Can I interest you in a 1961 Falcon with 50% more weight, 25% less power, and 100% more fluff?
(first posted 12/27/2017) I admit to having had an obsession for years with finding the specific car that most fully embodies the worst traits of the Brougham-Malaise Era. During this time, performance, efficiency, handling, space utilization and essentially all practical or objective qualities were thrown out the executive suite window in favor of padded tops, opera windows, tufted velour, plastiwood, stand-up hood ornaments and other tacky accouterments. That’s where the development money all went, and as a consequence, performance and efficiency went to hell in a…Granada.
I’ve harbored a long-held suspicion that the worst of the worst would have a blue oval on it, as Ford in the 70s under Lee Iaccoca was all about the show and most decidedly not about the go. But it took no less then three previous posts here to hunt it down, although I should have really known all along. But here it is, the winner of all four of CC’s Dunce Cap Award categories, the 1975 Granada with the 250 (4.2L) six:
- lowest hp per cubic inch: 0.28 hp per cubic inch.
- lowest rpm at max. power : 2800rpm
- worst power-to weight ratio 48.46 lbs per hp
- slowest 0-60 time: 23.15 seconds
All hail the victor, a triumph of fluff, feebleness and imitation style over substance, engineering and performance. And it’s not just me; Popular Science compared a 250 six Granada to a 250 six Nova, and the results were predictable.
The 1975 Granada optional (std. on Ghia) 250 (4.2 L) six was rated at 70 net hp, at 2800 rpm, in CA emission configuration, or 28hp per cu.in. The 49 state version made a whopping 72 hp at 2900 rpm. These are truly astounding figures, right from the late 1920s, especially compared to what the Japanese and European competitors were able to muster, never mind the American competition. Even the lowly Chevrolet 250 six was rated at 105 hp in 1975, which is a whopping 50% (!) more.
And what’s even more astounding is that the base 200 cu.in six was rated at 75 hp. Adding almost a liter of displacement somehow knocked off several horsepower. Only a company dedicated to “Total Performance” could possibly have been able to figure out that trick. All of Ford’s huge investments in racing was finally paying off for the customer.
In a recent post where this engine was nominated by Vince/BillMitchell, some of you tried to make excuses (emission controls) as to why this engine was so particularly low in output. Well, I’m not buying it. of course emission controls were the reason, but other companies were able to master that problem quite well. As pointed out above, the Chevy 250 six made 50% more power. The 1975 Chrysler 225 slant six also made 105 hp. And AMC’s 258 six made 110 hp. What was Ford’s excuse again?
Never mind that the Mercedes diesels of the time even made more power, by a huge margin. The 240D made 62 hp from 147 cu. in, or 0.46 hp per cu.in. Guess which was faster?
and has the same performance as a 1961 VW Beetle?
The 1975 VW Rabbit in the ad made the same 70 hp, from a 1.5L four with a carburetor. That’s .77 hp per cu.in, or almost three times as much. No mention in the ad that the Granada had the same hp as the VW. Oh, yes, there were V8 options in 1977, but since this was coming right off the energy crisis, I can assure that six cylinder Granadas were the norm in 1975.
One commenter mentioned that the Falcon six cylinder head with its integral intake manifold was at fault. Pfft. How about a new and improved cylinder head? The Falcon 200 six was used right through 1983 (making a whopping 92 hp in its final year), and was built by the hundreds of thousands, so a better breathing head with a proper intake manifold wouldn’t exactly have been hard to come by, eh? Sorry, there’s just simply no excuse for 70hp from a 4.2 L six.
When we factor in the 3,392 lb base curb weight of the Granada Ghia, we come up with an astounding 48.46 lbs per hp. That’s worse than the old 1192cc 40hp (34 net hp) 1961-1965 VW Beetle (46 lbs per hp), whose last year in the US was a decade earlier. And it’s only slightly better than a 1928 Model A, which had 53 lbs per hp. I can’t think of an American car since the 1930s that had a worse ratio.
And the Granada’s 0-60 time proves that: 23.15 seconds, as per a Popular Science comparison test with a 250 powered Nova, which is right below. That’s slower than what a good-running 40 hp Beetle could do (22 seconds). And that applies to a Mercedes 240D too.
I could go on with the comparisons, but I think I’ve made my point, for now. And I’ll leave it to Popular Science to give a more objective comparison of the Granada to its main competitor, the Chevy Nova. But even I was surprised at how lop-sided that came out. I guess I’m not the only one who only saw only sizzle and no steak.
Because this review is from Google Books, I couldn’t copy larger-sized images. If it’s too small for you, even after clicking the images, here’s the original.
The summary gives it away: the Granada loses (or ties) every category, except for eking out a one point advantage in roominess. Well, the Granada did have a new body, even if it was sitting on ye olde Falcon platform. The Nova’s body from the cowl back was still based on the 1968 Chevy II, which was never a paragon of space efficiency.
The Nova got significantly better fuel economy, despite weighing more. PS speculates that the difference is because Ford calibrated this engine to meet 1976 emission standards. But that speculation is likely off-base, as the 1976 version was re-calibrated substantially again, and had a bump to 90 hp, which is a 25% or more increase. I’ll speculate that Ford had serious problems meeting even the 1975 standards, and had to resort to extreme measures that killed performance and fuel economy.
Regarding handling, here are the two key quotes: ” the Nova feels taut and firm” “The Granada..has excessive freedom to roll, pitch and bounce”.
There you have it. And Americans had a lot of it; the Granada, that is.
Like all of Iaccoca’s new cars, the Granada was a big hit, at least for the first few years. The Granada almost duplicated the first few years of the Falcon, coming just shy of the Falcon’s record 474k sales in 1961. An energy crisis will do that. And the Nova did well too, almost hitting its record of 376k 1963 in 1977. These were the second coming of the compact years, after their decline in the second half of the 60s and the first half of the 70s.
No one will ever accuse Lee Iaccoca of being overly concerned about what was under the hood. It was the grille in front of it and the ornament on top of it that really counted. And now we can officially add another title to him; in addition to the Father of the Brougham Epoch he was also the King of Malaise.
A new cylinder head for the Ford six was available from Ford OZ by 1980 theyd had it redesigned in cross flow form for that very same engine did nobody at Ford talk to each other.
Literally, no. It was a worldwide company separated by timezones, cultures, and legislation. Ford Australia had indigenous management that tried to adapt products from other markets. They were a tail that couldn’t wag the dog.
Also, Oz was a protected market that needed a domestic source for its volume produced powerplants. Ford Australia needed a more powerful engine that could be made in the same facilities. Ford US had other domestic sources for engine upgrades, and Australia’s upgrades didn’t address the US’s twin problems of fuel economy and emission compliance.
That’s a good answer, although the crossflow head from ’76 made a very substantial difference to economy with new emissions standards; Holden didn’t bother for ’76, tacked the equipment on for the HX which ran very poorly indeed. But no, even a pretty cheap engineered solution like this from the Ford tail wasn’t ever going to be noticed by the dog.
Good point. Interestingly though, the heads were cast by Honda Japan, despite local content requirements. This would not have fitted US requirements technically, politically and financially, even if Honda had the capacity.
I think it was just the alloy head from 1980 that Honda cast.
As justy baum says the crossflow head made a big difference – it allowed Ford to meet the emissions standards without loss of performance. Then the alloy head let the Falcon equal the fuel economy of the smaller, lighter, smaller-engined Commodore.
Were Ford US in Henry-Ford mode of design an engine once and build it unchanged forever? Had they redesigned the cylinder head for the 1973 emissions regs they had 10 years to recover the costs!
I think one consideration was that in the U.S., the 250 was still considered the cheap economy engine and Ford assumed customers would mostly trade up for a 302. My impression was that in OZ by this time, the 250 was Ford’s mainstream engine and it was getting harder and harder for punters to justify the higher fuel and insurance costs of a V-8.
Cast iron cross flow heads were the most common but I had a XE Fairmont Ghia with alloy head with the trick alloy rocker cover with matching efi inlet manifold.
Could do about 110 mph 170km/ph but was breathless over 4000 rpm.
I can see why Ford Oz introduced SOHC, which may have on the drawing board when my car was built.
Sold it to a friend, was a orphan as had Bosch injection as the next year (XF) have Fords own system.
This motor was introduced to replace the 302c and 351c, which I don’t understand why as an injected version of the Cleveland would have been far superior to a comparable US 302w efi.
I don’t know what Ford OZ was thinking and would have been pissed when GM-H not only kept their local V8 by spending money not only on an unleaded version but efi variations.
I’m also not sure what GM and Ford (US) are thinking pursuing large FWD cars as the rest of the world equates FWD with tiny economy cars aka cheap garbage, A FWD large luxury car is a oxymoron.
You’re thinking alloy head KB. Cross flow came with the XC in 76 to meet ADR 27a. Our malaise error.
Even if they didn’t have the time or budget to verify the Australian six as compliant with U.S. regulations, they were already selling the Lima/Pinto 2.3 L 4 , which was lighter, more efficient and more powerful than the 250, in this country. I don’t understand why the 2.3, with a 5 speed, wasn’t an option on the ’75 Granada. Though USA-made, the 2.3 had its roots in Ford of Europe, thus lending a little more credibility to the “euro-sedan” image Ford was painting for this car. Even if most of the American public shied away from the 5-speed, it would have given the car some much-needed good press, and given those whose main priority was fuel economy a credible choice.
Could this be…………a DS? In all but name.
Here’s the problem with calling this a deadly sin. A ‘deadly sin’ should cause long term damage to the company, by spoiling the maker’s reputation and discouraging future sales, sending the company on a downward spiral. People ate these cars up with a spoon, and smiled. I knew three or four people who had them, and liked them, and didn’t learn to hate Ford after owning them. You see, compared to a Vega they were great, and Japanese cars weren’t quite ready for prime time in 1975.
True these Granadas were sh*t cars and even the advertisements were embarrassing but the general public looooved these things. Although they never run very well, they (generally speaking) never quit running completely and I think that was the key. True they rusted out badly, but no worse than the competition of the day, so that kind of went unnoticed. Finally, the interiors were comfy in a poorly-lit velvet-upholstered bar-booth sort of way, and they lasted longer than the bodies….
Iacocca really was a genius at this facade thing. As I recall things, people viewed the Granada as the reinvention of the American Car – all the luxury of the 60’s in a new smaller package. Worse, they believed the comparison to European luxury cars was valid because most Americans had never been within 20 feet of a Mercedes in 1975.
So, horrible sin against the motoring public? You bet. Deadly Sin as CC has defined it….. not exactly.
A Ford FUBAR might be a better descriptor – R being for reason.
In the early-80s an engineer friend called his Granada “the Grenade” for all the times it broke down. Poisoned him on Fords and probably all American cars forever.
You might well confuse it with a Mercedes, but nobody would ever think it was a Citroen.
I’m sorry, that’s bad.
Magazine ads for these cars circulated worldwide it only resembles a Mercedes to the visually impaired, the ads seemed funny at the time.
Maybe not a Deadly Sin, but owning one felt purgatorial…
Given the times, Mr. Iaccoca and Ford wisely focused their investment where they could achieve worthwhile returns.
The Granada sold pretty well.
Exactly Ford, GM, the rest put stuff on the market that people would pay for. Sadly, this left the door wide open for Toyota et al.
In addition to the Father of the Brougham Epoch he was also the King of Malaise.
Iacocca was the Brougham Crime Boss. His record at Chrysler wasn’t much better, pushing criminal garbage like the Dodge Dynasty.
My parents had couple of Granadas as long term loaners while the dealer body shop was trying to piece our Elite back together. Also, my Driver ed car was a 75 302 Monarch. The loaners were both V8s as well. The first was a 76 low option 2-door with a 351 that actually had some pep (could lay rubber a bit, don’t ask about fuel economy)
The second was a 77 4 door with a 302 that was predictiby less impressive. Our 72 Comet LDO 302 would have beaten it like a rug.
One funny thing spec wise, was that the 200 was never offered in Canada. And this was before CAFE .
Anyway , on the Prairies it was an unwritten rule that you ordered V8 power , period. So equipped, they were perfectly adequate.
People
who got anything less were seen somewhat as nebish cheapskates. Canada never had issues with fuel shortages and gas lines in this period, so most buyers didn’t care.
In fact, once the 302 became available on the Mustang II,
It was all the local dealer stocked, we rarely saw 2.3 & 2.8 powered ones here.
The prevailing attitude was if you wanted economy, get a Toyota . You know, those little tin cans that rusted so fast, unlike Detroit iron like a Granada…….oh wait!
Hey, be nice to the Granada. It is slow, ugly, and uneconomical. It has nothing. Why rub its nose in it?
So true. By 1977, its fake everything Cousin Versailles was already telling it to ‘eat cake’. But that’s another story that has already been told here.
Because its a prime example of everything that was wrong with the American car industry, an industry that was on top of the world twenty years earlier.
And verging on bankruptcy twenty years later.
Wow! I knew this era was a low point for performance and efficiency, but these stats are far worse than anything I could have imagined. Even looking at the 1974 models compared the majority had 0-60 times that exceeded mpg numbers! In contrast my 2012 VW Up, a car that is considered a snail by modern standards, puts out 75 net hp from a 1 litre 3-cylinder engine, does 0-60 in ten less seconds, and averages fuel economy four times better than the test Granada.
