After that, the four door Thunderbird was done for good.

The T-Bird Made A Mark

Honestly, the ’67 Thunderbird seems like it would have made more sense as a smaller Lincoln; like an LS or MKZ for an earlier generation, or a Versailles that actually worked. Of course, in the late sixties before the fuel crunch and years before compact luxury foreign cars were in vogue, such a market wouldn’t have existed; bigger was still better for the top brand of Ford. However, in 1969 Lincoln did introduce a version of this Thunderbird, the also-evil-looking Mark III as seen in the The French Connection and The Car. This was a smash success and proved extremely profitable for Ford and helped to save face for Lee Iacocca and his product planning collaborator Hal Sperlich after this generation of T-Bird proved to be a bit of a sales loser. Why is that when I see a Mark III owner wiping his hands, I assume that he just did a hit?

In many ways, though, I’m surprised that this generation of Thunderbird did as well as it ended up doing and wasn’t an abject failure. It’s a car that’s almost impossible to define as a very expensive Ford-branded luxury coupe that still wanted to be seen as a bit of an enthusiast’s car; it wasn’t, though in a straight line it was fast enough to inspire performance car people. Even the new sedan version really wasn’t a traditional sedan but instead an odd sort of coupe with an extra set of doors. What the hell was this thing?

Such hard-to-define cars often struggle in terms of appreciation, and that’s absolutely the case for the 1967-71 Thunderbird. Decent examples typically trade hands for the $9,000 to $18,000 range; that grey ’68 429 four-door shown below with 40,000 on the clock only fetched $35,000. Considering the mileage and beautiful condition, that’s pretty much all the money in the world for one of these things, and estimators at places like Hagerty don’t see it going up anytime soon.

To me, the sinister ambiguity of this unlikely hidden muscle car makes it oddly appealing. The most complex riddles are often easy to solve years later, but over half a century on the fifth-generation Thunderbird remains a mysterious thing that we might never fully understand.

source: Ford