The fifth generation Ford Thunderbird is a large personal luxury car series, produced by Ford for the 1967–1971 model years.
This fifth generation saw the second major change of direction for the Thunderbird. The Thunderbird had fundamentally remained the same in concept through 1966, although the design had been revised twice. The debut of the Ford Mustang in early 1964, and subsequent introduction of the larger, more upmarket Mercury Cougar to compete with the similarly larger Dodge Charger, began to erode the Thunderbird sales. This drove Ford engineers to increase the vehicle's size yet again, with Ford even introducing four-door Thunderbird Landaus.
History
For 1967 the Thunderbird would be a larger car, moving it closer to Lincoln as the company chose to emphasize the "luxury" part of the "personal luxury car" designation. Ford decided to abandon the Thunderbird's typical unibody construction for this larger car, turning to a body-on-frame method with sophisticated rubber mountings between the two to improve noise/vibration characteristics and reduce weight by a small margin. An overhead console (first appearing on the previous years Town Landau) containing illuminated indicators for emergency flasher use, low-fuel warning, door-ajar and seat-belt reminder light returned in a revised format.[2]