Impressive sales numbers for such an uninspiring car, but it must have seemed right to a lot of new car buyers at the time. I still have a soft spot for malaise era ugly ducklings in spite of, well, everything. Especially the Pacer, Gremlin, Hornet Sportabout, and Pinto.
Must say that I’m in agreement with you regarding the Pacer, Gremlin, Hornet Sportabout and Pinto.
I always thought they were kind of attractive. That raised panel of hard plastic on the c-pillar seems like a strange addition though.
A friend’s mother was getting divorced, and bought a new dove gray Granada ESS as her “single lady” car. It was pretty and looked nicer than it was. I never rode in it but it looked OK from a distance. The 70s were an awful time for ALL US carmakers.
I thought this article was going to be about this Ford Granada ?
I find the the EU Granada’s way sexier than the US versions. Just google a picture of the 1980 US Granada, and the 1980 EU Granada, and enjoy…
A pity that we in Australia didn’t adopt the European Granada around 1970, instead of soldering on with our comparativly crappy Falcon. And I believe the V8s world have fitted in too.
Be thankfull Aussie didnt have large British Fords from the mid 60s till 71, NZ did and they were rubbish most were V8 converted because the Essex V6 in all sizes was junk we didnt get the 4 banger Zephyr and even the 2.5 V6 was dumped from assembly for 67 it was too gutless and broke far too often under warranty, fortunately the CER agreement with OZ placed more Falcons in Ford showrooms and the MK4 UK effort was gone and extremely rare to see one today, based on their rep the Consul/Granada cars simply wouldnt have sold here.
“I can assure that six cylinder Granadas were the norm in 1975.”
I don’t doubt that but – I’ve often wondered how badly skewed the ratios were 85% 6 vs 15% V8? 90/10? 95/05? Did one manufacturer have a noticeably higher V8 take rate than the others?
As an example now that they put dual exhausts on all Mustangs it’s getting harder for me to eyeball the 4 vs 6 (now discontinued) vs V8 take rate.
Refer to my previous post-Preferences may have been regionally skewed, but in my neck of the woods the take-rate for sixes was very low. It was almost always the 302. The 250 might have been about common as the 351, i.e. not at all.
I recall that after 1976 or 77 both the 200 I6 and the 351 V8 disappeared from the menu. It seemed to me (but just a guess) that by 1976 the V8 probably made up a good 40%, if not more, usually the 302. 351s were always scarce in my experience.
What I meant though is I wonder if say Chrysler Aspen/Volare had a higher 6 take rate because the slant 6 was such a solid decent engine and people were specifically looking for it over the 318. Perhaps GM had a higher % take rate on the SBC because it was so iconic and you wanted to be able to tell the neighbors it had a V8. Although AMC offered the V8 in almost everything I could see the % of those who chose it being low too. Seems like many AMC shoppers were shopping on price.
Just my musings. I’d love to hear from the guys who were actually around.
I think Mopar buyers in the 70s tended towards simpler, less expensive cars. The Valiant Brougham/Dart SE never sold that well but the base or mid-level Dart and Valiant were everywhere. The six made these cars decent performers. That might not have been enough for a lot of Nova LN or Granada customers, but for the frugal, traditionalists who bought the Mopar A bodies they were fine.
In my own experience, it seemed like the 318 was found in maybe 20% of those cars. The actual number may have been higher, but they were definitely the minority.
Very true – and not just the buyers, but Chrysler as well.
After the E-Body cars came out – and in Plymouth’s case after the full-line Barracuda arrived in ’67, durable economy was the positioning for Chrysler’s compacts, partially mitigated by the Swinger/Scamp,
At least until the Duster/Demon/Dart Sport came on board. I suspect the take up rate for V8s was much higher for those.
My Mom bought a 1973 Dodge Dart, 318 with floor mount 3 speed. Bench front seat too. That chrome shifter rising out of the floor with, a curve in it to clear the seat was awesome. It could not crack 10 seconds 0-60 tho, my older brother sure tried.
Well I can’t say I know why the buyers choose the power trains they did but I can tell you that around here the V8 was rare in the Aspen/Volare sedans but relatively common on the wagon. The Novas and Granada commonly had the V8.
The V8 take rate would have been higher if the dealer’s had a free hand in the build mix. From ’77 on V8’s were allocated on a percentage basis to the whole Nova order bank. Because of that, I ordered V8’s on the higher end models, left the 6’s for the price leaders.
Well, I am not a guy who was around but I did own two Gremlins. My 73 was a six and just happened to turn out to be a lemon (before lemon laws came to be lol). Very interesting color, blue by day but put it under a light in the parking lot and it looked lavender! lol The accelerator pedal would stick sometimes, you could try to lift it with your foot, reach down and try to grab it or just shut the engine off. lol In spite of that, I liked the size of it and the way it handled, even if it was not speedy or fancy. Due to the accelerator issue (that never got resolved) I didn’t keep it long but wanted to give the car a second chance so I got a 74. Now that was one of the favorite cars I have ever owned. It had a V8 5.0, baby crap yellow with a white hockey stripe, chrome wheels with raised white letter tires and I drove it a lot (commuted to college in it for 4 yrs 32 miles round trip plus work and errand driving oh and vacations). I lived in MI and the drive to school was on a lot of rural roads that didn’t see a plow much, never got stuck and didn’t slide much either, which I attribute to the weight distribution, I have been obsessed with weight distribution ever since owning that car. LOL No need for chains or special tires, just good driving skills and good weight distribution. Back in the 50s and early 60s we had all those cars with long empty rear ends, fishtailing was an everyday thing, it was nice to have a car that was controllable. Yep, loved my V8 Gremlin, drove it to 83, when I replaced it with another blue car (not an AMC) that I ended up hating and not keeping long. LOL (no more blue cars for me, that color is a jinx)
302s were very common around here especially in the Ghia trim.
See George’s post of the PS reader’s survey, the 302 was in the majority of the cars.
Bingo! The epitome (or perhaps “nadir” is more appropriate) of Malaise!
ERSATZ car!
Very Brougham (albeit in a smaller package than a US mid-sizer of that era)
As somebody who actually had a 1975 Granada 4 door, with the 250 six and C4, I have to agree completely on this. Its only concession was the C4 slipped just enough to keep the rpms up, much like a “loose” torque converter. Got car from original woman buyer and it only had 50k on it. The trans fluid was dirt colored. Best use for that car was to put disc brakes on a early Maverick.
Earlier this year, I came across this 1978 Granada 250 six here in Virginia. Seems to be a daily (or at least frequent) driver, and when I drove past it again about an hour later, a very elderly man was sitting in the driver’s seat, warming up the engine.
I knew the 250 was slow, but didn’t realize it was 20+ sec. 0-60 slow, That’s really astonishing.
Here’s the interior:
I see it has AC, you should be able to use it a brake!
It looks like it is a one owner car. Those plates would have been issued to the owner of that car the year that Granada was bought. They are also still legal to use so those plates might have been in use for almost 40 years. At the very least the plates are 25 years old (this style of VA plate was issued in late 1978 to 1992)
Good eye on those plates. The 1980 Volvo 240 I purchased used in late 1982 had BVF-215 as its first set of VA license plates (the car was sold new originally in PA). So these Granada plates starting with “C” were likely issued in 1983. I still occasionally see this style of plates.
No experience with the first year low HP 250’s but my buddy had a 1980 Granada sedan with the 250/automatic and it was never anywhere near that slow. We generally got 0-60 times with both of us in the car around the 15-16 second mark. A former high school student with a 1978 blue coupe and the 250/auto was able to spin the rear tire and certainly didn’t seem all that slow at the time. The 1975 must have had very low base timing and a very narrow advance. The 1BBl carb didn’t help either.
On another note fuel economy was much lower with his 1980 Granada compared to my 231 V6 or 260 V8 powered A/G body cars of the same period so that didn’t improve by much.
It’s funny about the 250. We had an XB Falcon with that engine. Non crossflow, single barrel carb etc, I dare say a BW auto, not the C4. It flew around town and was quite competent overall. Except on the highway. At 100 kph you’d swear it was still on second gear!☺ Must have been pollution gear that really killed US ones.
BTW doubtful that Aussies would have bought sawft Euro Granadas, even with V8s. Mark 3 Cortinas bad enough with the six.
I had a few 250 cube OZ Falcons they went ok not great but were competent enough my favourite was the XB with 302 Cleveland C4 the BW trans was oil soluble in Valiants Austins and Hillmans and I killed one towing a 800kg caravan with a XB, swapped rapidly for a VJ Valiant regal 265 torqueflyte it barely knew the caravan was hooked on except for the drop in fuel economy
I was initially puzzled by how much the Granada’s sales dropped in the 1978 model year, and then I remembered the reason: The introduction of the Fairmont; weren’t something like 460k produced in the first model year?
Similarly, the following year’s drop in Nova sales was likely due to the early introduction of the Citation, in April of 1979. I’d forgotten how well the Citation sold in its inaugural year, even discounting the long model year that resulted in total production of 812k units. As a comparison with present-day sales figures, only the F-series comes close to numbers like that, while the best-selling sedans struggle to achieve half that volume.
But one major difference is that the Nova was completely dropped when the Citation hit the market, the original Granada ran concurrent to the Fairmont for 3 years. The the Fox-Granada took over for 2 more, which was hideous and a huge flop.
What a horrible mental picture that is: “Finally I’m rid of that horrible Granada! This new Citation will give me years of trouble-free motoring!”
A new ’79 Nova was one of my “wish list” cars when I turned 16 back in ’79 (a Rabbit topped that list); I was enamored by the new Citation, also. But dad said never buy a “new” model until it’s 2nd or 3rd year, so that the manufacturer could iron out any kinks.
What. Amazing. Wisdom.
The introduction of the Fairmont played a role but I think the downsized intermediates at GM (Malibu/Cutlass/LeMans/Century/Monte Carlo/Grand Prix) who arrived for the same model year might also be a factor as well.
I Wonder Why there wasn’t a Dodge Dart/Plymouth Valiant included in the “Popular Science” Granada/Nova road test?
The optional interior package made the Mopars the equal of the G/N in plushness and visual appeal, all three cars were close in overall size.
Perhaps because the Mopar drivetrain (slant six or V8 engine and industry reference standard Torqueflite automatic transmission) would had thoroughly embarrassed these two Malaise Slackers? Or perhaps the Valiant/Dart models were noticeably larger on the inside than the G/N models?
I’m going to take a wild guess here, and speculate that the editors knew the Volaré/Aspen twins were going to be introduced the following year, and would make a better comparison.
The Valiant/Dart were probably perceived more as competitors to the Maverick/Comet.
Perhaps “perceived” that way…but a numbers comparison puts the Valiant/Dart 4 door squarely in competition with the 4 door Granada & Nova; if not the actual winner.
Expanding on your thoughts: When did the “compact car” Chevy Nova become a “luxury compact” and a direct rival of the Granada?
Although the “Luxury Nova” model gave it a pleasing, upscale interior package, the same was available on the Dart/Valiant models.
I know in 1976-77, There was a Nova Concours model with upscale trim to compete with the Granada and the newly introduced Aspen/Volare models.
Likely because the Dart/Valiant were not new models.
Diplomat/Aspen/Volare would have been the likely models to be included in this comparison, but were not available until the 1976 model year – after the comparison was published.
The Nova could hardly be considered a “new” model; it’s basic body was from 1968 (as mentioned in the “popular Science” article”.
But Nova’s GREENHOUSE was new and it made the beltline look lower, in the newer styling idiom, even if it had the same, old 1968 cowl. So in Detroitspeak, it was NEW.
Although I have no idea if it would be a perfect swap, I always wanted a ’65 V8 Falcon with the transplanted Granada Ghia interior.
Go to Argentina.
Its fun to take pot shots at the original Granada/Monarch. But lets not forget the numbers. Over 2.39M units sold from ’75 thru ’80. Most car companies would kill for similar numbers from a single model in todays environment. http://www.gmv-registry.com/21869.html
Also, if Lee would have played with the suspension a little more (stronger sway bar in front plus a default sway bar in the rear), and added the rear disc brakes from the Versailles; the complements would have out numbered the faults.
Too bad Lee stopped at the body and failed to carry thru with the under carriage
Actually the rear discs were an option on G-Ms from 1976-78. Low take rate.
True, 4 wheel discs were available on the Mercury Grand Monarch Ghia (MGMG) which was a very high level luxury car. The 4 wheel discs migrated to the Versailles. If they had been offered on the “sporty models” like ESS with a handling package, the take rate would have been much higher.
No, no! When I said they were an option, that’s just what I meant. The discs were optional on ANY Granada-Monarch.
Pitiful numbers for sure. As a lifelong FOMOCO man I can’t even try to excuse these numbers. But I will always have a soft spot for the Granada due to the fact that in 1983 at the age of 4, my mom, aunt, sister, and myself were involved in a head on collision with a drunk in a stolen Oldsmobile. My mom said we were going around 40mph and we don’t know how fast the other car was going. We all survived with no long term effects but my mom and aunt had a good bit of injury’s. I remember little bits and pieces of the event. I remember seeing 2 tow trucks hooked up to the front and back of our car and they were pulling against each other along with a fireman using the jaws of life to try and get my mom out of the car. And I remember sitting on the floor of the cab of the ambulance between a fireman’s feet as we went to the hospital. It’s funny that I distinctly remember the ambulance was a 78 Chevy with a 454. I’ve often wondered if that’s why I became an EMT myself. But for all of us to survive that accident in pretty good shape, I thank the car. I know ours had a 302. That car was replaced with a new Mercury Monarch also with a 302.
