I snapped this 1975-77 Ford Maverick on my way to work the day after The Middle West got dumped on with about 6″ of snow. Wonder why the owner chose to drive it today of all days? Maybe their front-wheel drive or SUV with “all-season” tires got stuck?
Those Torino wheelcovers look awful from this angle, though to be fair the stinkbug stance isn’t helping much either.
Great term, “Stinkbug stance.” If they’re going to jack it up like that, they may as well install “fats in the back,” as Aussies might put it. And it would be a great gag on a milquetoast car.
Actually those wheelcovers, painted to match the body, were first used on the Maverick LDO (Luxury Decor Option) in 1972 (I bought one new). Here is an example on the 1973 LDO.
They were also available on the Gran Torino in ’72.. We had a neighbor that had one the same color as your picture with the same wheelcovers as the poster car.
Must be like the standard hubcaps for Ford, like the smooth disc ones that Chevy used for the Caprice/Chevelle lines in the mid ’70s.
They were also available (I think they might’ve even been standard) on the Mustang Grande from 71 to 73.
Seems like it but maybe not with the body color.
That car shows Ford’s facination with extremely long body colored wrap around body side molding. That fetish lasted until the middle of the 80s.
GM and Chrysler picked up on that trend, too, with various models (see the Dodge Aspen, for example). Ford just used it on virtually EVERY line, from the Pinto to the Lincoln Continental Mark V, during the 1970s.
Seems like, with Ford, that lasted all the way through aero years into the mid 90s. The Mustang had the traditional wraparound moldings up until 1993. Several other models still had a variation of it, though were somewhat integrated into the bumper covers by then. The full wraparound molding didn’t really disappear until the ovoid theme took hold.
Loved the LDO Maverick/Comet sedans…definitely one of the ancestors of the luxury compact. Those seats were beautiful. Too bad you could only get them in tan.
This talk is starting to make me thing of one of my favorite luxury compact models of the 70s, the Mercury Grand Monarch Ghia. It is sort of like a Versailles without the pretension. Apparently the most popular vehicle for Ford executives to drive in the mid 1970s.
I’ve seen a few Monarch and Granada Ghias, but never with the two tone interior like that.
Look how skinny and well tucked-in the wheels are. It’s almost like the car’s embarrassed having them.
Those are the least of that car’s appearance problems.
All the snow on that car says the dude parks it outside.
No, the Dude had a Torino……
“The Dude is not in, please leave a message…”
an “upgrade” from a Pinto, and you still get Pinto taillights.
Ford loves to cheap out on taillight assemblies, even to this day.
Look closely at a Ford taillight, even the fancy chromed-out ones, and you’ll most likely find a single combination bulb on each side. When Ford did their big decontenting in the late ’90s, a lot of models switched from amber to red rear turn indicators; That wasn’t just cosmetic…they actually eliminated a bulb from the assembly.
Then there’s the ’90s Escorts, MN-12 Thunderbirds, etc, that appear to have large taillights, but everything on the decklid is just a reflector.
That’s true for the 1989-1991 Thunderbird but from 1992-1997 they lit up via LEDs
Usually with every fourth LED blown out also. 🙂
But on my 95 Thunderbird, every time one would start going out, I’d comb the junkyards and find a good working replacement. I cut a few of them apart but could never figure out how to fix them. As I recall, Hewlett Packard made the LED assemblies for Ford.
And if you turn them straight up, you get truck taillights!
JK.
Those taillights were so simple you could install them upside down and they’d still work fine, and be flush against the body.I just changed the left taillight to right, and vice versa. I did that with my Pinto and they looked a little like Toyota Celica tail lights. It didn’t occur to Ford that they could do this to help make the Maverick and Pinto look different from the rear.
No, the Maverick came first in spring 1969, then, the 1971 Pinto got the same parts.
oh right…. thanks. That’s even a little worse. They still look like an after thought.
OK, maybe the experts can help me out on this one – did the Maverick use a 9″ rear end? Because the rectangular shape with the rounded corners of the differential housing visible in the picture sure make it look like one. Or was is possibly used only with the V8 engine option?
