Estate sales and country auctions typically offer bargains for anybody willing to step away from the limelights of headline-grabbing auctions dedicated to collector cars. Then again, Mopar’s wing cars seem like they’ll sell for noteworthy prices regardless of the venue, as we saw when an unrestored 1970 Plymouth Superbird sold for more than $200,000 over the weekend.
According to Terence N Teeter’s obituary, the NASCAR and Mopar fan who lived in West Alexandria, Ohio, “could and would work on just about anything,” but with a CNC business to run, he always had “a lot of incomplete projects around the old homestead.” Many of those projects were vintage Hemi V-8s – he had at least eight Red Rams, 331s, and other first-generation Hemis in various states of assembly – though he also had a disassembled 383-powered 1966 Dodge Charger undergoing restoration as well as the Superbird.
According to its fender tag and its broadcast sheet, the B5 Blue Superbird came from the factory with a 390hp 440 Six-Barrel engine, Pistol Grip-shifted four-speed manual transmission, 3.54-geared Dana 60, heavy-duty suspension, bucket seats, white vinyl interior, and black vinyl top. Of the 1,935 Superbirds built, 308 came with the Six Barrel/four-speed combination. At some point it had lost its fender scoops and had its nosecone molded to the front fenders, but little seems known about the car prior to when Teeter, then 22 years old, bought it in 1981 with 27,000 miles on it. He got to put another 9,000 or so miles on the odometer before parking it to take the intake and heads off the 440.
Photos of the Superbird show much of the car intact but in need of some work. Aside from the disassembled engine, the front bucket seats have significant rips at the seams while the hood is missing much of its paint. “We believe we have everything,” the auction listing claimed.
Teeter, his wife Susan, and their son Ben all died within two weeks of each other from COVID complications in December 2021, leading to this weekend’s estate sale conducted by Kirby Lyons Auctioneers in Greenville, Ohio. While chatter among the wing car community made it seem like the Superbird could sell for well below market value, hope for a bargain seemed to vanish once bidders filled the Kirby Lyons facility. Bidding opened at $50,000 and quickly ramped up to $170,000. Disbelief among the crowd seemed to start around the $185,000 mark, with the car ultimately selling for $203,000.
Among the Bugattis, the Bentley, the Chenard-Walckers, the Excelsiors, and many other continental Europe racing standbys of the interwar era that had lined up for the inaugural 24 Hours of Le Mans sat a lone Ford Model T. It wasn’t described as such on the entry list and it sported a number of modifications that almost made it unrecognizable as a Model T, but a Ford it was nevertheless, making it the first one to race at Le Mans, long before the GT40s that ran in the Sixties and the Mustang that Ford wants to enter there next year. So how did a Model T get there?
Charles Montier is hardly a household name these days, particularly here in the United States, but in a way, the Frenchman was an analogue to Carroll Shelby, Colin Chapman, or Sydney Allard, all of them adept at transforming common cars or their components into sports cars that could compete on the marketplace as well as on the racetrack. While Henri Depasse had staked a claim as the first Ford agent in France and leveraged his success to build a factory for assembling Fords at Bordeaux, Montier took on Ford’s second French franchise around 1911 not necessarily to sell to the masses but to sell to the sporting set.
Who Was Charles Montier?
As Chris Martin wrote in his book chronicling Montier’s exploits, Montier was a gifted mechanic who built a steam car with his father before the turn of the century and who “acquired the nickname of ‘Le Sorcier’ (‘The Sorcerer’) long before that name was revived later for the better known Amedee Gordini, for his similar ability to extract performance from equally ordinary Renaults.”
First based in Tours then later in Paris, Montier appeared to take great inspiration from the catalogs full of American speed parts for the Model T, Martin suggested. “The Fordia magazine circulated to all Ford agents published a list of accessories that APCO Manufacturing Company located in Kansas could supply: Ruckstell axles, Ricardo or Diablo pistons, special camshafts, high compression Milwaukee cylinder heads, and above all modifications to lower the chassis and front axle,” Martin wrote.
Rather than buy the parts from APCO, however, Montier decided to engineer and manufacture his own, starting with a complete system for lowering the front and rear of a Model T by six to seven inches. The system, which consisted of a spring-behind-axle conversion in front and Z’d frame rails in rear, even earned him a patent in 1921, about a decade and a half before Ford did something similar by moving the axle behind the spring rather than underneath it. Another modification he made – a taller radiator for increased cooling capacity – also made its way into production Model Ts not long after he introduced it.
