(first posted 7/25/2016) In last week’s post on Motor Trend’s comparison of 1969 mid size sedans, Ate Up With Motor pointed out that the Fairlane 500 2-door hardtop featured in that test was likely also used by Road Test Magazine for a drive report in May 1969. Sure enough, the car is the same! So let’s see how different drivers responded to the familiar Fairlane.
First off, to demonstrate beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is the exact same Wimbledon White Fairlane 500 used by both Road Test and Motor Trend, let’s check out the California black plate. Though very hard to see, especially on the Road Test shots, the last 3 digits (014) are unmistakeable. So this was a popular member of the Ford Public Relations fleet in Southern California!
Unlike Motor Trend, one detail that Road Test Magazine got right was pricing for the Fairlane: RT correctly used the retail prices for the car and the options (perhaps MT used dealer cost by mistake?). At $3,891 as equipped ($25,555 adjusted), this Fairlane 500 2-door hardtop was nicely priced for a well-optioned, high style mid-market car. Though today mid size 2-doors are virtually non-existent, there is still a current comparison available: the Honda Accord Coupe LX-S CVT retails for $24,875.
Ford was keen to showcase the new 351 V8, though the 2-barrel set-up was geared more toward economy than performance. But if economy was the goal, most buyers probably would have been better served by the smaller 302 2V V8. As for performance, Motor Trend was off the line more quickly, taking 17.1 seconds to hit 81 mph in the 1/4 mile standing start test. Road Test clocked 20 seconds to 82, though they estimated that on a dry track their elapsed time would have dropped to around 18 seconds.
There was a stark contrast, however, in the fuel economy observed. Road Test measured the Fairlane as delivering 12.5 miles per gallon, not that impressive for an “economy-oriented” engine. Motor Trend’s results were far more optimistic, with a range of 14.2 to 17 miles per gallon.
Both magazines noted that the Fairlane offered a soft ride and benign handling in normal, straight-line driving, but felt that handling fell apart as speeds increased and curves appeared. While steering response was universally praised, the editors differed on steering feel, however, with Road Test noting that “there’s not much road feel” while Motor Trend praised it as offering “good, solid road feel.” Who to believe? Given that Ford’s “marshmallow tuning” era was underway by 1969, I’d have to go with Road Test’s assessment on this one.
The Fairlane’s brakes were criticized by both Road Test and Motor Trend for being “grabby” though their actual stopping ability was praised. For whatever reason, Motor Trend editors were able to stop in 126.1 feet from 60 mph, versus the 138 foot stop achieved by Road Test’s drivers.
All testers liked the interior of the Fairlane, with high marks given for comfort, while criticism centered around things like the really small glovebox and the highly styled gauge cluster that, despite looking like it would offer comprehensive instrumentation, merely housed idiot lights, speedo, minimal gauges and an optional clock.
Ultimately, this Fairlane 500 was deemed “middle-of-the-road” in most ways by both magazines. Buyers agreed, rewarding the Fairlane 500 hardtop with decent but not spectacular sales: 28,179 found homes for 1969. Other Ford mid-size 2-doors were more popular, like the SportsRoof hardtops, which offered more in the way of sporty style and earned higher sales, both as a Fairlane 500 (29,849 sold) and a Torino GT (61,319 sold). At the lower-priced end of the spectrum, the plain Fairlane 2-door Hardtop was more economical and affordable than its fancier-trimmed coupe sibling, and was favored by 85,630 buyers, making it the most popular mid-size Ford body style for 1969. Only the Torino 2-door “formal” hardtops less popular than the Fairlane 500 version: 20,789 Torinos and 17,951 Torino GTs left the factory with that roofline.
Still it fun to keep seeing this Fairlane 500 press workhorse as it made its rounds in Southern California and demonstrating the smack dab middle of Ford’s 1969 line.
It’s one of my favorite Fords of the late ’60s, and one I’d like to own today, as a more exclusive alternative to contemporary Mustangs, which seem to be everywhere these days.
