The Ford Granada is not exactly a model you associate with being a home run for the domestic auto industry. But it was actually quite popular with consumers, even if it was unremarkable in every way. When it comes to building a car that will sell, most manufacturers already know that keeping the car simple and the options list long is the best way to make money as opposed to making the car every enthusiast claims to want. This Granada is as boring and as brown as they come, but it has survived in remarkable condition. It’s now listed here on eBay for $5,500 or best offer.
The Granda showed the strength of the mid-size sedan class when it was introduced, with many customers picking one up in 1975. Estimates show that Ford moved roughly 300,000 Granadas out of the showroom that year, and customers seemed to like the idea of a basic four-door that came with a healthy list of standard options and plenty of ways to make the car feel ritzier if desired. After all, the country was still in the middle of a love affair with the “personal luxury coupe” model, and much of the Granada’s advertising seemed to position it as a car you’d take to the opera or a night on the town with friends.
The faux woodgrain trim, the multiple shades of beige, and even some fake woodgrain on the shifter handle gives you a sense of what appealed to car shoppers at the time. Ford touted the comfort of its bucket seats at the time, noting that the European-inspired design was typically found in vehicles costing much more than the Granada. You had your choice of richly appointed velour all the way up to leather seating surfaces. Multiple adjustments were possible, too. Ford also wanted shoppers to know they used thicker carpeting that was stain-resistant, and other insulating materials, to keep the cabin rigid and quiet. All these years later, however, it seems funny to think of patting yourself on the back for making a cabin that didn’t rattle at every junction.
The seller lists the Granada as having a 4.1L V8, which obviously is incorrect. There was a 4.1L inline-six available, but based on the dual exhaust, this Granada has either the 302 or 351 under the hood. With the basic hubcaps over steel wheels and brown paint, it’s a bit of a sleeper even if horsepower at the time wasn’t exceptional. Assuming it has the 302 under the hood, power was right around 140 b.h.p., so not great. The Granada seems like a survivor, and the price is also fair for a car that appears to be as nicely preserved as this one is. The seller does refer to it being a project car, so perhaps reach out for some clarification on what that actually means in this instance.
A great example of taking a basic platform (in this case, its roots go back to the original Falcon), giving it conservative but attractive styling, and trimming it nicely. Which results in a quite successful model. I suspect Ford made a ton of money on these.
This one looks quite plain in brown, with basic blackwalls and hub caps (full wheel covers were standard). Taillights are broken. Kind of looks like what Bill and Joe on Dragnet would have driven if the show had lasted into the mid-70’s.
Thanks Jeff.
Ford still had the Maverick sedan for low bid public sector contracts in ’75, and put out a lot of non-Gran Torinos that way too. But yeah, if the product placement team wanted to highlight the new car, Friday might’ve had one.
Thanks, Bob. I had never seen one of these with small wheel covers, so I’m assuming those were just added to make it look tough. That seems to be a go-to for a lot of people for whatever reason.
It’s Grandpa Fox body! Another couple of years and this platform became the most successful Mustang of modern times. Look hard and you see the Fairmont and all the others. Now finding those tail lights could be a problem. This would be a great daily driver if you are ok with no touch screens and there is not an abs system. Remember how to modulate a brake pedal? Yes it’s missing some modern things. I sold my Fairmont wagon that I dropped a roller 302, 5 speed transmission and differential all out of a Fox Mustang. You can do many updates with this car such as brakes and suspension. Could be a great driver, even a good sleeper.
The 1981-82 Granadas were Fox bodies, the first generation Granadas were the last gasps of the Falcon platform. Either generation can be good sleepers.
It was not a Fox body until 1981.
Modern go-fast goodies can wake up the 302 or 351 in short order, but the styling still leaves me cold. The uni-body isn’t my first choice either, the GM X-Body cars at least had a front subframe to improve engine access. The Falcon platform, with the huge shock towers under the hood was really showing its age at this point, with it serving in its fourth (4th) iteration (Falcon, Mustang, Maverick/Comet and now the Granada/Zephyr/Versailles triplets). The second generation cars transitioned to the Fox-Body platform, just in time, IMHO! Like fourth time warmed over pizza or spaghetti, these were highly unpalatable by now. Only the low price point, thanks to the tooling being fully depreciated, saved these from total oblivion!
