(first posted 12/5/2018) One of the nice things of living on Canada’s mild West Coast is the myriad of older cars we see. It is rarely below freezing here in Vancouver, so old cars like this can be seen quite regularly.
Behold a completely original Ford Fairmont. I don’t know the year off the top of my head, but I think it is a 1978. It is parked outside near the home of a client. It has the original paint and zero rest, thanks to Vancouver’s salt free (mostly) roads.
But there is even more! The first owner had Paul’s favourite accessory installed: clear plastic seat covers! The car has obviously been outside for its entire life, show how rare the sun shines in Vancouver.
I have not spoken to the owner, but I would assume it has the 3.3 litre boat anchor six and a three speed automatic behind it, the same as my driver’s ed car. I thought it was a slug then. Imagine driving it now!
It’s amazing how often original cars in cream puff condition come out of the woodwork, even though we are well into the 21st century at this point. Even though my uncle was a senior FoMoCo engineer during this time, I don’t think he ever owned a Fairmont. I’m pretty sure he held on to his 1972 Mercury Cougar XR7 that he bought new until he died a month after I was born.
In fact, Canada’s West Coast is the home of abundant old cars. The climate is very mild and most folks don’t drive a lot.
It would indeed be slow. These are easy to fix, simple to understand, cheap and drive decently. Visibility is great, too. I would happily drive it all day sideways through the snow.
It’s not a ’78 because the quad-light grille was only offered on “basket-handle” coupes that year (and the Mercury Zephyr); Futura sedans and wagons came in for ’79.
And in its’ final (half?) model year, 1983, it was the last Ford car to have “Ford” in block letters at the front and rear instead of the blue oval.
Actually, I thought a Futura sedan didn’t come into the mix until 1980. I had a 1979 basket handle, and that front end stayed unique to the 2 door Futura coupe for 1979.
IIRC, by the time the party ended for the Fairmont in 1983 (before it was reincarnated as a little LTD), the single headlight front end was gone and this was the only look for all of the Fairmonts from the front end.
That was a good change for Ford.
The blue oval looks much better than the word Ford in block letters.
Excellent find Len. I believe quad headlights were introduced on the Fairmont in 1981. The Zephyr had them from 1978.
By 1981, the X and K Cars, had already eclipsed the Fairmont as state of the art in domestic compacts. Even when new, I wasn’t a huge fan of the Fairmont’s styling. To me, they looked flimsy. The Volare/Aspen may have been obsolete compared to the Ford, but they at least appeared more substantial and dare I say, robust. Unlike the Chryslers and downsized GM products, I could never visualize the Fairmont in police duty (or taxi service). I preferred the ’78 A bodies among the three competitors.
A small item, but besides going to quad headlights improving the Fairmont’s looks, I thought Ford should have went with clear turn signal lenses up front with amber bulbs, for a more elegant appearing front clip. Rather than the amber lenses they went with. Which I find cheapened the overall look.
By 1982, most people who bought a state-of-the-art X-car instead of a Fairmont were regretting that decision.
Ha, no kidding. It certainly was a highly competitive era for domestic small car competition. With class leading compacts being deemed out-of-date to newly launched competitors in one or two year periods in some cases.
Even during those pre-internet days, it did not take long for the X-cars to earn a bad reputation.
During the late 1970s, the Big Three were downsizing their line-ups at a different pace, so their offerings no longer lined up neatly against each other.
When the Fairmont debuted, it was initially priced about $630 lower than a comparable Malibu. That translates to about $2,500 today. The Fairmont was initially pitched as a compact replacement for the Maverick, while the A-cars were downsized versions of the former Colonnade intermediates.
This distinction soon disappeared, particularly as Ford’s intermediate sedan offers faded from view. I’ve seen ads from 1979 that compare the Fairmont to the Malibu. But they were initially envisioned as filling different market segments, which most likely accounts for some of the differences in “feel” between the two products. The Fairmont was developed as a compact, not an intermediate.