Though Fairlane-Torino exclusive parts probably can’t be found everywhere these days.
While considered mid-size then, I’d consider it a large car today. If only American cars had remained close to this size & quality, instead of turning into the humongous, shabby barges we were saddled with by the mid ’70s!
Happy Motoring, Mark
It’s funny the way different people come at the same car. This is one of your faves, but would be down at the very bottom of my list. I have never been much of a GM guy, but by 1969, the A bodies were finally getting away from the miserable 2 speed automatics, and were pretty appealing cars. Even though I have a disposition towards Fords, one of these would be low on my list. An LTD vs. a Caprice – that would be a completely different story.
I remember in high school, 1979, i had a book on USED cars and it covered known defects, recalls, and service bulletins.
The car with the least known issues in the whole book was 69 – 71 Fairlane -Torinos with small blocks.
There was ONE issue relating to the throttle cable and/or linkage and that was all.
One line.
That stuck in my mind because every other car in the book had a list of problems from more than a few to MANY.
I wish i still had that publication.
What a come down from the exuberantly styled cars of 10 years before. Yes, the Atomic Era cars were not very well assembled for the most part but what lookers inside and out. I couldn’t imagine having had a ’57-59 anything and then being faced with this as a new car option. (yes, I know, the ’57-’59 wouldn’t have lasted until 1969, but) There’s not a single must-have line or ornament or anything on this car. If I had to buy a car in 1969 the Cutlass line was beautifully styled.
Ford did quite a job for a few years of making the Fairlane/Torino mimic the styling features of that year’s big Ford. There is a lot of 1969 Galaxie 500/LTD in the trim details of this car.
I always found the Ford midsizers of this generation to have little to recommend them. The GM cars were more stylish and seemed to use nicer quality materials inside. The Mopars would outhandle them and proved to be tougher.
I can’t remember a single person that I knew back then whose family had one of these. The GM A bodies were commonplace and the Mopars were commonly seen, especially on TV and in taxi livery. The Ford buyers in my life tended towards either Mustangs or big Fords. These should have sold better than they did, and kind of receded into the background once they left the showroom.
I don’t know about you, but the starters on Mopars always sounded soooo different compared to Ford and GM. To my ears, they always sounded about ready to give up the ghost.
I always thought that Chrysler starters sounded like Dino the Dinosaur.
Tidbits:
The chart says it’s tail-heavy; could this be a misprint?
I’ve never heard of a car offered with an option to relocate the battery; very unusual. Would it really have made a difference here though? It might in a smaller car.
How could A/C keep out smog? Only in the past couple decades have cars commonly been offered with cabin filters, & with even these, manufacturers only promise they’ll capture larger particles like dust & pollen.
How could A/C keep out smog?
With the A/C on max and the windows up your just recycling the air in the car and not pulling in ADDITIONAL outside smoggy air so technically it’s keeping smog out.
As nothing cleans up the air which is as polluted inside as out, recirculation should make no difference. You need something to ●remove● pollutants to benefit from this.
Now if you’re following someone burning tobacco or oil, & don’t wish to ingest more, then you have a point.
I would think that some portion of the particulate pollution would be captured and expelled along with the moisture being condensed out as the air is cooled and dried. I’m not well enough versed in chemistry to say if the amount would be significant or not.
Well old school batteries could weigh as much as the difference between some big blocks and small blocks, and if you ordered a car with all the performance options checked and the convenience/comfort convenience options unchecked (which one could back then) the curbweight could be low enough where a 70+lb battery moved to the trunk would make a measurable difference in weight distribution.
I think it was an option on quite a few Fords and Mercuries in the total performance late 60s, the take rate appeared to be extremely low though
How wonderful, to be able to order a basic coupe such as this Fairlane with 4 spd on the floor attached to a 351…
Interesting that they call the departed 289 venerable. A less than decade old engine family in 1969.
Wiki says Ford increased the Windsor block to 302in² only in response to a change in race rules, which surprised me. Again, not a good reason to label the otherwise similar 289 “venerable.”
