When I saw this 1970 Ford LTD for sale on Facebook Marketplace, I said “Oh, wow! There it is!” and all these memories came flooding back. A childhood friend’s parents had one of these when it was new, in a root beer brown color. It was probably traded in after 3 or 5 years, and by 1980 or so, these ’70 Ford full-sizers had vanished from the roads. I haven’t seen one since. Have you?
The ad states that 17″ wheels and tires have been fitted, which somewhat changes the original look.
Greg M. was one year younger than me, and we would play together often. His parents had this LTD and a 1966 Pontiac LeMans (which Greg’s mother pronounced “Le-MANS” instead of “Le-MAHNS”–my father said both were wrong; it was really “Le-MAW”.) Yes, even though I was in kindergarten or first grade, I knew what car everybody had, and I liked studying the fine details of all of them.
Now at this time, my favorite cars were not new ones but cars from the ‘teens, ’20s, and early ’30s. And for reasons that even today I don’t fully understand, I had a fascination with Charlie Chaplin movies, which is kind of an odd thing for a 5-year-old in 1971 to be interested in.
Halloween 1977: Me as Charlie Chaplin; Elizabeth B. as Groucho Marx.
Channel 13 used to show Charlie Chaplin movies in the early afternoon. Greg’s family had a color TV, so one day I said to Greg, “Let’s watch Charlie Chaplin on your TV so we can see him in color!” Greg reluctantly agreed, and when we turned that round, clunky dial to channel 13, I was dismayed to discover that the silent movie was still in black and white!
When you’re little kid height, cars look different to you because you’re eye-level with a lot of fascinating details that adults are seeing from above. I distinctly remember these complexly-trimmed taillights and the mesh “grille” between them. There was also an elegant trunk lock cover with the LTD name and “tree branches”. (I guess you call that a “wreath”?)
Up front it’s a faceless monster. I remember those letters “L T D” and a wreath (but not broken). The headlight covers are cleverly “grilled” so visually it’s hard to tell where the real grille begins and ends. Maybe those hidden headlights work since the covers are not stuck open.
I also had a fascination with speedometers and dashboards, and this one was quite unique. It had a wrap-around effect; and like most domestic cars of the period, there was a lot of cheesy plastic and fake wood.
Internet photo–not the same car.
This one kind of perplexed me–why is the number 60 so small? And what’s that mysterious red line from 70 to 120? I guess it’s dangerous to go that fast! The radio’s on the left, which is also unusual.
Things look pretty nice in the back.
The ad states that this is a 351 V-8.
Greg’s grandparents would visit and they had a 1961 Ford Galaxie in mint condition that looked just like this one. To me, this ’61 Galaxie was a sharper, more beautiful car than the ’70 LTD. I was starting to shift my interest from pre-war classics to late 50s-early 60s cars. In the 1970s, cars like this ’61 were still being used as “daily drivers”.
Inside: sparkling Space Age–no fake wood here. Yes, it was true: “They don’t make ’em like they used to!”
Kid’s eye view of a 1959 Pontiac.
But my favorite car in the neighborhood was owned by the Sinclairs who lived two houses up from me. It was a 1959 Pontiac Catalina in green! I loved everything about this car–the sharp double fins sweeping back at 1000 MPH, counterbalanced by a pointed “ram” on the rear bumper; the parabolic sweep-spear; the graceful downward curve of the roofline; the enormous Panoramic windshield with raked vent windows; the double-parabolic Pontiac split grille; the “intergalactic” steering wheel with full circular chrome horn ring–Wow! All the far-out details flowed together beautifully. This Catalina made cars like Greg’s LTD look like very ordinary, uninspired lumps.
Cars like this LTD have fallen into that category of automobiles which were once so common, but attract little hobby interest, and are now mostly forgotten. In fact, this is the first 1970 LTD sedan ever featured on CC. Despite high production numbers, very few survivors remain. At a car show you’ll see Corvettes, Mustangs, and ’57 Chevys–but not this. If you Google Image Search “1970 Ford LTD sedan”, not that many photos come up. Granted, I don’t think these were “great cars” (although someone might) and I personally wouldn’t want to own one, but finding something like this gives me more satisfaction than seeing the typical over-restored or modified stuff. The seller is asking $4800 for it . . . I wonder how many people out there would actually be interested in owning a dull-looking but intact 1970 Ford LTD 4-door sedan.