Just think that in today’s cars you would likely be able to open the door yourself get out with no injuries other than ringing ears and perhaps abrasions from the air bag.
Even if the current car was half the size of the Granada.
The Granada is so fitting for this.
Looking in my Standard Catalog just now, it described the 1975 Granada as coming with equipment that ranged from taxi to mini-limo and with performance that ranged from sedate with the 250 six to being one of the fastest Fords for 1975 when equipped with a 351. Nothing like covering the spectrum.
A while back I inadvertently stumbled onto the fuel economy portion of this. How does fuel economy from a 250 six-banger Granada compare to that of a 350 powered ’75 Impala? They are estimated as being the same. Yeah, I know these were bold estimates, but it still shows that economy was not going to be a selling point.
https://www.afdc.energy.gov/pdfs/1975_feg.pdf
My family owned a 75 Comet 4 door with the 250 six cylinder and automatic transmission, a 69 LTD with a 390 V8 was the trade-in for it. That LTD was such a poor running car that I think my father didn’t care that acceleration was so dismal and passenger room was tighter.
At one point in later 1976 I was shopping for a new car and very briefly drove a new Granada with the 250 engine. As a new car these Granadas could be quite beguiling, and since most test drives DON’T include a trip to a drag strip or a fuel economy test, I imagine most potential buyers were close to being “committed” before the car even left the dealership. A modest trip around the block probably sealed the deal.
In my area, Monarchs were not huge sellers due to few dealers and almost no marketing (at least compared to the Granada), and many Granadas were sold with few options no doubt as a fancy alternative to a car like the Maverick. My guess is that the take rate for the 6 cylinder engine was about 55%.
0-60? They went 60 mph? Took my driver’s test in a ’77 Monarch. Strippo 4-door with the six. I remember a family trip from Seattle area to Portland during the fuel crisis days (…’79-’80, maybe?) 50 mph all the $&@!ing way. “We got 25 mpg!” A carload of surly people by the end of the trip.
Oh yeah, don’t roll that window down, it creates wind drag and less mileage. Grrr.
How steeply Ford fell between 1965 and 1975 is amazing to think about. This fall is even more amazing considering how strong their sales were in those years.
Ford always seemed to be more challenged in its engineering capabilities than were GM and Chrysler and the gamut of safety and emissions requirements seemed to hit Ford particularly hard.
These numbers are really pathetic. I never had any firsthand comparison experience with these, but always figured that the only benefit of the 250 over the 200 was for burning fuel more rapidly. With a 351, these became genuinely quick for the era.
Ford seemed to have the worst time getting efficiency out of their engines during the 1970s. Even AMC engines ran way better. In fact I had a ’75 Hornet with 258 six and automatic, and while it was no powerhouse it was responsive and had no problem getting up to speed. (I think that AMC was permitted to buy emissions tech from GM which no doubt helped.)
Ford’s troubles getting economy (and power) out of its engines goes a lot farther back than the 70s. Ford was there first with a modern V8 in the 50s, but the Y block was a slug. The SBC cleaned its clock and kicked Ford out of the “America’s favorite V8” chair.
Ford followed with the FE and MEL engine families, engines that they relied on through most of the 60s. They had their gifts and charms, but we’re never competitive in performance or economy with comparable V8s coming from Chrysler and GM.
The 1962 thinwall small block was the first Ford engine since the days of Henry Ford that could stand straight and tall against the competition, with comparable displacement. Even that one lost its mojo from the late 60s and into the early 80s. The ebb and flow of the 302’s abilities may be the biggest indictment of Ford’s engineering abilities from the dawn of emissions controls until the mid 80s.
While I agree with much of your comment JP, I don’t think you’re giving Ford enough credit. While I will agree the Y-block, and MEL weren’t exactly Ford’s greatest work, I think you’d be hard pressed to argue that the FE engines weren’t one of their better designs. While not all versions were the great, in general I’d say it had no issue standing up to the competition. Along with the Fairlane V8 (SBF), the 385 and 335 series engines certainly were great designs of their time as well.
I don’t know what the Ford 335 really did. The 4V Cleveland heads were short lived and not all that common. The 351M and 400 couldn’t really do much more than the 351W could other than bolting to the C6.
The 351C 4V was a truly solid and competitive engineering effort when it debuted, as a high performance smallblock. With a few (exotic + expensive) exceptions, Ford street engines lacked during most of the “total performance” era, in the same way the Granada lacked as an overall car lacked in the 70s. The Cleveland just came way too late when performance declined, and ended up getting neutered and compromised to the point that the tall deck M series was introduced.
Without getting into a massive post about the history and design about the 335 series engines, suffice to say that it was a very good design for the time that was more than competitive with the competition, both 2V and 4V versions. There is a reason that a Ford 400 won the engine masters challenge for two years in a row.
The fundamental design of the engine was excellent, although Ford’s execution, particularly of the mid 1970’s versions wasn’t always the best. The 302 and 351W was just as neutered by the Rube Goldberg Ford mid-1970’s engineering. Judging the 335 series engines by the worst iterations would like judging the SBC by its worst versions, also from the same time. The SBC and the SBF Ford engines were just as feeble in performance during this era.
Doesn’t sound like the era’s Ford power is getting a fair shake here.
I believe that a check of the official records on “clock cleaning” is going to show that during its time as Ford’s “big” engine the 312 Y-Block was the engine cleaning clocks. The ’57 clean-up would have been even more thorough were it not for rules/politics crippling Ford’s potential.
I feel the MEL is being sold short too. That engine was tough as an anvil and a great powerplant for Lincoln barges.
As to performance… of course Rodney Singer with a lowly MEL took NHRA Top Eliminator in ’59.
With heavy truck engines, NO other auto manufacture had a heavy that could compare with Ford’s Super Duty for power or durability.
The tough little Falcon-6 being kicked around? …its basic design was so good that it was able to evolve to stay in production over 55 years. Is that a record for an automobile engine design?
The Ford 312 was indeed a force – by throwing cubic inches at the problem. Ditto the MEL engines that were competitive in racing. It wasnt the 361 or 383 that made friends in racing, it was the ginormous 430.
I have most firsthand experience from the following decade when it always seemed to take Ford another 20-30 cubic inches to do what a similar engine from GM or Chrysler could do. I love the 4 bbl 390, it was delightfully smooth, torquey and durable. But it was not performance-competitive with a 4 bbl Chrysler 383.
The SBF and 335/385 designs finally brought Ford into some kind of engine parity (at least in the eras that avoided the worst of the emissions systems).
Sure the 390 was a little on the slower side compared to the 383 Chrysler, but Ford tuned it pretty mildly. Let’s be honest, how many people buying fullsize cars really cared about that minimal difference in performance? Sure in the Supercar arena that mattered, but I can’t see too many average Joes turning down a Galaxie to get a Fury because the 383 had a bit more pep.
Further, we are talking entire engine families, not just 390 vs 383. The 390 FE was only one of many iterations. Don’t forget about the 406’s, the 427’s and of course the 428 CJ, all of which have a rich performance heritage. The 428 CJ certainly didn’t give up any performance to a 440 Chrysler, and although rare, the 427 FE was certainly legendary in its performance. So, again, I attest the FE engine family was a good engine design for performance.
As for the Y-block, it’s pretty hard to argue that it wasn’t overweight for its size, and that it didn’t have an inefficient head design. Sure the supercharged 1957 312’s ran with the best of them, but how about the naturally aspirated versions? They certainly weren’t in the same category as the competition. The only way that it was competitive was with extra cubes or superchargers.
I will add the 335 series (Cleveland) and 385 series (429/460) engines were amazingly good ….. for about 4 years, from ’68 to ’72. Then they were re-tuned for low emissions, with low compression and retarded valve timing which killed much of the inherent goodness baked into the design.
Fortunately this can be rectified. Even a proper timing chain set, which advances the cam timing does wonders.
How steeply Ford recovered by 1986 with the hit Taurus/Sable is amazing too. Too bad it fell down again by the 2000s.
Here’s an early 70s Ford Styling video that chronicles their painfully unimaginative and ham-fisted design responses to new safety regs – compared to GM and Chrysler, especially the latter’s bumper integration on the ’74 C-Bodies.
Opens with a well-fed Gene Bordinat setting the stage – and denouncing 50’s styling – amongst classic cars in the Henry Ford museum – the cuts to some crash dummies & the line of the film:: “…a lot of people were pessimistic whether we could design a good looking car given the requirements”. More like prescient.
Also, Homer LeGassey evaluates some advanced designs. And this film, and the picture of Lido with the pre-pro Granada really reminds you that Detroit also suffered from fashion and hair malaise in the 70s.
Enjoy!
Robert,
Great video! Thanks for posting it. I found it very interesting. That 9-inch chrome side mirror made me laugh. Actually a lot of it did.
The look of disallusionment on everyone’s faces when they move to the 73 Torino from the 72 is quite telling, soon followed by Gene Bordinat basically stating “this is what you voted for, you still want it?”. Explains a lot. I get the impression that many of the new regulations were actually being embraced by the design teams, with many poking fun or feeling contempt for old designs, but these were indirect rules that allowed them to flex their creative muscles, compared to the 5mph bumpers that all but dictated a key styling characteristic of a given model.
Also pariscopes! I almost spit out my drink! That whole segment with the ridiculously wide side mirror on the “bubbletop” LTD was like the car designer version of Spinal Tap!
Just imagine how much fun it was for Lee to take the McNamara-designed Falcon and turn it into a Granada! The opportunity for Lee to show Bob how to sell a car for a giant profit was probably a very satisfying thing for him to do. Lee, a PT Barnum when it comes to turning a sow’s ear into a profitable silk purse, laughed all the way to the bank taking McNamara’s prize sow and turning it into a cash machine.
What Lee did to the Falcon with the Granada would be similar to taking Eliza Doolittle to meet the Queen, but first forgetting to give her a bath. No one would suspect that the stink was emanating from such an attractive and luxurious creature. The crowd fell in love before suspecting that they were exposing themselves as shallow bumpkins.
McNamara’s success became Lee’s when Lee painted up Bob’s austere engineering virgin and turned her into a brougham encrusted harlot. If Lee was a film producer, he would have resurrected Doris Day’s film career by putting her in pornos. LOL
I love this post ?
I’ve always wondered how American history would have turned out if Iacocca had been the one to go to Washington and McNamara had been the one who stayed in Detroit…
“McNamara’s success became Lee’s when Lee painted up Bob’s austere engineering virgin and turned her into a brougham encrusted harlot.”
Hilarious! And completely true! I recall how smitten people were with the Granada/Monarchs when they were introduced, bought one and were instantly less-than-delighted with the performance and qualities to be found in a tarted-up Falcon-Maverick. Complaints about MPG in the low teens, poor workmanship, and early rust blossoms were common.
While Iacocca might have laughed all the way to the bank, the unsatisfactory experiences with these Malaise-Era Blue-Oval gutless-wonders sent multiple buyers to import car dealers in search of a better next purchase, never to return….
Lee Iacocca was a marketing genius. And as I read the article, I now see that the Nova is the ultimate way to move your typewriter.
Part of the reason for the final blast of popularity for traditional Detroit compacts was they had become the closest thing you could buy new in ’75 to the “golden mean” ’49-55 low-price three’s dimensions, the intermediates which had been conceived with that in mind a decade before having swollen to the point where they were barely smaller than the all-time-record-size big cars.
Style-wise the Granada really showed Iacocca’s talent for timing; it was a car the first wave of Baby Boomers could feel made them look like real grownups and their empty-nest parents who no longer felt the need for a capital-letters Big Car could trade their LTDs in on without feeling like they’d come down in the world.
The fact that nearly anything else in the class was objectively a better car didn’t matter as much at first as the fact it looked new, compared to the facelifted Nova and conspicuously dated (and in all but Duster form, stodgy) Dart/Valiant. Unless it did, which is why others also posted respectable sales.
On sales, I wonder how the all-division body totals looked, Granada/Monarch vs Nova-Omega-Ventura-Apollo? (leaving the Versailles and Seville aside since price put them in a different class).
Earlier this month, we read how AMC attempted to turn a Hornet into a Gremlin, and then into a Spirit, an Eagle and an AMX. Then that reminded some of our intrepid bloggers to reconsider what Studebaker did between 1953 and 1966.
Lee Iacocca showed us how to do that by taking an old Falcon and turning it into a Granada. What AMC and Studebaker lacked, Ford had – the ability to repurpose an old car into a new market with phenomenal success.
Like what you see?
AMC and Studebaker nickel and dimed their way into market irrelevance by doing slowly what Ford did quickly. We can see how the Independents slowly made annual changes to an old car. We witnessed the Studebaker and AMC transformations slowly so we knew that the Lark was just a chopped up Starlite Cruiser, that the Eagle was just a hopped up Hornet.
But Lee and Ford’s dough showed how to do this overnight. It was so fast that the new clothing on the old car was so dramatically different, we bought the fantasy by the hundreds of thousands. Studebaker and AMC were lucky to get 30,000 sold a year with their incremental updates.