Around the same time he decided to prove his modifications by entering cars equipped with them in hillclimbs and other competition events. He won the first race he entered, at Boulogne-sur-Mer, in June of 1921, with an average speed of about 80 MPH. By the next year, he’d developed a model specifically for conforming to the Touring Car class and its requirement for four seats which he called the Gaillon. Not just lower, it also produced more power thanks to an overhead-valve head similar to Louis Chevrolet’s Frontenac heads, larger valves, aluminum pistons, a sidedraft carburetor, and a tubular exhaust manifold. Montier even swapped out the Ford planetary transmission and Ford axle for a Sinpar three-speed gearbox and Ruckstell. He upgraded the brakes first with larger rear drums then later with drums at all four corners
For 20 years, a veritable pandemonium of Hemis powered everything from modern muscle cars to trucks and SUVs
While many cars and trucks of the Eighties and Nineties dispelled the notion that American performance died off with the original muscle cars, it took an entirely new engine—one more powerful and less expensive to produce than its predecessor—to reignite the horsepower wars and usher in a new golden age. The Hemi V-8 has since become a standard-bearer for Chrysler, Dodge, Ram, and Jeep vehicles, and its basic engine architecture has spawned more than a dozen configurations, some of them difficult to discern from others. For that reason, we’ve put together this spotters guide to the third-generation (or gen 3) Hemi family of engines
What Sets the Hemi Apart
Teased in the 2000 Chrysler 300 Hemi C and the 2001 Dodge Super8 Hemi, the new 5.7-liter Hemi (Chrysler stylizes it as HEMI, but for expediency’s sake, we will not) debuted in the 2003 Dodge Ram pickups, featuring a deep-skirt cross-bolted iron block, aluminum heads, overhead valves, 4.46-inch bore spacing, the same bellhousing bolt pattern as the Chrysler LA-series V-8s, coil-on-plug ignition, composite intake manifolds, multipoint fuel injection, and that controversial head design.
Like the second-generation 426 Hemi, the 5.7L Hemi heads featured a camshaft in the block, opposed valves for a true crossflow design, twin spark plugs, and rocker shafts. The third-generation Hemi did not, however, feature a full hemispherical combustion chamber. Instead, Chrysler’s engineers decided to flatten either side of the combustion chamber to improve combustion efficiency and emissions. Some might argue that doesn’t make the engines true Hemis, but then again, the Hemi V-8s of yore were massive, heavy engines that cost a lot to machine and that wouldn’t meet modern-day fuel-efficiency or emissions requirements
Even though prevailing internal combustion engine design called for multiple valves operated by overhead camshafts (indeed, one of the engines the Hemi replaced, the 4.7L PowerTech V-8, used single overhead camshafts), the Hemi stuck with a two-valve, pushrod design. As they did with GM’s LS-series V-8s, critics scorned that layout as antiquated and unable to meet power, mileage, and emissions demands. However, Chrysler’s engineers made the most of it by taking Tom Hoover’s advice to relocate the camshaft upward in the block, thus shortening the pushrod length and improving valve train geometry.
What’s more, as Allpar reported, the Hemi proved less expensive to manufacture than previous hemispherical-head designs, which meant the engines could turn a profit just as easily as they could turn into ad copy gold.
5.7-Liter Hemis
After debuting in the Ram truck line, by 2005 the Hemi migrated to the LX-chassis cars (Dodge Charger R/T, Dodge Magnum R/T, Chrysler 300C) with the same 5.7-liter (345-cu.in.) displacement but a few changes. Truck engines—rated at 345 horsepower in the Ram, 335 horsepower in the Grand Cherokee, Durango, and Aspen—continued to use their own intake manifolds that mounted the throttle body atop the manifold. Meanwhile, car engines—rated at 350 hp in the Charger Daytona R/T and 340 hp in the other cars—moved the throttle body to the front of the intake. The 2005 car engine revisions also saw the introduction of the Multi-Displacement System, which deactivates four of the eight cylinders at cruising speed to improve mileage.
The most significant revisions to the entry-level Hemi came in 2009, with the so-called Eagle 5.7L Hemi. The 3.917-inch bore and 3.58-inch stroke remained the same, but Chrysler engineers added new heads, which reduced the combustion chamber volume from 85-cc to 65-cc and which flowed better with square intake ports and D-shape exhaust ports; Variable Camshaft Timing, which advances or retards timing by up to 37 degrees; larger intake valves; beefier connecting rods; a 58-tooth crankshaft sensor wheel; and a 10.5:1 compression ratio. The Eagle Hemi also features an active intake manifold with a flapper door that switches from long intake runners to short runners at higher rpms. The end result: anywhere from 360 to 375 horsepower in cars and SUVs and anywhere from 383 to 395 horsepower in Ram trucks.