And for more evidence of just how much time has passed, how many people living today even know who Charlie Chaplin is?
The “60” on the speedometer was short because the high beam indicator was squeezed in above it.. don’t love these cars but like them well enough..there shape had a pleasant genericness, and I think the movies” white lightning”, “magnum force” and ”Freebie and the Bean” imprinted on me. Years ago we rented white lightning and in the scene where they give Burt Reynolds the hopped up LTD they pop the hood and then cut to a scene that even my wife said “where was that shot?” It’s also hard that they make the car out to be a stick shift with some interior shots but the illusion is spoiled at least once when bird throws it in the park. Then in one of the first chases the LTD suddenly sports the protective skate bar at the front as well as having something go on with the headlights that I could never figure out. Yeehah!
” … their shape had a pleasant genericness, and I think the movies” white lightning … ”
Any time I see a full size Ford of this vintage with no wheel covers I think of Burt Reynold’s brown “White Lightning” Ford.
The red line on the speedometer was another Federal mandate, to remind you that the maximum speed limit on most roads (including Interstate highways) was 70 mph! 70 mph, that is, until the OPEC oil embargo of 1973, when the dreaded (and largely ignored) 55 mph National speed limit became the law of the land!
There was no such mandate. In fact, that red line was gone again starting in 1971 on the big Fords. And 70 was not the national speed limit. In fact, there was no national speed limit prior to 1974; states set their own. It was 75 in many states, 80 in some, none in Nevada.
It was just something Ford decided to do for a few years.
For some reason, it seemed like the ’71-72 big Fords hung around for awhile, but yeah, the ’69-70 models faded away quickly.
It’s been ages since I’ve seen it but I seem to recall Uncle Jesse on “The Dukes of Hazzard” had a black LTD from that era. I remember Roscoe pulling it apart looking for moonshine, and Uncle Jesse ordering him to put it all back together. It might have been a ’71-72 though.
Jessie’s “Black Tilly” was remarkably inconsistent throughout the run, or maybe he was still running enough shine to need to replace her periodically. I know she was a Mustang sometimes.
Yes, the 1968-70 LTDs and Galaxies were kinda rare in the 80s and 90s, even more so in the early 2000s.
Even in New England you still see the occasional 1971-72 LTDs being used from time to time, especially as 2 dr coupes, in that baby blue with black vinyl top color combo.
Now, I’m seeing quite a few 1968-70 LTDs(More so the coupes than the sedans) coming out of the woodwork for sale on FB Marketplace or randomly in driveaways or some junkyards as project cars.
Interesting comparison. The ’61 is all Fordian. The side shape, the taillights, the dashboard parts are the same as late ’50s Fords.
The ’70 is GM. The coke-bottle shape, the Riviera bumper, the triptych dashboard, even the vent flap cranks, which Ford had briefly in the ’40s but abandoned in the ’50s. All copied from GM, foreign to Fordian tradition.
That’s because Henry Ford II lured Semon “Bunkie” Knudsen away from GM to become the president of Ford, and the first thing Bunkie did was re-style as many Fords as he could to look like Pontiacs, LOL! Some people have said that the 1970-71 T-Bird, with the huge “Bunkie Beak”, was the best looking Grand Prix that Ford ever made, LOL! By the end of 1971, Bunkie was out, and Lee Iacocca was in as President of Ford!
My grandfather had one (a ’70-style big Ford – I am pretty certain it was branded “LTD” and not “Galaxie”, but I cannot swear to it). Dark green metallic with green brocade 🙂 upholstery. I remember it as big, smooth riding, quiet (in both traits, “very”)… and equipped with AM-FM radio. Listening to FM radio whilst riding in a car that was as quiet and comfortable as a house does leave an impression on one.
He generally drove (used) Cadillacs, but he made an exception and bought the Ford (used, too, of course), for whatever reason. It was a nice car.
One thing that strikes me about this car are the nicely-shaped, substantially-sized head restraints.
Most 1969 and some 1970 Ford cars had these restraints…then the company wasted no time shrinking them down to the point where they served as little more than a shoulder rest, serving the letter of the law but not the spirit.