Some might see what Studebaker and AMC did during their final decade was being more honest. While they renamed their old cars, reconfigured them, brougham versioned them, and four-wheel-drived them, they were still the same old cars and the market knew this and so these Independents slowly went out of business. What Ford and Iacocca did was the same thing that AMC and Studebaker did, yet we see what Lee did as dishonest.
Interesting…
So we see how to redesign a car and resell it, giving the old car a new lease on life, and returning fantastic profits. We also see how that success can backfire into seducing a car company into no longer designing new cars. Iacocca get credit for a lot of things. We seem to have forgotten how Lee also showed Detroit how to milk an auto platform into longevity and diversity. Without the Torino, there wouldn’t be a Thunderbird. Without the Falcon, there wouldn’t have been a Maverick or a Granada. Without the Fairmont, there wouldn’t have been a Lincoln LSC. And that’s only Ford. Lee took this game to Chrysler and turned the K-car into a Minivan and into a FWD Imperial sedan. When trying times comes to the Industry, we have Iacocca to look for advice on how to make due with old car platforms, engines and dated technology and yet give these old vehicles a new lease on life in the market.
We both hector him for this ability, enrich him for it and admire him all at the same time. We like believing in magic. We like being fooled now and then. Lee knew how to do that pretty damn well, didn’t he?
Well said!
The minivan was simply a great idea that Chrysler decided to do. The FWD engine/transmission/front suspension thing was basically already used in K cars, but all the rest of the structure was unique to the minivan. Obviously some common bits and pieces, but basically unique.
While this is a great post with great points, this wasn’t just Iacocca. Iacocca deserves credit for making consistent strings of hits from what started as the Falcon, but the level of platform sharing from the Falcon was fairly typical of Detroit. The notorious 62 Dodge and Plymouth became the B platform after the C-body came online(which itself was still basically the 1960 car with a new body), spawning hits like the 68 Charger and the 75 Córdoba.
Arguably I’d say the Studebaker/AMC analogy works better for Iacocca for the K-car. The Falcon derived cars never showed their roots on the outside, each separate model got their own body structures, sheetmetal, and even proportions on some. Studebaker’s the Hornet on the other hand wore much of their original sheetmetal from beginning to end with only a handful of tweaks, which I find more analogous to the K-car through much of the 80s. The first 5 years of the Fox platform could count as well, the Fairmont showed clearly through the facades of the 80 Thunderbird, Cougar, 81 Granada and 83 LTD, but the K car was way more successful.
The top photo of the Granada with the 1975 front plate shows front vent (or fixed?) windows next to the mirrors. They never made it into production.
I wondered if anyone else noticed this! It’s also missing the “Granada” script emblems on the front fenders. Not unlike the first-year ’86 Taurus (and Sable) brochures that promosed us available opening front vent windows that never became available.
Ford sure had lots of Malaise-mobiles for sale in ’75. If the new Granada Ghia didn’t float your boat, there was the Mustang II Ghia (with 302 V8 and a 3 speed auto your only transmission choice), all riding on a Pinto platform)? Or maybe an Elite that crystallized the long-hood, short-deck, opera-window ethos of its day (hey, two opera windows per side!), or the fat-cat Thunderbird which was all hood and fenders, not much room or power or handling inside. The Tonino which offered LTD-like exterior dimensions with Granada-sized interiors?
We should also identify the least malaise car for ’75-;76, I vote VW Rabbit (Golf) or Honda Accord, 1st gen for both. Malaise? What malaise?
I’m pretty sure this is a fiberglass mock-up.
I wondered if that was one of the roll-down vent windows Ford was pushing at the time. My father rented a Lincoln with them and at first I wondered if there was even a way to open the rest of the window (there was, if you held the button down). Ford did offer the tilting vent windows on the Fairmont as long as it lasted and LTD/CrownVic until the ’90s rebody. I miss the those, but I wonder if he roll-down vents were any more useful than a one-piece window with a decent gutter.
God what a miserable turd the Granada and Monarch was. My folks bought a new 1976 Monarch. I was born the next year(1977) and had to suffer sitting in the back seat (with all its vinyl glory) for the next 9 years until it was replaced by a 1986 Dodge Aries K (which was luxury compared to that turd)
I confess that I like these cars. When I bought my house in 99′ the neighbor had a 77′ Granada in mint condition.
Gold color, lots of chrome. Base engine, auto trans, AC.
He loved that car, washed and waxed it, dusted it, it was a thing of beauty. I enjoyed ogling the car. I’d wander over to chat with him about it when he was washing it. All that glorious malaise era style, pure gold color vinyl interior, absolute lack of power, it was the perfect car for its time.
Head gasket blew in 02′ and his mechanic told him it wasn’t worth the fix. Said mechanic gave him 200 bucks for it. Hmm.
Now the neighbor drives a 89′ Hyundai Sonata. I don’t ogle it.
I miss his Granada.
I think your neighbor’s mechanic was secretly *lusting* after that Granada and then said mechanic found a groovy way of getting Neighbor X to part with it for very little money.
Who cares about an ’89 Sonata . . . ? Meh. I’d still take the Granada warts and all.
Unless it was a real high mileage example it would have been worth the relatively minor ($700? – that’s what my Horizon 2.2 head gasket cost) charge if he wanted to keep this thing.
The Ford Granada. The best proof in my lifetime of the genius that was H. L. Mencken.
Comparing it to what is probably one of the best cars that GM turned out in the 70’s makes for a laughable comparison. Yet the Granada outsold the Nova LN by a wide margin – because it was louder, had more of a “look at me” attitude, and was advertised as a comparison to a Cadillac Seville or Mercedes Benz.
Obviously, there wasn’t much of a Truth in Advertising Act back then. And the American car buyer was an incredibly stupid, egotistical entity.
I reckon that there’s got to be another Dunce Cap award here, which would be performance for returned mileage. In the comparison test, this car got 7.3 mpg being driven hard but not beyond 55mph! I mean good grief, did it have some optional Sheik Enricher package fitted?
Makes you realise that despite how bad they were Aussie Fords of the era were remarkably good in comparism.
What this shows to me is that the buying public seldom understands what “car guys” know. Yes, this was a piece of crap, foisted upon an eager public, dressed in the worst drag one could tack onto the aging platform, and providing the worst performance AND mileage it could, yet it sold in huge numbers. Nobody had to think about buying one. It was a mindless decision, made as casually as one picks out a new appliance. It was a Ford, so people understood the price/quality expectations, and it was available widely from the large dealer network who could and would service it as needed.
We, as lovers of automobiles, tend to think that we understand what makes a great car, and more importantly, what makes a car a piece of crap. I humbly submit that this was the best car of the malaise era, as it probably made more money for Ford than any other car of the period. Minimal investment in an aging and paid for platform, cheap and easy design and manufacturing, and loads of profit for the company and the dealers as well. Lee may have been a crass showman, but he moved a hell of a lot of iron, which was the goal of being the CEO of an automobile company, isn’t it? Anybody can sell quality at a high price in low volume. The market for quality is low. When you can sell crap at a profit, and everybody is happy, you have succeeded beyond expectations.
At the time, even some “car guys” were fooled by these. My Car-Mentor Howard had owned many, many cars and was of the belief that Ford had really turned a corner on quality when it brought out the Granada. It was smooth, quiet and was nicely trimmed. The car gave the impression of a very nicely put together car and was certainly an improvement on the way stuff looked in Chry-Ply-Dodge dealer lots.
I knew many people who bought these because they seemed like such nice cars. Howard traded a 72 Newport on one, and my father traded a 72 Mark IV on a loaded 76 Monarch. I can think of at least two other relatives or family friends who traded other brands on one. If these things had been built as well and as durable as even a 67 Fairlane, they would have been good cars. They simply did not age gracefully, though. And this is ignoring the deficiencies pointed out in the road test.
My boss at a summer job in 1975 considered himself a “car guy”. He drove a Saab 99 and a four cylinder Capri, both stick shift. Near the end of the summer, he traded the troublesome Saab for a new Granada. I was 18 and thought it was the nadir of automobile-dom. He absolutely loved it, at least for the month or so before I went back to school and never saw him again.
Don’t say Granada & Triumph in the same sentence !
My first experience with a Granada was in 1978 when the youth group leader gave us a ride home in her new car that she was so proud of. I remember it being low to the ground, cramped and underpowered. It also smelled a little of sweat. My brother and I were the smallest ones in there at 140 and 160lbs each. Group leader and her two sons probably tipped the scales at a combined weight of over half a ton, 1100lbs by my estimation.
I remember feeling sorry for that car. It was replaced rather quickly by a 1979 Club Wagon. Springs kept breaking is what I heard. The Club Wagon was a better choice considering the size of the family. I didn’t mention the father or the daughter. That would have added another 500lbs to the total.
Lets not be so jaded against car buyers.
First off – it’s a car, not a liver.
It’s fun to get a new car and it is fun to trade them in and get another.
It’s fun to try out something completely new, has a new image and makes you happy. A new car can keep a buyer happy for a long time. That isn’t a bad thing. People like Twinkies. Fashions come and go. Forty years ago guys had mustaches. Then they had a goatee twenty years ago. Now full beards. It’s fun to change with the times. We do this with cars.
So we need to get a grip.
Picking a less than great car isn’t the end of the world. It shouldn’t make you angry. There are many less than great cars that are iconic. They sell for more than they did when they were new. The Granada was just another less than great car that is iconic in that it represents so much of the 1970s we’d like to forget. But we liked them back then, and we weren’t fools for liking them.
We shouldn’t judge people who don’t drive cars that we drive. We shouldn’t look down on people because they like a particular brand that isn’t recommended by the heartless Edmunds, or Consumer Reports. If those people had their way, we’d all be driving something good for us – not fun for us.
The Granada doesn’t represent America’s century of auto leadership. It doesn’t represent why our neighbors only think of imported cars. It’s only one car that was successful and less than perfect. Paul’s selection is as much to do with the Granada’s success as it does with its imperfections.
America in 1975 wasn’t better or worse than today. Our parents and grandparents weren’t lemmings blindly following a domestic auto brand. We are them, and we’ve got nothing over them regarding intelligence, logic or emotions. They liked the Granada and there were damn good reasons they did. We need to stop judging them for driving one for a few years forty years ago, OK?
It’s just another car among the thousands we love at Curbside Classic.
Amen!
Totally agree. I object to the premise of this article…. to find, allegedly, the worst car then gleefully do a hate-fest on it. Sincerely, it’s unpleasant to read and it’s not not why we come to CC.
I like and appreciate all cars and look to their attributes, especially given the times in which they were introduced and developed. The Granada was a stop-gap measure, for desperate times in a rapidly changing market. It improved during its lifespan, and was quickly replaced by the superior Fox-body cars.
More than a few of my friends had Granada/Monarch cars during this time period. Here’s a few of the comments I recall hearing from them:
The 250 six engine got just as bad/ worse city gas mileage than the 302 V8 engine, with the nearly-universally equipped loose 3 speed automatic transmission and with the factory air conditioning (SO desired in Hot & Humid New Orleans!) used 90% of the time.
Although hardly a dragster, the 302 V8 was MUCH more peppy than the six cylinder engine. The six sounded like it was peppy; until you noticed traffic leaving you behind.
The 250 six had a serious problem with valve seals hardening & turning into brittle pieces of flotsam; as early as 40K miles. The resulting oil burning and fouled spark plugs understandably enraged those who paid Big Bucks (at the time) for their “Luxury Compact” car.
The interior of these cars was not nearly as huge inside as the boxy, squared off exterior suggested. Three people in the back seat of a four door model was a tight fit.
The upscale (at the time) appearing “Dove Gray” exterior paint had serious peeling-off-the-hood, top and trunk areas.
If you look closely at the test results, you will see that the Granada does NOT have a number for 0-80 acceleration, while it shows one for 0-70.
The comparison with 1974 models graph does show something interesting. There are quite a few cars with both a six and v-8, and the V-8 numbers aren’t really that much better, maybe one and a half or two seconds faster to 60 mph. Does that mean the 302 Granada would struggle for 20 seconds to hit 60?
It doesn’t quote the 0-80 because it probably didn’t do 80 MPH. My aunt and uncles 1980 Zephyr which was lighter and had the more powerful 200 six had a top speed of an indicated 140 km/h (87 mph) (knowing the accuracy of the speedometers of the era it was probably less).
A 302 powered Granada probably ran 0-60 in the 13 second range, knowing what other 302 powered cars ran in that era. Our ’79 Fairmont with a 302 was about 12 seconds to 60 mph (when it ran that is).
“And the Granada’s 0-60 time proves that: 23.15 seconds, … And that applies to a Mercedes 240D too.”
I dunno. The Owner’s Manual in my ’77 240D quoted a 0-60 time of 28.5 seconds.
Paul, you’ve made a great case for your designee, and I smiled through the whole post today (and all the comments)—about a car I actually owned for a while.
I’ve told the tale a bit before (and it’s not worth a COAL), but my used ’75/250 2-dr had the big, comfy buckets but was otherwise stripped–power nothing, 3-on-the-column, and the rubbery mats IIRC. It was a NE OH salt-belt car, with the door bottoms rusting through in 1981 when I bought it. Previous owner had disconnected/plugged all the vacuum lines, and installed a manual choke (taking it back to its Falcon roots, in a way). I can’t recall a mileage figure, but it was not-bad-at-all during that 1983 gas price peak ( = about $3.45/gal today).