Note that Chrysler engineers also built a version of the Eagle 5.7L specifically for the 2009 Durango and Aspen hybrids. These used a special camshaft and still used EGR valves after Chrysler had eliminated EGR from all other Hemis. Poorly received when new, the likelihood of coming across one of these in the wild nowadays is slim.
To identify one, look for a “5.7L” cast into the side of the block just above the oil pan mounting surface.
SRT Hemis
Along with the 2005 changes to the 5.7L, DaimlerChrysler also introduced the first SRT-8 engine that year, the 6.1-liter (370-cu.in.) Hemi. More than just a bump in displacement thanks to a larger 4.055-inch bore, the 6.1L featured an aluminum intake manifold (the only third-gen Hemi that didn’t have a composite intake manifold), forged crankshaft, D-port cylinder heads with 74-cc combustion chambers and 2.08-inch intake valves and 1.60-inch sodium-filled exhaust valves, aluminum exhaust manifolds, bigger fuel injectors, oil squirters aimed at the underside of the pistons, and a more aggressive camshaft. Combined, these modifications make for a nice heritage-inspired horsepower figure of 425 (in the SRT-8 versions of the 300C, Magnum, Charger, and Challenger; 420 in the Grand Cherokee SRT-8). Look for a “6.1L” cast into the side of the block just above the oil pan mounting surface.
Rather than upgrade the 6.1L as with the Eagle 5.7L, in 2011 Chrysler engineers replaced the 6.1L altogether with the 6.4-liter Hemi, also sometimes referred to as the 392 or the Apache, an engine that technically debuted in 2010 on the Challenger Drag Pack cars. Along with the displacement increase (the result of a larger 4.090-inch bore and a longer 3.72-inch stroke), the 6.4L benefited from a 10.9:1 compression ratio, 2.14-inch intake and 1.65-inch exhaust valves, the 6.1L’s oil squirters, an even more aggressive camshaft, and an active intake manifold like that found in the Eagle 5.7L. Initially rated at 470 horsepower, the 6.4L bumped to 485 horsepower in 2015 with the introduction of the Scat Pack cars (Grand Cherokee and Durango SRT versions of the 6.4L bumped too, but just to 475 horsepower; the 6.4L in the Wrangler Rubicon 392 produces 470 horsepower). All 6.4L car and SUV engine intake manifolds have a front-mounted throttle body angled toward the driver’s side of the vehicle. Look for a “6.4L” cast in the side of the block.
At roughly the same time that FCA bumped the output of the 6.4L, it also made the larger Hemi available in the Ram 2500 and heavier trucks. Essentially similar to the 6.4L used in the cars and SUVs, the truck version used a BGE (Big Gas Engine) block with improved casting processes, higher nickel content, and a slightly more rigid design. Horsepower figures varied from 366 to 410, depending on the application. Look for a “BGE” cast into the side or back of the block and an intake manifold that angles the throttle body toward the passenger’s side of the vehicle.
Two decades into the new millennium, it’s the undisputed Golden Age of performance. Not only can your order 1,000 reliable horsepower with nothing more than a phone and a credit card, but you can find the project to wrap around it just as easily.
But whether you buy a crate motor, an entire vehicle or have your dream quarter-mile car built for you, the very next step is finding the right transmission to put all that power to the wheels. And while Tremec has been building the most reliable manual transmissions in the business, there are two major features of your new drivetrain that’ll need to be addressed:
Bellhousing Alignment: Your new Tremec manual transmission has been engineered to provide the driving experience you’ve come to expect from the best name in the business, but there’s a very important link in that chain of power that shouldn’t be overlooked: the bellhousing. Literally standing between the motor and the transmission, making sure the bellhousing is properly chosen and aligned is the difference between the strongest and weakest link in your new drivetrain chain. The tech experts at Tremec can guide you through the basic tools you’ll need and the procedure to align your bellhousing correctly.
Driveline Installation: Once the bellhousing and transmission are in place on one end and the rearend has been mounted on the other, it’s time to spec your new driveline. While the correct universal joints and input shaft are necessary, there are three rules to making sure the driveshaft is balanced and will spin freely:
a) Universal joint operating angles at each end of a driveshaft should always be at least 1 degree.
b) Universal joint operating angles on each end of a driveshaft should always be equal within 1 degree.
c) For virtual vibration-free performance, u-joint operating angles should not be larger than 3 degrees
The 2011 auction of Lee Roy Hartung’s collection included a number of items that attracted a good deal of attention, like the four matching sets of Tucker manufacturer license plates, a rare Edwards roadster and a bizarre Spohn-bodied 1950 Veritas. The sheer size of the collection, however, meant that plenty of curiosities went under the radar, including a unique 1937 Lincoln Zephyr modified with twin grilles that will cross the block again next month with a pre-auction estimate as high as four to five times what it previously sold for.