It would have been an 8″ rear, which looks like a 9″ but smaller. I don’t think the 9″ was ever installed in a maverick/comet from the factory. The 8″ used to be a popular street rod rear since it is already narrow and is strong enough for a small block.
CA Guy, I’ve said before we must live in a parallel universe. My dad had a new four-door ’73 Maverick with the LDO, it was white with a tan interior, thick carpet, a coppery colored vinyl roof with matching large body side molding, and those body-colored wheel covers, kind of a compact Brougham. It had the 302 engine which I recall delivered relatively poor gas mileage, and it drove rather heavily. My brother and I didn’t care much for it, we derisively called it the “Maverprick,” no offense!
DW: My Maverick LDO had the 302 and the gas mileage was terrible! 13 MPG in the city. A friend’s Dad liked my car so much (the fancy interior and trim, etc) that he factory-ordered a 1973 Comet LDO with the 302. He kept it only a year or two because the gas crisis hit in 73 and the terrible mileage in combination with the tiny gas tank and gas rationing in LA = bad situation. I think all the early models had that tan interior. My car was “Medium Yellow Gold” with the coppery colored roof and side trim. I liked the white one a bit better. You are absolutely right, it did have a heavy front end with rather poor handling in the rain (fortunately no ice or snow in SoCal).
If you’re gonna have a Maverick, a V8 LDO with all the boxes checked off is the one to have. I believe the “heavy” feel you speak of was a consequence of all the sound deadening and bushing softening to make it ride nicely. My parents had the 1972 Comet 4-door version in the aformentioned Yellow Gold, and every option. I always thought it had a pleasant ride, and including steel belted radial tires (in our case Goodrich RS’s in ER70-14) in that price class was a big deal at the time. I have fond recollections of unlicensed sorties (age 15) in it, and savoring it’s V8 punch. It was more fun that the times I had to sneak out my moms 6-cylinder Mustang.
Looks like its in panic stop mode, I havent seen a jacked rear in decades, bloody stupid idea at the best of times on a road car and the ‘fats’ only added to the handling problems the stance caused. Might look cool on a dragstrip it looks dumb when yer upside down in a drain.
It’s a great idea when the roads are packed with tailgating inattentive texting SUV drivers.no bumper misalignment! Sure it looks awful but well, the poor thing doesn’t have a whole lot to lose in the Looks Department anyway.
The original Maverick was much better looking than this refresh.
Has a car ever been redesigned to look better than its original design? I can’t think of one right off the top of my head.
This car wasn’t a “refresh” of the original Maverick. It was the same car with railroad-tie bumpers hung on each end to meet federal standards.
If this is true, this represents the absolute worst implementation of the battering rams I have ever seen. Prior to 1973 the car seemed more curvaceous, the above example looks like a blunderbuss. The apparent changes are, to my eye, even more dramatic than the changes to the Vega, Pinto, and Camaro, all of which looked much worse when they hung the I-beams on them.
I think Ford’s application of the 5mph bumpers was probably worst looking of the Big 4 overall in the 1970s. Just a cursory look at several cars shows at least on many GMs and Chryslers they were shaped and styled somewhat while most Fords I see are essentially I-beams bolted on and wrap around. Doesn’t make the cars necessarily ugly just the bumpers are most obvious.
I thought that the AMC solution to the battering ram edict was the best. They covered the shock absorber tubes with a rubber boot and hung the bumper out there with no valence or other cover. The bumper rail itself was shaped that it was rounded off so it camouflaged its battering ram nature and followed the contour of the car, at least with the post 1973 cars. Chrysler and GM did a pretty decent job of hiding the bulk, but Ford went all out in proclaiming it’s batteringramnicity™.
Yes, that’s a new word, like broughamness or Cockroach of the Road™.
Since I published it first, I get the trademark… 😉
Nah I can think of a few good ones. Sometimes first year stylings can have rough edges that the subsequent refreshes can polish up and improve on. GMs across the board 1970 refresh for the A bodies come to mind. I like the looks of the 70-72s better than the 68-69s from each division. There’s several other skin grafts I can think of that improved on the originals actually.
In the Maverick’s case though, it wasn’t really redesigned. It essentially just had those federally mandated battering rams tacked onto the original design, with some broughamy touches on top.