What a great car, sleeper-wise. Nice one, Jeff! This would be fun to own.
Todd wrote up this “Granader,” as the seller calls it, almost exactly six years ago, and that seller at least showed the 351 V8. How a seller could omit an engine photo when it’s arguably the most important part of a vehicle is mind-blowing.
https://barnfinds.com/rare-factory-sleeper-1975-ford-granada-351/
So, from an asking price of $6,900 to $5,500, and from Tampa, Florida to Branchville, New Jersey. I like it at $5,500 much better. The letter “H” is the fifth spot in the VIN, which stands for a 351 V8 for the 1975-1977 model year.
http://gmv-registry.com/92/index.html
This car, with a four-speed manual (only a three-speed manual was available with the 302, automatic only for the 351), would be gold at any Cars & Coffee event.
Hubcaps are from a Maverick.
That’s where they’re from!!! I was trying to picture them, I knew it was a Ford car and not a truck from the 70’s , good eye GC19.
Ford tried to compare these to Mercedes in ads back in the day.
Since 99% of the Granada market had never been in a Mercedes, it was a comparison they could get away with.
And a Cadillac Seville. Funny because to me (born ’74) these scream Ford from a mile away.
The family who lived next door to us bought one to replace the wife’s ’66 Mustang Convertible, which their very cute daughter got as her first car! She was my brother’s age, a year younger than I was, blonde, but dating my down-the-street neighbor, who was 5’10” and his folks were rich, until they broke up. I heard she later married the minister’s son, whose father served at the Episcopal Church in the center of town. Her Mustang was the same maroon color as my Mom’s ’67 T-Bird, a common color in Ford’s palette in the mid ’60’s through early ’70’s.
BTW, the faux Mercedes grille on the Granada that lots of Detroit iron copied at the time wasn’t fooling anybody, LOL!
Nice! I never drove a Grenada but loved the Maverick sedan I had. Ford built really cool vehicles in the 70s! These and the highboy F250 trucks with factory lift blocks, Mavericks, Broncos. They really built unique vehicles. Someone was thinking differently at Ford than the other manufacturers. This car is in beautiful condition.
I had a powder blue 76 Granada 4 door 302 with a 3 speed manual floor shift. Ran acceptable, pulled down over 20mpg on the highway but was perhaps built at the zenith of Detroits low quality cars. Comfortable, quiet and a nice highway cruiser when not rusting out or parts falling off.
After my dad got tired of his 74′ Mustang II
he bought a 76′ 2-door Granada V-8/Auto.I thought it drove nice.Never had a problem with it.
caps look out of place. needs a Granada style wheel treatment
I had one of these with the 302 It was a two door ran great but Ford had a problems with the rear springs car sagged even with new replacements
Someone got mad at the driver and kicked out their tailights. Good luck find some replacements.
Reminds me of what happened to a guy I knew back in high school. Cops pulled him over.
“What did you pull me over for?”
“Your taillights are broken”.
“No they aren’t”.
Bam, Bam with his billyclub. “They are now”.
Look closer, those tail lights are melted probably because someone replaced them with halogen bulbs and the plastic couldn’t withstand the heat
Sure look broken to me!
Check the rear bumper for straightness, as it could have been rear-ended, not hard enough to bend the sheet metal, but enough to break the taillights. A thorough inspection of the sheet metal and underside is a must, and a trip to a frame table to check for straightness might be warranted.
Very cool with the V8 and floor shifter! Yeah needs tail lights but can find on eBay for a few hundred.
The rear view looks like a Gran Torino? Sorta like the Starsky and Hutch version?
There’s a Ghia 2dr for sale in the Norfolk area same exact color.