If the highly acclaimed first-generation Lincoln Zephyr had a weak point, it was the V-12 engine that went under its hood. Sharing many design elements with the Ford flathead V-8, the 75-degree H-series V-12 had a narrow design that kept its displacement down and its water passages small as well as the flathead’s exhaust passages that ran through the block and water jackets, which often led to overheating. Illinois-based inventor Willard L. Morrison couldn’t do much about the engine design, but he nevertheless believed he could improve the Zephyr’s cooling by adding a second grille to the car’s front end.
Morrison claimed in his design patent for the twin-grille Lincoln (D111840) that the modification helped to streamline the car, aided driver visibility, and gave the car a more powerful appearance, but given his background in air-conditioning systems and in designing accessory Winterfront grilles, it’s plain to see his primary intent behind adding the second grille was to add cooling capacity. Indeed, behind the grilles he mounted a split radiator and overflow tank setup designed to take advantage of the additional forward ventilation.
(We’ll note here that a second grille is not an unprecedented modification, but to the best of our knowledge, it had only been implemented when adding a second parallel drivetrain, as was the case with the Konings-modified Ford Model AAs that Netherlands-based Smeets ordered. Morrison likely was not aware of the Konings twin-grille AAs when he built his twin-grille Zephyr.)
Morrison took out another couple of patents on the idea: one for a twin-grille Packard and another that explicitly states the twin-grille design was for admitting more air to the radiator. He also had an idea car built a few years prior out of a 1933 Ford to test out some of his other patents, but the Zephyr appears to be just one of two twin-grille cars he built (another, based on a 1940 Ford convertible and built for a friend’s daughter, appeared to have headlamps mounted at the top of each grille). It was rather well-finished, too, with custom trim that extended back along either side of the twin-grille unit, “Custom Twin” hubcaps, a “Custom Twin” filler panel between the grilles, and a single hood for both grilles.
The so-called tri-fives don’t seem to be waning in popularity at all
It’s easy to pick on the 1955 to 1957 Chevrolet passenger cars – known to many as tri-five Chevrolets – as ubiquitous and basic collector cars. They sold in such vast quantities that, it seemed, everybody at one point owned one, knew somebody who owned one, or wanted to own one. As a result, they’ve almost lost their mystique over the years. But it’s also worth remembering two things: There was a reason the cars became popular and remained so in the first place, to the point where they’re now considered pop culture icons, and there’s always a younger generation coming along intrigued by the cars and all they represent, but not yet studied in their ways. So what should anybody new to tri-fives consider when looking to buy one?
What Makes Tri-Fives Iconic?
Even mid-Fifties Ford fans will admit that – despite the fact that Ford’s passenger cars handily outsold Chevrolet’s in 1957 – the latter has gone on to become the darling of the collector-car world and the poster child for post-war American optimism and culture.
Did Chevrolet somehow capture the chrome-and-glitz zeitgeist better than Ford? Was it the new Chevrolet small-block V-8 that captured hot-rodders’ attention and made bold horsepower claims? Or was it the fact that Chevrolet found a formula for a modern car that set the tone for its output for the next few decades?
After all, here was a thoroughly redesigned car that ditched its predecessors’ torque tube and vestiges of pre-envelope styling. It introduced to the Chevrolet lineup ball-joint independent front suspension, suspended brake and clutch pedals, 12-volt electrical systems, and tubeless tires. What’s more, it brought jet-age futuristic styling in the form of tailfins, wraparound windshields, and trim packages that evoked high-speed travel.
Ford may have presented itself as the more affordable of the two, but did that really matter in terms of legacy when America’s middle class had gobs of purchasing power at the time and a desire for futuristic, auto show-inspired cars in its driveways?
So while mid-Fifties Fords have their fan base, the tri-five Chevrolet appeals across wide swaths of the collector-car hobby. As a result, it’s a car that’s readily available no matter where you are in pretty much every configuration one can imagine, from project car to stock restored to extensively modified.
It’s easy to pick on the 1955 to 1957 Chevrolet passenger cars – known to many as tri-five Chevrolets – as ubiquitous and basic collector cars. They sold in such vast quantities that, it seemed, everybody at one point owned one, knew somebody who owned one, or wanted to own one. As a result, they’ve almost lost their mystique over the years. But it’s also worth remembering two things: There was a reason the cars became popular and remained so in the first place, to the point where they’re now considered pop culture icons, and there’s always a younger generation coming along intrigued by the cars and all they represent, but not yet studied in their ways. So what should anybody new to tri-fives consider when looking to buy one?
