1957 Ford Thunderbird "F-Bird"

1957 FORD SUPERCHARGED "F" THUNDERBIRD CONVERTIBLE #F7FH336976. (Stock #4162.) Ford built 53,166 fabulous 2-seater Thunderbirds in 1955, 1956 and 1957. Powered by different versions of the 292 and 312 cubic inch V-8 engines, the cars not only were beautiful but also had substantial power. In 1957, Ford offered a very special version of the car—the “F-Bird.” Robert McNamara, Ford's president, proposed an initial production run of 100 cars in order to meet NASCAR homologation requirements to race the cars and The Daytona Beach Speed Trials were chosen for the competition debut of these special cars. Thus was born the “Ford Motor Company Supercharger Program.” The success of the Daytona competition prompted Ford to offer a somewhat milder version of the Racing Birds and Ford went on to build @200 street-going supercharged T’Birds (numbers vary from 194 to 220.) These cars were powered by a 312 cubic inch, 300 horsepower V-8 engine using a Paxton McCulloch "VR-57”supercharger with a Holley 4-barrel carburetor fed by a high-pressure fuel pump and with a high-performance cam, modified combustion chambers and a twin-point distributor. 

Production of the “F-Birds” commenced in June 1957. Our car was built on July 17, 1957 at, as with all F-Birds, the Dearborn, Michigan assembly plant. It was finished in Colonial White 

(CODE:E) with “Pleated Flame Vinyl” (CODE XH) interior. Adding to the rarity of our car, it was built with a 3-speed manual transmission with overdrive (CODE 2) and 3.70:1 rear axle ratio (CODE 3). Most of the F-Birds were built with an automatic transmission. This is a rare chance to own an all-correct, numbers matching, correct-codes original stick-shift F-Bird. From a local collection of the past 30+ years. SOLD!