It was the long-lived 302 which, in hindsight, deserves to be called “venerable.”
Well, Wiki is sometimes dubious. I think the real reason is that cars were getting heavier and they tried to safely ring out as many cubes as possible from the Windsor small block. Possibly emission issues as well, as longer strokes are more suitable for this.
That was my theory too, for other engines were getting upsized in that time frame, like Cadillac’s, the SBC, & the FE’s replacement, the 385-series. Maybe both were reasons.
Obviously so. Chevy went to a 307 for their base small V8; Ford wasn’t going to be left behind.
The SCCA thing is a red herring, as there was flexibility in the rules. IIRC, Chrysler used a de-stroked 340 for the Trans Am race series.
The writers state the car has a ladder chassis, wrong, it’s a unibody!
Also, the last caption under the the pic of the engine states a 427 was available (it wasn’t), when right in the text is the correct information.
Interesting that this press car was equipped with intermittent wipers, very inexpensive
($16.85) but very rare nonetheless. This was the electronic type that Ford stole from Robert Kearns, and the ’69 was the first year Ford offered them. It took several years for GM and Chrysler to reverse engineer and offer them. It took even longer for Kearns to get his just deserts in the courts, destroying him and his family in the process.
Re the trunk-mounted battery: I’m pretty sure this was a dealer-installed thing, as the Mustang Boss 429 had a trunk battery, so the parts were in the pipeline.
Re the 351: It has the exact same bore and stroke as the FE 352, 4″x 3.5″, comes to 351.858 CID if you do the math.
I suppose the marketing people wanted us all to know that this was a new engine, so they rounded down instead of up.
Not just marketing; imagine the logistical confusion parts people would have if they retained the previous engine’s reported displacement.
FYI, “Flash of Genius” is a depressing 2008 film dramatization of Kearns’s legal struggle.
“Justice is the interest of the stronger” was Thrasymachus’s definition vs. Socrates.
“ladder frame” Road Test strikes again. I’m really beginning to understand why I didn’t read Road Test back in the day: dry but yet often a bit clueless.
The other big three magazines had their shortcomings, but generally their writers seemed a bit more…um…intelligent. They probably paid better.
Road Test strikes me as a somewhat unfortunate hybrid of the other magazines and Consumer Reports. If I want the boring facts, like the ampere hour of the battery or such, I’d go to the brochure or CR. But back then (and now) I appreciate a bit of intelligent context (and a bit of dry wit/humor) in reviews, and Road Test seems to lack that.
If a reviewer doesn’t even know whether a a car is a uunibody or sits on a frame, how can I trust them to tell e if it has any “road feel”or anything else?
My preference from an informational standpoint in that era was Car Life, which had been bought out by the same organization as Road & Track and had some kind of conjoined editorial staff, but focused on U.S. cars. It was much more technically savvy than most of the others and almost as snarky as Car and Driver without the snobbishness or stunts. It was also less dry than R&T and while its editors were often critical of U.S. cars, they didn’t turn their noses up at them the way R&T typically did anything that wasn’t a European sports car. Unfortunately, they shut down sometime in the middle of 1970.
I think there’s a place for consumer reviewers who aren’t engineering professors or wannabe race car drivers (and/or aspiring to be P.J. O’Rourke/Hunter S. Thompson). The weakness of Road Test at this point is I don’t think they had a technical editor and sometimes it really shows. There’s a lot of automotive engineering stuff that’s not easy to understand and a lot of gearhead myths and assumptions that aren’t entirely correct (or aren’t so cut and dried as people assume), so if you don’t have a strong technical editor, your writers are left with whatever’s in the press kit (which may not be written by technical writers either) and can make some embarrassing gaffes in the use of terms they don’t really understand.
Yes, one would think that a car magazine would have an engineer on staff, but it seems Road Test did not. I read a lot of these Road Test pieces since my brother had a subscription to it.
I was a Car and Driver man, and boy, did this 14 year old thing Brock Yates and David E Davis Jr were just soooo cool. Now I am embarrassed to read their stuff.