The C & E body Cadillacs 85/86 certainly come to mind. After being panned for being too small and undistinctive for a Cadillac, both bodies received rather immediate updating that brought back some some of the styling cues that they were known for. We discussed this extensively a couple of weeks ago, but sales picked up for the redesigns.
The Lincoln Versailles (aka Lincoln Granada) had its best sales year in 1979 when they redesigned the car slightly to make it less obviously Granada.
I am sure there are others but yea I suppose there are few cars were a redesign produces take off sales.
Maverick bodyshell was never restyled. Just added new grilles, 5 mph bumpers, and two tone paint jobs in later years. By 1977, most sold were 4 doors to elders or teachers. [one I knew from 8th grade got a 77, near end of the model year]
The Granada was a restyle on the same platform, however. But its body also was not restyled, other than switching to square headlights.
Not many cars made the design transition from 1969.5 to 1978. That’s a lot of time and different styling directions. The boxiness of some of the AMC cars were an exception. Whereas the tumble home and the “tuck under” (If that is the right term…the body curve from shoulder to rocker panel) of the Maverick was a product of the early 70s era.
This old maverick is looking a bit more spry than that other arguably more famous maverick.
Nice find, but why is it jacked up in the back?
I believe the color is “Pastel Lime.”
Or perhaps “Dark Yellow Green Metallic?” Definitely not “Antiestablish Mint.”
Okay, after checking, it looks like the much more mundane “Light Green.”
Sounds like the colors of some of my cars in the past… “Special Order Blue” or “Medium Green – Metallic”
Doesn’t look as good as a two door but it sure makes a lot more sense. I rode around in a couple of two door back seats and it was strained even for a younger slimmer me.
Spotted in Brantford about 10 years ago
PEI yard circa 2000
That’s 71/72 Comet.
Makes me think of “The Thin Blue Line”……tail lights of a Vega do look like that, sort of!
this one looks like comet to me!
The Thin Blue Line was a documentary about a crime where the Police Confused the Comet as a Vega….because it was night time and they only saw the lights which are very similar…the car above is the actual vehicle in the case where a Cop was murdered……hence the reference above to a Vega….this pictured car was confused as a Blue Vega and the subject of a search for an extended period of time.
I liked the concept of the Maverick when they came out, especially the ads where they had a gorgeous model changing a front fender. After all, “only 8 bolts” held it on!
The lower dash package shelf was cool, but the styling was somewhat ponderous for such a “small” car, and the greenhouse had, by comparison, gunslit windows.
Always respected the Maverick – score one for Ford for me!
See? I don’t “hate” them all!
There hope for you yet!
I saw this one at a show in Yuma AZ last week, Midnight at the Oasis. Fun show!
Original paint. Stock plus dual exhaust (302 V8 I assume) and whatever else you can’t see.
I love it!
Those Fox mustang headrests and piping on the seats definitely aren’t original though. The steering wheel looks like it’s tan so maybe a 99% complete color change?
Yes, you are right…I was just looking at another pic of the car and the interior was more obviously custom. Nobody does a color change TO Green do they? LOL If not THE original paint I think the original color.
It was a wood wheel.
Nice one. Those hubcaps with the trim rings look excellent too!
Fully restored to all factory original four door Mavericks are classic car show winners!!!
Why is it out in the snow?
Can’t do it any worse. Look at the big rust-hole on the fender right behind the front wheel.
Car was obviously cared for most of its life; but it’s a rusted-out junker now. Classic or no, I doubt there’s any real value there beyond a part-out.
If that light green 4-door Ford Maverick is a junker, I’d like some parts out of it for my three prize-winning Ford Mavericks. Parts for those things are hard to come by and worth big bucks especially when it comes to a person that really needs the parts for their restoration project. Let me know if someone out there has a complete A/C box for a 70 – 77 Ford Maverick or Mercury Comet. E-mail is anthony.orenstein@icloud.com. Thanks!
If anybody out there has an A/C box for a Ford Maverick or Mercury a Comet, please let me know. My e-mail address is anthony.orenstein@icloud.com. Thanks!
Here’s another fully restored 1972 Ford Maverick!
Looking for a 1977 Ford maverick 4 door bronze or light brown with a 302 or 250 motor