My father had a lowly 69 Custom 2 door (though with a V8) and even it enjoyed those larger headrests in the same blue tone as this LTD interior. I didn’t pay much attention to them until he got a 71 Catalina, which had much trimmer units. As a the kid trying to see forward from the back seat I appreciated the smaller ones, but the the larger units did somehow make the Custom feel more upscale than it was.
Sidebar, I may be biased by having had one in the family, but I do prefer the perkier 69 rear to the 70, which reads a bit saggy to my eyes.
Like many decisions made by the Engineers, head restraint size is a tradeoff between strength, comfort and safety. Larger “headrests” absorb more impact energy, but they also block more view out through the rear window. They had to be properly adjusted to work properly, and most people didn’t bother to adjust them at all, they just left them in the full “down” position, which actually increased the risk of injury in a rear-end collision, by raising the point where your back or neck would hit the seat, turning a simple case of whiplash into a broken neck! Break your neck in the “correct” spot, and you survive as a quadriplegic! Break your neck in the wrong spot, and you ride to the morgue with a sheet over your face or in a body bag!
Ralph Nader and his minions, Joan Claybrook, NHTSA and the Center for Highway Safety, were always imposing ever more stringent safety rules, in pursuit of perfect safety, which doesn’t exist! All safety devices have trade offs, they increase safety in some cases, while reducing safety in others. Airbags are a case in point. Yes, the reduce injuries in frontal, single impact crashes, but are less effective in multiple impact collisions, and can actually cause injuries if they explode, or deploy prematurely, causing a crash! See the exploding Takata airbag scandal for details.
It seemed as if a relatively high percentage of the full-size Fords sold in the mid/late-’60’s through the mid-’70’s were station wagons, and that they hung around longer than the full-size sedans.
I owned a 1970 Country Squire (basically LTD) wagon from 1983 to 1987 as my “winter beater car”. I would have kept it longer, but unfortunately the frame rotted too badly for it to pass state safety inspection.
The radio location (on the left side of the dashboard, only accessible by the driver) was a weird feature.
I’m going to guess that the left side location of the radio was simply an ergonomic solution in that the gear selector lever would have interfered with a right side placement. The right side got the clock, which would have needed very little user interface.
Of course, it all could have been solved if it wasn’t for the ‘cockpit’ design of everything in front of the driver in the first place, i.e., the radio and heater controls in the traditional middle of the dash location.
And it’s true that the working headlight covers are odd. The way those worked was they were spring-loaded and were held closed by engine vacuum. As the rubber hoses deterioriated over time, leaks developed and the headlight doors would began to open when the car was stationary and not running, but would typically shut once the engine was going and developed enough vacuum to hold them closed.
It’s interesting the radio in the dashboard shot appears to say Stereo, but has only the dial for AM and no apparent way to insert a tape. Weird. I know there were cars with an AM radio/stereo 8 track combo in the early 70s.
Back in the day, you could buy an AM/FM stereo radio without a tape deck. Since FM was the only media that broadcast in stereo, it was perfectly reasonable to have stereo speakers in the car without either an 8-Track or cassette tape player, hence the stereo script on the radio faceplate. Kids!
You missed the key point here: this is an AM-only radio. And AM stereo was still many years off. It doesn’t make sense. Adults!
Because of the odd shape and location of the
radio, the tape deck is remotely located on the hump.
It’s nothing but a pod with a tape slot.
Everything else is controlled from the radio.
Aha! That’s different.
I too remember these, mostly as brown ‘meh’ rentals or Customer whips back in the day .
The ’61 looked good new and still does today .
-Nate
My grandmother wanted what she called “an LSD” (‘71). My grandfather bought a Torino which was big. We drove from Ft.Worth to Vicksburg down to Natchez and across the Mississippi River heading east back home. I was 16 and did almost all of the driving. Looking back, I can’t imagine how big that LTD would’ve been.
I drove quite a few of these during my days as a car jockey at Towson Ford. I preferred the ’70s, as they felt structurally tighter than the loosy-goosy ’71s.
The oddest one was a ’69 LTD sedan that a customer dropped at the service department: it had a 390, three-speed column shift, and manual steering. What a bear to drive!