Yates did some good commentary — there’s a deeply savage review he did of the Pontiac Bonneville SSEi in 1992 that’s just classic, for instance — but I can’t get past an editorial he did for Car and Driver at some point (mid-90s, maybe) about the absurdly long list of skills and interests he felt all auto enthusiasts MUST have in order to not be fake. (Not just auto journalists, mind, although that would have been silly enough, but “You’re not a real enthusiast unless …”) It made me roll my eyes so hard it gave me a headache. It remains perhaps the single most sophomoric thing I’ve ever read in a car magazine, which is setting the bar very high.
I never had much taste for DEDJr. I appreciated the wit, but I always felt like his determination to make everything into a lifestyle magazine and show off his sophisticated country club tastes was a major weakness. It was occasionally droll, but Jean Shepherd did it much, much better because Shepherd understood how completely arbitrary the lines between high and low culture really are.
Sports Car Graphic for me, guys..
Ate Up: Car Life was absorbed by Motor Trend and had a small statement beneath the main title on the cover: “Combined With Car Life”. Last Bond issue was in 1970.
Also combined with Sportscar Graphic & Wheels Afield.
Ah! Thanks. I was wondering about that.
Hey now! Don’t be correlating a writer’s level of pay to their intelligence! 🙂
Often their seems an inverse relationship these days.
Neighbors had a 69 Fairlane 4 door sedan with the 6 cylinder and automatic transmission, that car ran about as well as my father’s 69 LTD with a 390 and automatic transmission….which is to say not very well.
Yes, these Fairlane/Torinos did draw heavily on the same design cues as the BIG Fords, but if you don’t have a 69 Galaxie or LTD to compare it with, I think the F/T is a fairly plain looking car. I’m biased, but the Mercury Montego looks 100% better inside and out. Unfortunately, from some angles, the Montego looks too narrow. It’s not as classy, but the Plymouth Satellite also looks better than a F/T.
Still, if a nice looking Torino came along, I’m not sure I’d turn up my nose.
The 351/2V seems to have been part of a minor but significant engine trend: bigger regular fuel V-8s as step-up options. Previously, a lot of optional engine choices came with higher compression ratios and a requirement for premium gas. I think for the most part if you wanted something that could get by on regular fuel, you were stuck with a six or the base V-8 for whatever model. Stuff like the 351/2V and Ford and Chevrolet’s later 400/2V small blocks were sort of a middle choice: more torque than the base engine for workaday chores, but not that much more expensive to run. (The bigger engines drank more fuel, of course, but pre-embargo, the price jump from regular to premium was probably a bigger issue, cost-wise, than 1–2 fewer miles per gallon.)
My experience with the 351 of this era is that they didn’t run all that well on regular at all. At something like 9:1 compression a 60’s wedge chamber V-8 is going to be marginal on what they called 93 octane at the time, but was more like 85….
True, particularly once you got some carbon buildup. Still, 9.0:1 was less critical in that regard than the premium fuel engines with 10.25:1 and higher C.R.s.
I had a 68 Fairlane 500 Sports Roof with a 302 and auto trans. It ran very smoothly with good power and got 17 mpg. I had it for two years and loved it. I then went into and air-cooled VW phase, both buses and beetles. It was 30 years until I bought another V8, when I went into a Grand Marquis and Continental phase.
One of the rather odd things about those ’68-’69 Sports Roof Fairlanes is that they were actually ‘cheaper’ than the regular, non-fastback hardtops. I could never quite figure that one out.
perhaps sportier=younger=poorer
I was hoping there’d be more discussion on how auto journalists are mostly left to the mercy of auto manufacturers as to what cars they get. Quite obviously, this Fairlane was what Ford was passing around to all the magazines of the day, and certainly explains how it didn’t really fit in with the four-door sedans that the other manufacturers gave MT for the comparison test.