What Makes Tri-Fives Iconic?
Even mid-Fifties Ford fans will admit that – despite the fact that Ford’s passenger cars handily outsold Chevrolet’s in 1957 – the latter has gone on to become the darling of the collector-car world and the poster child for post-war American optimism and culture.
Did Chevrolet somehow capture the chrome-and-glitz zeitgeist better than Ford? Was it the new Chevrolet small-block V-8 that captured hot-rodders’ attention and made bold horsepower claims? Or was it the fact that Chevrolet found a formula for a modern car that set the tone for its output for the next few decades?
After all, here was a thoroughly redesigned car that ditched its predecessors’ torque tube and vestiges of pre-envelope styling. It introduced to the Chevrolet lineup ball-joint independent front suspension, suspended brake and clutch pedals, 12-volt electrical systems, and tubeless tires. What’s more, it brought jet-age futuristic styling in the form of tailfins, wraparound windshields, and trim packages that evoked high-speed travel.
Ford may have presented itself as the more affordable of the two, but did that really matter in terms of legacy when America’s middle class had gobs of purchasing power at the time and a desire for futuristic, auto show-inspired cars in its driveways?
So while mid-Fifties Fords have their fan base, the tri-five Chevrolet appeals across wide swaths of the collector-car hobby. As a result, it’s a car that’s readily available no matter where you are in pretty much every configuration one can imagine, from project car to stock restored to extensively modified.
1955 Chevrolet 150
How to Identify a Tri-Five Chevrolet
Over its three-year run, the tri-five Chevrolet was offered in three basic trim levels, at least eight different nameplates, and at least 21 different body styles, with significant styling changes from year to year. Telling them all apart, however, isn’t too difficult.
Let’s begin with model years. The 1955 Chevrolets all had fairly square egg crate grilles flanked by semi-oval front marker lamps with triangular taillamps mounted to the tops of the rear quarter panels. The ’55s are also the only tri-fives to feature a fuel filler door mounted on the quarter panels. The following year, Chevrolet hid the fuel filler behind the left taillamp, widened the grille to encompass rectangular front marker lamps, and shrank the taillamps to small round lenses in a larger chrome decorative bezel in roughly the same location. Then for 1957, the grilles became more sculptured, with the front bumpers wrapping up at the ends to nearly encapsulate them. The hood ornament of the prior two years gave way to bombsights set into the leading edge of the hood, the headlamp bezels were opened up and fitted with mesh to permit fresh air intake, and the leading section of the fenders was scored with hashmarks. Around back, the ’57s featured pointer fins, the fuel filler door behind a piece of chrome trim on the fin, and taillamps mounted at the base of the fin.
To distinguish the three trim levels, look primarily to the chrome spears mounted to the sides of the cars. The base 150 came with no side trim in its first year, a single spear extending from just behind the headlamps to a piece dropping down from the post-B-pillar notch in 1956, and a single spear extending rearward from the same notch in 1957. The mid-level 210 had a side spear similar to the 1957 150’s, though mounted a little lower, followed by a full-length spear that swooped downward at the rear in 1956, and a branching version of the downward swooping spear in 1957. The top-of-the-line Bel Air always used some variation on the same year 210’s side trim: In 1955, it added a simple spear extending rearward from the headlamps; in 1956, it added a second horizontal piece paralleling the main one from the headlamps back to the notch; and in 1957, the Bel Air added a stainless steel panel between the two side trim branches.
Note too that certain body styles only exist in certain trim levels during the tri-five Chevrolet’s run. No two-door or four-door hardtops were ever available in the 150, convertibles could only be had as Bel Airs, and business coupes (“utility coupes,” in Chevrolet parlance) were only available as 150s.
Station wagons had their own nomenclature depending on the trim level. The 150 series had the Handyman, available only as a two-door; the 210 and the Bel Air had the Townsman, available only as a six-passenger four-door; and the Bel Air had the nine passenger three-row Beauville. And let’s not forget the Nomad, the sporty two-door station wagon from the Bel Air series that took its name and greenhouse from the Corvette Nomad Motorama show car.
While all of the above applies regardless of the number of cylinders under the hood, Chevrolet did add trim to differentiate the V-8 cars from the six-cylinder ones: a small emblem under the taillamps on 1955 models and a vee-shaped piece of trim on the hood for 1956 and 1957 models.
Long a staple of the street rodding scene, the Effies remain simple to restore or customize
Can a pickup truck be beautiful?
Attractive, sure. Stylish, yes. Handsome, absolutely. But is “beautiful” the right word for a pickup, especially one designed and launched in an era when light-duty trucks were still largely sold to farmers, ranchers, and handymen, and generally not seen as acceptable in suburban driveways past five o’clock?
