Junkyard Find: 1965 Ford Thunderbird Landau


A perfectly restored example of a 1964-66 Ford Thunderbird is worth plenty. A beat-up example, even a non-rusty California car, on the other hand… well, it’s one of those cases where you can start with a thousand-dollar car, apply 15 grand to get it into pretty nice shape, and end up with a car worth $9,500. This cruel math is the reason that today’s Junkyard Find was spotted at a San Francisco Bay Area wrecking yard a few weeks back.

The body is rough (though not rusty) and the interior smells like a mixture of mildew and Porta-Potty, but this car still has much to offer someone restoring a nicer T-Bird.

Now this is a proper landau roof!

My ideal car interior would combine mid-60s Thunderbird and mid-80s Subaru XT controls. Throw in some early-90s Chrysler Whorehouse Red velour and it would be perfect.





















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- MaintenanceCosts So there is no Sonata trim without some type of Theta engine.It seems like they've been doing a bit better when attached to a hybrid system, so that's probably the one to get, but they're going to have to go several years without further engine troubles before I'd trust a H/K ICE product again.
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10-4 on T-Bird economics. Almost cheaper to buy three at $1,000 each, and mix and match until you have one $6,000 bird. Best deals from the '60's now seem to be Buick/Olds hardtop sedans and maybe an inline six B-pillar Impala or Chevelle, but then only because they're going to be the next big thing.
Bings back memories when America actually had decent auto and space industry. Everything stinks today........