I don’t recall how long it’s been – long, that’s for sure – since I’ve seen an LTD from the 70s. I think you’re absolutely correct that few of them survived the decade.
To me, they always seemed like fleet cars, even before I really knew what a fleet car was. Some of this impression may have been formed by how they seemed to figure prominently in TV shows (anything that was a Quinn Martin Production) where they were inevitably driven by detectives and other government employees. I have a number of images in my mind of scenes in The Streets of San Francisco where these large cars were driven at speed chasing some baddie, becoming airborne going down the … streets of San Francisco. At least that’s how I remember it.
Charlie Chaplin. For some reason, silent film stars like Chaplin (and Buster Keaton too) always kind of creeped me out. I have no idea why. So I avoided watching them. My mom though for some reason shared your fascination with Chaplin and therefore I watched (mostly against my will) my fair share of his movies. Sometimes on 16mm prints, brought home from the local public library…back in pre-VCR days.
Maybe my recollection is faulty, but I think a pillared sedan in LTD trim is unusual. I remember the sedans mostly in the lower Custom and Custom 500 trims, and I feel like most big Fords in LTD trim were hardtops. But it’s been a long time.
Check out “Rare Classic Cars & Automotive History” on YouTube. It features a lot of forgotten cars such as this LTD, but in great condition. Very good YouTube channel. Not my channel.
Always liked the grill of the non-LTD models better. Just seemed like a cleaner design.
Ah, my Dad’s company car, a Galaxie 500! And, yes, Ford spelled it “Galaxie”, NOT Galaxy (the French spelling, to make it classy, LOL)! Marketing! Sheesh!
“The marketing division of the Sirius Cybernetics Corporation were the first ones up against the wall and shot when the revolution came!” – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, by the late, great, Douglas Adams!
The Galaxie is most definitely a cleaner grille.
I guess Ford figured (probably accurately) that upper-trim buyers wanted the LTD’s much busier style with its taller profile, eggcrate shapes, separate, taller center section, and hidden headlights.
While not as distinctive as the new Mopar fuselages, these big, conservatively styled, lower-trim Galaxie sedans were everywhere back in the day. I miss them.
This one’s the I could find to answer your question, Stephen.
It was a ‘70 XL that my Dad and I saw at Carlisle’s Ford weekend a few years back.
Ironically, it wasn’t this car that initially caught our eye, it was the ‘73 parked right next to it (owned by the same guy). The ‘73 caught my Dad’s eye first, as he bought one in gold back then that eventually became my first car.
In retrospect, I would have rather had the ‘70…
I actually prefer the ’71, I like the cleaner, simpler taillight treatment on the ’71, compared to the chunky taillights on the ’70 example, with the busy pot metal trim between the taillights. The ’70 Galaxie 500 got a simple aluminum trim piece between the taillights, which I think looks better, but the Galaxie 500 gave up the hideaway headlights, so there’s that. The ’72 got a chrome bumper with the taillights set into it. The center of the Galxie bumper was solid chrome, but the LTD got a red single taillight in the center of the bumper. The Federal Bumper rules began to kick in in 1973, so the 1970-73 nose that I like so much was gone, and the rear taillights would be restyled in 1974, when the rear got the Federal bumper as well.
If Jack Arnold in the Wonder Years had wait a little bit, he could have get a 1970 Ford instead of a 1969, maybe getting a LTD sedan instead of a Custom 500. 😉
If I recall correctly, a later episode had Kevin and his father fighting over which radio station to play. They kept showing a radio in the center of the dash, and I knew our 69 LTD had it on the left. My friends would ask why the radio was over there. I guess whoever selected the car for the show, never expected a show plot that wouldn’t work with the car they had.
The pecking order for full-size Fords was as follows (From bottom to top): Custom 500; Galaxy 500; LTD; XL (the XL was a two-door coupe or Convertible only).
I haven’t seen one of these 70s Fords in a long time even in the low rust PNW. The closest is probably the gargantuan 78 or so Lincoln Continental parked behind the bicycle shop.
In 1984 a friend at college bought a 73 Galaxie 500 at a yard sale and was driving it until at least 86-87 although this was upstate New York so it has rusted into oblivion by now.