And here’s a little bit of movie trivia that I always think of whenever I see a ’68-’69 Fairlane hardtop. For the classic movie Bullitt, Ford was the primary supplier for most of the cars and, in fact, the bad guys were supposed to be driving a 1968 Fairlane. But, for whatever reason, it was replaced by a much more sinister-looking triple-black Charger R/T.
Imagine how the chase scene had played out if they’d stuck with a rather mundane looking Fairlane being chased by Steve McQueen in his Mustang fastback. For starters, I doubt a Fairlane, even a ‘high-performance’ version (which would have been a similar 390 dog as the Mustang got) would have handled anywhere near as good as the Charger, and I would imagine it would have been bouncing and wallowing all over the place. At least it would have been more realistic as the Mustang would have truly been able to keep up.
I’ve noticed that if a car maker sponsors a particular make, when the story calls for a fatal crash (and often burn), they make sure the death car is a different make.
Wouldn’t want to give the impression you could die in one of their cars!
I think the 68 and 69 Fairlanes and Torinos are Ford’s most attractive intermediate cars. The introduction of the 351 really filled in the gap between the 289 and 302 and the 390. My father had a 1970 Fairlane 500 – very attractive, but slightly less attractive than the 68 and 69’s.
Yes, that 100-ish cubic inch gap between the 289/302 and the 390 in 1967-68 was huge. Chrysler had almost the same situation in those years with nothing between the 318 and the 383. GM’s way of clustering engine displacements around 50 cid gaps proved to be about right.
Yes, the “014” on the license plate is unmistakable. But it doesn’t prove anything. While it is very probable that both these articles did indeed write up the same car, the “014” on the license plate does NOT confirm it. California manufacturer and dealer plates were numbered by the owning entity, not by the vehicle. “014” was Ford Motor Company, not a particular 1969 Ford Fairlane 500. “015” was General Motors. Note also that they appear to have been doled out alphabetically when the numbers were first assigned…Chrysler had a lower number but I can’t recall which, perhaps 012.
California dealer plates were movable between cars. A dealer would pay for a number of plates, and that was the maximum that dealer could have on the road at one time. I do not know if the interchangeability applied to manufacturer license plates, but if it did, this plate could have been on a 1969 Lincoln a week or a month later.
That’s how it was done at the time of these test reports…I don’t know if things are the same, now.
Very interesting! Now I am curious to check out more plates in these vintage reviews so we can see which makes got which numbers in California.
Do you know anything about the Michigan plates? That would obviously be the other primary state where Big 4 press cars were in service.
Still I think this particular Fairlane is one and the same, based on the options and color combo. I don’t think they would have bothered having 2 identical white Fairlane 500 coupes in the press fleet at the same time. Plus, Motor Trend noted that there were ~8,000 miles on the car when they tested it, so it had clearly seen a lot of duty, likely including its time with Road Test.
Michigan manufactures had a letter “M” between the letters and numbers, dealers had a letter “D” between the letters and numbers. Plates were registered to the dealer/manufacturer, not the car. I worked for an automotive supplier in Michigan and have a friend who was a licensed dealer and used to have dealer plates.
G. Poon is right. While this probably is the same car, the telltale number is not the big “014” on the right, but the smaller number (obscured by the attempt to draw attention to “014”) on the left. In between them are the letters “MFG” from top to bottom.
That’s a classic 1963-69 yellow on black California manufacturer’s plate. I’ve attached a sample to show more clearly. In this case “013” would be the manufacturer, and “1C” would be the specific plate.
Today, it’s a little more complex, with manufacturer and distributor plates for many more makes, and issued over a period of decades. Hyundai and Mitsubishi press vehicles still occasionally show up with 1969-83 yellow on blue distributor plates. The plates are used on cars year after year.
Here’s an example of the 1969-83 yellow on blue manufacturer’s plate, with “8731” being the manufacturer and the specific plate (in this case “14A”) moved to the lower right corner. California has grandfathered in existing blue manufacturer/distributor plates.