I made several trips from OH to my new job in ID, pulling a trailer, and the Granada always saw me through, even crossing the Rockies during a trip across Donner Pass in the snow (back when I owned chains.) Out west, this rusty-though-recent car was a novelty, and people passing me on I-15 would point & laugh and the l-o-n-g door bottoms flapping away.
I drove the Granada to our 1983 wedding, but my still-with-me wife didn’t drive a stick, and so it got sold off. Some years later I got a note from a boneyard in Las Vegas: they had the car, and for some reason traced previous owners, asking if I wanted to buy it—go figure? At least the car had a warm & sunny final resting place.
*******************************************
FoMoCo insider postscript: in the early 1980s I visited the Cleveland Foundry/Engine Plant complex where I’d worked a decade earlier. I returned to the Pattern Shop, where all the master patterns for the 250’s block and heads were still on the storage racks, and told my old foreman that my Granada, with its seven main bearings, was apparently unkillable. He smiled wryly and said, “aha—the engine so good [that] Ford doesn’t make it any more.”
Thanks again for spotlighting the ’75 Granada, Paul, even for all its style-over-substance compromises and faults.
Those were the days of the national 55mph limit (presumably not to change anytime soon); the EPA says its “highway” test was at 49mph. I’d say these 1975 figures are about what I got on my own Granada (and also reflect what I remember getting on Dad’s full-size Ford with the 400):
From the May ’75 owners’ survey in Popular Mechanics: “Ford product planners conceived this car several years ago to replace the aging [Maverick/Comet] line. But the then Oil Embargo hit, Mav/Com sales perked up, so did a certain demand for small luxury cars, and Ford decided to keep the Mav/Com. This meant that to not complete directly in the Mav/Com price range, the Granada and Monarch would have to be upgraded in such areas as interior decor and general appointments in order to appeal to more to those interested in an American Mercedes–at half the price.” (Also reports 90 lbs of sound deadener, more than the T-Bird) Here’s owners’ mileage report, which does correlate pretty well with both EPA and my memory–though it’s their biggest complaint):
You can’t help but notice the dealer service ratings. Only about 1/3 of the Ford owners rated their dealer service as good to excellent. Might as well have sent those folks an engraved invitation to visit a Toyota Dealership next time.
*I found a ’75 Granada Ghia for my brother-in-law when he needed a college beater. Mint condition, low miles, and $1500 as I recall, with a 302 and working A/C. Got him through college and into his first real job with no trauma or drama. Not a great car (or even a good one), but served it’s purpose well.
Some interesting information in that. I confirms what I suspected in that the 302 was by far the most common engine choice.
The other interesting thing that really shows it was from another era, the 2dr Ford outsold the 4dr and the 2dr take rate wasn’t that low on the Monarch either.
@ PolarBear No people wouldn’t have wanted to run to the Toyota dealer for better service. The 1971 owner’s survey for the Corona had customers that were quite unhappy with their dealer’s service. So bad it made the headline. https://books.google.com/books?id=htcDAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA96&dq=Toyota+owners+survey&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjw-a3Ll6zYAhUD62MKHYqGADwQ6AEILjAB#v=onepage&q=Toyota%20owners%20survey&f=false
In the mid 70s, I could usually be found reading the latest issue of Motor Trend. All the big three models were pigs then. Most common road test phrases I read then were “can’t pull itself out of it’s own dents in the pavement” and “pressing the gas pedal only results in more noise”. A few years later, Ford achieved it’s crowning glory: the 255, featuring significantly less power than the 302, while burning just as much gas.
I have a theory about this: The big three were hoping for public outcry to repeal all the safety and emissions standards, so proceeded to make their compliance strategies as awkward and dysfunctional as possible. Then they could tell customers “Hate those huge bumpers? They are the government’s fault, complain to your Congressman. Hate how poorly your car runs? It’s all the government’s fault, complain to your Congressman.” The 1974 seatbelt interlock system requirement did result in enough complaint for the reg to be repealed before the 74 model year was out. The big three never got the emissions regs repealed tho.
As for the Granada, I rather liked their looks. A tidier package than several others of the era. To my eye, the winner of the wretched excess award has to be the late 70s LTDII/Cougar.
And the seat belt interlock was a Ford idea, not the government’s. Both Henry Ford II and Lee Iacocca requested and got a personal meeting with Nixon to persuade putting off the dreaded passive restraint (airbag) requirements for 2 years to the 1976 models. In their place, the interlock would be mandated for the 74-75 model years to force people into using their seat belts.
As we know, the interlock requirement was a miserable failure, but the passive restraint requirement didn’t begin to phase in until the 1987 model year, and by then, the unpopular “automatic seat belts” were allowed as an alternative to airbags.
The seat belt interlock was proposed as an alternative to air bags. People forget today that Joan Claybrook and Ralph Nader were pushing for air bags as the primary restraint system. Meaning, it would protect front-seat occupants who were not wearing seat belts.
The auto makers correctly claimed that this would endanger short drivers and small children who were sitting in the front seat. They were pilloried for this stance in some quarters at the time, but they were ultimately proven correct. (We’ll also note that even the imported marques who touted safety in their advertising during the 1970s – Volvo and Mercedes – did not install air bags in their vehicles during the 1970s.)
Air bags were not truly feasible until states had passed mandatory seat belt laws. They did this in the 1980s, along with child restraint laws that basically barred small children from sitting in the front seat. Then air bags were feasible.
The seat belt interlock was proposed as an alternative to air bags. People forget today that Joan Claybrook and Ralph Nader were pushing for air bags as the primary restraint system. Meaning, it would protect front-seat occupants who were not wearing seat belts.
GM produced a “safety car” prototype that showed up at the 73 auto show in Detroit. Among it’s features were stationary side glass, to improve roof rollover strength, with a tiny retracting window so the driver could pay tolls. iirc, it had large panels under the dash that blocked the occupant’s legs so they could not slide under the air bags. There was a huge bolster on the back of the front seat to hold rear seat occupants in position during a crash.
The irony of the interlock, vs automatic belts, vs air bags is, when the passive restraint reg went into effect, iirc, in the early 90s, Ford, among others went with the “mouse up the pillar” automatic belt system. Iacocca, now at Chrysler, went with the more expensive air bag systems, because they irritated the occupants less than the automatic belts. As you said, air bags, by themselves, don’t provide adequate protection, which is why they are now called a “supplemental restraint system”. The first line of defense is a properly designed three point belt.
I’m a few notches more skeptical (or cynical, if you like) on the matter; I’ll speculate that Ford had self-inflicted “problems” meeting even the 1975 standards. We’re talking about Ford who bіtched and moaned and bellowed and bleated that the 1975 standards were flatly not possible to meet without doubling the cost of an automobile, Ford who threw enormous amounts of time and money into lawsuits and petitions to stop or delay emissions and safety standards on a pretty much ongoing basis through the ’60s and ’70s (at least), Ford who met ’75 emission standards by putting the exhaust from one side of a V8 engine through a catalytic converter seemingly designed deliberately to be as restrictive as possible, while putting the exhaust from the other side of the same engine through a straight headpipe with no catalyst at all, and otherwise like that. This is just one of a very long list of emission control strategies that might have squeaked the cars past their federal new-vehicle emissions type-approval tests so they could be legally offered for sale, but were guaranteed to cause lousy driveability and performance and mileage and cars that didn’t fix well or stay fixed. Almost(?) as though they were complying in the cheapest, nastiest, most problematic ways possible in an effort to spur public rebellion against the very idea of regulating vehicle safety and emissions. They certainly weren’t alone in taking that tack; Chrysler and GM behaved similarly to varying degrees, but Ford’s behaviour was often enough brazen enough to be notable under and below the depths of the American auto industry’s behaviour as a whole.
See also: Swiss-built ’70 or ’71 Darts and Valiants with single-buckle, retractable, emergency-locking front 3-point seatbelts that were comfortable and easy to use, while American-built examples of the same cars got distinctly uncomfortable, complicated, difficult-to-use multiple-buckle separate lap and shoulder belts with retractors on the lap belt only, and nasty ALRs at that—pull the belt slowly to fasten it, otherwise it locks and you have to feed it back to its fully retracted position and try again. (“See? Nobody uses seatbelts, but the mean ol’ government’s making us put ’em in anyhow! Mister Consumer, that costs you money!”).
We’re talking about Ford who bіtched and moaned and bellowed and bleated that the 1975 standards were flatly not possible to meet without doubling the cost of an automobile,
All of the big three do the same thing, all the time. When something goes terribly wrong, it’s never, ever, management’s fault. It’s always laid on the government, or the union, or the Japanese, and, they claimed, the burdens laid on them by these evil doers would “kill the industry”.
Remember when big three models had rocker switches for power windows? Every year, a few pets and children would stick their head out the window while they accidentally leaned on the “up” end of the rocker switch. The window would come up and throttle the kid or pet. The government proposed the big three use the same type of switches that many imports had by then (early 2000s) that required an upward pull to close the window. The local media was full of “spokespeople” from all three of them, claiming it was “impossible” to change the style of switch and requiring a change would “kill the industry and put tens of thousands of people out of work”. It’s a freaking little switch for crying out loud! When I bought my 2008 Taurus X, I noticed it had the new, safer style switch, the same style as my aunt’s 1998 Civic had, which all of the big three had declared “impossible” only a few years earlier.
I remember all of the big three crying about the CAFE standards, how they would “force mothers and their children into little lightweight cars” In 2006, the CAFE standard was “reformed”, and the new methodology distorted to favor SUVs over passenger cars and large vehicles over small one.
I don’t know why any of the big three managements have a nickle of credibility with anyone. They cry a river at the suggestion of the slightest improvement, fight it tooth and nail. Then, the day the reg goes into effect, they have compliant products and make a pile of profit.
Speaking of cynical, a few years before the Granada came out, Ford decided to cheapen it’s six cylinder engines by not drilling oil passages in the crankshaft. They decreed that splash alone would be fine for the rod bearings. Didn’t matter how thick the 10w40 then used got in northern winters. It put a couple more nickles in Ford’s pocket, and the engines would (probably) survive the puny 12 month warranties of the era. Ford figured wrong because the 70s was the era of consumer rights and Ford was ordered to execute a very expensive recall.
Recalls can only be ordered by the federal government if there is a manufacturing or engineering defect that causes a safety issue. A failure to provide sufficient oil passages in an engine is bad engineering, but it’s not a safety issue.
I therefore doubt that the federal government ordered Ford to recall the vehicles equipped with this engine. More likely there was a class action suit on behalf of the affected owners, and part of the settlement was Ford agreeing to repair the engines, even if that vehicle’s warranty had already expired.
It would be much like Honda settling with owners over the defective automatic transmissions used in various V-6 Acuras and Hondas from 1999 through 2004. Honda agreed to replace the defective transmissions, even if the vehicle’s warranty had expired.
But the federal government never ordered Honda to recall the vehicles with these transmissions, because it was ultimately not a safety issue.
I therefore doubt that the federal government ordered Ford to recall the vehicles equipped with this engine. More likely there was a class action suit on behalf of the affected owners, and part of the settlement was Ford agreeing to repair the engines, even if that vehicle’s warranty had already expired.
It’s quite possible that the order came from a judge hearing a class action suit. I looked for an article on line about that case a while back and did not find anything. I remember when that case came up in the mid 70s however. I had taken a very close look at a new LDO Maverick with a 250 in 73, and was thanking my lucky stars that I had not pulled the trigger on it.
Ford might have reached an agreement with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Both Honda and Chrysler also had cases before the FTC during the late 1970s that resulted in customer repairs at no charge. The Honda and Chrysler cases involved rusty front fenders.
But these cases – and the Ford engines – did not involve safety defects, so no official recall was mandated.
The companies in question had to pay the cost of having the defect repaired, or reimburse customers who had already had the repairs performed.
I’m surprised how bad the Granada compared in the noise levels, the handling and engine deficiencies I expected out of a 70s Ford, but that was a measure I always assumed was the Granada’s major strength vs. any competition.
I have to echo the sentiment that Ford engineering seemed to be consistently the worst of the big three. They’d quickly rush out something the market desires, which would intrinsically be flawed or unremarkable from the getgo – engine, transmission, platform… – and spend 20+ years trying to mask their deficiencies. The Granada was essentially a culmination of all the above. The few times engineering was on par or better with the competition (like the 335 series V8s) they’d be a mere blip on the timeline and phased out and neutered by the time any accolades for them would appear. When the question was posed the other day I knew it had to be a blue oval, I had just assumed it would be a Torino with a mid-sized V8, but I forgot about the Granada (being such a forgettable car afterall) and for whatever reason assumed the six couldn’t have been worse than a 302 in them, let alone this much worse than an equivelant Chevrolet.
As for Lido, despite putting out this turd of a car, it was a well polished one. Any deficiency the Granada had that would turn off possible future Ford customers was in just about every other Ford product at the time, and at the end of the day the Granada’s success likely kept Ford from the very bankruptcy Lee ultimately had to steer Chrysler out of with K-car based Granada doppelgängers. The cars put out under him were truly cynical, but that the public kept eating them, with few lasting repercussions(unlike GM’s cynical moves, where Every. Single. One. of them made a lasting dent in their reputation), shows the cynical outlook customers equally shared, not caring about details they’re supposed to care about. Many surely traded their Granada for an import, of course, but the Pinto controversy likely turned off way more people than any bad statistic from their 70s product lines.