The real Ford competitors to the downsized A-bodies were the 1980 Ford Thunderbird and Mercury Cougar XR-7 in the personal luxury class, followed by the 1981 Ford Granada and Mercury Cougar in the sedan class. Ford did make upgrades to the Fox platform for those cars.
The ’81-’82 Granada/Cougar and certainly the ’83-’86 LTD/Marquis were promoted as Mid Size by Ford, yes. By this time, Fairmont model name was fading into history.
Fairmonts and Zephyrs did use clear lenses and amber bulbs originally, on both the two and four headlight versions, before changing to amber lenses. I don’t recall which year it was. Several cars seemed to switch between those two options; not sure why manufacturers do this.
I remember thinking same thing that looked flimsy and cheap compared to the volare but everyone I know who had it got great service out of it. Including taxi drivers. My friend Miz Rollins had one that she used as a cab for 20 years on original drivetrain. It was reliable and had over 500,000 miles.
The 1959 Plymouth Fury I bought in 1979 had those clear plastic seat covers too. They were really heavy vinyl and were themselves in just as good of condition as the upholstery they were protecting.
After all these years I still have mixed feelings for these Fairmonts. Your interior shot reminds me of how thin the seat cushions were. The whole car just felt insubstantial.
I was also never a fan of Ford’s greenhouse designs during this era. There were so many things going on there with various levels of frames and seams. Especially near the C pillar there is just way too much happening.
It does look busy near the C-pillar. Most likely the quarter window in the rear door was put there to allow the passengers to wind down the door window. Without the division, there is no way that the window could have retracted very far into the door.
This owner did what my grandmother used to do — get plastic seat covers and then put towels or bedsheets over the plastic on the front seat. This serves three purposes, listed here in decreasing order of importance:
1) It adds a second layer of protection for the seats;
2) It ensures the plastic seat covers themselves don’t get damaged, scuffed, or marked up, because they’re expensive; and
3) It keep your legs from sticking to them… but leave the rear seat as bare plastic so your passengers can see the pretty upholstery design and they can experience the joy of their own legs sticking to the plastic.
My grandmother also had plastic covers on her couch — kept covered with bedsheets most of the time, but removed when company came over so that people could see the pretty upholstery design and experience the joy of their legs sticking to the plastic. As you can tell, I’m quite quite a fan of these things.
In the film “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” plastic upholstery covers were prominent. I asked a coworker from a Greek family what she thought about the film and she said it cracked her up, it was exactly how her family worked. “We must find you a good Greek boy,” she was told.
A Greek girl I was keen on in high school let me know there was no future as her parents had a husband arranged for her already. Ten years later a Greek work colleague married an Aussie boy. Changing times, or rebellion against tradition?
Your seatcover observation fits with my car floor observation. There were metal floors. That got covered by rubber mats. Which got replaced by carpet. Which got covered by rubber mats. Which got carpeted inserts. Which became virtually all carpet. And now Weather Tech does a great business by covering the whole mess with – rubber mats.
I hadn’t thought of that before, and it’s a good analogy.
The first accessory I buy for a car now is WeatherTech mats. I’ve used them in our Odyssey for nine years, and they’ve protected that van’s carpets through countless hiking trips, snow storms, coffee spills, etc. Occasionally I remove them and admire the new-looking carpet… and them replace the mats so that no one else will ever see that new-looking carpet.
My grandma and her plastic seat covers would be proud.
As Paul once called this the rare honest car, WeatherTech is that rare honest company. When my mom got her 16 Fusion I bought her a full set of mats. Well, for some reason the plastic started delaminating around the edges and where your heel would rest near the pedals. A couple emails later and she had a whole new set sent to her. I have a full set in my 18 Buick as well.
This layering of covers on the floor can be quite dangerous. The famous unintended acceleration of a loaner Lexus in Southern California which resulted in the deaths of four people was the direct result of the wrong, thick SUV floor mats being placed on top of the floor mats already in the car. There were other factors, as well (the loaner had severely worn brake pads reported by the previous driver, and the driver who was killed was a state trooper who undoubtedly had a lead foot) but the ultimate culprit was, indeed, the accelerator pedal catching on the floor mat.
