What Panthers Did You Find?

[Arquemann]

How tough is it to find a trans rebuilder for the US cars there?

Not hard, though the best guys are always pretty booked, especially in wintertime. The best ones are usually mentioned just by name or not advertised, word of mouth kinda stuff, a guy who knows a guy who knows a guy. Some US-specific shops do rebuilds aswell, older US transmissions are generally well-documented. General shops can be hit or miss.

[Arquemann]

One curious '81 LTD Landau.

https://www.nettiauto.com/ford/ltd/14847927

- Later grille and bumper strips
- Hub caps I don't recognise, looks like 14"s
- Both types of side skirt trim
- Aero mirrors on both sides
- Some sort of front air dam
- Mercury dash and horn pad
- Probably seats and door panels off a Mercury aswell, odd handles and rear seatbacks have some mismatch

And still somehow looks relatively unmolested...

[VicCrownVic]

Curious indeed.
The last picture with the rear driver side door open, you can see the plastic trim beside the seat is a different color, and also paint on the striker. The screws on the floor plastic trim look out of place, I think they are usually dark color.

I'm wondering if this is a Mexican Ford Grand Marquis or did someone go through a lot of trouble to install parts that did not originally belong to this car?

[VicCrownVic]

But, at least in 1982, the Mexican Ford Grand Marquis got the Mercury Grand Marquis (I'm primarily looking at headlights and taillights) body with Ford Badges. So, unless Mexico did something different in 1981 where the body (primarily head lights and taillights) was the LTD body, this doesn't really seem to checkout as the Mexican Ford Grand Marquis.

https://www.instagram.com/autoconceptousedcars/p/Cpo5d8cu-iO

Also just noticed wagon fender braces and the not backward engine accessories unlike the Ford Grand Marquis. I'm thinking someone swapped the Grand Marquis Dash in.

[Arquemann]

Curious indeed.
The last picture with the rear driver side door open, you can see the plastic trim beside the seat is a different color, and also paint on the striker. The screws on the floor plastic trim look out of place, I think they are usually dark color.

I'm wondering if this is a Mexican Ford Grand Marquis or did someone go through a lot of trouble to install parts that did not originally belong to this car?

This thing probably got a bunch of bits from a part-out Mercury. Wanted leather seats and swapped everything else to match.

Trunk and C-pillars have the LTD Landau emblems and the likelyhood of a rare mexican market aberration ending up in Finland is very low. Just being a sedan makes it rare here.

The repaint is a pretty good job, new pinstrike, no obnoxious overspray and looks factory-ish.

The nipple radio, later model grille and weird seatback grab handles are the biggest oddities to me.

[kishy]

Those leather seats are legitimate early-year parts. The aluminum piece on the side only exists up to 1982, and there is no real way to retrofit it to a newer seat. Plus the seat cushion pattern is different from what you find on newer year cars.

I agree that the interior trim pieces are of differing (in model year) reds, but I bet it was more of a "replacing broken pieces" than "piecing together a desired interior in a car that didn't come with it".

[Tiggie]

I was guessing we were looking at an LTD but the VIN says LTD Crown Victoria, so it did not start as a base model.
Someone had access to several different cars to make this one personalized.
The dash says premium sound under the radio, yet there are no door speakers. So it's unlikely the GM provided the door panels.
The seat color red/brown is a 79/81 color. That back seat backrest is very odd. The leather boxes I have seen do not have that pattern on the back, but I don't think I have seen a 79/81 with leather. This one could be the original seats and door panels.
Definitely a GM dash swap.
Definitely a grill swap.
Added exterior emblems on the trunk, that car should have "FORD" in block and no blue oval.
The lower rocker panel trim was likely swapped for the shiny stuff from whatever wagon they got those fender braces from.
Wheel covers are 83/84ish.

[Mainemantom]

I think the car is total that was pieced together and repainted. Those wheel covers were offered on the CV. 1983-1986 14 inch. Look at the assist straps on the back of the front seats Obvious that those would not be factory. It would be nice to see the door sticker unless the door has been replaced. It could be a foreign market Ford.

[Arquemann]

For fun I looked up the car's info on our DMV-equivalent. Seems like the car was sold new here, as it is first registered in Finland June 5th 1981.
Also shows a mention of being rebuilt and shows a previous license plate. Probably related to that, the registration info is wacky, one thing being the car HAS NO MODEL DESIGNATION. Which was basically the only thing I wanted to see.

So, the car was probably crashed a long time ago and because Finland, it was slammed together with whatever parts were available and some personal preference added on top.
The LTD Landau emblems really fooled me.

I dug into early box brochures, and found those seats in an '81 Marquis brochure, in leather, with the aluminium trim AND the grab handles!


Here the grab handles are easier to see, pattern is the same too, but in plush.