Maybe not when the first Ford F-100s were new or when they were just used trucks plying rural backroads, but in the 70 years since their introduction, the F-100s have gone from workhorses to showponies, earning all sorts of descriptors in the process, including “beautiful.” They’ve also inspired a loyal following, making them one of the simplest and most accessible generations of Ford truck for budding collectors to get into, regardless of what one decides to call it
What Makes F-100s Desirable?
That loyalty and enthusiasm for the first generation of the F-100 goes back decades, as Dave Emanuel wrote in the April 1984 issue of Special Interest Autos. “No other truck, and damn few cars have ever inspired the almost maniacal fervor found in F-100 aficionados,” Emanuel wrote. “In fact, Ford’s early Fifties pickup is every bit as much of a ‘cult’ vehicle as the Chevrolet Corvette or VW Beetle.”
Part of that could be due to the F-100’s simplicity. It had classic and unadorned lines, was fitted with as few gadgets as possible, and sat on a chassis little more complex than a haywagon yet as rugged and durable as grandfather’s ax.
Part of that could also be due to the $30 million worth of research, development, and engineering that Ford claimed to have put into the trucks with the express purpose of making them more driver-centric. Ford’s engineers and designers even went so far as to create a positionable dummy, the “Measuring Man,” meant to emulate the dimensions of a typical American man, and sized the cab and its fixtures around the dummy. For the time, it was indeed a “revolutionary new approach” to truck design, as Ford claimed in its own sales literature for the trucks, intended to “make the driver’s job simpler and less tiring and to permit him to get this job done faster.”
Ford’s ad men even dubbed the trucks “Triple Economy,” referring to their greater load-hauling capacities, their economical drivetrains, and a number of “Driverized” cab upgrades that “reduce fatigue, conserve energy, help keep the driver fresh and alert for better, safer driving.”
Indeed, while the side and front profiles of the new-for-1953 pickups weren’t radically different from the previous Bonus Built F-1 pickups, the number of changes that Ford made to the trucks – everything from larger windshields to wider seats to a four-inch-shorter wheelbase – led to an entirely new nomenclature system, with half-ton pickups now designated F-100. (Medium- and light-duty trucks adopted similar nomenclature from F-250 up to F-900.)
Or, as Emanuel and numerous other authors have noted, the popularity of the 1953 to 1956 F-100s could come from how easy they are to modify. “Here was a truck that had barely launched its hauling career when it became a favorite of the street rod set,” Tom Brownell wrote in his “Ford Pickup Color History.”
Whatever the case may be, the F-100 has become a mainstay on the collector car market and remains as popular as ever with enthusiasts looking for an old truck to tool around in.
Ford brochure image
1953 Ford F-100
Can a pickup truck be beautiful?
Attractive, sure. Stylish, yes. Handsome, absolutely. But is “beautiful” the right word for a pickup, especially one designed and launched in an era when light-duty trucks were still largely sold to farmers, ranchers, and handymen, and generally not seen as acceptable in suburban driveways past five o’clock?
Maybe not when the first Ford F-100s were new or when they were just used trucks plying rural backroads, but in the 70 years since their introduction, the F-100s have gone from workhorses to showponies, earning all sorts of descriptors in the process, including “beautiful.” They’ve also inspired a loyal following, making them one of the simplest and most accessible generations of Ford truck for budding collectors to get into, regardless of what one decides to call it.
How to Identify an F-100
While the F-100 came in a number of different configurations during the mid-Fifties, including chassis and cowl, chassis and cab, and even stake truck, collectors tend to gravitate toward the pickup and the panel truck, which we will focus on here.
The 1953 through 1955 trucks can all be distinguished mainly by their grilles. From a double horizontal bar between the headlamps in 1953, the grille switched to a single bar with two vertical supports in 1954, then back to a double bar with a large V notched in the middle in 1955. The 1956 double-bar grille differed slightly from its predecessors, largely in its use of frenched headlamps.
For 1956, Ford’s stylists also decided to update the F-100’s cab with a more upright wraparound windshield. That required extensive modification to the cowl, the vent windows, and the doors as well as a longer roof.
While F-250 and F-350 pickups could be had with an 8-foot bed starting in 1953, the half-ton F-100 made do with just a 6-1/2-foot bed until 1956, when Ford offered an 8-foot bed as an option.
Each year saw minor changes in what little trim the trucks came with. To distinguish Deluxe or Custom cabs from base trim levels, look for small chrome “teeth” on the grille in 1953, “sergeant’s stripes” hashes on the grille in 1954, a slotted upper grille bar in 1955, and a chrome-plated grille in 1956. Similarly, to distinguish trucks powered by the V-8 from the straight-six, look for a V-8 emblem for the former or a three-pointed (later four-pointed) star for the latter.
