Very rare pre pro 75 thunderbird

[Tinman]

All you have said only works if it was done at the end, it could have been done much earlier. It could of been done before the 75 came out in 1960 for all we know. And then never used...

You are forgetting that the modification was made on the last incarnation of this casting. It can't be a model from 1960 because of the other modifications to the body. The succession of body mods means that the model you show came at the very end of the time line for the casting.

[Tinman]

You are forgetting the size of Lesney what you are both suggesting doesn't make financial sense think about it, It's the sort of thing a one man band might do. No you are both guessing to tie it up, put on your thinking caps again and burn some grey matter

It's the very fact that Lesney did use things already lying around to make new toy combinations which lends me to agree with the test bed theory. Burning gray matter makes me remember things like an old kingsize RW trailer combined to make a proposed yesteryear model, decals and labels from various models cut and fit to different models for trials. A host of parts taken from existing models to create a proposed new model. The list of the re-hash of stuff goes on and on with Lesney ... those guys were cheap.

They never made anything new if they could use something old. Ford and Chevy toys shared the same interiors. Models shared the same drivers, the same hydro sleeves and so on. So many models shared the different size tires and that kept the different sizes to a minimum (even sharing between kingsize and 1-75). So many of the pre-production models coveted today would not exist if Lesney had not been so cheap ... they simply boxed and sold many fully assembled prepros. What didn't get boxed and sold was melted down and gone forever. Many more odd ball and prepro items escaped only by leaving the factory in a lunch box or a pocket. It's not like the molds of discontinued models sat around waiting for some magic rebirth. Most of those were discarded/scrapped as well.

[Batterseaboy]

You are forgetting that the modification was made on the last incarnation of this casting. It can't be a model from 1960 because of the other modifications to the body. The succession of body mods means that the model you show came at the very end of the time line for the casting.[/quote

show me the timeline of the brace non brace etc it wasn,t clear in the picture.

Also there roof rack on the 75a is different to the fiat so the flow rate thing would be a totally new set of calculations

[Batterseaboy]

saying matchbox was cheap is also wrong they employed thousands of people and produced a first class product.

[Tinman]

saying matchbox was cheap is also wrong they employed thousands of people and produced a first class product.

I'm not saying they were cheap, I'm repeating what's been said many times over by former employees and even Jack Odell.

[GHOSTHUNTER]

It is so obvious the roof-rack on the Thunderbird is the development 'Buck' for the roof-rack appearing on the Fiat. The inside area is less fussy on the Fiat, suggesting the interior design on the Thunderbird did cause flow problems. The Four sides of the Fiat's rack are lower than that of the Thunderbird's rack, suggesting a slight redesign of them (more flow problems perhaps!), and the fact it is the Thunderbird does not matter at the time of development, they just needed something to work on and the Thunderbird's tooling being obsolete in time for the development of the Fiat and not likely to be required for production any more was an ideal candidate.

Even if a few sets of tooling was obsolete at the same time as the Thunderbird's, perhaps the flatness of the Thunderbird's roof was nearest to the proposed Fiat's roof.

Ghosthunter.

[Batterseaboy]

I'm not saying they were cheap, I'm repeating what's been said many times over by former employees and even Jack Odell.[/quote]

most employees when leaving a company don,t have nice things to say about it and Odell left under a cloud.

[Batterseaboy]

It is so obvious the roof-rack on the Thunderbird is the development 'Buck' for the roof-rack appearing on the Fiat. The inside area is less fussy on the Fiat, suggesting the interior design on the Thunderbird did cause flow problems. The Four sides of the Fiat's rack are lower than that of the Thunderbird's rack, suggesting a slight redesign of them (more flow problems perhaps!), and the fact it is the Thunderbird does not matter at the time of development, they just needed something to work on and the Thunderbird's tooling being obsolete in time for the development of the Fiat and not likely to be required for production any more was an ideal candidate.

Even if a few sets of tooling was obsolete at the same time as the Thunderbird's, perhaps the flatness of the Thunderbird's roof was nearest to the proposed Fiat's roof.

Ghosthunter.

obvious to who show precedence GH

[Tinman]

show me the timeline of the brace non brace etc it wasn,t clear in the picture.

For that kind of detailed information you have to refer to Antonin's posts. He has kept the most amazing records of details that were previously unpublished (and in some cases unknown). Details that people like Mark Curtis used to scoff at and make fun of but now we see exactly how important those details are in determining the time line of the various models.

Also there roof rack on the 75a is different to the fiat so the flow rate thing would be a totally new set of calculations

Now you're just splitting hairs. The roof rack on the T-bird is larger than the Fiat. If the flow is there for something slightly larger, then something slightly smaller will be just fine. I doubt anyone ever cracked out the slide rule and made calculations but rather observations were made of a run of castings. Proof is in the pudding if you will.

[Batterseaboy]

It is so obvious the roof-rack on the Thunderbird is the development 'Buck' for the roof-rack appearing on the Fiat. The inside area is less fussy on the Fiat, suggesting the interior design on the Thunderbird did cause flow problems. The Four sides of the Fiat's rack are lower than that of the Thunderbird's rack, suggesting a slight redesign of them (more flow problems perhaps!), and the fact it is the Thunderbird does not matter at the time of development, they just needed something to work on and the Thunderbird's tooling being obsolete in time for the development of the Fiat and not likely to be required for production any more was an ideal candidate.

Even if a few sets of tooling was obsolete at the same time as the Thunderbird's, perhaps the flatness of the Thunderbird's roof was nearest to the proposed Fiat's roof.

Ghosthunter.

so you mean if there is a roof produced before that is closer in shape and size to the fiat you will concede that there is a possibility that you have guessed wrong