Forgot to attach:
And here’s the current manufacturer’s plate design, with the specific plate number stacked vertically to the right:
This is great to learn!! Do you have this information for other states besides California?
GN: Not offhand. I’m an automotive journalist based in California. Most of what I get are California manufacturer or distributor plates, though Ford, FiatChrysler and VW switched to Michigan plates out here, Nissan is Georgia, and Volvo, Jag and Land Rover run New Jersey plates. I just haven’t paid that much attention to sequences in out-of-state plates.
Thanks for the info., and I will look forward to reading your work!
Curious that Nissan runs on Georgia plates when their U.S. operations are based in Tennessee…
Fairlane name was on the way out, and gone by 1971. [Later, Torino was demoted by Gran Torino, etc.] Why didn’t Ford just send out top of the line Torino coupe for car mags?
Better trim and more in line with a ‘family car’. Parents had a ’68 Torino, for a year in 72-73. But my then 17 y/o brother totaled it, luckily only the car was hurt.
Fairlane went to Ford AU they used that name into this century on their upscale offerings.
GN: My error. Nissan is Tennessee plates.
A couple of other notes:
Mitsubishi’s main plate number is “202”. Hyundai’s is “27000”. I’m not sure how Hyundai got blue distributor plates, since they weren’t sold in this country until the late 1980s. Mitsubishi would have made the blue plate cutoff of 1983.
And some oddities:
Hyundai’s press cars have California distributor plates, but despite a fairly extensive partnership with Hyundai, Kias come with standard issue civilian license plates, as do Mazdas.
G. Poon is also right about the 1963-69 black plates being assigned alphabetically, with Ford given “014” and GM given “015”. The “013” example I posted was from Cobra, which in the 60s was its own manufacturer. Most likely Chrysler was “012” and American Motors “011” (though the Rebel in the Motor Trend comparison test is wearing California dealer plates rather than manufacturer or distributor plates.
California dealer plates today follow the same format as the manufacturer and distributor plates, but with DLR stacked vertically on the left side. Example below:
Correction. Hyundai’s main plate number is “17000”.
Glancing at the lead photo, has me thinking the more sensibly-sized Fairlane would have served law enforcement better than the full-sized Fords.
Was the full-size, 2-door Ford sedan for the Canadian-market only? I don’t recall those being available in the US for 1968 or later.
It’s a very dry and analytical review. I’m guessing their circulation wasn’t very high.
The Spanish-built Dodge 3700GT, ’71-up, could be the ’69 American Ford Fairlane’s far-flung twin, as viewed from the front.
That “shoulder belt problem”, alluded to in the review wouldn’t have been a big problem in “69”.
Almost nobody took the shoulder belts down form the ceiling until about 1973/74.
Buy then , the lap/shoulder belts were one long, annoying, thing!
Long time since these ’69 Fairlane ‘road tests’ were published, but the comments re. cosmetic ‘instrumentation pods’ were quite apt (as well as applicable to most U.S. & imported cars at the time). What was NOT mentioned in the testers’ options list was that 1968 & 1969 Fairlane/Torino models offered a matching tachometer, logically housed in the pod next to the speedometer pod! In 1969 I ordered/bought (& still own) a Fairlane 500 wagon so equipped. Predictably, the wagons had a better front-to-rear weight balance vs. coupes/sedans, but still with a front bias. Apparently in early July of 1969, California Air Resources board determined that the 390 FE engine (2bbl or 4bbl) was no longer approved for new Ford mid-sized vehicles. Curiously, they still allowed in the 428 Cobra Jet equipped coupes & sedans, though Ford refused to equip my wagon with a 428 CJ! The 302 & 351 engines did have lower emissions vs. the FE engines, enough so that they did not require Thermactor pumps/air injection to pass then-current standards. Surprise… this also meant the factory-installed 4bbl Windsor reduced front end weight of my wagon by about 200Lbs compared to an FE-engined model! (Think: handling improvement!) With added rear ‘stabilizer bar’, Cobra Jet front bar, serious shocks & larger radials, this wagon eats up mountain twisties!