The VIN, located on the glove box door from 1953 to 1955 and on the driver’s door frame post in 1956, will not only identify the truck’s model year and tonnage rating, it will also identify which engine the truck originally came with. The first three digits correspond to the truck’s series, so look for an F10 for an F-100, F25 for an F-250, or F35 for an F-350. The fourth digit is the engine code (D for six-cylinders; R, V, or Z for V-8s). The fifth digit corresponds to the model year (3 for 1953, 4 for 1954, and so on)
It’s not every day that a chance to own a Bonneville record holder pops up on the internet. This 1956 Kurtis-Kraft Offy Midget holds the record in the Midget Vintage Oval Track (MVOT) class with the Southern California Timing Association (SCTA) on the salt flats in Utah. The current record is 136.1 mph and it’s ready for more.
Before it began its racing career, the current owner of the Kurtis-Kraft Midget chassis found it in Michigan and brought it to Illinois where it was stored in his rafters until the 1990s. After attending a Bonneville Speedweek event, he came home inspired and started building. The Midget sports an all-aluminum body protected by a 4130 chromoly roll cage and a full nose to tail belly pan. It’s powered by a 110 Offenhauser engine with Carillo rods, a Moldex crank, J&E pistons, Dema Elgin cams and Don Ricard valve springs, and it pushes around 200 horsepower.
The car and owner broke the original MVOT land speed record in 2006, then exceeded that record three more times, the most recent run taking place in 2010. The race car was also invited by Al Unser himself to be displayed at the Al Unser Museum in Albuquerque, New Mexico for a year and a half. Now it’s listed for sale on Hemmings.
The seller states that this registered no. 714 race car has passed tech five times at Bonneville and will again. Will its next owner run it into the 140s, or stash it away for show?
At first glance, this 1959 Cadillac Eldorado Brougham appears to have early-‘60s fins and a roof from a ‘61 Deville. That’s because it’s just one of the 99 existing Eldorado Brougham’s shipped as a completed chassis from the factory to Italy to receive legendary coachwork by Pininfarina. It was the first time for GM to allow Pininfarina to produce and design the Cadillac’s body in lieu of making changes to an existing shell. The result is an exceptionally rare Cadillac that exudes elegant styling ques in its handcrafted body and interior work.
The most notable change is the elimination of the flamboyant bullet fins typically seen on Cadillac models manufactured in 1959. Also note the pillarless hardtop design that allows for an airy cabin. As if more proof is needed, this car is yet another reaffirmation that Pininfarina coachwork was way ahead of its time. The sleek physique and more subtle lines of this 1959 Cadillac’s design mirrors the 1960s trends that shifted away from jet age dreams and toward simplicity. It’s safe to say that Pininfarina’s design on the ‘59 greatly influenced the Cadillac’s future.
The Pontiac Synonymous with ’60s Performance is Still a Perennial Favourite
For some Baby Boomers, Pontiac’s GTO is the automotive equivalent of Jimi Hendrix’s Star Spangled Banner guitar shred at Woodstock: powerful, iconic and emblematic of an extraordinary era in American history. Pontiac offered a GTO until 1974, then dusted off the badge again for its last hoorah 30 years later on the 2004- ’06 edition. A few versions of the model were significant, at least one was legendary (we’re looking at you, The Judge), but it was the pure-and-simple ’64 that lit the fire. The GTO’s origin story is almost as legendary as the car’s performance reputation. In the late 1950s, Pontiac General Manager Semon E. “Bunkie” Knudsen resuscitated the brand with an infusion of electrifying styling and performance. The division also firmly established itself in motorsports and became America’s third best-selling automaker. All of this attention neatly coincided with many Baby Boomers reaching driving age. When Knudsen left for Chevrolet in the early 1960s, Pontiac was flush with talent, and the young engineers he’d hired to aid in the division’s turnaround were promoted. E.M. “Pete” Estes became Pontiac’s general manager and John DeLorean became its chief engineer.
These young execs recognized the need for a fast, agile, affordable car that could further expand Pontiac’s performance image. The perfect candidate arrived in ’64: the mid-size A-body that replaced the compact Y-body. The new car eschewed the earlier model’s advanced unit-body platform, swing-axle rear suspension and transaxle, in favor of more traditional architecture: a full-frame, a solid axle with four-link rear suspension and a conventional drivetrain layout. As a result, the 389 V-8 engine from the full-size line, and three- or four-speed manual transmissions could easily fit in the A-body. Paired with heavy-duty suspension, the car’s handling qualities could be elevated to equal the big engine’s performance.