An acquaintance of mine, who spent his career selling, installing, and calibrating very large dynomometers for automakers all over North America, says “Ford do a good job of building a lousy design. Chrysler do a lousy job of building a good design. GM do a mediocre job of building a mediocre design”. There are exceptions in all directions here and there, but in the broad view I find that’s generally true and has been for many decades.
And then I read this book on recommendation from Geeber in the comments on this piece…holy ѕhіt! And then the recent revelations (New York Times, etc) that Ford factories are still festering hotbeds of sexual harassment and other badness, just like in the book…
In all fairness, Mr. Dewar has claimed that friends who worked in Chrysler and GM factories at that time told him the same stories. I doubt that Ford factories were – and are – any worse than GM and Chrysler factories in this regard.
And, at the plant level, union leadership, not corporate management, is the organization protecting some of the accused.
Blaming the union is just a cop-out. All employers are responsible for workplace respect rules. In my direct, personal experience, sexual harassment almost always comes from a manager to an employee. It’s all about the power imbalance.
A female colleague is not your “honey” or “sweetheart.” She’s there for the same reason as you: to work.
I’m going by what posters who actually work at Ford – and some of them are union members – have said on Blueovalnews.com. They do not hold the union blameless in these latest cases.
Given their proven credibility on other issues, I’m inclined to take their word on this particular issue, too.
The union is not powerless at the plant level, and union leaders work to protect favorites, too.
Thanks for this article and comments. I don’t remember much about these, except for the absurdity of the advertised comparison with Mercedes. This may have been based on the grille design, pretty much reflecting how meaningful it was.
I have long wondered why mid-70s cars both ran terribly and used so much gas. As noted here, the power and performance were awful as well. I understand the point was to reduce emissions but how was this approached? What were they trying to do: Heat or cool the combustion process? Inject air to dilute exhaust? Make fuel mixture lean to reduce hydrocarbons? (It’s difficult for me to imagine the intent was to make regulation unpalatable, but…) Insights or references will be appreciated.
Why so difficult? Unambiguous examples abound; just look at what happened with the seatbelt/ignition interlock.
Granadas and Monarchs were everywhere in the Lima, OH area in the 70’s. It probably had something to do with the Ford engine plant that’s in town.
I DIDN’T know that the 6 had such pathetic horsepower ratings, and that the power/weight ratio was so horrible!
A friend owned a Granada coupe with the 250 ci 6, and a manual 3-speed trans on the floor. I think I rode in it a couple of times before he traded it for something else. If I remember correctly, he owned it for less than a year.
The contempt for the buying public by Ford and Iaccoca during the Malaise Era, is self evident. Style over substance sums up perfectly, Ford’s domestic marketing strategy at the time. Ford also had perhaps the worst reputation for premature rust of any manufacturer in the 70s. Foreign or domestic.
Did Iaccoca later redeem himself at Chrysler? Quite remarkably! The K-cars managed to leap frog the GM X-cars as the most highly regarded domestic compacts. With none of the recall/reliability issues of the much hyped GM products. The K cars also collected better reviews than the underpowered (and underwhelming) Ford Escort/Lynx. Chrysler’s product line was timely, and well received. And unlike Ford’s cars of the 70s, the kudos were well deserved.
Quite brilliantly, Iaccoca marketed Chrysler as the comeback kids with products that were highly competitive with (or better than) the domestic competition. Yes, a lot of Iaccoca’s marketing was chutzpah. But as cynical as the Granada was, the K-cars, the Omni/Horizon, and the minivans offered genuine value and practicality the domestic competition struggled to match.
The K cars were mostly already developed when Lee arrived at Chrysler. Since they were an evolution of the Omni/Horizon, they really weren’t all new either.
I give credit where credit is due, but Lee also started to run Chrysler into the ground by doing the same thing he did at Ford: an endless series of boxy K-based broughams. He was totally against the new aero look. They had to literally drag him out of there at the end.
Yes, I know all this. When Chrysler was at a crossroads, and needed a pitchman to sell America on what truly great products they had to offer for those uncertain times, he did an admirable job. And the product line he was promoting when he was new to Chrysler, were sound cars for the times. Cars they could be proud to sell. That’s the difference.
He will always be associated with Chrysler’s remarkable recovery.
He hung on all the way until his bloated ego was shoved out the door in 1992. Would have been better if he’d left in 1985 after his biography dropped.
I’ve said this before at CC, but I think one positive the Granada can claim much credit for, is it helped get a lot of Americans out of oversized cars. Independent of the many shortcomings of the platform.
I think we have to remember something about Lido Iacocca, he was a salesman first. Remember, Iacocca stated off at Ford in Engineering, but after a short time he switched to marketing. This is where he found his true success in the history of the automobile. He had a knack for marketing what the customer wanted at the right time. He said himself, he marketed the Mustang at the right time, just as boomers were coming of age and looking for something fun and sporty looking. Then later in his other big hit, the Minivan, was marketed just as many boomers were looking for family movers. Iacocca was all about moving iron and making the most money possible.
However, Iacocca was never about offering the latest and greatest technology or even engineering innovation. Like a true car salesman, he appealed to the customer wants and desires, but only through style and not substance. Look at his two biggest successes (arguably), the Mustang and the Minivan. Neither was particularly advanced, using basic economy car platforms, but they did offer a new innovative package on top of this basic engineering. The way I see it, all of Iacocca’s cars fall into this category, including the Granada. In the Granada’s case though, the new package the Iacocca offered was a compact car with the isolation, luxury, ride and handling of a Detroit “standard.” And it hit the market at the right time, right after the oil embargo.
While it was a sales success there were more holes in the Granada plan compared to other Iacocca cars. Using a very dated chassis, the very poor drivetrains and of course Ford’s atrocious quality control all added up to become significant problems. Further, the “Brougham” tastes of the American buyer seemed to wane out of style pretty quickly after the mid 1970’s. At the time of sale, when the buyer in 1975 was looking for a smaller car that they believed would offer more fuel efficiency than their big Detroit land yacht, the Granada looked pretty darn good. How many customers knew or even cared what the car really was underneath. A Nova, no matter what Chevy options it had or what fancy name Chevrolet called it was still a Nova. It looked like a Nova and everyone knew a Nova was just a poor basic economy car.
As for the horrendous performance of the Ford engines, for 1975 in particular, as I mentioned in the previous post, Ford did just enough to make the engines “good enough” and not a penny more. Ford and GM certainly had the money to reengineer things properly, but they didn’t. I mean, in the two previous decades, how many clean slate engine and carburetor designs were there by Ford and GM? Now what about the 70’s? What happened to the march of technological progress?
I believe there is some truth to Daniel Sterns post above. The Car manufactures were angry and bitter they were being regulated; maybe that was why they built things so poorly in the hopes that the government would back down. Instead of spending money on learning to cope with these new rules, they spent time and effort on fighting them, and left peanuts for the engineers to make things work with their existing old technology. Of course though, these new expenses cause by regulation meant cutting costs everywhere else to maximise profits, which I believe was another big factor in the minimal investment in technology and the cost cutting.
At the end of the day as my father used to say, Detroit is not in the business of making cars, it’s in the business of making money. In this era, the American Big three took their profiteering to new levels, and the product suffered, allowing their once safe and secure market to start to crumble away.
my mother bought a ford granada new in ’75. it was a step down for her but she had two kids in college and i was in high school. i think they bought a demonstator for $4k. nobody in the family actually liked the car but my parents kept it for 7 years,
honestly, it wasn’t that bad. we had the two door landau with bucket seats. i don’t remember it being painfully slow even though it had the 250 six.. it certainly didn’t feel as slow as my mercedes 240d. the trunk held groceries unlike my dad’s fiat. the air-conditioning worked well. there was never any serious repairs and the it didn’t rust like the fiat either. i almost crashed it when the firestone 500 tires shredded on me but that was firestone’s fault not ford’s.
as soon as my last semester of tuition was paid in late ’82, my mother went straight to the volvo dealer. that was the last ‘merican car my parents ever owned.
As far as why did the Granada/Monarch sell despite their faults, just look at what else was in Ford showrooms. The Torino/LTD II was a ridiculous barge laughably branded “intermediate” size that actually had less interior and trunk room than the Granada.
The Nova had the much better chassis and drivetrain, but you had to move up several trim levels to get one that didn’t look like a taxi inside. Whereas even a base Granada had a pretty decent interior, especially in the first couple of model years.
By the way, I see PopSci was wishing that the Granada came with the Mustang II’s gauge cluster. I’ve long wondered if it would be possible to transplant a Mustang II cluster into a Granada/Monarch. I think it would require a lot of rework, ad the Granada dash is angled, but the Mustang’s is flat
A two-door I came across a couple years ago.
Rear view
The reason that Ford didn’t spend money on a new head is that they knew the Falcon 6 was at the end of its economic life cycle. Low cost of production, and durability were the key design requirements, not emissions or specific power output.
There was no future in straight 6 engines. They suck for packaging so instead of spending money on improvements they spent money on V6s which was the future. Of course Ford AU saw it another way in that they could fix the faults of the Falcon 6 and retain some of their tooling vs the expense of tooling from scratch for a V6 and they couldn’t get away with importing the Cologne V6 even if it would have been suitable for the Falcon and affordable.
Meanwhile Ford was spending money on advanced technology, like the various iterations of the PROCO engines. Unfortunately the cost benefit trade off wasn’t there yet and those patents expired before technology and regulatory demands made it economically feasible. However today’s directed injected gasoline engines are based on the basic principles of the PROCO. While the direct injection didn’t become common until recently the crank triggered distributorless and dual spark plug concepts made it to market much sooner.
Granted, they had just cut the Falcon 6 down to make the Lima 2.3 four which would go on to the end of the Ranger pickup line.
Wrong. The Lima 2.3 is a completely different design. It’s OHC and was launched in 1974. The Tempo 2.3 is the cut down six. It’s a pushrod design and was launched in 1983.
What was it with Ford’s fetish for completely or substantially different engine designs that had identical displacement? Your example is the pair of 2.3s. I can also think of the two 3.8 V6s (both called Essex), the multiple 351s (Cleveland, Windsor and Modified) and I am probably missing at least one. I have never understood this.
And there’s the Ford Cologne 2.3 liter V6, introduced in 1967. That makes it a trio of 2.3s.
There was a 2.8 Essex V6, a Cologne 2.8 V6, a Cologne 2.9 V6, and a metric 3.0 V6 too.
What was it with Ford’s fetish for completely or substantially different engine designs that had identical displacement?
Utilization of existing tooling/transfer lines. The Lima 2.3, which was heavily based on the European 2.0 SOHC four, required new tooling and transfer lines. And it was designed for RWD north-south orientation. When the Tempo-Topaz were developed, there’s little doubt in my mind that Ford wanted to utilize the existing tooling/transfer lines of the Falcon six, which was capable of large volumes, rather than invest in additional capacity for the 2.3.
Note that the last year for the Falcon six (1983) was just before the first year of the the HSC 2.3 four, which was essentially a Falcon six minus two cylinders and a new head design. This allowed the extensive Falcon six capacity to be switched over at minimal expense.
The tooling, and especially the transfer lines of a given engine family is an enormous investment, and keeping that going as long as possible is paramount.
It’s no coincidence that the 4.380″ bore center of the Y Block was also used on the “Windsor” and “335” V8s; they used the same transfer lines. Same applies to the Lincoln/truck Y block, which shared the 4.630″ bore center of the FE/FT engines. And the MEL shared a 4.900″ bore center with the “385” V8s.
Transfer lines are the giant machining/milling/drilling facilities that prep the raw block castings, and are very expensive. So when Ford replaced an older engine family with a newer one they kept bore centers so that these transfer lines didn’t need to be replaced.
GM had similar issues, and explains why there were so many overlapping V8s in the latter days of the V8. As demand for different engine sizes fluctuated due to gas prices and such, rather than invest in new existing ones were reused. The goal is always to maximize the utilization of existing facilities.
This also explains the Windsor and Cleveland V8s, which were similar in some regards but different too. They were built in different facilities, at a time when Ford needed two large plants to build enough mid-sized V8 engines.
There was only one American Essex V6 (3.8,3.9,4.2 L) There was a British Essex V6, but that was never used in the US. The American Essex was built at the same Windsor plant where the small block V8 was built, but it had unique bore center, and was not a Windsor V8 minus two cylinders. It was essentially a copy of the Buick V6. It seems surprising that they didn’t use the same bore center as the Windsor, but that must have been because it was so similar to the Buick.
The funny thing is that all of the 351’s are actually 352s as they share the same bore and stroke as the old FE. However when Ford wanted to create a big inch small block they called it at 351 to avoid confusion, only to shortly there after create the 335 series engines and call them a 351 as well.
In addition to the Lima and Tempaz 2.3 they have revisited that displacement with the engine sold under the Duratec name as used in the Fusion and others and the Ecoboost version currently used in the Mustang and others.
And of course the 4.6 is 2 x 2.3 and they had originally considered making an inline 4 that shared many parts and key dimensions with the V8.
So yeah Ford seems to have a thing about certain displacements.
@ Paul, just because they reused some of the Falcon 6’s production equipment for the Tempaz 2.3 (and Taurble 2.5) doesn’t mean they needed a duplicate displacement. In fact if they had kept true to a Falcon 6 minus 2 cylinders I’d expect a displacement of 2.2l as 2/3 of the old 200 cu in version.