Yes, I have. There was a 1970 LTD convertible for sale about three (3) years ago, and once in a great while, I’ll see one on the street. But they have become quite rare. Here outside of Boston, road salt and rust have eaten most of them, and they were crushed into scrap metal and shipped to Japan, where they have returned as Toyotas, LOL!
My Dad used to get a new company car every two (2) years when I was a kid, and they were all full-size sedans, so he could take customers out to lunch or dinner. Two (2) were Fords, both Galaxie 500’s (the company wouldn’t pay for the top-of-the-line LTD), one in 1966 and one in 1970. His first company car was a 1964 Dodge Polara 440, and the third one was a 1968 Plymouth Fury III.
So why was there consumer resistance to head restraints? You see these ridiculous sausages on the backrests of late 70s US cars, sometimes seemingly slanted toward the doors. Who wants whiplash?
There were a couple of reasons. First, they needed to be adjusted properly in order to actually work and most weren’t, which actually increased the risk of injury! Most were left in the full down position, so instead of restraining the neck and head, they became something for your neck to hit, causing the whiplash they were designed to prevent, or worse, breaking your neck! If your neck was broken in the “right” place you might survive as a quadriplegic, but if gets broken in the wrong place, you’d receive a perfect “hangman’s fracture”, between the fifth (5th) and sixth (6th) cervical vertebrae, killing you instantly!
Second, when they were added to the rear seats, they almost completely block the view out of the rear window, making changing lanes or backing up an exercise in guesswork! Volvo and Saab had solved that problem, but the American examples were yet another example of the Big Three’s intransigence when it came to meeting Government rules. “You want headrests? Fine! Here they are! Are you happy now?” seemed to be the dominant mood at the time. Do the absolute minimum necessary to meet the rules, and do it so poorly that the customers will write their Congresspersons and get these awful rules repealed, so we can go back to building cars the way we want to! AFAIK, that approach only worked once, with the infamous seatbelt interlock debacle of 1974.
Interesting. I never found a problem reversing in car with headrestraints in the the back. I have a car with three and it´s no bother. I had a car with fold away rear headrests – down they did not break necks; up they were not a visual problem either.
But the headrestraints I am interesting in is the front ones. I never found them a problem at all. I get the feeling it was, as you say, mindless intransigence. The Japanese adopted 5 mph bumper regs without making their cars look crap. The US makers seemed to make a meal of them. It´s really lame.
My dad owned a 1969 Ranch Wagon. Looking exactly like the one below. Including the same gold colour.
By 1975-1976, it had serious rust everywhere. Bottom to top. It looked like a Holstein cow. As my dad sprayed Red Oxide Primer, wherever there was rust. Which included every surface.
His did have the two D-pillar mounted chrome air deflectors.
Our family was opposite order; my Dad bought a ’73 Ranch wagon which replaced his ’69 Country Squire. The Ranch wagon was better equipped than the Squire other than no Di-noc trim, it was his first car with air conditioning, power locks (but manual windows), AM/FM Stereo and trailer towing package.
The ’69 was bought at the same dealership that my Uncle had just bought a new LTD just a few months before…he’d just been completing his undergraduate degree when his hand-me-down from my grandfather ’51 Chrysler Windsor blew a head gasket and he had no time to get it fixed…guess he also wanted a new car after he graduated. His was a 4 door hardtop with the 302 and 4 wheel drum brakes. The Squire had the 351 and front discs.
One thing I remember is the radios had the “Philco” label on them, which I think was Ford’s electrical division back then. Both the ’69 and the ’73 had them labeled that way. Did AM stereo ever come out? I heard something about it many years ago (maybe 40-50) but never have seen it, so wonder (except maybe for the possible tape deck) why the bezel has the “stereo ” written on it.
AM Stereo didn’t appear (briefly) until the late 1980’s. The FCC selected the Magnavox system as the standard in 1980, whereupon all of the losers in the competition promptly sued the FCC. By 1982, the FCC gave up, authorized ALL of the competing standards and said “Let the market decide!”. Of course that meant that no one standard would emerge, and broadcasters stayed away in droves, not wanting to spend thousands, if not millions of dollars on equipment that might be obsolete in a few years if you picked the wrong system. To this day, AM Stereo in the United States is non-existent for this reason.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AM_stereo
What a timely article. Just last night I was searching 1970 Fords. Actually Ranch Wagons is what I was looking at. My dad had a maroon coloured one in which I got my driver’s license. It had the 351 as well. So a certain nostalgia is held by these ships of the prairies.