The ultimate result was that, today, Toyota OEM floormats are about half the size before the accident, meaning they’re effectively useless.
Recent cars we’ve owned (Japanese) have had full-sized floor mats, with hooks to prevent slippage.
I think the only really high-wear spots are under the pedals; they could save a little weight by omitting the rest.
Unfortunately, that’s exactly the opposite of what Toyota has done: they removed all the material from underneath the pedals (so as to keep them from getting caught), leaving only the largely unused area just in front of the driver’s seat base.
The car is nice, I like those Fairmonts, they were a great rerun of the Falcon from 18 years earlier, reliable, economical transportation that didn’t have any noteworthy problems. I think they appealed to the same people left high and dry when Dart/Valiant production ended.
The plastic seat covers fit the stereotype. In my experience it’s an old school Italian cultural thing, (my lovely in-laws are an example), or Depression-era holdover, cover your new upholstery in plastic, then use it, wear that uncomfortable slippery plastic like a hair shirt to remind you and your guests of your virtuous, sacrificing ways.
I think the Dart comparison is apt. I used to drive a Fairmont wagon for work and thought it was a great car for it’s intended segment. I couldn’t kill it despite my aggressive driving. It handled well and didn’t look like it wanted to be something it wasn’t. It wasn’t fast, but I’d always driven small cars and it had adequate power for everyday driving.
I would be happy with one now, but would do a work-up on the suspension. I assume Mustang parts fit.
I have commented on my steaming POS 78 Zephyr before.
My dad died in 1990, I inherited his car, a Fairmont Futura coupe, with the Pinto 2.3, in the same color as this car. It ran like crap too. Couldn’t wait to see the back side of that thing.
The continued use of the plastic seat covers makes me want to know more about the owner. Seems like something that would have been done when it was purchased new…nearly 4 decades ago, yet here we are with the plastic still in place. Original owner?
“Look”, I’d tell them, “it’s been 35 years. Don’t you think it’s time to live a little by sitting directly on that fabric? You’ve earned it.”
My best friend in high school drove a 78 one of these in the exact same pale yellow that seemingly covered 90% of all Fairmonts sold.We jokingly called it “The Sexy Fairmont” as it was, even at the time, the exact opposite of sexy. The only redeeming quality it had was that it was fairly new, compared to most of our friend’s cars (this being 1979-1980, when I graduated HS). Competent, yes. Coveted, no. My 77 Monte Carlo was the preferred ride by most of my friends instead.
I had one.
It was a great car.
A 1981 Ford Fairmont Futura.
Until I drove it, I thought all American cars were garbage. This Ford made me a Ford fan.
It had the six.
It had rear wheel drive.
It was two-toned silver with a red interior.
They do look flimsy, but they weren’t. They do look square and they were. There was a lot of room in them. They were very easy to see out of. It look a while to get used to driving around in it.
It wasn’t slow. It had to take me everywhere in Colorado, and I don’t remember it suffering from high altitude, a lack of speed, or that it struggled going over the high mountain passes.
It was a very good car.
Awww, where’s the picture of that bony brown plastic steering wheel?
As well as the mis-aligned plastic glove box door.
“They were very easy to see out of…”
I say bring back cars with good visibility.
+ 1
One of the main reasons I bought my Golf was the excellent visibility.
Well, you can always buy a convertible, excellent visibility with the top down, with the top up maybe not so much.
I have seen but fortunately never had to ride in a car with the clear plastic seat covers. At one time they were virtually standard equipment for the “good furniture”, and yes it was uncomfortable to sit on. My wife’s aunt had some on her living room furniture as recently as 10-12 years ago; fortunately that room was not used when she had guests, we got to sit on actual upholstery in another room.
That was the main reason we went crossover- massive glass area. We won the size game with a vehicle smaller than a Civic.
I remember learning to drive on a ’78. As someone mentioned these felt flimsy, and they had that awful, abrupt throttle tip-in Ford built into their products at the time to give the illusion of acceleration!