There is a reason for the three 351 engines. Ford rushed the 351W into production in the late 1960’s as it had nothing to compete in the increasing popular “350ish” CID midsized engines. The easiest way to do this quickly was to make a tall deck stroked 302 at the Windsor plant. The plan was that that the Cleveland plant would build these midsized engines to fill that role. While engineers started with a 351W as the basis, it was decided to do a number of upgrades to the design during development, which eventually resulted in the 351C. Ultimately, the plan was to drop the 351W but demand for the midsized engines was too much for the Cleveland plant, so the 351W remained in production to supplement the 351C.
By the mid 1970’s things had changed, and cost cutting was the name of the game. Ford dropped the 351C and made a new “tall deck” 351M from the 400’s taller engine block. This was done only to save money and increase parts interchangeability. Of course, this resulted in the 351M being a compromised design in comparison to the 351C. The 351W remained in production during these years again to keep up with demand.
Eventually by the early 1980’s, demand for mid-sized engines like the 351 was reduced to almost nothing. At this point it made more sense than to drop the 351M and keep the 351W which shared its architecture with the 302, which would become the main V8 of the 1980’s.
They didn’t have a crystal ball, but if they had done a new combustion chamber design for the 1973 regs they would have had 10 more years production!
Maybe the Granada was just a ploy to set the bar low, so that car guys would be really impressed with the Fox platform a few years later. A mid-sized car with four cylinder engine, floor shift manual transmission, and rack and pinion steering! How innovative and “European”! A Volvo from Detroit! I know I bought into that at the time; even my Lotus-driving buddy bought a Fairmont for his wife.
By the early 1970s, Ford upper management was firmly in the grip of the bean counters, led by the late Ed Lundy.
The popular perception today is that Iacocca ruled the roost at Ford before he was fired, but the reality is that he was operating off the norms set by Lundy and the Finance Department.
Iacocca, meanwhile, was the master at selling the same old wine in a new bottle. That was a formula that the Finance Department understood. Given that atmosphere, it’s no surprise that Ford trotted out the 1975 Granada/Monarch as an “all-new” vehicle. (Or that it would introduce a Granada with a Continental grille, fake spare tire hump and better upholstery as its answer to the Cadillac Seville a few years later.)
Work on the Fox and Panther platforms was started because market forces and impending government regulations basically left the company with no other choice.
This is a period of Ford history where I need to deepen my knowledge. What you say makes some sense. Iacocca’s time at Chrysler may have been the truest picture of “Lee turned loose” because Chrysler had always been a company mostly controlled by The Big Boss.
But Ford’s fall after the mid 60s has been confusing for me, and seemed to start with Knudsen’s failed presidency. And I can easily see Iacocca lacking political capital with Chairman HFII when compaired with Lundy, who was one of Henry’s own hires. The fact that Henry went outside when he hired Knudsen shows that there was nobody inside with the combination of skill and influence in the areas outside of finance.
How did Granada/Monarch sales stack up against all X platform models? Or at least against BOP versions equipped with 6 cylinder engines? Add all the Skylark, Omega and Phoenix sales in with the Nova’s and it probably meets or exceeds Ford’s Granada/Monarch figures. And as much as hindsight has made the rear drive X platform cars the “best” American cars of the later 70s – at least to hot rodders – I find the idea of owning a clean “baby brougham” Granada or Monarch appealing. Granted I am a bit weird…
I have to say, I don’t disagree with a lot of what has been said here, but I have always liked these cars, having driven a few back when they were new or slightly used. They were a good size for the times and not bulky and ponderous like so many other contemporary cars. Here in California, you didn’t see the sixes too often — only the 250 was offered here due to CA emissions regulations — so most were equipped with a 302 V-8. There were OK for their times. What I remember most about them is how cheap the plastic wood was — on the dash, and on the door caps of the Ghia models. Ugh.
A ’76 Granada Ghia LDO or Grand Monarch Ghia would certainly have a place in my garage, if one ever crossed my path.
This explains my parents’ choice of a Volvo 164. Our 1974 model with the battering ram bumpers and 3 speed automatic also weighed around 3000 lbs but the OHV 6 in the Volvo was still good for 140 horsepower thanks to EFI and well designed manifolds and ports. Plus the Volvo was shorter, and had better visibility and headroom.
I recall some pretty good parodies of Ford’s “precision size” advertising slogan for the Granada/Monarch, especially when they targeted the Mercedes 280E, a comparision even more ridiculous than a Cadillac Cimarron and a BMW E30.
Yep, my dad rocked a ’73 164. At the time, it was a heckuva value for what it was.
The Grenades were a lot tougher car than comparables from the competition.
Rugged bullet-proof powertrains and lacking an “Achilles’ heel” that would killed ’em off in droves, so Granada survived longer and in greater numbers.
In the rust belt the tin worm was the #1 reaper of most cars, with that:
Brand A had a cowl that would lose structural integrity, killing the car.
Brand P had a torsion-bar anchor/ crossmember that would commonly give way in a non-repairable way.
Brand C had a sub-frame that would become disconnected from the body structure in a non-repairable way.
Brand C also had a lot of problems with rear leaf springs and associated structure.
While not perfect, Granada didn’t have a particular weak point.
As to powertrains:
The Chevy 6 of the era was plagued with cylinder head and carburetor problems.
The Slant-6 of the day, as fondly as they’re recalled now, had a nasty habit of tossing #6 rod through the block; to boot, manifolds and induction were also troubled.
AMC 6 gobbled valvetrain components.
Meanwhile Granada soldiered on with the same ol’ tried and true Falcon reliability.
I’d say that automatic transmissions were equally good across the board. Standard shifts… not so much, with AMC and Chrysler arrangements the worst. GM transmission was okay, but bellhousing and linkage arrangements were a weak mess. Meanwhile Ford did a great job with its standard transmissions and their fitment.
So to me, of Detroit’s stopgap old technology cars that were carried forward beyond their time, Ford really did the best job.
Nope. Perhaps you’re magnifying an anecdote, or perhaps you’re just misremembering.
Having the 20/20 hindsight advantage of following these cars from showroom to graveyard, as I read the linked new-car-comparison I could tell that Granada was being unfairly slammed. But how could I bring the the bias argument to CC, in black and white, without sounding overly protective of Granada?
Then, when the comparison suggested that Granada spark plugs are difficult to access, I figured I had some beef to bring to the table. Because, every wrench-turner who ever gazed at a Falcon six knows that they had the most wide-open service access ever. And anyone who ever tuned an HEI Chey six knows that despite the engine’s overall clear access, two or three plugs may be buried.
Let’s look.
With the one-image-per-post rule let’s look first at a random stolen image of Granada spark plug access. How tough could that plug change be?
Next post we’ll look at Chevy six.
See next post…
(Please hold replies until I can make the second post up. Thanks)
…continued
And here’s a random image of an HEI equipped Chevrolet six.
There is more evidence of the comparison’s bias, but we don’t need it.
The point being, if the authors would go so far as to bend the truth about something so obvious as Granada’s wide-open plug access, while downplaying Nova’s cluttered access, their entire testimony should be disregarded.
King Paul, based on the obvious perjury it’s respectfully requested that Granada’s Malaise Award be rescinded; certainly there are more worthy recipients.
I had one I used as a taxi. It lasted 390000 miles when I junked it due to cracked head and just being worn out. Someone reserected it though it would have been cheaper to get something newer. I drove it 3 months on a cracked head and it went through 11 -14 quarts of drain oil a day before junking it. It lasted a long time and got plenty of miles out of it. I remember breaking a leaf spring driving an obease woman and having to put antifoulers on 4 of the 6 plugs. But for a 200$ car, I got over a year
Thanks for the trip down nightmare lane; what a turd!
When I was a little boy I loved all things Mercedes and was EXTREMELY gullible. Our local car dealer (Los Angeles CAL WORTHINGTON) would always say in his TV commercials how the Granada looks just like a Mercedes. I really believed him…but even I couldn’t see it. I thought it was me with the problem not that I hadn’t learned that car dealers told “fibs” and that Cal Worthington didn’t really have a dog named “Spot”
…
And it turns out he wasn’t actually saying “pussy cow”.
Had no idea Ford neutered the ’75 Granada’s 250 engine so ridiculously, at least they somewhat fixed it for ’76. Friend had a ’76 6 cyl 4 speed version that seemed to move out OK. It had come to SoCal around ’82 from a rust state and it was rusted out everywhere, being white didn’t help hide the rot. Think they paid all of $400 for it, replaced the clutch during the 2-3 years they owned it. I always thought it was a pretty well styled and roomy car for the times.
I wonder what if Ford had introduced the Fairmont 3 years earlier instead of the Granada?
Well, The 70s were a dark age not only for the American car building industry.
When I think of the high-end Mercedes-Benz products from this time frame, the first thing that comes to my mind is that you really cannot keep one on the road unless you have several “donor” cars to scavenge spare parts from. Because mechanical fuel injection, etc. etc. none of which is repairable – you have to replace old parts with other old parts and hope that it will work… somehow.
Those cars were also stupidly overly complicated, e.g. on a mid-70s 280SE the throttle linkage consists of something like five or six intricately curved solid links, hinged on everything in the engine bay and connected by ball joints. And unless every ball joint is properly lubricated, the gas pedal is stiff as hell. Herren, why couldn’t you just use a cable instead ?! And it’s essentially all built like that.
I really doubt that is the case with cars like this Granada.
The more “down-to-earth” Mercedeses built for the taxicab companies were durable & reliable like hammer and anvil, no doubt about that. But were they all that better than a Granada in terms of performance etc. ? I really doubt that, as well.
What it excelled at in 1970s, Mercedes-Benz achieved by using cutting-edge technology that at the time just could not be made reliable and durable enough, or cheap enough to be implemented in mass market cars like the Granada. Most innovations used on these cars were evolutionary dead-ends, like the wretched K-Jetronic continuous mechanical fuel injection (and the dead-end D-Jetronic transistorized electronic fuel injection, as well). Essentially these systems were just a sophisticated way to make the buyers pay for being test subjects in their development programs. Which didn’t produce serviceable results until much later.
When the American companies started to use fuel injection on a large scale in 1980s, they just employed the results of the European development process of the previous decade, mostly omitting the part of making people suffer from the overcomplicated, underdeveloped & overpriced earlier fuel injection systems. And as far as I understand it, at least in the late 1980s and early 1990s GM EFI was considered to be far superior to anything developed by Bosch or Siemens.
Until that, in the hindsight it looks like the safest option to stick with the old and relatively inefficient, but tried-and-true technologies that just work. Like the “Falcon platform”.
Of course, all that does not excuse in any way building engines with lower specific power than the low-compression flathead engines of late 1920s possessed.
The 1980s Volga engine with its 2.5 liters and 110 SAE hp suddenly starts to look really hot in comparison (and in stratified-charge, lean-burn configuration it also easily complied with the European emission regulations of the time).
I am with you on this.
In addition, I was very surprised at the high number of 1970’s Mercedes automatic transmission failures that would come into our shop.
Most around the 50,000 mile range.
What is wrong with K-Jetronic? Once you figure out how the system works, it is basically more simple than a carburetor. After like fifteen years, the air metering units would conk out but they were easy to rebuild.
Hats off to you sir.
Myself, I find CIS to be a nightmare system to troubleshoot, repair, and adjust. Unfortunately for customers when the system has problems they usually are in need of many things to get them back to running properly. Besides the fuel distributor issues, the injectors would leak down, corrosion of the electrical system including connectors and sensors, and the who can troubleshoot the brain except to plug & play a known good used one?
Had an ’87 VW Jetta with the CIS fuel injection – last model year for it and what a nightmare it was!
Exactly. Mostly mechanical in operation, simple to diagnose and repair. Durable and reliable. A lot of people were afraid to touch them back in the day, but you can’t blame the K-Jet system for lack of knowledge on the part of the repair technician.
This said, a lot of ’70’s K-Jet cars had steel gas tanks that would rust and cause major problems as the cars age, by the mid ’80’s plastic tanks and more corrosion resistant components for E10 fuel was a big improvement.
Haynes made a pretty good manual for the K Jetronic. Without that and the VW service manual fixing my Rabbit would have been much more difficult. Luckly the fuel filter caught most of the gunk and only one injector was clogged.
I checked the oil on a lot of early Granadas and Monarchs in both Toledo and Las Vegas and rarely saw one with anything but a 302. I had driven a coworker’s six cyl Granada in late ’75 and was shocked at how slow it was. He complained endlessly about how “weak” it was and about 2 years later, it was gone, replaced with a ’77 Trans Am that his son still owns. The twin boxes sold big in Vegas, I saw endless numbers of them and wondered what possessed them to buy one? Old people, young ones, they just seemed to be everywhere. By 1980, most were looking pretty sad, with the gas cap cover hanging diagonally and just looking tired. Honda, Toyota, and Datsun sold a lot of the replacement cars.
Ford sold a crap-ton of these cars because they were relatively cheap and somehow imparted to their buyers that they would be easier on fuel. Easier than what? A five ton?
The Granada was all how Detroit sold the sizzle and not the steak. They pumped a gazillion of them out the door and made money on every single one. There was still enough anti-Japanese and German sentiment around for these cars to actually sell. I wonder how many Granada owners bought another Ford? Well, the company was almost belly up by 1980.
Detroit still sells sizzle and not steak, so much so that it has basically given up on passenger cars. There is simply way more money in selling gargantuan rolling tough guy lounges than in econoboxes or small premium cars.