Thanks for posting!
I saw one as a little kid because this was our car, in the pictured blue color as well. The main things I recall about it are vague memories of that interior (and the vinyl smell) and that my parents called it a “lemon” since it was always breaking. We only had it 2-3 years, and they were happy to get rid of it.
I had 4 of those types: 1969 Galaxie 500 fastback, 1970 LTD 2 door hardtop, 1970 LTD post sedan, and 1970 Ranch Wagon. Rustbuckets all, but the base-model Ranch Wagon actually did better than the other three (And ALL OF THEM had the 390 2bbl)
Burt Reynolds short-lived September 1970 TV Series Dan August prominently featured full-sized Fords from this era. Worth buying the series, if these Fords interest anyone.
Series Ford driven by Reynolds with his partner Norman Fell.
In respose to Mr. Herriot’s comment – and I’m 54 so I was pretty young when the head restraints and such started becoming prevalent. I think part of the issue had to do, as I remember it, with “nomenclature”. So far as most folks I knew referred to them as “Headrests”.
I don’t think that their actual purpose was clear to most people. The perception – at least in my circle – perceived them as alleged “comfort /convenience” items. The way door armrests slowly became the norm. From that standpoint the “headrests” failed entirely.
When Dad, ahem, “upgraded” from our well-worn 65 Dart to the 77 Aspen one of the first things he did was yank those newfangled nuisences out. They got in the way of him swinging his right arm backwards to dispense “discipline” to we brats in the back seat without taking his eyes off the road.
PJ, I’m 64, so was a little older than you when “head rests” became mandated. For a few model years prior to the mandate, some manufacturers offered them as options, ostensibly a luxury item, hence the name “head rest”. “Head restraint” reeked of safety, which was not a popular marketing stance. I think the “head rest” moniker just stuck.
Thanks PJ and Bryan. This indicates how cultural differences manifest themselvees. Volvo offered them and in my eyes this was another example of Swedish design excellence to be copied by other marques as soon as possible. I used to call them head rests but changed my language sometime in the late 80s (when I was circa 18). Generally, it seems American customers have a different attitude to safety, not unlike my dad who thinks safety is for unmanly (he´s in his mid 80s now). I presume nobody has a beef with the head restraints now.
I always liked the styling of the 70 full-size Fords and at one point my father considered a Galaxie when it came time to step from the 62 Comet. But, the Ford was too wide and too long for our single garage.
A few years later I bought a used 71 Custom which I enjoyed a lot as it was an ideal highway car to get from A to B when I worked at a small town radio station two hours away from Edmonton. Yes, all the big cars slowly disappeared over time. The 70 featured in the article should be preserved. The asking price a little high in my opinion.
I actually own a pretty clean one. Surprisingly good driving car.
I guess being a Ford man I liked the 69, 70 looks. The 69s taillights were oddly placed, but if I look at them the right way I can see the look they were going for. I liked the 70s much better. I also liked the hidden headlights. I had a 75 Mercury Marquis Colony Park which also had hidden headlights. I bought it used and I thought it was a beautiful station wagon. Ford engineers loved powering accessories with engine vacuum. My wagon had the same problem, the doors would not stay closed overnight. I took on the challenge of understanding why the doors would open overnight. So I learned how they worked. Ford designed them with a default to remain open in the event of a loss of vacuum. The system had two large duel action vacuum motors under the front end. There were numerous vacuum check valves at various points in the vacuum lines. The system was pretty complex with the check valves and a vacuum canester that looked like a large black coffee can mounted under the hood on the left side wheel housing. Even the headlight switch on the dash had to have vacuum routed through it. So I replaced all the rubber vacuum lines, all the check valves, and headlight vacuum motors and the storage canester. The check valves were used to trap vacuum in the lines in the event engine vacuum dropped below a certain level. I read in the service manual that the vacuum systems were totally independent of each other to not be effected by the different systems. There was the vacuum systems for the ATC, the auto parking brake release and the speed control. While the shop manual states the system systems were all independent, they actually weren’t. There was a large vacuum tee at the back of the intake manifold that was the vacuum source for all the systems including the power brake assist. After replacing all the vacuum system components for the headlight system, the doors would still not remain closed overnight. One day while I was backing into a parking spot, I had the driver door open to see the parking lot lines, I could hear a vacuum leak coming from under the hood when I would hit the brakes. There was never any brake issues, but I now am aware of a leak in the power brake booster. So we replaced the booster which was an all day project, from that point forward, my headlight doors would remained close over night, but for weeks. I fixed the problem and found out the vacuum systems were all connected. In any event, I felt very accomplished. I now love vacuum powered systems. I drove all my friends crazy talking about my headlight doors.