I’m surprised that plastic seat covers were available at the time the Fairmont was new.
They were a thing back when my father bought his 1962 Comet. I have seen many nice older cars from the Vancouver area on Kijiji and now that I have extended family on Vancouver Island, perhaps my next old car will come from that part of the country.
I drove a Fairmont in the identical color (but with dog dish hubcaps) as a company pool car for several years. Had a 4 speed manual with the 4 cylinder engine. Slow off the line, but with the most powerful A/C which was deeply appreciated in the Deep South.
As with most pool cars, it last only 5 years before it was replaced by a bank of K cars which didn’t to be as reliable.
For three decades, Ford seemed to consistently come up with the absolute cheapest new compact every ten years. First, there was the Falcon. Then, there was the Maverick. Finally, the Fairmont. Each one of them, in their most austere version, was among the most spartan car one could buy, and each one looked and drove like it, too.
I have a friend with a Boss 302 powered ’71 Maverick, T5 manual trans, and Global West suspension. I can assure you, It does not drive like a cheap penalty box. 🙂
Car is scary fast, and has brakes so good you can lose your chewing gum. Can you say Shelby Maverick?
How true that is, rudiger. The ‘spartan’ accommodations inside my aging FORD are part of its charm. You can always find one with more ‘stuff’ in it or on it, but I find it more fun to check out the cheapest-of-the-cheap models to see what’s ~not~ in them. 😀
The ‘66 Tempest I inherited from my grandparents (through my Uncle) in 1985 or so still had plastic seat covers fitted. The seat fabric was pristine when I removed them. The seat covers had a diamond bump texture to them that quickly replicated itself in negative on my six year old legs. That I frequently got carsick may have played into their installation in the first place.
Plastic seat covers were fitted to lots of cars here they could have even been factory, I bought an old Vauxhall with them on, once removed the seats were the best part of the car. An ownership search though proved the car had spent time as a taxi on an Auckland island called Waiheke so maybe the covers were for that duty, island life certainly explained the rust.
It appears to be an 1983 with Fox-body Thunderbird hubcaps in place of the stock plastic turbine caps.
I owned one with the 200 six and C5 automatic. Reliable as a refrigerator and less fun to drive.
The very definition of ‘transportation appliance’.
… in place of the stock plastic turbine caps.
A co-worker of mine had a 79 Mustang, 302/4 speed, bought new, with those turbine wheel covers. Before the 1 year warranty was out, three of the covers had broken and fallen off. The dealer replaced the broken ones under warranty, but Gary wondered what the future held when the warranty was done as the covers cost $70 each.
The Mustang also ran like crap.
It was sold off in a year.
Well Steve, I must say, I thought those wheel covers were great!
The reminded me of the allow wheels on mid/late 70s Alfa Romeo Alfetta sedans/coupes. I actually thought they were alloy wheels! I don’t know how or why, but at some point (probably the local Ford dealer), I touched one and I realized I had been fooled! But never mind, I was sold, so when my dad decided to get a new 1980 Fairmont, since the selection of 4-cyl, 4-speeds was virtually non-existent (2-door stripper) and he was going to order the car, I persuaded him to get the “Turbine Wheel Covers”.
Eventually I inherited the car. Over 6 years and 80k miles, ours looked as good (fake alloys) then as they did new.
One of my friends in high school had a 78 Mustard with the 255 and a VV carb. It too ran like crap. A swap meet 4 bbl and manifold were swapped in. The car ran fantastically well after that. Emissions were well within state guidelines so the inspectors never looked under the hood too carefully.
I hope your buddy didn’t pay much for that 255 V8 to swap it into his ’78 Mustang II. Maybe if his Mustang was in good shape, originally had a four cylinder that had a catastrophic failure, and he got the 255 for free, it would have been worth the effort.
The 255 is widely regarded as one of Ford’s worst V8 engines (which is really saying something). Essentially a smaller bore 302, it has different heads and parts don’t interchange without modification. The only thing it did well was meet emissions regulations, and nothing else. Even fuel mileage was no better than the 302 The 255 V8 was only available 1980-82 and was then quietly dropped.
