Did You Miss This? The Ford Forty-Nine Concept.

What do you guys think of this concept?

Sometime in 2001 while my head was apparently buried in the sand like an ostrich, Ford came out with the” Forty-Nine” concept.  It was a way of tipping their hat to the great success of the 1949 Ford.  Apparently in 1949, Ford had 1.3 million orders for the newly redesigned cars before they even arrived at the dealers.  Yeah, that’s pretty decent and all, but we aren’t here for sales numbers, we are here to talk about this cool “Forty-Nine” Concept.

For me, I wish I had seen this car in 2001 before the 02-05 Thunderbirds came out.   The “Forty-Nine” is a great looking car from every angle (especially the convertible), but it strongly hints at the 02-05 Thunderbird, which forces me to give it a major attitude and a healthy dose of mean muggin’.  We all know that very few people actually like the 02-05 Thunderbird because of its high price, “blah” suspension, mid 1990’s interior, automatic transmission, and “meh” horsepower numbers.  I have to assume that if this “Forty-Nine” actually did go into production, it would likely have been a Thunderbird on all the same levels.  A heaping bucket full of “blah”, with a complementary side of “meh”.  No thank you.

But let’s be more positive now, because nobody likes a negative Nancy

Fact: This “Forty-Nine” car concept is great looking. Look at how straight the body is, and how clean all the edges of the glass are.  I wish my cars had the kind of smooooooth that Ford brought to 2001 with this car (A+ on that).  The wheels are little dated now, but in 2001 they were probably the hottest thing on the block.  The roof is clear, which is great for a multitude reasons that I won’t dive into.  Other than the intake pipe decal, the engine bay is a work of art that looks delicious.  With the engine bay that nice, who cares what the rest of the car looks like?  The interior overall is pretty nice looking.  It really brings a simple, sporty, and classic look to the table.  Well done on that.

Now, build this car with a new supercharged 5.0L and a 6-speed manual transmission, loud exhaust, and new wheels, and it will be eternally great.  I’ll take mine 4 inches lower too.


Images from:

http://www.seriouswheels.com/

Jeremy Nutt

Hi, I'm Jeremy.

7 thoughts to “Did You Miss This? The Ford Forty-Nine Concept.”

  1. This was one of those Concepts Ford should have made!
    This would have been Much better than the “not quite there” new baby Thunderbird.
    That just lacked tail fins and a continental kit to get it right and maybe a bigger motor.
    The Forty-Nine is awesome!
    but I guess I will only drive it in a Ford PC Racing game I have.

    This would be the tip of the Volcano (meaning HOT!) with some superwide whitewalls with baby moons or those Custom spinner style hubcaps and lake pipes and quite possibly this would be in the driveway! And I am not a Ford guy!

    The interior is about the only thing lacking that i think could be greatly improved upon.
    But I love it and agree a few inches lower would make this a great modern tail scrapping spark flying sled!

  2. I don’t “remember” the Edsel per se’ because it was built long before I was, but I am quite familiar with them. In fact, there is an Edsel sitting in the woods not too from me right now. I think it’s a Pacer if I recall correctly.

  3. I wish there was some campaign that I could sign up for that would make Ford manufacture some of these.

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