Well said William ;
Of course, if the vacuum pods were ‘duel’ they’d fight each other…..=8-) (sorry, I couldn’t resist) .
I too love vacuum actuated systems now that I understand how they work and thereby how to easily diagnose them .
Best of all they’re _silent_ .
Many American vehicles use vacuum to operate the HVAC plenums as well .
My old Mercedes uses them and after 40 + years they’re still reliable and dead silent .
My son who’s IMO, a better Mechanic than I hates vacuum systems because he’s too lazy to bother the simple trouble shooting .
-Nate
I see one of these, in the seemingly most common color, the “Root Beer” brown, with a darker vinyl top once in a while in the NW Ohio area. It looks really to be in great shape, and the interior looks great too. Not my cup of tea, looks and brand wise, and even the color is on my list of “Nope, never”, but it’s nice to see it.
My own experience with Ford products from around that period is when I had a loaner of a ’70 or ’71 LTD, in the same brown with a tan vinyl top on it. It was obviously a trade in at the Olds/Caddy dealer we bought all our cars from back then, and it was totally beat up. Going over 45MPH was an adventure, as it started shaking like crazy, and the fastest I had it in the five days I drove it was 60 for a few seconds to show my best friend how badly it shook. It needed an alignment badly, as it required constant steering to keep it straight. When I got my “boring” ’72 Cutlass back, it was like I was driving a spaceship. It went straight, was much quicker than the LTD, and I would say the only thing the Ford had going for it was it was a tiny bit quieter. The Cutlass was MUCH better looking besides. The only Ford products I rode in after I had the LTD were a Lincoln MKIV, an F150, a couple of Mustangs, and an OJ type Bronco until the later 90’s. None of these made me like Fords any better than I already did, which was that I didn’t like them at all.
I grew up in Chicago, Illinois, USA during the 1970s. A significant percentage of the taxicab fleets used the plain full sized Ford 4 door sedans and station wagons. .Fancy LTDs with covered headlights were in the hands of private ownership. It turned out to be somewhat odd considering that Chrysler had one of their full size car factories in Illinois and for many years the Illinois State Police and many Illinois counties/cities used the plain versions of the full sized Chrysler 4 door sedans and station wagons.
I remember these cars as being 8 years old in 1970 and older brother fresh out of navy looking to buy new car , I remember looking at all makes/models and this with hideaway headlights was cool !
Years ago, circa 2000, I had the chance to pick up this 390 2bbl example in PEI, but passed due the logistics of getting it to Ontario
rear
interior
Interesting stone , parking pad, surrounded by grass. Gets me “nostalgic’ for vent windows..
That is a “for sure, 1970, blue”.
Dean ;
It’s dead easy, just take a greyhound bus to wherever the car is with a duffel bag full of basic tools and some commercial grade jumper cables, been there done that and have the memories and stories (good and bad) to prove it .
That one looks sharp and in VGC .
-Nate
Wow, I have not seen one of these in forever. This one is the spitting image of one owned by a friend’s family when I was in 5th grade, in 1970-71. My friend Joe’s mother drove a turquoise 63 Galaxie 500 sedan, that I really loved. His father (who looked just like Glenn Ford) drove a 70 LTD 4 door in this exact color combo.
Nobody has mentioned one possible reason for these going extinct – these were some of the most prodigious rusters ever built. Large rust holes in quarter panels and lower doors were common in salty climes by the time these cars were 4 or 5 years old. I don’t know if they suffered the same rust problems that destroyed the perimeter frames in the 1965-68 cars, but it would not be surprising. Which is too bad, because these were really solid-feeling cars when they were new (unlike the 71 models).