As the story goes, during tests of a ’64 Tempest at the Milford Proving Grounds, Pontiac chassis engineer Bill Collins noted that the 389 would fit in the new chassis, engineer and engine specialist Russ Gee proposed the swap and DeLorean agreed. Soon after, a running prototype was completed.
The name “GTO” was chosen for this performance edition; it’s an acronym for “Gran Turismo Omologato.” When used on a Ferrari, it meant it was homologated by the Fédération Internationale D’Automobile for racing. Pontiac’s GTO wasn’t, but the name implied exotic performance, and that was good enough.
At the time, GM had limited its intermediate cars to a 330-cu.in. V-8 ceiling, so to get around that, the GTO was offered as an option instead of a model. Thus, for $295.90, code 382 turned a Le Mans into a GTO with all of the performance bona fides, plus emblems, blacked-out grilles, and hood scoops to make it stand out. Just $2,776 ($27,000 in 2022) bought you the base pillared GTO sports coupe.
Many road testers were enthusiastic about the GTO’s style and acceleration. Others panned it for its name and other short-comings, like its brakes. Nevertheless, the overall impression was positive. A masterful marketing campaign for the GTO by Jim Wangers and his team at Pontiac’s ad agency MacManus, John & Adams, did more than a little to create that same impression among buyers. With 32,450 GTOs sold that first year, the formula for success was established.
What is a First Generation GTO Worth?
First generation GTOs have been a mainstay of the collector car hobby for decades due to their popularity among Boomers. According to multiple value guides, 1964-’67 GTO prices have remained fairly steady over the last five years averaging in the $50,000- $60,000 range, overall. The ’64—which we’re singling out for analysis here—has followed a similar trend. One of the more notable, recent sales of a ’64 GTO occurred back in July 2022, at a GAA Classic Cars auction in Greensboro, North Carolina. The car was a nicely restored black coupe and it changed hands for $88,000. At Mecum’s Chicago auction in October, a good-looking black ’64 convertible sold for $64,000; at the company’s Kissimmee sale in January, a stunning black convertible sold for an impressive $107,250. Meanwhile, on the more affordable end of the market, a very presentable, driver-quality ’64 coupe was sold by its second owner on Hemmings Auctions in September for $24,460.
The GTO’s traditional fanbase is still a driving force in the collector car hobby, but it’s gradually turning the market over to Generation X and Millennials, who may be less interested in cars of the early 1960s. Still, the original GTO isn’t going anywhere anytime soon. It’s probably safe to say that expertly restored examples and cars with professional-grade restomod treatments will continue to command lofty prices, but the overall value trend will remain steady into the foreseeable future. If you’re in the market for one of these pioneering American performance machines, here are some points to keep in mind.
First Generation GTO Engine Options
The GTO’s standard-issue 389 was topped with a Carter four-barrel carburetor and rated at 325 hp at 4,800 rpm/428 lb-ft of torque at 3,200 rpm. The Tri-Power option swapped the four barrel for three Rochester two-barrel carburetors. The center carburetor acted as the primary and, when the throttle was two-thirds open, the outer carbs kicked in via a vacuum-diaphragm-controlled linkage. Pontiac advertised the Tri-Power 389’s output as 358 hp at 4,900 rpm/428 lb-ft at 3,600 rpm. Both engines came standard with a cast-iron, dual-plane intake manifold; 421 H.O.-spec cylinder heads with larger ports; 1.92-inch intake/1.66-inch exhaust valves and HD valve springs; cast-aluminum pistons helping to deliver 10.75:1 compression; a cast crank and rods spinning in a block with five main bearings and two-bolt main caps; and iron exhaust manifolds feeding dual exhaust. The single four barrel and Tri-Power 389s used a hydraulic flat-tappet cam with 273/289-degrees advertised duration and .410/413 lift activating 1.50:1 ratio rocker arms. To help keep the package cool, a seven-blade 18-inch declutching fan was also included. The 389 is a generally reliable engine but be sure to check for any odd noises, smoke, and leaks that would indicate mechanical issues due to age or neglect. Many owners added Tri-Power to their ’64 GTOs years after purchase, so be diligent in checking engine codes and date codes to ensure that a purported factory Tri-Power GTO is accurately represented. There are no new stock-replacement engine blocks or iron heads being reproduced, and though cores are getting scarce, they are still available. If you’d like to modify your GTO, large-bore aftermarket Pontiac-style blocks, various aluminum cylinder heads and intake manifolds, and carburetor and EFI options are offered. There are also solid and hydraulic flat-tappet and solid and hydraulic roller camshafts, forged rods and pistons, cast and forged cranks, and stroker kits on the market.
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