Bought a ’75 Granada Ghia used in ’78, 4 door 302 with 3 speed on the floor. Very nice car.
I have never understood all the criticism of the Granada…maybe due to the silly Mercedes comparison. Don’t think they weren’t intended as any more than day to day comfortable relatively inexpensive family cars for the masses, and they did fill that role well. The healthy sales figures support that.
I agree. Although I was way too young at the time to drive a car, I’ve known people who drove the Ford Granada, the Chevy Nova, the Dodge Aspen/Plymouth Volare. I don’t get the criticism of the cars offered during this time. With the right maintenance and careful driving, it’ll last indefinitely. That’s not how it works. People seem to think it’ll just run indefinitely, without doing anything to it, no oil changes, no careful driving. Not true.
You might get lucky and find those tail lights in a bone yard but I wouldn’t put this kind of money into a 4 door.
There were quite a few of these on the rental fleet when I started working there. Equipped with the 302, vinyl seats and little else. I kind of liked them because they were easy to clean. I always thought they got a bad rap. They were pretty dependable and handled quite well (for the 70’s).
Always sounds suspicious, if a seller doesn’t know what engine is resting under the hood…
Depends on the seller. Could be grandma selling grandpa’s car who knows nothing about cars or the “newest” generation who also seem to know nothing about cars or even have an interest in getting a license.
The 302 was rated at 122 horsepower that year, probably the lowest of the decade. I had a 75 Granada with that engine. It was still fairly lively for the time.
Why would you even post a 75 grenade?
So every car has to be a Ferrari or a ’68 Charger? How boring….
These were a Ford threesome, with the Mercury Monarch and Lincoln Versailles. With typically mid-70’s baroque Ford styling, these weren’t my favorite Fords even when new, and while the body and interior are in good shape, the broken taillights will be hard to replace, given the lack of NOS or junkyard examples to get donor parts from. I liked the clean and crisp styling of these cars successors, the Ford Fairmont and Mercury Zephyr much better. The Lincoln Versailles was Ford attempting to play catch-up with the first-generation Cadillac Seville, based on the GM X-Body platform, but GM won the competition in both the styling and sales departments, IMHO.
Interior looks like my Grandmother’s 1989 LTD Crown Vic.
The nicest Granada left on Earth sold on BaT for $6700 last year. This is worth half that. Busted up tail lights? Get outta here…
Ford’s design attempted to look similar to the 1975 Mercedes 300.
True, but Ford wasn’t the only of the “Big Three” infected with the Mercedes disease, LOL! The Chevy Malibu also got a faux Mercedes grille in the ’70’s. The Lincoln Mark series, starting with the Mark III, pioneered the look, although it could be argued that the Lincolns were emulating a Rolls-Royce as much as a Mercedes. IIRC, Chrysler also got in on the act IIRC, as either the Chrysler Imperial and/or the Cordoba also got one, as did the the Aspen/Volare twins. Especially on the Aspen and Volare twins, it wasn’t a good look, IMHO!
Lovely looking car. I had a neighbour when I was a boy who owned a Ford Granada. At the time, I didn’t find it very attractive for some reason. These days, I actually find the car quite attractive. I’d buy one if I lived closer to the owner and knew the owner.
A HUGE problem with the ’75 Granada was the Duraspark I ignition. This is the first year FoMoCo offered the electronic ignition. Unfortunately the Duraspark system was not quite ready for prime time and had a nasty habit of intermittently dying. No warning, nothing. Just left you sitting in traffic or stranded on the side of the road.
Pops bought one brand new for mom and it left her sitting 3 or 4 times before Pops said, “screw it” and put a points distributor in its place.
Ford wouldn’t warranty it because when they brought it in, of course it worked perfectly. The way FoMoCo treated the situation soured my dad, a life-long Ford man from ever buying another Ford.
It’s crazy, since I didn’t grow up with Fords or Chevy. I grew up with Toyota and Nissan. I had a neighbour when I was growing up who drove a Ford Granada.