My friends dad and uncle worked for the “Ford dealer” in our home town. Did about “45” years there, I believe.
Anyway, they always had 4-5 year old “trade ins”.
They’re “69 Full size Ford was green/ grey inside.
Was not dolled up with vinyl top, trim etc.
I recall it did have big wheel covers and white stripe tires. Factory “a/c” too.
The car it replaced was a “65”, more adorned, Galaxie. (burgundy)
The thing that really looks odd to me is the awkward seat belt bottom mounting. Rather than being mounted at the bottom of the pillar (or stub pillar in a hardtop, I guess), it’s mounted at the base of the back seat, making a web for the back passengers to climb through. Why on earth would they have done this?
Great build Peter! Love it.
If I recall correctly, these had separate lap and shoulder belts for outboard front seat passengers. The shoulder seat belt is not mounted at the base of the back seat. It is just hanging down from the side of the ceiling, and appears attached below. It attached on the sides of the ceiling at the top of the b-pillar, on both the driver’s and passenger’s side.
Look more closely…the shoulder belt is just a strap bolted to the roof rail…it’s simply hanging down to the floor..creating an optical illusion in that particular shot if it was properly stowed on its clips it wouldn’t even be visible.
You don’t see the sister car either very much. I haven’t seen many full size Mercuries between 1969-76. If I see a Grand Marquis it is more likely 1977-78 for some reason. I don’t know if their frames evolved over time or the E-coat was also finally being used. From the 65 model year on up into the early 70’s these full size Fords had frame rust issues pretty bad.
Last I saw one of the big 1970 Mercurys was around 1987–it was parked on the corner of James & Summit Sts., Newark NJ. I was like, “Oh, there’s a familiar face I’ve haven’t seen in a while!” After that, never saw another one on the street.
Looked like this:
George Henderson drove a 1970 Ford LTD Country Squire in “Harry and the Hendersons”, but the wagon took lots of abuse during the movie.
Ah my favorite Ford. I had two 70 models, both Broughams. One was a dark ivy green sedan, and one was a white coupe. In my opinion, the most beautiful dashboard Ford ever executed.
I used to despise full-size cars like these as land yachts, boats, barges, garbage scows, etc., with their wallowing, pillow soft ride and Novocain-assisted steering and brakes, but as I’ve gotten older, they’ve grown on me. Especially since I’ve discovered that they can be tuned and/or retrofitted to handle better, while retaining the traditional body-on-frame construction that I miss so much! Add in a big American V8 under the hood, driving the rear wheels, and these have become, dare I say it, cool!
I really liked the 1969 – 1972 full size Fords. We had a 1969 Custom 4 Door in the family as well a very stripped down 1970 wagon. Before switching over to a long run of Impalas and base model Caprices I had a 72 Galaxie 2 dr hardtop.
I liked that car but the 4 door sedans had a more solid feel and seemed to stay tighter longer.
While these cars were built in large numbers just like their GM counterpart they never had the charm that would make them collectable. They were also very rust prone especially in regions of the country with hard winters. While survival rates are low decent looking survivor cars do show up every now and then.
They LTD sedans are interesting as most LTD buyers seemed to opt for a hardtop.
The one pictured really does deserve to be rescued.
My buddy had a green ‘70 LTD . He got back from a year in Okinawa in late ‘87 and his dad had sold his HS car( surplus Ma Bell two tone white over green, three on the tree phone company van) and Sunday night , after the Simpsons, we would drive back down to Camp Pendleton. It was awesome because we could pull over at Dennys and stretch out and take a proper nap on the way back. Good times! I was watching the old Hawaii 5-0 with my boys and my youngest asked why the car kept moving after it was stopped.?
Book’em Dan-O! Murder 1! Yes, Steve McGarrett’s preferred ride was a Mercury Marquis (still no DeSade Edition, according to Car & Driver, LOL)! Most cop shows, at least in Quinn-Martin productions, used basic Ford full-size sedans (Custom 500). I can still picture Karl Malden and Michael Douglas in the Streets of San Francisco, Karl wearing his trademark fedora, Michael bareheaded, driving their police-issued, unmarked Custom 500 sedan, as the chase started, one of them would reach over and pull the magnetic “gumball” emergency light from the dashboard and stick it to the roof as the siren began to wail!