And of course gasoline will be cheap forever.
I got here via Mr. Jason Shafer’s Granada write-up of July 31, 2019.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/blog/cc-capsule/cc-capsule-first-generation-north-american-ford-granada-the-lido-shuffle/#more-321056
I never knew vent windows were an option for the Granada/Monarch line.
Ya learn something new every day.
The PS story is revealing in the way it shows not only how much unrealized potential the Granada had, but also how good a car the Nova, which was almost a 4-door Camaro, had become. The Granada, the 1977 GM B & C bodies and the 1976 Seville were, to my eyes, unusually handsome for boxy sedans, and a welcome relief from so many confused 1970s styling kludges like the 1977 LTD II, GM’s square-headlights-on-rounded-body mid-1970s A-bodies, the piggy ’71-78 Eldorado or just about any 1970s T-bird. While it couldn’t match the space efficiency of the Euro-Granada, with its independent rear suspension, it offered adequate space in a much lighter package than most mid-sized cars of that era, and at least from a distance, its interior, unlike that of its compact competitors, actually looked luxurious. Too bad Ford was stuck with mostly dreadful engine choices, especially in the pivotal first 2 years, and too bad that they had to sacrifice both the ride and handling quality in favor of a false veneer of smoothness on only the best roads. Ford dealers must have had to carefully plan out the test-drive route. On the other hand it was surprising to see that the Nova, despite its painfully cramped interior, made such good use of the improvements of the underpinnings it shared with the Camaro; for PS to call the ’75 Nova’s handling better than that of a ’71 Camaro was no faint praise. GM, for a change, made the best use of what they had on the Nova, while Ford squandered the what could have been a game-changer for them.
The information in the article was incorrect. The 250 was rated variously from 92-99 HP from 1975-1980 in the Granada and Monarch. All Ford and Chev 250s in there first Gross HP year were 155 HP gross. The biggest looser in the Malaise Era was the 1982 module year 351M truck engine in the last F150. Started as the 265 HP 351C 2V with 250 or 265 HP as a mid 1969 option in the Ranchero, ended up as a 148 HP at 3400 rpm 1975 replacement, and then died in June 1981 to June 1983 as a Feedback 136 HP net at 3400 rpm 50 states legal truck engine.
No, you are incorrect. The 1975 250 six was rated at 72 hp for 49 state version and 70 hp for the CA version.
Go up and look at the spec sheet in that review of the Granada and Nova in this post: it’s right there: 72 hp.
I’m quite prepared to be wrong.
Ford kept the same 250, 4.1 liter output for 5 years. It varied only if the fan clutch was engaged or not. 97 bhp or 72 kW @ 3200 rpm and 241 Nm or 180 lb-ft @ 1400 rpm. I have the figures from Ford, and the details Popular Science have used aren’t the same as Ford’s.
You are wrong. There’s plenty of other official sources that confirm the 70/72 hp rating.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/vintage-reviews/vintage-review-1975-ford-granada-the-perfect-car-for-mother-to-buy/
Road & Track’s test of the 1975 Granada mentions that they also drove a 72 horsepower 250/6 with a 3-speed manual. Automobile-catalog also lists the 72-horsepower engine, although their chart of its horsepower and torque curves looks like something that could only be achieved with electronic engine management and fudging, like the advertised torque plateaus for small displacement turbo engines, only in reverse.
Rhetorical question, but why did we not get the Ford Europe Granada? It had real wood interior, actual gauges (vs idiot lights), and looked like a Jag…..I mean maybe they just should have put a few on the lot and see what would happen (I suppose Mercury dealers were trying that with the German Capri…)
https://www.tradeclassics.com/auctions/ford/1977-ford-granada-ghia-2/
There was a Euro Granada concept done up with Lincoln trim and called Mark I. Maybe the Versailles would have sold better with more Euro. We will never know. Versailles failed because it had the same wheelbase, interior and exterior as the Granada/ Monarch. Seville was better with a longer wheelbase and more Cadillac styling both exterior and interior. Ford made a goof up here with the Lincoln.
I had a 250 six in my ’70 Mustang with an auto transmission. The performance was actually pretty good. It was rated at 155 hp. at 4,400 rpm, but what was better was 240 lbs/ft. of torque at a low 1,600 rpm. low speed and mid range acceleration was very good. It cruised easily at 75 mph, and I had it up to 95 mph. a couple of times. I had calibrated my speedo with a Navigation app on my Wife’s phone. My only real complaint was the poor fuel economy. I had 15” radial tires, a Mach One front spoiler, and a low restriction turbo muffler single exhaust. The best I could get on a hundred mile freeway test at 55 mph. was 15.5 mpg. Performance improving parts for this motor were scarce and expensive. With a 302 V8 I could get different carbs, manifolds and headers, which could provide more power with similar mileage.
It’s hard to believe that Ford took an engine that was a good solid performer, and had modified it into such a wheezer by 1975.
5 years later, Iaccoca made up for it with K-cars even if it was still late compared to the European like the French with their Citroen CX ( in the text above , review is from Google Book page 34 … scroll down to ” The view down the road ” just below the text on the Granada ) The Citroen CX win the ” Trophée européen de la voiture de l’année 1975 ” .
It always seemed to me that Iacocca’s strength (and weakness) was that he built the car(s) that he himself would be interested in purchasing. He wasn’t a “car guy”, and he felt that most of middle America wasn’t either. And figured that they cared about what he cared about, and in the 1970’s Iacocca basically wanted what all of America apparently wanted, which was something that was vaguely Chevy Monte Carlo, Chrysler Cordoba, or Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme, none of which cars had any pretense to anything other than smoothness and middle-America wood-paneled-den luxury. Iacocca gave “the customers what they wanted”, but that was precicsely I think because that’s what he wanted, or imagined he would want if he was in the customer’s shoes. So he figured, heck, if they want a V-8, they can buy a V-8, but if they don’t, they don’t, they’re probably just tooling around Peoria anyhow and won’t know the difference or care particularly. The only place this didn’t really correlate was with the minivan, but I think Iacocca was able to place himself in the shoes of a young family and hence hit that target squarely on the nose as well. Iacocca probably didn’t really understand performance cars other than as “hot rods” like might be built in a shed by someone like Carroll Shelby, and marketed to the same, so that’s what he served up both at Ford and Chrysler. Iacocca’s sensibility served him well for many years, until the 1990’s came around and suddenly his value system didn’t correlate with the customers anymore.
Iacocca understood what many buyers of his generation wanted (along with those born about 10 years later, like my father). They wanted no-fuss mechanicals, a plush interior, effective air conditioning and a smooth ride. Which this Granada delivered – all in a package that was easier to park than an LTD Landau (an important point for many women buyers of that time).
Aside from the lethargic performance, the main complaint with the Granada is the handling, or lack thereof. But to drivers such as my father, “handling” meant that the car was easy to steer and park. If the road became twisty, the solution was simple…slow down. The fault wasn’t with the car for having a soggy suspension. The fault was with the driver who was driving too fast for conditions.
Of course, a generational change, as younger buyers moved to the forefront, also brought about a change in priorities, and what buyers expected in the way of chassis tuning and performance.
Lee Iacocca did what he was paid to do, sold cars for his employer. I don’t know if he was a car guy or not, but he build cars that sold. Mustang, check. Granada, check. K car, check. Minivan, check. Enzo Ferrari, no.
Granada/Falcon. Correct me if I’m wrong, and I might very well be wrong, but wasn’t the Granada larger in the interior than an Falcon? Especially in the back seat? What the Granada was, was an alternative to a 4500 pound LSD, er, LTD, that typically got sub 10MPG whatever the EPA tests suggested. Gas mileage tests today aren’t all that good, back in those days they were laughable, both up and down.
Lastly, I’ve never driven one, but knew people with them, and they liked them. Think Volvo 140/240. Look at the spec’s on paper, they’re crap. But people loved them. What counts more, spec’s on paper, or what people like to drive?
Seems like a ‘Best of/Worst of Iacocca’ would make for a good CC. The interesting thing about a few of the ‘Worst of’ is that they were actually big sellers for a while (Mustang II, Granada).
But, then, there were the losers that never sold well (Imperial coupe, Executive limousine, TC by Chrysler).
There was a Euro Granada concept done up with Lincoln trim and called Mark I. Maybe the Versailles would have sold better with more Euro. We will never know. Versailles failed because it had the same wheelbase, interior and exterior as the Granada/ Monarch. Seville was better with a longer wheelbase and more Cadillac styling both exterior and interior. Ford made a goof up here with the Lincoln.
“Well, the Granada did have a new body, even if it was sitting on ye olde Falcon platform.”
Here’s a 1st gen. Comet and a Granada. It’s easy to see the Falcon origins in the Comet, but the Granada seems to have nothing in common with Falcon or Comet. The Granada looks wider, for one thing. If I can’t see a similarity, then neither could John Q. Average, right? What was common? Inner parts of the unibody and the suspension? My ’60 Comet has fairly firm springing–it won’t bounce and roll like the Granada in the article.
As for the Falcon-based 6 cyl., yes, performance was weak, but this was 1975 and everybody was freaking out over gas mileage. If the 6 wasn’t powerful enough for you, just get the V-8; problem solved!
The first Mustang was a restyled Falcon–no one seemed to care.
While I agree that this car gets a bum rap in some ways – it was hardly a disaster on the order of the Vega, Pacer, Aspen/Volare and GM X-cars – critics do have a point when it comes to Ford did (or didn’t do) with the Falcon platform.
The problem wasn’t that Ford kept the platform in production for years. The problem was that it didn’t make any meaningful upgrades in handling and braking during that time. Many older buyers may not have cared, but, by the early 1970s, an increasing number of younger buyers did.
What was okay in 1965 was not competitive in 1975. GM, for example, did improve the dynamics of the Nova.
wow, i think this has become a “classic” cc article. as i posted back in 2017, i grew up in one of these and they weren’t as bad as this article makes out. despite the non-cali 250 six version only having 75hp, it could get to 40 mph in under 10 seconds due to 180 ft/lbs of torque. it sat five reasonably comfortably, had a big trunk and had roughly 400 miles of range at 20 mpg highway. it also cost less and arguably looked less plain jane than it’s main competition, the chevy nova.
was it a great car. no but it wasn’t a disaster either.
I bought a new 1977 Ford Granada Ghia 2 door with a 4-speed transmission, in 1982 when it had 102,000 + miles on it I thought I should consider replacement, I was working for an insurance co. claims dept. when I received a call from an insured as he had a claim with us. While talking he let me know he was an executive at Ford, he wondered if I owned a, I Ford, I advised him I did, a 77 Granada with around 102,000 miles on it, he replied ” it must be a standard transmission. I ask “why do you say that?”, his reply was ” we’ve found after about 85,000 miles there junk”, I assumed he meant. automatics. Shortly after manuals were no longer available.
Looks like this site has picked up a fan from Youtube. “Ed’s Auto Reviews” has referenced Curbside Classics twice that I saw so far. 1 was this article on the Granada, and another on “The Great Brougham Epoch.
I rented a room in 1980 from a lady who drove Ford compacts. She hated her 4-door Maverick with manual steering and an automatic, said it was like driving a truck, and it gave her plenty of trouble. She replaced it in ’75 with a 6-cyl Granada that she liked well enough, but at 5 years and 50k miles it had gone from slow to virtually undriveable as the carburetor and every vacuum line expired.
Her neighbor had a similar Granada with a 302. At 5 years old it had electrical gremlins and a failed rear differential.
Those Granadas and my girlfriend’s early Fairmont Futura 6-cyl that had transmission problems, cooling system issues and drivability issues at 3-4 years old badly soured me on Ford products for many years to come.
As for my landlady, I loaned her our ’75 Regal V6 when her Granada wasn’t working one day. It was much less sluggish despite a smaller engine a larger car, cornered better and was easier on fuel. The odd-fire v6 was coarse and sounded like a vacuum cleaner when revved, but was light years ahead of the ‘75 Ford 250.. When my parents sold it, my landlady snapped it up and was pleased as could be. I lost track of her long before she tired of it.
It seemed like most US brands’ quality was pretty random, though. A salesman neighbor nearing retirement had a ‘76 Granada 6-cyl company car with 50k trouble-free miles on it. Based on our experience with the Regal v6, he bought a leftover ‘78 Skylark rather than the company Granada for his retirement. He said it was by far the most troublesome car he ever had.
My friend Kevin bought a new Honda Civic in September 1976. Though the MSRP was c. C$3000, the dealership gussied it up with slotted mags, a black vinyl roof, and an aftermarket AM/FM cassette stereo, and I think he was out the door at $4K + sales taxes.
He phoned me up to offer a drive in the country in his new car. I loved the car, having been a big fan of the Civic, and small Japanese cars in general, since becoming car-aware a couple of years earlier.
During the drive we saw a new Granada, and I was quite put off. I had an irrational dislike of Fords, and always hated excessive ornamentation on any car. I was fairly appalled when Kevin said “That kind of car is called a Grandana (sic). It looks classy – I think I’ll buy one for my next car”.
I was quite appalled, but showing restraint told him I much preferred his Civic.
*******
A couple of years later the Fairmont (and its twin, the Zephyr) hit the road, and I didn’t like them much better, but was impressed with an article that said the Fairmont was by far the best car Ford had ever made.