Car and Driver modified a 255, and backed it up with Ford’s new 4-speed auto in 1981, and it was as quick as the 1979 302.
In 1982, the 302 returned–and was available with a 4-speed.
I was in high school then, and thought this was the best car–till the 83 Rabbit GTI came out.
In my mind, more than any other cars sold in the US, especially the 82 Mustang 302 and also the 83 Rabbit GTI represent dawn ot the post-malaise era–modestly priced quick, fun cars.
Soon they would be joined by the 83 Prelude, Corolla GTS, MR2, CRX, even the Camaro Z28, fuel injection and engine electronic management systems would banish the malaise era forever.
Now, after a great 30-year run, we are once again at the dawn of another dark age…the electric/autonomous car, combined with boring crossovers, and overzealous activists will once again take the fun out of cars.
The lack of UV damage is striking, perhaps it was a garage queen in a previous life?
Perhaps, but it rains a lot in Vancouver.
My dad was a terrible cheapskate about cars. He had a 1970 Pontiac Sratochief with zero options. In theory a six and three on the tree were available, but every one I saw had a Chevrolet 350 in it, most with Powerglide,
It had the most horrid rough, cheap, vinyl seats one could put in a car. The interior was all black and in the summer it got like a furnace. Paul had his dad, we had our mom. We were not, repeat not, allowed to roll down a window, should we mess mother’s hair. This was on pain of extreme drama. On top of this, they both smoked like a factory.
The raised dots on that stuff would sear into my flesh and grate like sandpaper. I used to get sick and hurl all over the place and was therefore drugged with Gravol, It was only much later in life that I realised it was not motion sickness, but tobacco poisoning.
Ahh, Irish families in the 1970’s.
The popularity of vent windows on cars in the 1960s and early to mid 70s likely helped prevent (or at least reduce) various respiratory conditions, and/or cancers in young children.
LOL, I watch a guy on you tube in Canada who has a thing for base models and Exner Chryslers, has a vast collection of junkers that run mostly 50s cars and old Citroens, Dailies a Kaiser, lots of old cars around in Canada it seems.
At least this one is not the Flesh color some these came in. Why they never put a 2150 carb on the six is beyond me.
What a great leap forward the Fairmont was compared with its predecessors and forebears in the Ford family. Here is a car with a useable back seat which does not have the tortured, lumpy, bumpy, bloated styling of other seventies Fords and does not weight 4500 lbs and have enormous two foot wasted space overhangs at each end and is not being marketed as a Mercedes Benz look alike. Despite as mentioned being cheap feeling and somewhat flimsy and austere, it was a great leap forward. . . Right into the front wheel drive tidal wave. Did any car ever go from tomorrow’s hero to yesterday’s fish as quickly as the Fairmont? The x and k cars arrived and that was it.
Re the plastic sheets on the furniture, this was a generation who had lived through scrimping and saving and hand me downs and making do and when they finally got something nice, they intended it to stay that way. This was also the generation of covering Everything. There were macrame covers for the television, plastic tents for the toaster and mixer, carpeted covers for the toilet seat, knitted covers for the tissue boxes. . . And even appliances meant to be seen like stereos and clock radios had bizarre plastiwood finishes. Radios at one point were vacuum tubed in wood cabinets, but a vcr? A clock radio?
I have been inspired to rant. Old man bitchiness ahead!
I would never use plastic seat covers like that. Seats are for sitting. They are supposed to wear and get dirty. For me cars are not displays in a museum, that are meant to be used and enjoyed. Life is too short to be petty.
I can’t stand those Weather Tech mats either. They look big and gaudy and ugly to me. If I pay for carpet, I want to feel and see carpet, not big blocky rubber things. Let it get dirty. Or wash it. Or do as I do and get cheap carpeted mats and replace them when they get worn. They’re like ten bucks a set. You always have new under your feet for almost nothing.
The absolute worst seat material I experienced was in a ’72 Torino. It was my Grandfather’s car, and my mother borrowed it for a couple of weeks when I was eight. It was a flat black rubbery, roughly-textured asphalt-waste-petro-product kind of stuff. You couldn’t slide yourself on the seat if you wanted to. The whole interior seemed to be filled with similar materials. I never had an opinion on car interiors before that. But it was just gross! The car was a sort of olive green, and even had really blah hubcaps. The whole car was just depressing. Made my mom’s lemon-fresh ’77 Subaru feel very fancy in comparison, and that’s just crazy!
I don’t mean to offend the WeatherTech fans. I know they make good products. Just not my thing. Okay, end of rant.
Never liked the Fairmonts, especially the sedans. Particularly with the original grille. As others have noted, they looked insubstantial. Plus, that over-tall greenhouse was really awkward – yet Honda pulled it off with aplomb in my ’88 Civic.
As to seat covers, these were not as common as they once were by the time this Fairmont rolled around. But it used to be very common to buy a new car and fit it with seat covers, a testimony to the poor wearing quality and stain resistance of OEM upholstery in those days.
When I was in college in the mid 80’s I remember seeing a black over white ’64 Sixty Special with plastic seat covers over pristine cloth seats and black vinyl floor mats with unblemished white Cadillac crests. A true time capsule. I wonder where it is now?
Standup comedian Jeff Foxworthy had a joke that went (and I paraphrasing a bit here):
“If you have a Ford Fairmont,
and people come up to you at the WalMart parking lot
and tell you what a nice car you’ve got,
you might be a redneck!”
I have been looking for a fitted front bench seat clear vinyl or plastic seat cover for a 1962 Ford Sunliner. Any help? Thank you
All original except for those hubcaps; although they are indeed Ford hubcaps. The car is a survivor, regardless.
As if vinyl seats aren’t bad enough.
I don’t understand why leather and leathette is in. Back to the same problems of too cold or too hot seats.
Another cool survivor .
Washington State too used to be chock full of rust free older vehicles .
I was never impressed by the Fairmont but so many say they’re great I think I missed out .
-Nate
In my FoMoCo adventures I’ve owned and daily driven a 65 Falcon, a 79 Zephyr and an 82 Mustang at different times in my life. All had the “boat-anchor” 200, and all did a fine job of getting me from point A to point B. Forget about any hint of performance … reliability was their strength. None of them could touch my lightly modified 78 Fiesta for fun and games, though, and I miss that Fiesta far more than the others. They’re all long gone now, but my 62 Ranchero still waits patiently for me in my back yard, where it has languished for decades.
Clear plastic seat covers? That`s a Brooklyn (NY) thing. Going from inside the living room sofa and chairs and sometimes the dining room chairs then into the cars, the idea was to keep your furniture looking like new for as long as you owned it. This practice was fairly common among working class Italian Americans. A neighbor had a `67 Chrysler Newport 4 door sedan with them.Even with the air conditioning on, your body just felt like it was glued on those hot vinyl seats.He owned that Chrysler for almost 30 years and kept it like new, but those clear plastic eat covers never came out of that car!
I graduated from university in 1979 and secured a permanent job in August of that year. I decided it was time to replace my 66 Ford Custom 500.
My funds were still limited so while I really wanted a midsized coupe I set my sights on domestic compacts. At GM the 1979 rwd X cars were sold out and the fwd X cars and the A cars were out of my price range. I looked at an Aspen and a Volare before going to the Ford dealer who had a 79 Fairmont Futura with a 200 six and a four speed manual. It was indeed slow, slower than my 66 Ford and slower than the slant six Volare with an automatic so I said no thanks. In the end I bought a 79 Concord D/L hatchback with a 258 automatic. Faster than the Fairmont, fancier than the Fairmont and only $300 more. I drove it for five years and sold it to my brother who sold it to my other brother who sold it to my sister. The car was in the family over 10 years. I did get a Fox platform car eventually as the Concords replacement was an 85 T-Bird with a fuel injected 302.